Here’s one way. It’s not the most important. But following up on our posts from yesterday and the day before, one significant way to know what’s best to do next is to ask this question:
“Which one thing, if I accomplished it, would result in the greatest number of all these other things that I also want to do also getting done as a result?”
This is the converse of yesterday’s post, where I made the point that you have to be OK with not doing everything and instead focus on what’s best next.
Here’s the irony: When you focus on what’s most important, you often get all the other stuff “thrown in.” This happens by virtue of the spillover effect. Doing the most important thing leads to positive ramifications that often accomplish the aims behind all those other things you weren’t able to do.
I’m not saying you will literally find that all the things you decided to leave undone are accomplished. Some of them will be. But more significantly, the point behind them will often be accomplished through the spillover effect.
That’s significant.
But if you try to do everything directly, you often end up accomplishing nothing. (Or, almost nothing.)
The point is to do what’s best next, not everything that’s next.
And the reason for this is the simple fact that there will always be more to do than you possibly can do. It is simply impossible to do everything.
And, if you know what’s best, if you know what’s most important and what really counts, you will be OK with that.
The reason it’s a fallacy to pit these two against one another is that learning is about making connections. That is, learning is about making connections between facts — between truths.
Hence, you cannot learn anything without knowing facts.
The process of learning is the process of seeing and identifying and even delighting in the connections that you see among various truths. Without a storehouse of knowledge — of facts — this can’t happen. With a great storehouse of knowledge — of facts –, however, this can happen in abundance.
Learning how to learn is important. However, the first step in the process of learning is to gather the facts — gather information and truth. As you are doing that, connections (learning) will come. And as you gather more truth, more connections happen — and thus learning increases.
If in our schools and colleges and graduate programs we only focus on learning “how” to learn, we set people up to be incredibly behind. For they will have to embark on the actual process of gathering the information that is the fuel of learning after they are done with their school or program, rather than getting a bunch of that in place during their program.
Far better to learn how to learn and, right along with that, actually learn. Then, when you graduate, you will not only know how to learn when you encounter new territories, but you will already have a large storehouse of knowledge to build on. You won’t have to take so much time getting basic (or advanced) knowledge in place, and thus you will be coming at the new territory with a significant head start.
I think this is recognized in most schools, but there still persists this idea, perhaps only in popular conception, that the most important thing is “learning how to learn” rather than actually learning specific and abundant facts and truths as well. Though probably we could do better in most schools and graduate programs as well (with graduate programs, perhaps, focusing more on the making connections component of learning rather than mostly gaining information; also critical here is gathering the right information — which means, for theological education at least, reading fewer liberals).
One last thing: The fact that almost everything is available now through an internet search does not eliminate the need to actually learn facts. I love Google and looking up whatever I need to know when the need arises. But since learning is the act of making connections between facts, you need to have a whole bunch of facts in your head — not just available through a quick search on the Internet — in order for learning to take place.
(And, it’s also more efficient not to have to look everything up.)
When I was at ETS two weeks ago, one of the sessions I went to was on a biblical view of economics. Wayne Grudem argued for a largely capitalist framework (which I agree with) and Craig Blomberg argued for a “third alternative” between capitalism and socialism.
I think Blomberg was confused, not rightly understanding the definitions of capitalism and socialism, and thus not realizing that there is no “third alternative” here (though there are degrees). But, it was great to hear Blomberg, as he is a very solid NT exegete and theologian (his essay on the Sabbath in the recent Perspectives on the Sabbath: Four Views
In the question and answer session, one objection Blomberg made to capitalism was its tendency to create a proliferation of useless items, such as pet rocks and those really dumb singing fish you can put on the wall.
Now, the first point to make in response here was made by someone in the audience who had actually bought a pet rock during family night with his kids a few weeks ago, and it made for a memorable experience. I myself think pet rocks are pretty neat (though I don’t have any), though I think those singing fish really are quite atrocious. So much is in the eye of the beholder. Who gets to make the call? The point of capitalism is: you. You get to make that call, not the government. Amen.
The second point, though, is that there is nothing in capitalism itself which says people need to make pet rocks or annoying singing fish. The essence of capitalism is simply that people are able to pursue whatever endeavors are of interest to them. Capitalism does not say you have to make singing wall-mounted fish to make money; it does say that, if that’s what you want to do and you can (somehow!) get people to buy them, you are free to go for it.
So, I defend people’s right to make those singing fish that I hate so much. But, having recently been to Australia and overdosing (probably) on souvenirs for the kids, and right now feeling like my wife and I are starting to drown in the “stuff” that accumulates after 13 years of marriage and having 3 kids and so forth, I have a better proposal.
Even though we are in the midst of a quite severe (and long-lasting!) economic downturn, we are still a society of extreme abundance. An economist friend of mine recently pointed out that the US produces 1 billion units of clothing per year. The number could even be 100 billion; I can’t remember for sure. But it was simply massive.
I’m glad we produce a lot. I think that is a partial fulfillment of the creation mandate, and that it is good, not evil. However, I suggest that we could get by with producing less of some things in order to produce more of other things. We need more pastors. We need more missionaries. We need more people devoted to serving those in need. We need more people devoted to the causes of fighting large global problems, like extreme poverty and corrupt leadership. Many of these things cannot in themselves be done at a profit, but can and must be done.
When society reaches a point that we have a proliferation of trinkets and other such things, it’s not a sign that capitalism has gone bad. Rather, it’s a sign that we need to use the freedom that capitalism affords us to point our efforts more fully in another direction — namely, the social sectors. We need more non-profit organizations, more churches, and more people going in to ministry and non-profit work in general. We can afford it. It will mean less singing fish, and perhaps less pet rocks. More seriously, maybe we won’t be producing exactly the 1 billion articles of clothing per year (which I am fine with as long as Banana Republic doesn’t go out of business). The point of our prosperity is not simply or mainly to enable us to keep buying more stuff, though the desire to accumulate is not evil in itself. The point of our prosperity is, rather, to divert some of our ability to accumulate more to efforts that focus more directly on using our abundance to meet pressing global needs.
I know there is one important consideration and possible objection here, which is actually a point I’ve made for years and that I make in my book (if I don’t cut the chapter due to length). And the objection is that I may seem to be pitting business against social good, when in reality it is business, not charity, which is the long-term solution to global poverty.
So I want to say clearly that I am not doing that. I do believe that business is the only long-term solution to large global problems like global poverty. And I’m not saying that when a person opens a business and makes money that he is not contributing greatly to the welfare of society. They are. But business cannot do this alone, because not all needs can be met at a profit, and there is injustice blocking the way in many instances. We need to be a society of both excellent businesses and great non-profits.
This is not anti-capitalistic, but is precisely the freedom that capitalism upholds and champions. Start the organization you want to start, not looking to the government to keep you afloat but rather, under the grace of God, your own efforts and ability to produce things of value. Capitalism is about freedom, and starting non-profits is just as much in line with capitalism as starting for-profits.
What I’m saying is that we are at a point as a society where the enormous wealth we have created virtually demands that we give much more consideration to using that wealth not to buy more things and enhance our own positions, but rather to fund those who are meeting the types of essential needs that cannot be met at a profit.
Don’t stop buying better things altogether, or even to a huge degree necessarily, but do direct more of your money this year to your church, to missionaries that are raising support and, for some of you, to starting organizations devoted to meeting pressing needs on a global scale.
This is an interesting, quick survey on motivation at Dan Pink’s website.
Dan Pink is the author of the excellent book Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us
Type I behavior: A way of thinking and an approach to life built around intrinsic, rather than extrinsic, motivators. It is powered by our innate need to direct our own lives, to learn and create new things, and to do better by ourselves and our world.
Type X behavior: Behavior that is fueled more by extrinsic desires than intrinsic ones and that concerns itself less with the inherent satisfaction of an activity and more with the external rewards to which that activity leads.
One interesting observation: When most people think of productivity, they almost immediately tend to think in terms of Type X. Ironically, Type X is horribly detrimental to productivity in most cases. We are most productive (and, more important, enjoy what we are doing most) when we operate according to Type I.
One of the things that was a bit annoying at first about Mac OS X Lion is that Spaces and Expose were integrated into Mission Control. I like the changes overall, as it brings the best of both together in one place, but they also changed the location of some features I liked to use in Spaces.
In fact, they changed the location of these features so significantly that it is almost impossible to figure out on your own, without having to spend more than a few minutes (a critical usability problem, in my view).
I just found this article which outlines the changes made and how to access the old features in Spaces you may have liked but which aren’t immediately evident in Mission Control. Here it is in case it’s helpful to you as well.
Here are some notes I jotted down when I was working on the chapter in my book on mission statements. They are brief and scattered, but here they are in the event that they are helpful to you.
In my chapter, I go against a major problem in most books on productivity. Most of them talk about having a “mission” or “purpose” to your life, but they say “that’s a very personal thing, something for you to decide for yourself.”
I think that’s wrong. Pretty bad, in fact. The reason is that since we didn’t create ourselves, we cannot define our own purpose. God himself defined the purpose of life. What we need to do is identify the purpose he has defined, say it in a way that captures the unique angle on that he has placed in our life, and align ourselves around it. Or, better, align ourselves not first around our “purpose,” but the gospel, with our purpose directing us but the gospel empowering and defining us.
Interestingly, the Bible talks about the purpose of life a lot. You even see mission statements all over the place, especially in Paul.
Here are my brief, rough, notes:
Criteria any Potential Purpose Must Fulfill
Must create happiness. Flourishing. So when the Bible talks of “blessedness,” we are in this domain.
It must create a happiness that is eternal, not fleeting. And happiness that is great, in itself invincible, and that can endure through immense trial and difficulty.
What the Purpose of Life Is
Making God look good. Making “good reports” about him abound. Making joy in him abound.
But not just anything does this. Mercy is at the heart of it. And justice. And, you must really do it for his glory. Micah 6:8; Isaiah 1:18; 58:1-13; Mt 5:16
What This Does
You can fulfill it each day, and yet never fully complete it. There is always more.
It drives your actions, gives purpose, and cannot be exhausted or wear out.
This is simple, and it reflects John Dickson’s definition of humility in Humilitas
The greatest leaders we’ve studied throughout all our research cared as much about values as victory, as much about purpose as profit, as much about being useful as being successful.
This Friday morning (November 11th) I’ll be speaking at the Social Media Shepherds monthly event on “How the Gospel Should Shape Your Web Strategy.” It will be 8:00 – 9:30 am at Bethlehem Baptist Church (downtown campus), 720 13th Ave S, Minneapolis, room 203 (upstairs and to the left).
For anyone in or around the Twin Cities interested in web strategy and social media, it would be fun to see you there.
Looks like you can also RSVP and get more info on Facebook.