Empty Ourselves

March 25, 2026

Robert Van Gulik was a scholar of China, a excellent writer, excellent artist, and Dutch ambassador to China before World War II. Retiring, he wrote a series of murder mysteries based on a historical character called Judge Dee. The mysteries are fiction, but Van Gulik brings 7th Century China to life.

When I’m between projects and my brain needs refreshment, I’ll pull one of these from my bookcase.

The other evening it was Necklace and Calabash where he drew a character typical of ancient China—a “Taoist” recluse. A sort of spiritual guide.

Master Gourd left Judge Dee with a piece of wisdom relevant for us all:

“It is only after we have been emptied of all our vain hopes, all our petty desires and petty illusions, that we can be useful to others.”

Are we so full of ourselves that we haven’t time to love and serve others as Jesus commanded?

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The Value of Prayer

March 24, 2026

My last post concerned the value of wisdom. Reading in Evagrius’ Chapters on Prayer last night, I found this nugget.

The value of prayer is found not merely in quantity but also in its quality. This is made clear by those two men who entered the temple, and also by this saying, ‘When you pray, do not do a lot of chattering…” (reference to Luke 18:10 and Matthew 6:7)

I’ll stop chattering.

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The Value of Wisdom

March 23, 2026

The value of wisdom lies in the recall.

Of what use is continual memorizing and study if it doesn’t help you when you need it?

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Writing Is Thinking

March 20, 2026

AI news and opinion notes clog my sidebar of potential blogs. Go ahead, try getting an hour free from some AI hype or dire warning.

One I find a bit amusing is the fear of AI LLMs taking over writing.

I’m old enough to remember teachers telling students not to just copy from encyclopedia entries.

I wrote a paper for my university freshman composition class (do they still have those?). It cited one major source book. I lived at home and used a book from my local library. Now, what are the odds that two students from a class of 40 would pick the same topic—Henrik Ibsen’s Concept of Truth in Peer Gynt? It happened. 

The copy of that source disappeared from the university library. The instructor called me to her office. “Can you  bring in the book?” she asked. No problem. Turns out the other student copied their paper from the book. Net result—I received an A and a suggestion that I major in English.

Cheating must be as old as schools.

Back to AI. I have recently guided Claude through a series of questions to research smart manufacturing. Wound up with many notes. I asked it to write an essay in the style of The Manufacturing Connection (my other website). It did. 

I have now discovered what programming leaders are discovering about using AI to write code—checking the work and (in my case rewriting to suit me). That entails a lot of time and work. 

Writing is thinking. If you want to think through something, don’t just copy AI. Write your thoughts and then organize them. 

Oh, I didn’t major in English. International politics and philosophy. Add that to all the math classes I took, it became an ideal background for working on the technical side of business.

The point of the essay—truth is the creative response to life. Try it.

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Are We Being Manipulated?

March 19, 2026

Are you the product—that which is sold?

Many (most?) technologists are amoral. Without morals. They design most products to exploit human weaknesses to capture and sell our attention to advertisers. That attention can also be given (sold?) to governments who wish to track people.

When we allow ourselves to be immersed those created worlds of Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and now all the gambling apps, we need to consider the value we receive versus time lost to mindless provocations. What’s lost in the emotional upheaval of negative posts. What value to our life is gained? How much money do we throw at the gamblers?

Let’s face it. Mark Zuckerberg doesn’t need any more money.

And us? What value could we add to the world through living rather than scrolling.

These thoughts were prompted while watching the only commercial TV programs in our house—Premier League soccer. I can’t believe the gambling apps. You can bet on anything—instantaneously. Talk about getting sucked in.

This isn’t an old man telling you young people not to have fun. It’s an old man who has lived through many things attempting to point to better ways to live. After all, Jesus had fun. He was often the life of the party. He didn’t get sucked in to addictions.

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The World Can Be a Complex Place

March 18, 2026

You do something. You thought it was simple and isolated.

People don’t react the way you thought they would.

The action affects situations or people you didn’t expect.

People  see through your motivations that you thought were so pure.

But ego plays a role. And pride. Perhaps selfishness.

We’ve been considering simplicity.

Sometimes we must strip away our ego. And pride. And selfishness.

Before we act—what is the next right action. Considering kindness. Considering what we’ve learned from Jesus.

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Beauty–The Antidote

March 17, 2026

“The luminous and shocking beauty of the everyday is something I try to remain alert to, if only as an antidote to the chronic cynicism and disenchantment that seems to surround everything, these days. It tells me that, despite how debased or corrupt we are told humanity is and how degraded the world has become, it just keeps on being beautiful.”​— Nick Cave (Singer, Musician, Writer)

We can get sucked into cynicism and negativity so easily. Media, social media, conversations can accumulate ideas of how bad people are and how divided we are. 

Poll after poll show actually the inverse. Most people are kind. Most people are helpful. Most Americans want basically the same thing—maybe with subtle differences left or right.

Listening to Nick Cave reminds us to look for beauty everyday. It’s there. Awareness is in itself a beautiful thing.

Some people look at the Gospels and see “separating the sheep from the goats.”

I see Jesus grieving for each person who came to him and could not find the courage or strength to make the right decision to change directions and follow him.

Just for today, look for the beauty in something—nature, a building, a relationship, seeing a parent with child. And then maybe you look tomorrow. And maybe it becomes a way of life which will change our very attitude toward life. 

That would be a beautiful thing.

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Simplify Decisions

March 16, 2026

The same day I received an essay from Om Malik on simplicity and renewal and from my meditation teacher on stripping away complexity, I downloaded the next podcast from Tim Ferriss. He asked five acquaintances to reply with thoughts about what they have done to simplify life in 2026.

I offer some thoughts that you may find helpful.

Maria Popova noticed that she found herself in long conversations that were not nourishing her life. So, she stopped giving time to those conversations.

Morgan Housel replied with a “do nothing” thesis. His wealth basically consists of house, cash, and funds. He invested in a number of diversified funds. Then, he no longer found himself needing to make constant decisions. “The fewer decisions, the better.”

Computer scientist, professor and writer Cal Newport asks, “What request deserves a yes when the default is no?”

Craig Mod quit alcohol and decided to concentrate on only one craft (he is a writer, photographer, and occasional leader of long walks through Japan and southeast Asia).

Debbie Millman stewed over the decision to leave the corporation she had helped found or accept the offer to become CEO. Her boss and mentor finally told her, “If it takes four months to decide, you probably don’t want it.”

Thinking about deciding once and eliminating future emotional drain for decisions, I think of Steve Jobs. On a trip to Japan, he noticed everyone at the companies wore a uniform. He returned home. Cleaned out his closet. Bought black mock-turtle shirts and jeans. That was his uniform. No daily decisions. [He didn’t have my wife, who constantly wants me to add to my wardrobe—you need more colors…]

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Simplify

March 13, 2026

I wrote yesterday about how the word “neo” contains the meaning of not just new but re-new—refresh, strip away accumulated crud that a philosophy (or a life) attracts to return to the simple truth.

The same day that the article appeared the provoked my thinking about renewal meaning return to the simple beginnings, my meditation teacher dropped this statement into the day’s meditation:

Strip away added complications returning to simple presence.

Jesus made everything seem so simple. Yet, the bar for achievement often seemed impossibly high for the normal human.

Forgetting the bar, think only on the simple. Throw away all accumulated justifications and fuzzy thinking. Look at the few things he spoke with clarity. Living with these leads to participation in God’s Kingdom.

  • Choose to change the direction of our life (the usual translation is the single word Repent)
  • Acknowledge the change leads to living with-God in the Kingdom
  • Orient our life toward always acknowledging God (Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength, mind)
  • Live out this Kingdom orientation with our changed life (Love your neighbor as yourself, and Love one another as I have loved you)

Simple, yet keeping it up requires practice and persistence. 

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Neo = Renew

March 12, 2026

Apple just released a new laptop. You can get one choosing from among five cool colors for $700 or less. The laptop is called MacBook Neo.

Neo means something more than “new.” More like “renewal.” Think of stripping away accumulated baggage returning to the basics. Simplifying things. 

Writers and podcasters who follow Apple are in love with this stripped down, but still powerful, computer. One of my favorites, Om Malik, wrote a thoughtful piece.

The neo-Platonists, especially Plotinus, remain among my favorite philosophers. They stripped several hundred years of accumulated gunk on Plato’s philosophy. The returned to the thinking that everything in the universe came from The One. They sound almost Christian without the theology.

Jesus announced the beginning of his ministry saying, “Change the direction of your life! The Kingdom of God is all around you, here, now.” I think you could look at that first word as a form of “neo.” Renew yourself. Strip away the accumulated gunk of the burdensome laws the Pharisees have loaded upon you. Step into God’s Kingdom. Or as we like to say, live a “with-God” life.

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