Faith Venture

There is always a well-known solution to every human problem—neat, plausible, and wrong. HL Mencken

Some people sit in libraries or their studies reading books and deriving theories about how things should work and how other people should think and act.

Mencken’s thought reminded me of a saying that undereducated people develop simplistic answers to complicated problems, while overeducated people develop complicated answers to simple problems.

Some problems are simple problems requiring simple solutions.

Many times problems are messy requiring compromise and rethinking. The solutions may not satisfy everyone.

We need to learn to live in a world without perfection. Living within paradox has some tension but in the long run is most satisfying.

Dan Millman in Peaceful Warrior Newsletter – July 2025

It wasn’t until I met the Sage (Dr. David K. Reynolds) that I fully understood that neither I nor anyone else has direct control over arising thoughts or passing emotional weather — and therefore, no responsibility for random thoughts or emotions. (We can only be responsible for what we can control.)   In fact the only thing over which we have a good bit of control is our behavior — how we move; the actions we take. And we are responsible for our actions whether or not we happen to feel inspired or motivated or fearful or angry or sad.

Wisdom resides in our understanding of what we cannot control and must therefore live with and understanding what is in our control and working on it.

Every year I suggest that all Americans take some time to read a few things to refresh our memories about the founding of our country. It’s probably not a bad practice for all of you who do not live here just for the ideals.

Read 

• The Declaration of Independence
• The Preamble to the Constitution
• Actually the entire Constitution
• If not all, at least the first 10 amendments—the Bill of Rights
• Bonus points—read The Federalist Papers

These documents are full of compromises—something that has made it last so long. And something we seem unwilling to do this past decade or so.

Learning is not compulsory…neither is survival—W. Edwards Deming, quality master

There are people who have a set of things they know and judge all events and actions against that set. There are people who have the continuous unease of not knowing. The former can be typed (perhaps too rigidly) as “FJ or Feeling Judgmental” on the Myers-Briggs Types Indicator. The latter as “TP or Thinking Perceptive.” Anyone who has read more than a few of my thoughts can easily figure out which type describes me.

At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who, then, is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.—Matthew 18

As with all spiritual texts, this can be open to numerous interpretations. I choose in this context to reflect on “beginner’s mind.” Wisdom about as ancient as humans in community recognizes that if our heads are full of knowledge or “stuff,” then there is no room for growth, for learning.

Unless we change and become as little children, that is, unless we are open and fascinated to learn more, we will be stuck where we are.

Seth Godin remarked, “Learning is the difficult work of experiencing incompetence on our way to mastery.”

Unless we become like children—stumbling until we suddenly walk; needing an adult to keep the bicycle up until suddenly we are riding; stumbling over pronouncing a new word until suddenly we are fluent.

Where do you feel the tension of unease of not knowing that will entice you into trying until you learn?

Ancient wisdom—You become what you think about.

Shane Parrish writing in Brain Food, updated the thought. You become what you scroll.

Don’t be like the loser in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade about whom the Last Crusader remarked, “He chose poorly.”

Inch by inch, row by row, gonna make this garden grow. All it takes is a rake and a hoe and a piece of fertile ground. — Folk song written by David Mallett

A series of caves populate southern Ohio’s Hocking Hills region. Thousands visit Ash Cave, Old Man’s Cave, and others every year.

Drips of water formed these limestone attractions over the course of centuries. Patience, persistence, unending.

This era has been captured by the hype of sudden change. The organization, be it business or church or non-profit, will grow suddenly as if overnight.

Organizations, and yes, even our lives, are actually built slowly over time like those limestone caves.

Like the Garden Song, we hoe a bit by bit and over time we realize how much we have grown.

Religion is not so much telling man there is one God as about preventing man from thinking he is God.—Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Somewhere buried in my library is a book by Erich Fromm, You Shall Be as Gods: A Radical Interpretation of the Old Testament and Its Tradition.

Contrary to what Fromm wrote, when a human begins to believe they are God, good things never occur.