MATH

How are we going to multiply?

At some point in life, you start thinking past yourself. Not for everyone gets here, but most people do and it usually occurs when a child comes on the scene. All of a sudden, the decisions and details of our lives go beyond just us and our own desires. We see longer into life - the decisions we make now impact another generation...actually, they always have impacted others, we just see it clearly now.

We begin thinking longer. Our lives and decisions aren't dead ends anymore, we see the ripple of effect.

Then, something else ... something bigger can happen, and I'm not sure how many people see this reality with precision, but our children will have children and they will have children. The implications of our life grows immensely. The decisions we make, who we are, what we do, how we live, will affect multiple generations. People will be impacted in 200 years by our lives...or not.

My mom's parents left a legacy with me that is now, by name, in my son. My kids know about the characteristics of my grandparents and they will learn more in the years to come. My life is impacted distinctly by their devotion and wisdom. My career path can be traced back to their focus on stewardship...and now my kids too - that's four generations that will span over a hundred years. Next thing you know, my children will have children.

We are called to be fruitful and multiply. This call for our lives goes well beyond the physical multiplication. I'm marinating on this idea about the legacy that we will pass down. A longer-term perspective allows for better decisions today. On the flip side, a shorter-term perspective allows for more foolishness. Foolishness hurts and costs. It costs money, time, implications, relationships and on and on.

A decision based on the next quarter - a decision based on the next three years - a decision based on the next thirty years - a decision based on the next hundred years.

How would our decisions be different if we were thinking about the generational impact of our lives?

Think longer. It's basic Math - How are we going to Multiply?

Finish Strong

We're all a mixed bag. Made in the image of our Creator, broken by our wrongs, so easily taken off track and yet blessed by genius by the Spirit of God that is within us ... and we're called to be apart of the redemptive story of humanity. I don't know Joe Pa, I don't know what he is really like. I know this, he didn't do what he needed to at a very important moment. It was more than a 'personal failure' - it was a failure to protect others that will be forever marred (humanly speaking) on more than one occasion. He allowed the worst of human existence to occur under his watch.

We must fight for the young, the disadvantaged, the poor and we must flip the tables over when Money, Position and Power are mis-used and abused. This is the worst of us. May God forgive me if I do this knowingly or unknowingly.

Sometimes our culture likes to self-righteously and publicly execute people as a normal habit without ever giving grace and mercy or forgiveness. I don't pretend to know where the balance is for it all. What I do know is that humanity is in the habit of failures. But our God is redeeming, that is what he does, making all things new and extending forgiveness when it doesn't make sense to us. I hope Joe Pa saw where he failed and I pray he sought forgiveness in a genuine way. I pray for the healing of any that were abused.

Our lesson is this...It is easier to start well than finish strong. May our lives chase after justice - may we be a voice for the weak and the hurting, the young and the innocent who are abused by others and may we, start well and Finish Strong.

(Failure leaves clues...Howard Hendricks breakdown how Finishing Strong can be stolen from us all http://tinyurl.com/7sld7nh)

Implement the Inspiration

When the music stops and the inspiration fades, get to work on the vision and new direction that you've been given. Don't leave the idea in the song, take it with you into life and change the future. The emotions aren't bad, but it would be a shame if you left your life's calling on the shelf and only picked it up to read every now and then. Do something...Get to work.

Implement The Inspiration.

#Winning

Two things to winning.

1) Spend more time on it strategically than your competitors.

2) Approach your time involved more intentionally, by seeking to learn from your weaknesses and understanding your success/strength.

Bring the endurance/marathon mentality to the above and it will be hard for you to lose. Of course, by that time, you've done all the work, paved the way, and paid your dues through preparation. You'll win.

ATTENTION!!

From Abnormal Returns...this applies to trading and to life at large. Be stingy with your attention...

"Attention is a zero-sum game
How you spend your time (and attention) as a trader is a key driver in your eventual performance. We all have a limited amount of time we can devote to the markets, therefore maximizing the impact of that time is crucial. This point was driven home in reading Margaret Heffernan’s interesting newish book Willful Blindness: Why We Ignore the Obvious at Our Peril in which she writes:

After a decade of experiments by himself and others [Dr. Daniel] Simons, concludes that we see what we expect to see and are blind to the unexpected. And there are absolute hard limits to how much we can take in at any given time.

“For the human brain,” say Simons, “attention is a zero-sum game: If we pay more attention to one place, object or event, we necessarily pay less attention to others.”

Our attention is a limited resource worth shepherding. The question is for traders whether their time is well-spent watching financial television? The problem is that the way television is designed disrupts our ability to think. Heffernan writes:

The bottleneck that characterizes our ability to receive information explains why we cannot intelligently absorb all the information presented to us on TV screens like those displayed by CNN, Fox and CNBC. The scrolling text, sidebars and stock prices don’t make us smarter or better informed; they make us stupid. While we are watching such a busy array, we can’t efficiently think, discriminate or make critical judgments.

Trading is hard enough under the best of circumstances. If you continuously expose yourself to inputs that don’t make you “smarter or better informed” you are doing yourself a disservice."

Better Than Bigger

I recently learned the difference in terms that affects anyone who's a parent, mentor or leader of any kind.

In the effort to raise our kids combined with being responsible for their learning through homeschool, we talk all the time about their development. I'm sure most parents do, and we definitely do especially because it all falls on us we have a bit of extra "fear" that we want to get it right as possible. The difference in terms I read recently was the difference between teaching and training.

Teaching is when you show someone something,

Training is when you've passed along "the will" for them to do it right without your involvement.

So, for example, you can show your kids how to make their bed, but you haven't trained them in it until they can do it consistently well without your input. That is a startling contrast to how most of us take our responsibilities in training. Now bring the idea of training to developing the spiritual foundation of our kids. A question we wrestle with all the time is how to establish a strong spiritual connection between themselves and God so that they seek him, talk to him and know him deeply.

Given the ages of our kids, one of the things we've attempted to do is to keep the basics basic - even while they increase their learning. We thought, if they can just know that God is bigger than anything AND know that he is good...really really good, then they will want to seek him. So, we've spent time just showing them daily or weekly examples of how much bigger and better he is than things they can relate to.

On this journey and knowing enough about how life goes something emerged...most people who don't chase after God, probably don't because they struggle with his goodness. They question his way over their own, their not sure that he has their best interest in mind. In a sense, they question his goodness and his goodness for them.

So know that we've spent ample time conveying the God is Big and God is Good message, we feel convicted to harp on the fact that while he's Big AND Good, God is Better....Than he is Bigger. He's worth trusting and he's worth trusting completely. Hold all of life with an open hand and just listen to him, then act. He has your and mine best interest at heart.

I hope we can not just teach them this, but may we train them as well so that they seek him no matter what.

A Thousand Conversations

We live in a time, when attention is held briefly and decisions are made likewise. Short-term thinking persists our world. The goose is killed for the golden eggs it has now.

But there are those among us, looking longer. Often though, the longer term thinking relates toward activity, results and "Success".

Success becomes the things we do. What is achieved, is valued. Wealth. Position. Results. Well prepared and trained children. A happy marriage. Strong friendships.

Things that are good can become the objective. Achieving takes the pole position.

So what? What's wrong with achieving? ...Nothing. If you're not achieving, scripture has harsh words for not fulfilling your stewardship responsibility with your talents, time and opportunities. But, achieving is not the ultimate end to who we are becoming. Our soul is.

Our soul, that confusing, not easily understood place in our lives that we sometimes call our conscience, our heart. The soul is who we really are. The thousands of conversations and self-chats we have through ideas, brief thoughts, thoughts of others, thoughts of ourselves, thoughts of God. No matter how transparent we are with others, our soul knows us more. Our soul is the reality of ourselves and how we see life, and therefore how we decide to be and act in life.

The soul is our core and our soul has to be cultivated. This IS the end of our lives. More than who we are when no one is looking, the soul is what is in our hearts and mind that no one else will ever be able to to fully discern. The soul is our depth. The soul contains all of our "layers" that make the whole of us.

Living for the soul, brings contentment, joy and a beautiful connection with our creator. We cultivate the soul we have by thinking as our creator thinks, by living according to his way, not just on the outside, but maybe more importantly with every thought that crosses our mind. More than how we treat others, how do we view them? Do we serve them, but secretly see ourselves as more important, more loved, more anything...seeing ourselves as better? Do we lead others and lead with excellence, but secretly and ultimately make sure we're taken care of at the end of the day? When we walk through our day and encounter countless individuals, what are the biases and perspectives of ourselves and others that we hold on to?

For some, their view of their self is an ongoing defeating self conversation where they can never be good enough, be successful enough as they compare themselves to others. This is damaging to our soul because this is a lie as well. When we connect our soul and align it with the way of our God, our perspective aligns and our heart is nourished. When our heart is nourished and our self-agenda is tossed to the side, an amazing beauty emerges from within that is indescribable though it is impossible to mistake.

We have to know the thoughts of God. We have to "take captive of every thought" and run it through the filter of the Almighty. Christ took the "actions" of the Old Testament and then made them applicable at our soul's level, through what we think and feel. If we lust, if we're in wrong anger, then we're damaging our soul. The inner thoughts matter.

I do not say any of this (or anything I ever say) as one who has conquered or as one who has figured "it" out. We are all inspired in the image of our God, but we are broken and living in a broken and beautiful world. I would submit that we are on a journey with God, toward God. He has something beautiful to say about the greatest pain we experience, the normal day to day as well as our mountain top success. God is in our soul and about our soul as well as he is about anything else. He wants to be in those thousand conversations we're having every day. Invite him into your success, your views on everything and even your sin. Let him permeate the very core of who you are, and believe that his way is better. His way gives us life, and life to the full.

This life to the full will not be judged completely from the outside, but it will transform who you are from the inner spaces that no one else will ever see.

Yes, may we chase wisdom, but may we live life from the heart and cultivate our souls by immersing our thoughts in our God.