I suppose there’s hardly a youth alive that at some time or other didn't wondered how the birth-stork got it so wrong as to deliver him to such an ordinary and underfunded set of parents.
What I’m trying to say is that when we stop counting our blessings and focus instead on what we take uncritically to be the unadulterated good fortune and glowing success of others, we are on ground beneath which vast sinkholes lurk to swallow us whole.
One of my most favorite exercises in my university studies was to address efficiency/effectiveness trade-offs. That is, in business or government (or in our personal lives) we can be sorely tempted to sacrifice long-term effectiveness for the sugar-highs short-term efficiencies can offer. And wouldn’t you know, it is at this juncture in which purpose and integrity become key-- a totally unprincipled person has huge advantages in getting things done speedily and efficiently due to the absence of their needing to weigh conscience and ethical considerations.
So therefore, we can look at others with great penis envy for the impressive size of their brand-new toys. With a little discernment, however, we may in fact find that we do not subscribe at all to their underlying nihilism—expressed as "those who die with the most toys win." In fact, we may find such a view repugnant and antithetical to our own beliefs.
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Efficiency (get it done right here, right now!) can trash the insights of portfolio theory…yet finding a vehicle to employ "all the love we can give" can be excruciatingly inefficient and time consuming and, most importantly, require a sustaining grounding in faith.
Nevertheless, somehow, I feel much more secure within the intricate tapestries of faith than when boldly blazoned upon the garish banners of absolute and centralized power.
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