[June 24, 2026] Part of our emotional and intellectual development is to recognize the evil tendencies that characterize us and to wrestle with them and learn to integrate them. We should not cast those evil tendencies away, we should convert them instead to make us stronger.
We can see the difference between people who’ve done so and the people who haven’t. Those who have not integrated this evil within are naive, and you can tell that when you talk with them. And when they are naive, they’re also resentful because they get taken advantage of.
Those who have integrated their evil into themselves are much more dangerous in the martial arts sort of way. They are dangerous but they don’t have to use it because their very presence radiates the potential for havoc. That’s necessary. It gives people self respect.
If you’re harmless, you’re not virtuous. You’re just harmless, much like a rabbit is harmless. If you’re a monster and you don’t act monstrously, then you’re virtuous but you also have to be a monster, nevertheless.
It is a common mythological notion that the hero has to be a monster, but a controlled monster. We see this all the time. If you’re going to be a fighter, you have to want to win and you have to want to hurt people; not for the sake of hurting them. That is what makes you different from an evil person, but you have to have that capacity.
You have to develop that capacity to harm. That’s the step on the way to Enlightenment.
Learn to recognize the evil within yourself. That is the first step to becoming someone who can be a true human force.
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NOTE: Many of these ideas today are from Dr. Jordan Peterson and the philosophy of Stoicism.
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Gen. Satterfield nailed it. I know from personal experience that the evil that runs through all our hearts can guide us in the wrong direction. But to “integrate” it into ourselves makes us stronger. For a long time, I did not understand the idea of “integrate.” It simply means you learn to live with it, and not let that evil take over. The urge is always there, but the measure of a civilized, strong, put-together person is to make that evil make us stronger inside our relationships. Too many folks today are not encouraged or taught to understand this idea and they are forever lost to their own whims and emotional wants. Many will never learn. And, indeed, much of it is learned in our culture. Take, for example, the black community in America. They have gone off the rails and think they are “owed” something just becuase they are black. This victimization culture is in the process of destroying them; as most of us sit on the sidelines and watch, unwilling to help for fear of being called ‘racist.’ Lesson learned.
Wow, another excellent article on the evil that divides our souls. Yes, to make our evil part of us, and under control, is what helps make us strong. But the hard part is to keep it corralled up and not let it escape. Today, in much of the West, i see many who are unable to control their evil, especially among young, white, college educated women. Saad noted that this is what the mind virus is about. 👍
This is true, Xerxes II, and also very unfortunate, especially when there is no social control mechanism to slow or to stop it. In fact, many of the past mechanisms, like our schools and policitians actually encourage it.
Good points here. 🙏 Let us pray for their lost souls.
Recognizing the evil within allows us to have emotional growth and integrating dark tendencies builds inner strength while unintegrated evil leads to naivety and resentment. Acknowledging personal darkness fosters self-respect as a controlled monster radiates protective presence. Harmlessness alone lacks true virtue and virtue requires the capacity for harm without using it. Heroes embody controlled monstrous power as fighters must develop the will to win and hurt. Capacity to harm distinguishes good from evil and recognizing evil is the path to enlightenment. This integration creates a true human force. Thanks, Gen. Satterfield for this, a very similar article to your thinking on the idea of evil.
This article is a classic Gen. Satterfield, very much in line with his book “55 rules for a good life.” Great stuff here and very deep in many respects. Those who fail to recognize the evil we have in our hearts (and the good too) are doomed to live in fear all their lives. And, as Gen. Satterfield says, we must integrate it into ourselves and that makes us much stronger.