Amazing Grace or Amazing Disgrace

Charlie Sheen has a tiger by the tail.  It’s himself.

Amazing grace, how sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me,
I once was lost, but now am found,
Was blind, but now I see.

So are the words of John Newton, once an infidel and libertine by his own account; the words are the beginning stanza of Amazing Grace, a famous Christian hymn about redemption. Despite the libertine ways of his younger days, Newton changed his ways, and spent the last 43 years of his life preaching the gospel.

There are two meanings to the phrase Amazing Grace: 1) the forgiveness of God and 2) the ability of some people to show amazing gracefulness.

The Artisans are known for their charm and grace.  Talented Artisans can be known for their amazing gracefulness.  However, those Artisans that are using the Dark Escape methods, methods of madness, can be amazing in their disgrace.

Charlie Sheen.  A very charming and graceful guy, no doubt. His life has been characterized by youthful blind hedonism and selfish pursuit along with great success, followed by a form of self-induced failure, spectacularly self-destructive, often hurting others along the way. The classic Promoter Artisan bad boy.

You know your heart keeps tellin’
You’re not a kid at forty-five
Played around, you lost your wife
You play too hard you’ll lose your life

Some gotta win, some gotta lose
Good time Charlie’s got the blues
Good time Charlie’s got the blues
Good time Charlie’s got the blues

John Newton broke the pattern of a me-me-me kind of guy. Lastly, switching to a cooperative, soulful individual, rejecting that original life style of blatant self-indulgence.  Amazing Grace.

What about Charlie Sheen?  Currently, he making money on his own promotional tour and he doesn’t have to take care of his kids – he has a court order for that excuse.  He is foot loose and fancy free.  He maybe crazy, but he is not worthless – right?

The question is: Charlie Sheen ever going to learn?

Some gotta win, some gotta lose
Good time Charlie’s got the blues
Good time Charlie’s got the blues

Good time Charlie’s gotta ????

4 thoughts on “Amazing Grace or Amazing Disgrace”

  1. David, please let me help you finish assembling the jigsaw puzzle of effective behavior modification for adult Artisans. For me, a Composer Artisan ISFP struggling to start a new chapter of my life in a new community, it’s an urgent practical question.

    On its face, your “Amazing Grace” paradigm resembles the belief system of Alcoholics Anonymous and the many “Twelve-Step” organizations patterned after it—even though their disease model of addiction has no scientific basis, as Thomas Szasz can explain. At the same time, I notice that you exclude Artisans from the set of people whose madness (not “mental illness”!) can be healed by the work of someone like Milton Erickson. What’s going on here?

    If I can’t summon intellectual respect for the Twelve Steps, what do I do instead? Can you recommend an alternate means of “cooperative symptom roleplaying,” whatever that would look like for me?

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