Faith Venture

Professor Carol Dweck of Stanford published groundbreaking research about how we see life—what we believe—in Mindset: The New Psychology of Success in 2007. She says, “It’s not always the people who start out the smartest who end up the smartest.”

By what you believe, I don’t mean whether or not you believe in Jesus or God or Spirit. It’s sort of what you believe about yourself. Dweck discovered that some people believe in constantly growing. That their are opportunities in the world to be discovered. That I believe that I can be as healthy and fit as nature allows. It’s called a growth mindset.

We all know people, I pray you are not one who believed that things were always bad, they were going to turn out bad, that there was little hope on earth. There is a negative mindset.

You can change and adapt your mindset. It may be almost natural, something you learned early to adapt to life. It may be something you’ve grown into. 

You can adopt a mindset open to new experiences. You can be open to hearing or feeling the urges that come from God. You can be open to following the ways of Jesus and living in the spirit.

I sometimes sit with my arms crossed because it stretches my shoulders and feels good. But mostly we sit with our arms crossed and maybe our legs crossed as a sort of defensive posture of not wanting to hear what someone else is saying. Try sitting “open.” Upright, Hands open. Eyes open. Let the words of text or from the speaker soak in open to perhaps learning something or at least understanding someone else.

You may find yourself growing emotionally and spiritually.

How are you in the organizations or groups you serve?

Some people have nothing to lose in the game. They have no skin in the game.

Skin in the game would have been if Elon Musk had sat inside the Cybertruck when they shot at it to show off the bulletproof construction. 

Soul in the game is when you care. Robert Pirisig writing his essay on quality in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance talked of the mechanic who cared about the quality of his work.

Do you root for something where you have nothing invested? Then what does the outcome really matter?

Are you invested in time or money you could lose? Then you could be hurt by the outcome. You have Skin in the Game.

How much do you really care about the outcome, the quality of service, the people involved? Now you have invested Soul in the Game.

A trade magazine trying to drum up subscribers at low cost ran an ad on Facebook. The magazine covers the automation market and featured some sort of robotic agriculture application. I noticed it because I was a co-founder of that magazine although I’ve been gone for 11 years.

A few people commented. I was shocked. Comment on an ad?

The comments immediately took off on “illegal” farm workers losing their jobs and sopping up free unemployment compensation.

We as humans really like to metaphorically take the ball and run with it, don’t we? We assume so many things about other people.

I’ve done that. Still do, in fact. See someone. Make an assumption about them. Then I meet them. Talk with them. Listen.

I’ve met the most interesting people that way. Sometimes opened my eyes to a whole new world.

Want to bet the first Jesus-followers met some of the same attitudes? First, suspicion from those around them. Then, a conversation, perhaps. Then, it was “I want what they’ve got.”