Our Response to Life

My little brother Todd recently posted an article on his blog at Neva Story. Here's a small excerpt from the article I thought was exceptionally poignant: 

"After an ALS diagnosis, we need to grieve, and not worry about where it’s going to take us. Grief is a process, not just an emotion. Grieving is something that we need to do, something that requires action. One of those actions is that, eventually, we need to gain perspective, that life is out of our control and the only thing we can control is a response.

We tell them that one of the perspectives that can be gained is that we have the blessing of time.

Reading from our book Heavy, I said, “Every one of us will die, some much sooner than others, and some more tragically than others. Some will have their lives snatched from them, leaving their family shocked. I, however, am on notice. I have time.”

Kristin told them that the only thing that we can control is our response.

Again, reading from our book, she said, “We can’t control this disease, but we can control our response to it. Todd has chosen joy instead of anger and bitterness, and that makes it easier for me. If I am stressed, melting down and falling apart, that will be the reaction my kids will see, and they will follow my lead. We need to grieve, but we also need to be thankful for today’s joys.”

Kristin encouraged them to keep seeking God, even in anger and sadness.

“He’s God. He can handle our emotions. He understands our pain. Jesus was in emotional anguish when he went to the cross for us.” And she said, “As ALS keeps on robbing Todd of functionality, I keep crying out to God, sometimes in tears, sometimes in anger. He doesn’t always erase our pain, but He is with us.”"

Crucified Between Two Thieves: Catholic Social Teachings vs. Right and Left ... by Anthony Basile, Ph.D.

If you've followed my blog you may have wondered about my political persuasion?  Politically, I'm not a Republican or a Democrat but a registered Independent.  Morally, I'm more in line with the Republicans, but economically I'm more in line with the Democrats.  Understand, I'm a follower of Jesus Christ and a committed Roman Catholic Christian which defines my political ideology. In this vein, I wanted to share a great article by Dr. Anthony Basile, Ph.D. called "Crucified Between Two Thieves: Catholic Social Teachings vs. Right and Left."

  

Killing the Dragon

My close friend, Allen Laudenslager (who writes a blog at A Voice In The Wilderness)
shared this fable with me:

A father was reading his little boy a bed time story about a medieval village and a terrible, fire breathing dragon that terrorized it. 

The little boy asked his father, “Why didn’t they just kill the dragon?” 

His father replied, “Why son, the dragon was big and powerful, it viciously breathed fire, its hide was as tough as armor, and the villagers weren't able to kill it with their primitive weapons."

The little boy said, “No, I mean, why didn’t they just kill the dragon while it was still little?

And the moral of this story is that you ought to nip evil or wrong-doing in the bud as soon as you see it and not wait for it to become a bigger, unmanageable problem.
  

How many of us wished we wouldn't have smoked that first cigarette, drank that second beer, or eaten that second helping at dinner?  If we hadn't then we wouldn't be addicted to cigarettes or alcohol or be obese.  How many of us wished we'd made better career choices?  If we had then we wouldn't be stuck in miserable, dead-end jobs.  How often have we wished that our leaders made different choices like trying to prevent World War II, the Vietnam War, the 9/11 attacks, or the Recession?

The examples could go on and on, but the point is that little problems can snow-ball into bigger, unmanageable problems unless we nip them in the bud while they're still little, that is, kill the dragon while it's still little.  It's just so much easier.

Hind-sight is always twenty-twenty, but if you use the positive or negative examples of the past as how you should or should not do something, then you can slowly grow prudent and wise and make better choices each day.  Something else you can do is to pray for prudence and wisdom as God loves to pour out his wisdom onto those who ask.

Silicon Valley’s Giants Are Just Gilded Age Tycoons in Techno-Utopian Clothes

By Joel Kotkin  www.thedailybeast.com  4/25/2014

The $300 million payout from tech giants like Google and Apple to settle a lawsuit brought by employees makes it clear that Silicon Valley is out for profit, not to change the world.

Silicon Valley’s biggest names—Google, Apple, Intel and Adobe—reached a settlement today in a contentious $3 billion anti-trust suit brought by workers who accused the tech giants of secretly colluding to not recruit each other’s employees. The workers won, but not much, receiving only a rumored $300 million, a small fraction of the billions the companies might have been forced to pay had they been found guilty in a trial verdict. 

The criminality that the case exposed in the boardrooms the tech giants, including from revered figures like Steve Jobs who comes off as especially ruthless, should not be jarring to anyone familiar with Silicon Valley.  It may shock much of the media, who have generally genuflected towards these companies, and much of the public, that has been hoodwinked into thinking the Valley oligarchs represent a better kind of plutocrat—but the truth is they are a lot like the old robber barons.

Starting in the 1980s, a mythology grew that the new tech entrepreneurs represented a new, progressive model that was not animated by conventional business thinking. In contrast to staid old east coast corporations, the new California firms were what futurist Alvin Toffler described as “third wave.” Often dressed in jeans, and not suits, they were seen as inherently less hierarchical and power-hungry as their industrial age predecessors.  

Silicon Valley executives were not just about making money, but were trying, as they famously claimed, to “change the world.” One popularizing enthusiast, MIT’s Nicholas Negroponte, even suggested that “digital technology” could turn into “a natural force drawing people into greater world harmony.”

This image has insulated the tech elite from the kind of opprobrium meted out to their rival capitalist icons in other, more traditional industries. In 2011, over 72 percent of Americans had positive feelings about the computer industry as opposed to a mere 30 percent for banking and 20 percent for oil and gas. Even during the occupy protests in 2012, few criticisms were hurled by the “screwed generation” at tech titans. Indeed, Steve Jobs, a .000001 per center worth $7 billion, the ferocious competitor who threatened “war” against Google if they did not cooperate in his wage fixing scheme, was openly mourned by protestors when news spread that he had passed away.

But the collusion case amply proves what has been clear to those watching the industry: greed and the desire to control drives tech entrepreneurs as much as any other business group. The Valley is great at talking progressive but not so much in practice. In the very place where private opposition to gay marriage is enough to get a tech executive fired, the big firms have shown a very weak record of hiring minorities and women. And not surprisingly, firms also are notoriously skittish about revealing their diversity data. A San Jose Mercury report found that the numbers of Hispanics and African Americans employees in Silicon Valley tech companies, already far below their percentage in the population, has actually been declining in recent years. Hispanics, roughly one quarter of the local labor force, account for barely five percent of those working at the Valley’s ten largest companies. The share of women working at the big tech companies - despite the rise of high profile figures in management—has also showed declines.

    

In terms of dealing with “talent,” collusion is not the only way the Valley oligarchs work to keep wages down.  Another technique is the outsourcing of labor to lower paid foreign workers, the so called “techno-coolies.” The tech giants claim that they hire cheap workers overseas because of a critical shortage of skilled computer workers but that doesn't hold up to serious scrutiny. A 2013 report from the labor-aligned Economic Policy Institute found that the country is producing 50% more IT professionals per year than are being employed. Tech firms, notes EPI, would rather hire “guest workers” who now account for one-third to one half of all new IT job holders, largely to maintain both a lower cost and a more pliant workforce.

Some of this also reflects a preference for hiring younger employees at the expense of older software and engineering workers, many of whom own homes and have families in the area. 

 “I want to stress the importance of being young and technical," Facebook's CEO Mark Zuckerberg said at an event at Stanford University in 2007. "Young people are just smarter. Why are most chess masters under 30? I don't know. Young people just have simpler lives. We may not own a car. We may not have family. Simplicity in life allows you to focus on what's important."

Of course what’s really “important” to Zuckerberg, like moguls in any time and place, is maximizing profits and raking in money, both for themselves and their investors. The good news for the bosses has been that employees are rarely in the way.  Unlike the aerospace, autos or oil industries, the Valley has faced little pressure from organized labor, which has freed them to hire and fire at their preference.  Tech workers wages, on the other hand, have been restrained both by under the table agreements and the importation of “techno-coolies.”

Rather than being a beacon of a new progressive America, the Valley increasingly epitomizes the gaping class divisions that increasingly characterize contemporary America.  Employees at firms like Facebook and Google enjoy gourmet meals, childcare services, even complimentary house-cleaning to create, as oneGoogle executive put it, “the happiest most productive workplace in the world.” Yet, the largely black and Hispanic lower-end service workers who clean their offices, or provide security, rarely receive health care or even the most basic retirement benefits. Not to mention the often miserable conditions in overseas factories, notably those of Apple.

It’s critical to understand that the hiring restrictions exposed by Friday’s settlement, reflect only one part of the Valley’s faux progressiveness and real mendacity. These same companies have also been adept at circumventing user privacy and avoiding their tax obligations.

One might excuse the hagiographies prepared by the Valley’s ever expanding legion of public relations professionals, and their media allies,  but the ugly reality remains. The  Silicon Valley tech firms tend to be  every bit as cutthroat and greedy as any capitalist enterprise before it. We need to finally see the tech moguls not as a superior form of oligarch, but as just the latest in long line whose overweening ambition sometimes needs to be restrained, not just celebrated.

The Curious case of Phineas Gage (1823—1860)

On September 13, 1848, Phineas Gage, a 25 year old railroad construction foreman, was directing a work gang blasting rock outside Cavendish, Vermont. While Gage was compacting the explosive charge using a tamping iron, the blasting powder exploded prematurely and sent the tamping iron completely through the left prefrontal cortex of his brain. Surprisingly, Gage survived the accident (and lived another twelve years), but even more surprisingly Gage’s personality changed completely. Before the accident Gage was a quite, patient, respectful, well-liked, hardworking, responsible, and highly self-controlled person; after the accident Gage was the complete opposite. Due to the brain damage Gage suffered, he’d lost his ability to control his thoughts, feelings, and actions. This case is frequently cited in the curricula and academic papers of neuroscience and psychology which has led to our current understanding of how the brain works.

The human brain has the largest frontal lobe of any in the animal kingdom.   Our ability to think and reason and make logical choices makes us god-like among all the other animals.  And quite frankly, our intelligence puts us atop the food chain and makes us by far the most dangerous animal on the planet.

Why do most people prefer dogs over cats as pets?  Well dogs have a large frontal brain lobe too and this allows them to learn and be trained.  Cats, on the other hand, have quite small frontal brain lobes and are very difficult to train.  In fact, cats are very instinctual animals; that is, they're hard-wired to behave in certain ways.

Phineas Gage lived another twelve years after the accident and was eventually able to relearn many of the good character traits he had before the accident.  We too are not locked into certain behavior patterns and can relearn the good character traits we learned as children.

Some people believe they're set in their ways and don't want to improve as human beings. Science and the Good Lord both say differently. We're all capable of changing for the better.

Giving Up on the Human Race

There are times when I feel like giving up on the human race!  Throughout my life experiences, I'm constantly amazed at the new depths mankind can sink to.  Everyday we all hear bad news of murder, mayhem, rape, robbery, war, injustice, hatred, lies, scandal, and many other evil deeds too numerous to count.  When we drive our vehicles out on the highways, especially in our crowded cities or shopping center parking lots, it's rare to see polite drivers.  When we go to work we're confronted with poor management, political posturing, juvenile, high school, two-faced and back-stabbing behavior.  Our superiors, coworkers, colleagues, customers, and neighbors can be so petty, caddy, and vindictive.  My word, I don't think there's hardly an altruistic or kind-hearted bone in anybody.  People in general are so self-centered and don't seem to give a damn about anyone except themselves....  And then I remind myself of that God so loved the world that he gave his only Son!  God could have given up on the human race a long time ago, but He didn't.  I guess I shouldn't either.  Have a Good Friday and a Happy Easter.

On Hatred

Have you ever considered the abyss between not hating and loving?  Hate is the opposite of love, but have you considered aversion, detachment, or indifference? These are forms of hatred too simply because they're not love and they stem from the same plant of hatred.

Usually when we dislike someone we may not necessarily "hate" them per se, but we'll tend towards aversion, detachment, or indifference.  In other words, our hearts grow cold towards others (especially those we dislike) through these three forms of hatred.

Also, have you ever considered complaining about and "bad-mouthing" others?  We all like to let others know when we've been offended by complaining about and "bad-mouthing" others.  Does a homeless beggar ask other homeless beggars for alms?  No, because all he'll get is meaningless sympathy.  This is what the world gives us when we complain about and "bad-mouth" others: nothing but meaningless sympathy.

If you want to live a life of love, then we need to avoid not only hatred but aversion, detachment, and indifference.  And if someone offends us, don't complain about or "bad-mouth" them to others.  Instead bring your complaints to God who gives true and lasting comfort to us and teaches how to behave with love and wisdom in difficult and sorrowful circumstances.

Vocation of the Business Leader

I wanted to share a link to a great document (in PDF format if you'd like to save it) on the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church on business. 

Vocation of the Business Leader: A Reflection, from the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: 

When businesses and market economies function properly and focus on serving the common good, they contribute greatly to the material and even the spiritual well-being of society. Recent experience, however, has also demonstrated the harm caused by the failings of businesses and markets. The transformative developments of our era—globalisation, communications technologies, and financialisation — produce problems alongside their benefits: inequality, economic dislocation, information overload, financial instability and many other pressures leading away from serving the common good. Business leaders who are guided by ethical social principles, lived through virtues and illuminated for Christians by the Gospel, can, nonetheless, succeed and contribute to the common good.  

Obstacles to serving the common good come in many forms —lack of rule of law, corruption, tendencies towards greed, poor stewardship of resources—but the most significant for a business leader on a personal level is leading a “divided” life. This split between faith and daily business practice can lead to imbalances and misplaced devotion to worldly success. The alternative path of faith-based “servant leadership” provides business leaders with a larger perspective and helps to balance the demands of the business world with those of ethical social principles, illumined for Christians by the Gospel. This is explored through three stages: seeing, judging, and acting, even though it is clear that these three aspects are deeply interconnected.

SEEING the challenges and opportunities in the world of business is complicated by factors both good and evil, including four major “signs of the times” impacting business. Globalisation has brought efficiency and extraordinary new opportunities to businesses, but the downsides include greater inequality, economic dislocation, cultural hcultural homogeneity, and the inability of governments to properly regulate capital flows. Communications Technology has enabled connectivity, new solutions and products, and lower costs, but the new velocity also brings information overload and rushed decision-making. Financialisation of business worldwide has intensified tendencies to commoditise the goals of work and to emphasise wealth maximisation and short-term gains at the expense of working for the common good. The broader Cultural Changes of our era have led to increased individualism, more family breakdowns, and utilitarian preoccupations with self and “what is good for me”. As a result we might have more private goods but are lacking significantly in common goods. Business leaders increasingly focus on maximising wealth, employees develop attitudes of entitlement, and consumers demand instant gratification at the lowest possible price. As values have become relative and rights more important than duties, the goal of serving the common good is often lost. 

JUDGING: Good business decisions are those rooted in principles at the foundational level, such as respect for human dignity and service to the common good, and a vision of a business as a community of persons. Principles on the practical level keep the business leader focused on: 

• producing goods and services that meet genuine human needs while taking responsibility for the social and environmental costs of production, of the supply chain and distribution chain (serving the common good, and watching for opportunities to serve the poor); 
• organising productive and meaningful work recognising the human dignity of employees and their right and duty to flourish in their work, (“work is for man” rather than “man for work”) and structuring workplaces with subsidiarity that designs, equips and trusts employees to do their best work; and
• using resources wisely to create both profit and well-being, to produce sustainable wealth and to distribute it justly (a just wage for employees, just prices for customers and suppliers, just taxes for the community, and just returns for owners).

ACTING: Business leaders can put aspiration into practice when they pursue their vocation, motivated by much more than financial success. When they integrate the gifts of the spiritual life, the virtues and ethical social principles into their life and work, they may overcome the divided life, and receive the grace to foster the integral development of all business stakeholders. The Church calls upon the business leader to receive—humbly acknowledging what God has done for him or her —and to give—entering into communion with others to make the world a better place. Practical wisdom informs his or her approach to business and strengthens the business leader to respond to the world’s challenges not with fear or cynicism, but with the virtues of faith, hope, and love. This document aims to encourage and inspire leaders and other stakeholders in businesses to see the challenges and opportunities in their work; to judge them according to ethical social principles, illumined for Christians by the Gospel; and to act as leaders who serve God.

Does God Even Care?

Throughout the storms of life, most of us have asked ourselves if God even cares?  Does God care when we're suffering, or struggling, or lonely, or doubting?  Here's something to consider from Mark chapter 4: 

35 On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, “Let us go across to the other side.”36 And leaving the crowd behind, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. Other boats were with him. 37 A great windstorm arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped. 38 But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke him up and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” 39 He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm. 40 He said to them, “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” 41 And they were filled with great awe and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”

Yes God cares!  And He's in the boat with us throughout life's storms.

Breaking Bad or Building Good

I'll confess that I've been a fan of the AMC drama series Breaking Bad starring Bryan Cranston, Aaron Paul, Anna Gunn, Dean Norris and many others.

In case you haven't seen it, Breaking Bad is the two-year long story (shown over five seasons on television from 2008 to 2013) about Walter White (Bryan Cranston) of Albuquerque, New Mexico, a mild-mannered, married, father, and underemployed high school chemistry teacher who is diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer at age 50 (the beginning of the series).  Partnering up with his former failed chemistry student Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul), a Meth cooker and addict himself, Walter turns to a life of crime by producing (cooking) and selling methamphetamine in order to pay for his cancer treatment and secure his family's financial future before he dies.  He tells Jesse in the beginning that he only needs around $700,000 and he'll quit the Meth business.  Towards the end of the series, Walter has become a drug kingpin accumulating over $80 million but leaves behind him a trail of bodies and broken lives. (I won't spoil the show for you in case you too want to watch the series on Netflix.)

I think all of us who've been around awhile can identify somewhat with the character Walter White and the moral and ethical choices he makes in his life. Over the course of the series, we learn that when Walter was in graduate school he co-founded a company with two classmates; they had a falling out and Walter sold his interest in the company for a mere $5000. Fast forward to Walter's 50th birthday and the company is now worth over a billion dollars!  Walter feels life has cheated him.  He lost out on the profits of the business he started with his two classmates, he's underemployed as a high school chemistry teacher, he's still living in a small starter home with his wife and handicapped son (with another child on the way), and he's just been given a cancer death sentence. Believing he has nothing to lose and everything to gain, he gets into the dangerous, deadly, and illegal Meth business.

This is why it's so important to have an Ethos, or a set of guiding ethical and moral beliefs in which we consistently strive to live our lives by such as the 10 Commandments, the Golden Rule, the teachings of Jesus, or societal mores. The character Walter White's god was his love of money and success. Literally he was willing to earn a profit at any price by lying, cheating, stealing, murdering, breaking the law etc.

Most of us wouldn't go to the extremes Walter did to earn a profit; nevertheless, we're all tempted to (in varying degrees) throughout our lives.  I'm reminded of a chilling story Jesus once told (in Matthew 12:43-45): "When an unclean spirit has gone out of a man, he passes through waterless places seeking rest, but he finds none.  Then he says, 'I will return to my house from which I came.' And when he comes he finds it empty, swept, and put in order. Then he goes and brings with him seven other spirits more evil than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man becomes worse than the first."

One way of looking at this passage is that when we strive to become more virtuous by getting rid of our vices (unclean spirits) we essentially "clean house." But if we don't fill our house (our characters) with virtues our former vices can return with a vengeance and we can end up worse-off than before. Virtue is something we have to strive for despite the ups and downs of life. It's more common than not when bad things happen to us we digress to our vices. So if we stop persevering in virtue then our vices naturally return and it will be even harder to get rid of them. Ask any alcoholic, drug addict, or ex-smoker and they'll tell you they could relapse anytime if they don't stay vigilant in maintaining their sobriety or smoke-free lifestyle. Work to rid yourself of vices, but replace them with virtues so your vices don't return.

Breaking Bad is something that can happen to any of us which is why we need to keep Building Good.