This reminds me of some stuff I read on Milton Erickson.
He said that some people are born losers. They just cannot be helped. They cannot learn, or they won't. Either way, the result is the same.
As I read this I became distressed. Could it be, I thought, that in some areas there is no hope for me? Have I not succeeded in certain areas my whole life because (at least in some sense) I am a born loser?
The person Erickson was talking to seemed to share a similar concern. It is shocking to hear something like this from Erickson, who gave so many supposedly hopeless cases a real chance to get better. He asked something along the lines of "surely, you cannot believe that for these people there is absolutely NO hope?!"
Erickson replied with a story about a hardened criminal who was in and out of jail his whole life. While in jail, he would be violent so he could be put in solitary, which he seemed to like better than being with other inmates.
During one of his periods out of jail, it looked like he was going to do something that would put him back in, but as he sat on a bench he noticed an attractive woman walking on her way back from the store. He watched her do this on several occasions. I think she was a widowed woman who was very strong, respected, and taking care of her own life and that of her child.
One day, when she was walking back from the store. He stood in her path and wouldn't move. They looked at each other for some time. The man finally said, "Would you have dinner with me?" She looked him in the eye and said, "If you will be a gentleman, yes."
He agreed. He was a gentleman from that point on. He never went back to jail. The two got married and the man eventually took a job educating juveniles.
"Now," Milton Erickson said, "that hopeless case changed. But who could possibly know that it would take a beautiful woman who caught his eye saying, 'if you will be a gentleman, yes' to change him? Who could possibly know that?"
I think, Philip, you're facing a similar problem here. Some things aren't so simple.
