when the child does hurtful behavior, our conscience reacts with “bad!” and we experience some negative affect in the direction of the child.
I suppose that, as parents, we behave this way toward our children, especially younger parents. But I don’t observe the same judgmental attitudes among, say, grandparents toward their grandchildren, at least not nearly so often. But a grandparent would have the advantage of wisdom and may even be spiritually-mature enough to realize that a young child is capable of behaving to the highest level of her consciousness, however low that may in fact be.
What is the point of me saying this? It’s to indicate that the wiser (more enlightened) among us have disengaged from knee-jerk, negative reactions, especially toward those at a low level of consciousness (e.g., children). They simply don’t participate in that judgmental behavior. And that probably means something important. Moreover, not even all parents engage in knee-jerk, negative reactions towards children. I have known many parents who try to redirect their children rather than express harsh judgment.
The example I gave in the beginning was
“the capacity to desire ‘power to command and rule over others’ which is, more simply put, the desire to dominate, to be in control.”
It’s an ok point, as far as it goes. But, similarly to the point I make above, I’m not so sure this is a universally-experienced phenomenon. By which I mean, when one considers those medieval great temptations (power, pleasure, wealth and honor) it simply is not the case that all humans are tempted in these categories. What I mean to say is that a person might go her whole life and be mildly drawn (on rare occasion) to seek her own honor, for example. But, generally speaking, this is not a temptation to which she is susceptible. Perhaps she is more drawn to the temptation toward pleasure. I happen to think that power (control) is likely to be similarly displaced among populations. As in, a desire to control others will be pronounced in some and hardly ever felt by others. Within ourselves and within others that we know and observe, this seems to be the case.
But, I’d like to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you are referring to this power/control phenomenon in the broadest sense possible—as in, an innate human desire to transform others to be more like ourselves (which could be a form of attempted control). To cajole, coerce, persuade the other—is this the sort of thing you have in mind within this category of power/control/dominance? A very wide sense of attempted power/control? If so, then yes, that seems to be more universal. But concepts like repression, resentment and control freak would seem to apply only to a more particularized human propensity to be controlling over others. And, as I say, I’m not ready to grant that this specific temptation is very widespread at all. The 4 great temptations, like the 7 deadly sins, seem to be more unevenly distributed among humanity, than universally-experienced on a regular basis by all.
But if we haven’t learned by an older age how to deal with the human shame that affects are acceptance of ourselves and others, and learned in any case that we aren’t as holy as we once thought (and this is a problem regardless of whether we’re believers or atheists), then we’re probably not the sharpest knife IMO. Or, IOW, pride continues to have an especially tight hold on us -and that is observed in the elderly sometimes.