Month: January 2020

To our senses, the world is incomplete. Because we can’t know everything that is actually happening around us.

When we observe the parts but perceive the whole, it’s called closure.

Our entire reality and narrative are based around this concept of closure.

Because in our eyes, the world is incomplete.

That is why it is impossible to truly make an unbiased decision. There are no unbiased decisions, only more informed.

No matter how hard we try, the world as we perceive it is still fragmented. It’s impossible to take it all in. Our perception of reality then must rely on faith.

You don’t own the flame.

Instead, you get to carry the torch.

For a while, if you are lucky.

It’s your choice who you pass it along to.

Keeping the flame burning is really all that matters.

Since the invention of the electronic signatures, it isn’t efficient to fly from Clevland to LA to sign the final documents of your parent’s inheritance.

Watching a Game 7 on ABC isn’t the same thing as going.

Sometimes we skip booking ahead and take a chance that there isn’t a line at the barbershop.

Not everything is supposed to be done in the name of rational or practical.

Some things in life are better done in person.

If you are feeling stuck in your job or in your routine, it’s probably because every time a choice is made you choose the reasonable one.

Because it seems reasonable to stick with a job you know (and hate). “Have you seen this economy?”

Because it seems reasonable to put off the gym until Monday. “I don’t have time.”

Another way to say reasonable is responsible. We are all trying to be responsible for our actions. We have responsibilities we need to take care of.

After a while, it seems difficult to wager what we have gained.

Perhaps, the answer then isn’t to continue to choose what is responsible in the eyes of others and what we call reasonable…

The answer is to embrace unreasonable.

It is unreasonable to quit a job that pays so well.

It is unreasonable to pursue a new field.

It is unreasonable to go to the gym at 5 am.

Be unreasonable.

Ex-convict.

Single parent.

Orphan.

Refuge.

Immigrant.

Unemployed.

Uneducated.

It doesn’t matter about the circumstances of where you came from.

What matters is where you are going.

And sometimes all we need is to see ourselves as someone who can do great things.

Which is hard when the path we lead to this point hasn’t shown much of anything.

That’s just it.

The paths we take are not great until great we make the path.

…

“Sometimes it is the people no one can imagine anything of who do the things no one can imagine.” — Alan Turing

History has shown us two things:

1) Problems are inevitable.

Whether we are talking about solving the way humans travel great distances with the use of airplanes (now we need airports, pilots, air traffic controllers…) or vaccinations (cure one disease and so it begins to mutate); when we solve one problem, two more pop up in its place. Which means…

2) Problems are soluble.

Not solvable. Because that would mean that once we figure out a solution then we would never see that set of problems again. No, we continue to evolve as we continue to face adversity. We rise up to the challenges we face of our day. That with the right combination of information and knowledge, we can temporarily solve something. Or we fail and likely perish.

Wich also means that progress is always attainable. Because there is no destination, only direction. We will never achieve utopia in this life because that would mean we have solved every problem we know (and have yet to discover).

Which finally means, that today is the beginning of something great. That we can move in the direction of progress. That as we continue to grow, we face these new sets of challenges never before seen.

HT The Beginning of Infinity.

There are many truths we hold onto.

But…

It all depends on our point of view.

The story we tell ourselves of where we come from, where we are, where we are going, about our parents, how we were raised, what we were taught, what we value, what our motivation is, what the people around us expect, what we think our neighbors say…

Where we stand changes our narrative. Our narrative changes where we stand.

It’s been so ingrained in us since we were lining up after recess.

Do what you’re told. Keep your head down. Follow the simple step of instructions. (And hey, we will reward you with an A, and maybe someday, a paycheck.)

After a while, it’s easy to think the person upfront giving the directions, the boss who has been in the office for 30+ years of experience is actually leading.

But that couldn’t be further from the truth.

Experience or title doesn’t equate to strong leadership. They have as much in common as fish and money.

Leadership is measured in initiation. It’s measured by ruckus you make—how you managed to color outside the lines. Leadership is about taking us to the places we want to go, making things we want to see.

Leadership isn’t about being told what to do next. It isn’t about following the map but creating your own path with a compass.

The greatest leader we know and remember is the person who went on a limb and connected with us. Impossible to do following the person in front of us.

Each of us stands with a tension of what we are and the ideal of what we are trying to become.

This conflict causes us to constantly look to the horizon for better days ahead.

If we are always caught looking too far ahead, we tend to ignore what is right is in front of our noses. And that is the progress we have made that has led us here.

We don’t have to run away from the past. In fact, we can learn to sit with it. On the other hand, none of us will ever reach perfection, but that doesn’t stop many of us from pursuing it.

As they say, “It’s a journey, not a destination.”

Some journeys are full of yellow brick roads while others are wondering paths less traveled.

Republican or Democrat.

Religious or secular.

Conservative or liberal.

We live in a culture of choices. Today, you might be pressured to have to choose one way or another with not enough room in between.

Yet, our lives are not this binary. We don’t leave space for a new catagory to show up. Because…

It’s possible to be religious and liberal.

It’s possible to own guns and to support gun control.

Labels are a human invention, and over time, they become polarizing. Polarization destroys discourse.

People live on a spectrum. Not this or that. It’s possible to stand outside the lines that our culture draws.

And I think we could do a better job making that space more comfortable.