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Recent Posts on Medium

8 Jul

If you have never checked out http://www.medium.com, now is a good time. It is a beautifully designed site with some fascinating articles. I was recently invited to write on the site and have made a few posts.
You can check out:

The Art of Releasing Tension: A compliment to the mantra of deliberate practice

This post highlights the tension we bring to our practice.

and

Our Utter Arrogance: Do you think too highly of yourself?

This post is a riff on the whole NSA situation.

I hope you find them interesting. Thank you for reading!

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The Wisdom of Not Knowing

17 Feb

What does knowing bring us?The Wisdom of Not Knowing

It often brings us comfort. We think that knowing gives us power, control, even wisdom.

But knowing is a false state of mind because what we know pales in comparison to what we don’t know.

What we don’t know is what makes life interesting. What we don’t know, especially about others, is what necessitates empathy.

The opinions we form based on what we know should forever change based on what we find out we didn’t know.

This is why we often think of God as infinite wisdom, this ability to know everything.

And yet we act as God, thinking that our limited knowledge gives us space to create absolutes.

Instead, we should live open, open to the unknown, open to the expansion of our knowledge.

This openness gives rise to wisdom. Not a wisdom of knowing everything, but a wisdom found in being open to living.

Be wise.
Be open.
Be alive.

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Wisdom Stories Aren’t Necessarily True Stories

25 Jan

Why do people fight over the truth of religious stories? Religious stories, by their very nature, are wisdom stories. They represent more than a mere representation of the facts. They try to teach us how to live. They are not designed to be a factual account of history.Wisdom Stories Aren't Necessarily True Stories (3)

Last night I saw the “Life of Pi”. I had not read the book (yet). The twist of stories so strongly made this point; that we “believe” certain stories when they fit our view of how we should live. We believe certain stories when they challenge us in just the right way.

If the story we hear is too far outside our current belief system, we may reject it. If the timing in our life is not quite right, we may reject the story. If the characters in the story don’t sit well with us, we may reject the story.

In fact, we may reject a story because the other people who “believe” the story are too different than us. This particular bias is especially scary to me. Our chances of being open to the wisdom in the story may be limited not by the story itself, but by our own fear of others.

The lesson for me is that I should reflect even more thoroughly on wisdom stories that seem too challenging. I suspect that the chance of a challenging story pointing me toward my own biases is even better. The chance seems even greater that a challenging wisdom story will help me lead a more open and good life.

Instead of shutting down and closing off when a story challenges me, I would do well to pay attention, reflect on my own reaction, and grow from the experience.