September 2022, I was not only excited about starting school, but I was pretty sure and excited about my NPO. Even though I knew I would be working on my NPO I was thankful it was pretty much set and had to be tweaked a little. After two months of school, I was getting some doubts about my set-in stone NPO. Six months later, I\u2019m even more doubtful than ever. A huge reason for my doubt is all the required reading that is challenging my way of thinking, believing and responding. At this time my NPO has developed into, \u201cMen who have sexual brokenness challenges desperately need help from the church to heal.\u201d After reading \u201cWhy We\u2019re Wrong about Nearly Everything,\u201d by Bobby Duffy, I am questioning if my NPO should be something entirely different. As I read the book, I actually questioned myself, <\/p>\n
1.\tHow do I REALLY know men are having sexual brokenness challenges?
\n2.\tWho are these men (young, middle aged, elderly, teenagers)?
\n3.\tWhat is a sexual brokenness challenge?
\n4.\tAre men really desperate about needing help or is that just my belief?
\n5.\tWhat is the Church ACTUALLY doing to help men?
\n6.\tHow can I find out what the Church is doing? Should I narrow down my research to just my church or community or denomination?
\n7.\tWhat does it mean to heal and how do I know if the Church is helping in this area?
\n8.\tHow in the world did I go from certainty to frazzled about my NPO in 6 months?<\/p>\n
In his book Duffy describes the way people misperceive social realities, from teen pregnancy to crime, obesity, and immigration. His studies involved more than 100,000 interviews on many issues in 40 nations. He demonstrates, through solid data, that we only hear what we want to hear. In England, asked what percentage of British teens gave birth every year, people guessed 19% (correct answer: 1.4%). In France, people thought Muslims were 31% of the population (reality: 8%). In the U.S., people guessed immigrants make up 33% of the population (reality: 14%). And so on.[1] \u201cOur misperceptions are wide, deep, and long-standing,\u201d [2], writes the author. Complex forces shape beliefs, most notably our emotional responses, which are key to our perception of reality. Driven by \u201cpreexisting beliefs and wishful thinking,\u201d our delusions are formed by \u201chardwired\u201d biases and a tendency to seek information that reinforces our views. The latter includes news media whose penchant for negative stories leads many to think \u201ceverything is getting worse.\u201d \u201cWe not only have a built-in bias towards focusing on the vivid and threatening, but we also tend to think things were better in the past, and therefore are worse now,\u201d [3], writes Duffy. As a result, we are often \u201cvery wrong\u201d about global trends. The author depressingly notes that it is \u201cdifficult to change people\u2019s delusions simply by giving them more information.\u201d [4]. There is no magic formula for encouraging more accurate perceptions, he writes, increased skepticism and awareness of our emotional thinking can help.<\/p>\n
Now, I\u2019m looking inward to check my preexisting beliefs, wishful thinking, hardwired biases, and my emotional thinking. Without a doubt I strongly believe my NPO has biases. In September, I would not have agreed to any bias. Now I\u2019m asking, \u201cHow do I know the Church is not helping men to heal? Just because Christian men struggle to get help does not mean the Church is at fault. \u201cIs there something else that correlates with both? This something else is called a confounding variable.\u201d [5]. So, what am I missing in my NPO? Am I just assuming the Church is failing in this area, which is a bias. Chivers and Chivers said, \u201csamples can be biased, the most obvious is leading questions.\u201d [6]. All my leading questions and NPO were biased, and I never saw it. But who knows, maybe my NPO will end of similar to the one I have now but if it does, it will be after much scrutiny. I remember when Poole wrote, \u201cYou will never be \u2018finished\u2019, so future proofing your leadership means taking charge of your learning as an on-going activity.\u201d [7]. I will continue to remind myself of this, even when I think I\u2019m done with my NPO or have the \u2018right\u2019 wording or concept. <\/p>\n
Finally, I saw through Duffy\u2019s book that my NPO has lots of emotion even though there are no emotionally charged words in it. \u201cIf our emotional reactions are part of the reason we exaggerate or downplay reality, it makes sense that our delusions may relate to how emotionally expressive we are.\u201d [8]. I always read my NPO with such emotion because the Church should care for those who are broken. That\u2019s a no-brainer but not all will look at my NPO with the same emotion and now I realized that. <\/p>\n
[1] Bobby Duffy, Why We\u2019re Wrong about Nearly Everything: A Theory of Human Misunderstanding, First US edition (New York: Basic Books, 2019). P.25,27,29.<\/p>\n
[2] Ibid, Duffy P. 7.<\/p>\n
[3] Ibid, Duffy, P. 29. <\/p>\n
[4] Ibid, Duffy, P. 43.<\/p>\n
[5] Tom Chivers and David Chivers, How to Read Numbers: A Guide to Stats in the News (and Knowing when to Trust Them). (Great Britain: Orion Books, 2021). P. 47.<\/p>\n
[6] Ibid, Chivers and Chivers, P. 32.<\/p>\n
[7] Eve Poole, Leadersmithing: Revealing the Trade Secrets of Leadership. (London: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2017), P. 13.<\/p>\n
[8] Bobby Duffy, Why We\u2019re Wrong about Nearly Everything: A Theory of Human Misunderstanding, First US edition (New York: Basic Books, 2019). P. 225.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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