Modes – Your Stance to Respond
by Stephen Cocconi © 2011
Mode: How we get things done!
The Mode is “how” we do our human experience toward learning and interacting on your life journey. The Mode is the personality characteristic most associated with ones’ response style or their method of expressing in their behavior. The Mode is your foundational or base action stance. All of one’s unique strategies for behaving emerge under this guiding context. The Mode is your modus operandi, which means that Essence has equipped Personality with a preferred means to the end. Like all
Oveleaf Traits, their are seven categories which correspond to the same grouping approach as other Overleaves: ordinal & exalted and Axis influences.
Caution,
Power,
Perseverance,
Aggression,
Reservation,
Passion, and
Observation.
People will identify your style of action with your Mode. The Mode is the Overleaf that is most external in one’s behavior. It is the aspect where you can notice the way you employ your personality and to what degree of strength you are letting yourself exhibit it. When you learn to use a number of different Modes, you enhance learning success for both the Essence and the Personality. This is what Michael calls “sliding.” Sliding helps a person get out of the negative pole of his/her Overleaves.
Modes are visceral in nature. They are the predisposition to behave. Hence, it is entirely possible to feel a Modes influence within your body. Just imagine a particular state of being like feeling aggressive. Notice all the aspects of your body including the way you hold yourself, your breathing, the amount of tension, etc. Or Caution, what happens to your posture or willingness to speak and how? Awareness of your Mode can assist you in assessing what emotional state is occurring within you and then make alterations in behavior, or at least questions the emotional disposition underlying it. The more one understands about Mode, or any chosen Overleaf energy, the greater the degrees of freedom you have to alter your mood or behavior, at will! On the other hand, knowing the sensations, postures, and other physiological aspects of a Mode can provide you the command to invoke it, at will.
Sometimes, the Essence will create a very difficult challenge by taking on a Goal and a Mode whose basic nature is contradictory to one another. When this occurs much of that conflicted energy reveals itself in emotional and psychological upset. This situation is what Michael refers to a “abraded Overleaves.” Counseling is very useful for helping the person cope with this condition.
Modes of behavior are often used as the adjectives to describe our institutions and culture. We describe the Italians as Passionate, the English as Reserved, the Germans and Japanese as Persevering or Aggressive, etc. Cultures and Racial groups exhibit historic trends for Modes more so than any other Overleaf. The Protestant Work Ethic is a combination of both Caution and Perseverance. This ethic is the Mode that has been favored by Capitalism for its workers for 300 years. Yet for the entrepreneur and captains of industry, the Modes of Aggression and Power are preferred and held in higher esteem.
