Travis Johnson

Enlighten the People

While inside the Houses of Congress yesterday, I was taken back by a statement by Thomas Jefferson. It was chisled above a doorway. He said:

Enlighten the people, generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like spirits at the dawn of day.

Wow. What a governmental concept. Give citizens information...no... give humans information and they are freed from oppressive machines and imaginations. The truth of Jesus Christ enlightens and frees the minds, bodies, and souls of humans. May our cities be freed by the transformational power of the Gospel of Christ.

Destiny

"The only thing standing between you and your destiny is the tough decision you are unwilling to make."

I wish I could remember who said this.  How many huge, mission-oriented opportunities are out there for you?  Having trouble getting to them for the clutter?  Consider eliminating your clutter to get to your basic life mission.

I find that clutter happens and becomes somehow important.  The next thing you know a garage no longer has space for a car, a person has no time for God, a life has no space for others.

On Broken Dreams

If one dream should fall and break into a thousand pieces, never be afraid to pick one of those pieces up and begin again.  ~Flavia Weedn

I was pulled aside a few times yesterday by people who have experienced failure along their journey.  I'm inspired by their decision to pick up a piece and move forward.  Facing failure is not fun.  But, I believe that our failures are actually the dark places where we find God's hand and the hope that we can trust Him.  The decisions we make in those moments alter our life's course.

Martin Luther King Jr. on Guts

"Cowardice asks the question, 'Is it safe?' Expediency asks the question, 'Is it politic?' Vanity asks the question, 'Is it popular?' But, conscience asks the question, 'Is it right?' And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but one must take it because one's conscience tells one that it is right."

-- Martin Luther King Jr.

Edmund Burke on Leadership

On Novermber 3, 1774, Edmund Burke spoke to the Electors at Bristol regarding his conviction of leadership.  He said, "Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment; and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinion."

The status quo is our biggest enemy.  In fact, status quo would call us to abandon our better judgment and innovative ideas to line up with the organizational cogs who predictably resist any substantial change.  Fighting it can be so exhausting that we eventually either lose our will to fight it or we give up never fully developing our backbone and thoughtful words needed to overcome it.  Worse yet, we often fight status quo in all the wrong places.  By targeting the fully entrenched and decidedly unchangeable for the purpose of affecting change, we have already lost.

Greg says to target the driest kindling with our fire.  Everett Rogers schools us all in what Greg is saying with his idea diffusion curve.  Seth says "all the growth and the opportunity and the fun is at the leading edge."  He further states that this is "where the change happens."

So, take the fight for positive change to the hearts and minds of those most receptive to change and innovation.

tagged: seth godin - greg stielstra - idea diffusion - edmund burke - leadership and innovation

Favorite George Eliot quotes

It has been a while since I read a good fiction.  I've read Silas Marner before.  It was in the ship library and I couldn't pass it up.  "George Eliot" shares some super insightful words, as applicable today as ever before. Consider these excerpts:

"...the past becomes dreamy because its symbols have all vanished, and the present too is dreamy because it is linked with no memories."

Silas is relieved when Dolly leaves: "her simple view of life and its comforts, by which she had tried to cheer him, was only like a report of unknown objects, which his imagination could not fashion."

"As the child’s mind was growing into knowledge, his mind was growing into memory: as her life unfolded, his soul, long stupefied in a cold narrow prison, was unfolding too, and trembling gradually into full consciousness."

"Do we not wile away moments of inanity or fatigued waiting by repeating some trivial movement or sound, until the repetition has bred a want, which is incipient habit?"

"A man will tell you that he has worked in a mine for forty years unhurt by an accident as a reason why he should apprehend no danger, though the roof is beginning to sink..."

Technorati Tags: George Eliot - Silas Marner - quotes - emerging church