If someone follows a rule "if you don't care about me/people, I don't have to care about you and hold myself accountable or to hold standards that you don't follow by yourself", is that a Snake primary and one of the rules they learned to follow when dealing with people? If a person can do whatever they want and don't meet me half way, or other people around them, there's no expectation I need to fulfil, apart from generic human interaction guidelines.
That's actually very Badger. 'If you don't meet xyz requirements, I have no moral obligation to care about you.’ It's an opt-out system. Everyone is included by default, and then have to do things to get themselves kicked out.
With Snakes it's the other way around. They have no moral obligation to care about you until you do something to get IN, and become one of their People.
I am pretty sure I am a snake/snake sorting, with my primary (burned snake) as a rock solid certainty. I am not doing so well on figuring out how models work, and if I have them. It makes me doubt my secondary sometimes. Let me give you a few examples:
Last autumn, I was making a lot of soup from scratch. I started with recipes, but pretty soon I was just throwing things together.
Definitely sounds like an improvisational secondary.
(I'm a Badger secondary, and my baker friends make fun of me, because I treat recipes like spells I follow them so exactly. I only recently learned that the reason you put put in salt in water is to make it boil faster. I'd been doing it, but I might as well have been putting it in there to banish the bad spirits.)
But I always made sure I had some kind of home-made broth to hand, and some kind of soup magic stuff (heavy cream, milk, cream cheese, etc.)
This could be rapid-fire bird (or a rapid-fire bird model.) You feel comfortable improvising, but only because you already know a lot about soup.
I only went back to recipes when I wanted something new or specific. Then I went and posted a kind of improv instruction for soup making (take some meat, any meat, sear it and and pair with some veggies, any veggies, etc.).
So far, I'm agreeing with you. Improvisational secondary, maybe some kind of bird model to give extra structure and support.
I train new colleagues. When I start with a new group, I like to have all the prep-work done so I can concentrate on the social aspects and not get bogged down finding the right worksheets, or shit like that. I plan my first few words, and if there is no better opening, I use them and go from there. I have a general structure of what I want to teach them, what methods to use and in what order. It is adapted from experience, and the more rigid guidelines we are given by our client. I am constantly tweaking it when I'm not training. If I feel my group needs something different, I will abandon the plan, let them guide me on a detour, and bring them back when it feels right. Somehow, it still works out 95% of the time, especially now that I have found my confidence and know it works^^
This sounds exactly like how I teach. And for me, what is going on is the bird model prepwork making me comfortable enough to just vanish into my Courtier Badger. I've only recently been learning that I can... relax on the prep, a little. That sometimes too much prep gets me in my head, and sabotages me a little. Like I can just trust myself in the moment, and things work out just fine.
I have found the shc system a week ago, and I have been obsessed ever since. I got curious because a friend mentioned it. They were really into it, and I like sorting people if the system makes sense. I dug in, got hooked, and finally found words to describe everything I had figured out so painfully about myself in the last few years. Especially my snake primary was such a surprise and relief, let me tell you.
It's a good system. And it's... uniquely able to talk about certain kinds of things.
I am thinking there is at least some sort of bird model here, giving my improv some structure?
Took the words out of my mouth.
I was flirting with rapid fire bird as a secondary, but now I have put it into words, not a chance. I like my (contained) chaos too much^^
So far, I don't have too much to add. It's all very well laid out, and well understood. I do like the dramatic structure that happens when someone writes in convinced their a Lion and I start going into why they're actually a Snake but hey. This is nice. This is mellow.
Let's talk about badger secondary model instead. Just to get the elephant out of the room: I hate hard work, it feels slow, dull, and like there should be a better method somewhere. But I know that sometimes, you just have to do it if you want to build a reputation, or you know you need to rely on the goodwill of your community in the future.
This is so like... Rapid-fire bird processing Badger. Just the grudging respect of SURE badger secondary can be a useful tool I GUESS.
I feel awkward keeping shallow contact with my colleagues, I forget if they have kids, and I have been experimenting with discreetly taking notes on what they value.
This is so Bird.
It's not very successful because I can never remember them when it's necessary, so I nod and figure it out by asking "knowing seeming" questions, anyway.
This is so Snake.
What does resonate with me is the part of "becoming what they need" making myself into the tool I need, making myself seem reliable by being relatable. I mostly start a one-on-one conversation by mirroring the other person's mood.
Courtier Badger and Snake secondary can look very, very similar - especially from the outside. This right here could be a description of either.
It is only recently, and only with people I know well, that I have found the seductive power of railroading them instead. I can now cut short a friends whining by summarising what they're saying in a blunt and charming manner, and make them smile instead. Not always, but now I know it works, I use it more and more often.
... but this could only be Snake. Doing this sort of thing consciously and on purpose is so huge and so key. Courtier Badgers do have to believe it, and so they have a way of vanishing that Snake secondaries don't.
And I think I am exaggerating my "go and figure shc out, and be loud and open about it on tumblr" part, because it's what feels right at the moment, but also because the friend who got me into it is a burned lion secondary. They like me charging in, taking it for myself, and they admire anyone who can be honest and vulnerable in public.
Very Double Snake. Using a specific approach, specifically for your friend. Also you say your primary is burned... but I'm not getting burned primary from you. But you're also not really writing about your primary, so.
I guess I am making myself appealing, not just relatable like before.
What a perfect way of describing the difference between Snake and Badger secondaries.
Huh. Fading badger performance as snake gets confident? With another badger performance for work that I do grudgingly.
Performance is right. Just a shallow thing you wear over the top, that barely seems there anymore. You work like Bird, not a Badger.
Now lion. Well, lion is... difficult and easy at the same time? I have to take charge, be the boss, and make split-second, straightforward right-and-wrong decisions when I am leading my group: Call out anyone who doesn't play by the rules (though I usually don't care much if it is not annoying). Decide on, and hand out, the appropriate punishment for someone being late, again. Deal with brewing conflict in a head-on manner. But that is something I am still learning, and I am not very good at it.
Some of this is primary stuff - WHAT you do "be the boss, hand out punishments" versus HOW you do it. It's sounds to me like you're building a Lion primary model over your Snake primary, which is normal. Snakes with safe people almost always model something else. (And I already know you've got a friend that's a Lion primary... Snakes do like to match their People.)
It's possible that you're also building a Lion secondary model, or that one of your Snake secondary masks looks a little like a typical lion secondary, but my take is that most of this is coming from a primary model.
I tend to let conflicts slide, trusting they will work it out among themselves.
I feel that this speaks to the water-like nature of the Snake secondary, and a desire to always go around the problem.
or at least be professional about it and not bring it into the training. Definitely a lion performance here, and one I get frustrated with fast because I am not very good at it.
I have my lion moments, like I described with my way of being open and vulnerable about shc here on tumblr. But I wouldn't do it if it didn't feel right, or more specifically like something I need to heal and get better. I know I need to be vulnerable to heal, and it's relatively safe here, in the anonymity of my internet persona.
Hmm. Interesting. I'm not getting Lion from you... if this is a healing exercise, maybe you're practicing existing in your Neutral state?
I have to write it all out, and some of it just happen to come out as advice for other people's asks. It would be nice if I get some recognition for it in the community, and I love the fact that my friends reads it and tells me they like it.
My take on that sort of thing is going to be annoyingly Badger, so I apologize in advance. For me it's all about consistency. Lay a foundation and then build, one brick at a time.
Now that I have written it all out, I think it's probably the most snake way of arguing myself out of any secondary model I could come up with^^ I guess I don't have one, or if I do, I am dismantling it because I need things to be simple for a while. I am tempted to post this on my own blog, but I know it will get a bigger audience with you.
Yeah, no Lion secondary here.
and maybe help someone in a similar situation. So I will be patient, and I thank you for inviting us all to use you as a sounding board for our own shc issues. I have to stop going through your likes, I'm ruining my obsessive fangirl/shc vibes tumblr with beautiful rl-things and creative human interactions^^
Could you give examples of fictional Snakes modeling Badger?
With questions like this, feel free to check out the Master Character Sorting Document, which I just went through to put together this list. That said, questions like this are going to get you really weird combinations of characters:
Me, a snake primary, to my badger primary husband: so if a friend needed you, but a complete stranger needed you more, would you feel guilty if you didn't help the stranger? Husband, making a slightly self-deprecating gesture: oh yes absolutely. (I, a snake primary, consider prioritising the friend to be obvious...)
Perfect example of the way Snakes and Badgers parse loyalty.
