{"id":576,"date":"2013-10-31T03:32:00","date_gmt":"2013-10-31T03:32:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/beta.dminlgp.com\/?p=576"},"modified":"2014-08-13T21:48:10","modified_gmt":"2014-08-13T21:48:10","slug":"the-deluge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/the-deluge\/","title":{"rendered":"The Deluge"},"content":{"rendered":"

I have always been intrigued \u00a0by the stories in Greek mythology.\u00a0 One of my favorites is the story of Sisyphus.\u00a0 Sisyphus was the King of Ephyra<\/strong> (same city as Corinth)and was the son of King Aeolus of Thessaly.\u00a0 As the tale goes, Sisyphus who struggled with chronic deceitfulness was banished to a life of rolling an immense boulder up a hill, only to have it roll back to the bottom, where he would again repeat the process over and over again for eternity.\u00a0 No way out, chained to his circumstances, only to repeat the same exhausting process everyday for eternity with no change. \u00a0\u00a0Sound familiar?<\/p>\n

\"image\"<\/p>\n

This past week while reading “A Failure of Nerve: Leadership in the Age of the Quick Fix” by Edwin H. Friedman<\/strong>, I was struck by his research on the information deluge, and\u00a0 its particular effect on human interaction as relating to leaders, teams and their respective organizations.\u00a0 More specifically, I was captured by how this deluge of information in repeated excess, causes chronic anxiety leading to organizations centered around immaturity and selecting the least mature to lead.\u00a0 The following\u00a0 three \u00a0constructs emerged as key sociological flips which have aided in this deluge.<\/p>\n

Social Science Constructs Have Confused<\/strong><\/p>\n

Information with expertise\u2026\u00a0<\/strong> In a world of e-mail, text messaging, Facebook, twitter, Google plus and instagram, if we are not careful we can very quickly attribute the amounts of information dealt with or learned as expertise.\u00a0 Yet expertise is something entirely different.\u00a0 Expertise is sitting with one idea, concept, area of thought for an extended period of time until one becomes an expert.\u00a0 For many today, the assumption is made, \u201cIf I have the information, I must be an expert!\u201d<\/p>\n

Know-how with wisdom\u2026<\/strong> Wisdom has given way to know how and the quick fix.\u00a0 You\u2019ve heard it said, \u201cTime is money!\u201d get yourself moving.\u00a0 With the information deluge, expectations and time have been compressed.\u00a0 Years ago when someone would ask my counsel, I often would listen, pray with them and let them know I would get back to them in a few days.\u00a0 This would give me time to pray, sit with the problem, possibly even check with a mentor about their thoughts and then get back with the person to give counsel.\u00a0 Today, those same people will private message you on Facebook wanting and immediate response from your mobile phone app which keeps connected.\u00a0 Know-how, fix the problem and do it quickly.<\/p>\n

Change with almost anything new\u2026<\/strong>\u00a0 A few days ago in one of my undergrad classes, I placed a picture of my family on a power point slide for an illustration.\u00a0 Immediately, one of the students in the room said, \u201cyou need to get a new picture!\u201d\u00a0 Now, the picture I was using is the one I have of my family on my Facebook profile page.\u00a0 It\u2019s about 10 months old.\u00a0 I asked, \u201cHow new does it need to be?\u201d They looked at me with a straight face and said, \u201cSomething I haven\u2019t seen before, to look at something twice isn\u2019t worth my time.\u201d<\/p>\n

The deluge numbs our senses, causes us not to hear God\u2019s still small voice and isolates us from others!<\/strong><\/p>\n

If we get caught in the fallacy that all information is equal and that all communication needs to be responded to, we run the risk of forever being chained.\u00a0 Not all information is worth gathering, just as not all communication is worth returning<\/strong>.\u00a0 If we enter our work a day world measuring success based off the need to get everything done, collect all data, we run the risk of becoming like Sisyphus.\u00a0 Ever chained to our desk or data phone, missing the very simplicities that often display and communicate great love.\u00a0 Drawing us into the presence of God, then others.<\/p>\n

Juan Mann the creator of “Free Hugs”<\/strong>,\u00a0 realized after a season of numerous personal difficulties he had become isolated and depressed.\u00a0 Those who he would once see and smile at in public, simply became objects to avoid.\u00a0 Realizing his depression and isolation was becoming worse, he turned to visiting the Pitt Street Mall in central Sidney Australia.\u00a0 His goal was to begin giving \u201cFree Hugs\u201d to those in the mall, realizing it would benefit them as well as him.\u00a0 Watch how Juan Mann stepped out of the deluge.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I have always been intrigued \u00a0by the stories in Greek mythology.\u00a0 One of my favorites is the story of Sisyphus.\u00a0 Sisyphus was the King of Ephyra (same city as Corinth)and was the son of King Aeolus of Thessaly.\u00a0 As the tale goes, Sisyphus who struggled with chronic deceitfulness was banished to a life of rolling […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2,243],"class_list":["post-576","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-dminlgp","tag-efriedman","cohort-lgp3"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/576","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=576"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/576\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1910,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/576\/revisions\/1910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=576"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=576"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=576"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}