Origins of One Divide^®

Edward Kroger, Founder of One Divide and author of materials

Like everyone, I have my own story of survival and life experiences… and like most, I asked the very human questions of why.

Throughout life, I discovered the difficulty of finding true answers to those questions, and had even more difficulty having deeper, truthful discussions about my life experiences with those around me. Properly exploring them required a level of introspection and self-examination that many avoided — usually for their own emotional self-preservation. The answers I was looking for and the emotional growth I was yearning for within myself and with the people in my life remained elusive…

My questions centered on fundamental issues of human behavior, such as “why do we do the things we do?” or on a deeper, existential level, on concerns about my own existence, sense of identity and purpose in life. Some of my questions centered on larger social behavioral issues, such as “why do we do the things we do to each other?” or on a broader level, how we operate collectively as people or as the human race. I wasn’t hearing answers that logically fit some aspects of life, human behavior, personal discord and and interpersonal conflict that I intuitively sensed and could easily see.

Observing what I now define as Emotional Warfare and its Pattern(s) in others is something I believe we all have the natural instinct to do, as we do it for survival, but I didn’t yet have any sort of framework to help me understand what I was observing. I began a course of university study to address these questions. However, while attending the University of North Carolina at Greensboro (1991–92), I had a significant conversation — one that would ultimately lead to embracing independent study, as certain thoughts and concepts I had already developed on my own challenged the conventional wisdom of my peers and the academic world. Moreover, the natural skill set and level of critical thinking I had acquired from my life experience and the environment in which I had grown up made me reconsider the necessity of committing to a standardized, formal curriculum. I needed new information and a different approach to understanding the dynamics of human behavior than what was being taught in degree programs. Ultimately, I chose to leave university and pursue my own answers.

With this, a true journey and exploration into life itself began; eventually, after another significant moment in my life, a forced change in priorities led me to take a deep philosophical approach to this longstanding interest.

This significant moment came in the form of a severe back injury (at the age of 23) in 1996. The injury required several years of rehabilitation, and doubts of ever fully recovering forced me to a new level of inward reflection and self-evaluation. This triggered a higher level of insight into my initial concepts — which I had begun to develop and which now act as the Philosophy of One Divide’s core principles — and also triggered the beginning stages of a higher level of observation of others’ negative behavioral patterns and conceptual barriers that I may not have reached otherwise.

Ultimately, this forced examination into my own emotional realm (and its visceral relation to my physical being) turned a very early life crisis into an opportunity for life consciousness.

Like most well-founded conclusions, the answers to my questions began to formulate after an accumulation of life experiences within the personal and professional spheres of life. Whether these experiences were positive or negative, each acted as a stepping-stone to an awareness and knowledge base that could only have been acquired along the path least traveled.

After years of personal examination, emotional excavation and independent research and study, the Philosophy of One Divide and the theoretical framework of Emotional Warfare were completed. As in all true philosophical endeavors, the platform underwent a series of debates (or Socratic discussions) to disprove or prove its core principles. I was extremely fortunate to have several important discussions with very well-established individuals who have excelled in their professional fields and industries to establish that if the philosophy’s principles were correct, they would truly make a difference.

Obviously, there are several key influences that have helped to shape One Divide. Some psychological parlance and behavioral aspects of One Divide overlap with other theories of psychology and philosophy, which also have been generally accepted and/or proven to be correct, scientifically or theoretically.

All this has led to the formation of One Divide and, most importantly, the Philosophy of One Divide’s principles (officially introduced in 2012) being effectively applied in real life by real people from various backgrounds, cultures and points of reference, with many successful outcomes — personally and professionally.