But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, ge
Sin Boldly
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Rusty Guinn: “There’s only one way around this tendency: we must be explicit in stating our principles, and we must convert those principles into process.”
Thoughts…The secret to productivity is managing energy not time. You can get more done in less time using the mental equivalent of high-intensity interval training: alternating between eustress sprints (hyperfocus, high arousal) and recovery (inward focus, low arousal) to prevent burnout.
To Sin Boldly…made me think of a post that so resonated with me long ago!
“Anyone who tries to sell you your own divinity is a scammer.
Anyone who tries to define you sees themselves your master.
Anyone who tries to punish or reward you sees themselves your master and wants you to accept that role. Your parents (and guardians) are often piloted by the blind forces of trauma patterns. What they do at these times is not parenting but seizures of madness, of which you are the audience and often the victim. This is not your fault, not your doing, and is not right. You are good to the core, but happen to be on the receiving end of these seizures.
This is true for every occurrence of unkindness, humiliation, or abusive interaction by a person who has power over you.
Sometimes it’s helpful to see beliefs, stereotypes, even language and habitual ways of thinking as forces that have colonized humanity. There’s space and life beyond these. Follow your curiosity about that dimension. It exists and is vast — infinitely more expansive than the mind’s ability to think.
Humanity/society is multilayered. The shittiest layers get most of the publicity. There are many, many awesome people living in integrity, creating with open hearts and rich imagination. You can be one of them; the easiest way is to join their communities and friendships.
Friendships are sacred, and deserve your utmost integrity, attention and honesty.
You’re good and you are able to recognize the people who have not broken/fallen to the dark side. Trust that.”
Continue the conversation…
This is really smart: “we must be explicit in stating our principles, and we must convert those principles into process.” My one humble caveat is that, even with a process, one has to leave room for decisioning in real time, in particular, in a three-body-market. As Ben notes in “Clear Eyes, Full Heart, Can’t Lose” (an incredible piece), there is no answer. It’s the reason this stuff is so very, very hard.
And this is really smart: “These aren’t behavioral biases. They are attempts to change the baseline against which you measure behavioral deviation!” No caveats from me.
I like a lot of these ideas. A lot. But after a decade of working in finance and interviewing hundreds and hundreds of people - job candidates, fund managers, financial company CEOs / CFOs - I’m not as convinced that it is possible to recognize good people. I don’t trust my instincts there. It’s a bit far afield for this note, but I don’t think the secret there is trusting that instinct. I think it’s a willingness to be vulnerable to the circumstances where that instinct proves wrong.
Rusty…I agree with those sentiments! Here’s what I know about people after spending over a decade in and out of Afghanistan and Iraq: I am pretty good at seeing the environment for what it trully is to include the people half hazardly walking thru it…I have faith in one thing, the only thing I have any modicum of control over, the TEAM of guys next to me. Those years in combat zones as a good friend reminded me of said, Mike and that decade was like Dog years," never thought of it that way but it was spot on. I do not trust pure instinct either, but I do when I back it up with data, changing conditions…things that most do not see! And after all of that experience of which I wish on no one…I am still an Optimist…in that I think humanity will eventually do the right thing and as Americans it’s usually the last damn thing and also I am a Skeptic…in that I fucking question everything, your internal Bullshit Detection Meter might be the single most important thing you can develop!
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Great sentiments this morning in my am read…“The trouble with you son” said Bill Shankly once to a struggling young player “is that your brains are all in your head.” The great man had a point, and not just about football.
What I mean is that there are some things which we recognise intellectually but which we just don’t get in our hearts or guts. There are limits, therefore, to how far we can empathize with others’ views, even if we try (which, of course, many people don’t)"