Properties of Willingness Elements

Common v Differentiating Properties

Insofar as the elements have properties in common, these properties are those of RL7-Willingness, the Root Level that emanates the elements.

The common properties that deserve mention are:

positivity: this property is intrinsic to the function of willingness; it relates to being wholehearted in whatever is done.
energy: the Will (R) is conceived as the reservoir of energy for psychosocial existence and its endeavours. This energy must be delivered to endeavours and it is conjectured that this occurs via willingness. There is no reason to postulate negative energy, because an absence or minimal amount of energy emerges as unwillingness or reluctance.
variability: because there can be more or less energy, willingness can be more or less intense. If the intensity is zero, there is reluctance. As intensity builds, a person is more and more energized to use the appropriate element.

The teacher's universal injunction—"must try harder"—is appropriate in principle, but ways to enable that release of energy into willingness requires clarification of its elements.

While the elements developed in the previous topic seem quite distinct, it is necessary to validate and emphasize these distinctions. This can be achieved by considering the following properties for each element or level.

Benefit to be gained, present as a pay-off that reinforces this particular form of personal functioning.
Fears to be overcome to release willingness.
Required quality.
Uncontrollable factors that can interfere in everyday life.
Unwillingness (syn. reluctance, reticence, resistance) and its consequences if persistent.
Handling unwillingness: either gently or severely.

Try : Keep Trying (L1)

Function: Trying refers to making a specific attempt even though failure is evidently possible or even likely.

Benefit to be gained	Trying is intrinsically morale boosting, for yourself and often for those around you. Even if you fail, you are rarely worse off unless trying has significant costs. Culture can assist by making trying praiseworthy,
Fears to be overcome	The fear that failure will expose you, internally or externally, to humiliation, inferiority and criticism can block attempts. Actual failure is paradoxically a form of success: it proves you tried and deserve admiration for that.
Required quality	Initiation: initiating action (i.e. the trial)
Uncontrollable factors	Luck can generate unfortunate hurdles or provide silent assistance.
Form of Unwillingness	Refusal to try whenever failure threatens, which can ultimately lead to ingrained passivity or apathy and stagnation.
Handling Unwillingness	Staging the attempt allows the challenge to be addressed piecemeal, and managing the environment can help reduce exposure-related fears. Compulsion may be used when all else fails.

Believe: Affirm a Belief (L2)

Function: Believing refers to adhering firmly to a viewpoint even if doubtful, contested, unproven or untestable.

Benefit to be gained	Believing provides a stabilizing inner reference that can be a focus for personal growth, as well as being a source of predictability and reassurance for others
Fears to be overcome	Whatever the belief or how it is reached, everyone has to deal with being categorized, pigeon-holed or stereotyped leading to others making wild and often wrong assumptions. There is no fear of being wrong, although idiosyncratic or minority beliefs may lead to being viewed as irrational or strange.
Required quality	Insistence: iinsisting on knowing (the belief).
Uncontrollable factors	The belief may have implications (e.g. for employment or relationships) when the presence of the belief is recognized.
Form of Unwillingness	Focused doubt leading to evasiveness and equivocation about your position. At the extreme, doubt spreads and a person comes across as vacuous. Note: Scepticism is a particular form of belief: not an unwillingness to believe.
Handling Unwillingness	Explanation and reframing the issue can remove fears based on ignorance and being stereoptyped. Social pressure to believe can be activated via propaganda, or emerges as part of belonging to a group.

Face: Continue Facing (L3)

Function: Facing refers to addressing a relevant reality directly irrespective of its uncongeniality or urges to conform to a common denial of its significance or existence.

Benefit to be gained	Facing up to a relevant reality unblocks a way forward by allowing for thinking, discussing and clarifying. The reality may be a private matter or about a tricky social situation where there is shared denial.
Fears to be overcome	Fears of being unable to cope with the reality, often with associated painful feelings of being exposed as incapable and the consequences of failure.
Required quality	Attention: attending to a depiction. (i.e. what has to be faced).
Uncontrollable factors	Socio-cultural blinkers that are widely shared. Unconscious enduring biases that have become part of a personal identity.
Form of Unwillingness	Distortion and obfuscation of matters directly relevant to personal safety and well-being. The end result is confusion and delusion with activity that is irrelevant to current needs.
Handling Unwillingness	Dialogue about the situation with a trusted friend allows for modulated support and firmness about the reality. Confrontation by an authority who emphasizes the dire consequences of continued avoidance.

Participate: Sustain Participation (L4)

Function: Participation refers to contributing to a social situation despite its intrinsic frustrations, demands and inconveniences.

Benefit to be gained	Participating results in becoming valued in society and groups because it enables functioning that benefits others as well as yourself.
Fears to be overcome	Fears of being overwhelmed by actual expectations and imagined demands, with the possibility of getting over-committed and being exploited.
Required quality	Submission: submitting to experiences (i.e. associated with belonging to a social group).
Uncontrollable factors	The evolution of any group or social situation is intrinsically unpredictable and conditions may interfere with participating.
Form of Unwillingness	Withholding which leads to withdrawal and ultimately to social isolation.
Handling Unwillingness	Encouragement by colleagues can be persuasive. Threats of social punishment or rejection by the group.

Risk: Tolerate Risking (L5)

Function: Risking refers to committing to an undertaking for tangible gain despite the potential for significant harm or loss.

Benefit to be gained	Nothing in life is risk-free: you must be able to enter situations where winning a tangible gain is likely.
Fears to be overcome	Fears of loss or harm including fears of being trapped or of being left out.
Required quality	Daring: dare to commit (i.e. despite understanding imperfectly).
Uncontrollable factors	The inherent complexity of any social undertaking means that surprises arise from unknowns, both known and new.
Form of Unwillingness	Hesitancy or caution based on timidity, which taken to an extreme leads to privation.
Handling Unwillingness	Incentives can encourage risk-taking and mitigation of specific likely dangers can lessen the likelihood of harm. Force (compulsion, threats, ultimatums, "burning bridges") can produce compliance, potentially reluctant and filled with resentment, blame, or fear.

Learn: Value Learning (L6)

Function: Learning refers to acquiring additional knowledge and skills despite the effort required, the uncertain relevance, and the likelihood of errors.

Benefit to be gained	Learning provides for assistance and guidance in dealing with situations beyond a person's current capability.
Fears to be overcome	Fears of dependency and vulnerability that could be exploited, for example by indoctrination.
Required quality	Change: changing for a reason (i.e. to remedy a deficiency in capability).
Uncontrollable factors	The quality of any assistance, guidance and education is variable and hard to determine in advance or even during the process.
Form of Unwillingness	Laziness shown as not putting in the needed time or effort which will ultimately lead to weakness. Arrogance, that interferes at any level, specifically shows here as denials: of ignorance, of the value of learning, of anyone having anything to offer.
Handling Unwillingness	Innovative methods may help, and teaching can be adapted to the individual's specific needs and personality . Examinations and tests give feedback that checks and compares progress.

Trust: Extend Trusting (L7)

Function: Trusting refers to entering a new and unknown relationship without any guarantee of benefit or freedom from harm.

Benefit to be gained	Trusting provides an openness to possibilities. That means it enables any social relationship or endeavour to develop as efficiently and positively as it can given its inevitable and usually unknown limitations.
Fears to be overcome	Fears that openness will ultimately result in a betrayal.
Required quality	Hope: hoping for the best (i.e. that the other will be well-disposed and circumstances will conspire positively).
Uncontrollable factors	The persistent self-interest of others and the impersonality of social life mean that your trust may be misplaced.
Form of Unwillingness	Mistrust in order to feel safe, which if persistent can become a form of chronic paranoia, ultimately leading to a life of despair and desolation.
Handling Unwillingness	Reflection can soothe anxieties by reasoning that mistrust encourages mistrust and fosters a downhill damaging spiral. Rigorous prolonged meditation can enable the self to be understood and developed. Dynamic psychotherapy might help because mistrust will emerge and get analysed.

This Table assists comparisons:

L#	Level of Willingness	Potential Benefit	Main Fear to be Handled	Unwillingness	Handling Unwillingness
7	Trust	Openness to possibility	Betrayal	Mistrust leading to paranoia.	Reflection and meditation, dynamic psychotherapy
6	Learn	Guided assistance	Vulnerability due to dependency	Laziness leading to weaknesses	Adaptive innovative teaching and testing
5	Risk	Likely tangible gain	Unequivocal loss or harm	Timidity leading to privation	Incentives, mitigation of dangers, force.
4	Participate	Positive social valuation	Overwhelming demands	Withholding leading to withdrawal and social isolation	Encouragement and threats
3	Face	Unblocking a way forward	Inability to cope	Obfuscation leading to confusion and delusion	Dialogue and confrontation
2	Believe	Stable inner reference	Being categorized	Focussed doubt that can spread leading to vacuity	Explanation and social pressure
1	Try	Morale boost	Experience of failure	Refusal leading to passivity, apathy, stagnation	Staging, environmental management, compulsion.

Importance of Time

An intrinsic feature of forms of willingness are that they are potentially difficult to activate due to egotistic concerns. These egotistic forces don't just accept defeat but return quickly to encourage giving up.

Persistence is therefore important and is a criterion of meaningful functioning in this Domain.
Details:

Taxonomic principles were used to conjecture the forms and functions that Willingness takes at each level of a presumed hierarchy. The properties of these forms have been further articulated above.

Now it is necessary to check that the proposed ordering fits the formal features of a THEE-type Primary Hierarchy.

Evidence for hierarchy in the elements of Willingness.

Originally posted: 20-Feb-2026.