The Most Effective Organization in the U.S. by Robert A. Watson & Ben Brown

Watson, Robert A., & Ben Brown.  The Most Effective Organization in the U.S.: Leadership Secrets of the Salvation Army.  New York: Crown Business, 2001.

What is The Salvation Army?  Is it a service organization or a church?  Yes.  That is, it is both.  In The Most Effective Organization in the United States, former National Commander Robert A. Watson, with Ben Brown, writes much about the organization’s dual mission of preaching the good news of Jesus Christ and helping needy people.  The Salvation Army would say this is a single mission because they so closely relate saving people with serving them.

The title of the book is taken for Peter Drucker’s praise for the Army.  The authors do not for a moment shy away from the Christian history, motivation and mission of the organization.  Even so, this book is aimed at business and organizational leaders who want their companies to be more effective.

It’s good to start with this focus on mission.  The Army is extremely mission focused.  Everything they do and the way they do it, including how they organize, manage and lead, is done to achieve the mission.  The first lesson in effectiveness is that an organization needs a transcendent mission, something greater than making money that can bring purpose to people’s lives.

Clear mission allows the Army to attract great people.  People need meaning and purpose in life, and finding people with personal missions that align with the organization’s leads to passionate employees.  They’re not just employees, they’re partners.  They also see their clients, often people in very bad situations, as potential partners.  People who have been transformed by Christ and who know the value of the help they received from the Army, when they are on their feet again, are potentially very committed and motivated volunteers, employees and officers.

As one would hope from a Christian organization, the Army places a high value on integrity.  Integrity is closely linked to accountability.  They are very careful to assure that all they do advances their mission.  Likewise, they want their people, especially officers, to live their values.  They also want their constituents to trust that they will deliver on their promises.  The Army careful about accountability.  Their local leaders have extraordinary latitude, but they also have great responsibility and are answerable for themselves and their programs.  They are open and transparent so clients and donors know that the resources entrusted to them are used well.

One of the things that impressed me about the Army is that their commitment to mission and accountability makes it easier for them to say no.  If it doesn’t fit, or if it isn’t sustainable, they let it go.  Even existing programs are not sacred.  If it’s not working, if it begins to distract from the mission, it is dropped even if a lot as already been invested in it.

I enjoyed this book much more that most business books.  I admit it appealed to my own sensibilities.  It’s also a glimpse inside an organization that most people know relatively little about.  The authors explain how the Army accomplishes so much with its resources with so little management structure.  They’re way is adaptable to business, but probably requires a lot more discipline than many top business managers may have.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Revved! by Harry Paul and Ross Reck

Titus

Vital Friends by Tom Rath

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Technology in World Civilization by Arnold Pacey

For those looking for a brief survey of technological history around the world, Technology in World Civilization by Arnold Pacey would be a good start. With just a little preface to introduce ideas about how civilizations interact in relation to technology, Pacey dives into a historical narrative of the development of major technologies. He starts in A.D. 700 and continues almost to the time the book was published in 1990.

Throughout the book, Pacey describes the interactions between civilizations as a dialogue. Straightforward, direct transfer of technology from one civilization to another is rare in his view. The success and development of a technology that originated in a foreign culture depends a lot on the customs, organization, government, economy, and technology of the receiving culture. Very often, the adoption of a foreign technology spurs adaptions, improvements and even new inventions among the adopters. Even the rumor of a foreign technology can spur people invent, or independently reinvent, solutions to a problem. Pacey is keen to recognize this stimulus effect in cross-cultural dialogue related to technology.

In addition to recognizing the inventiveness found in many cultures, Pacey is careful not to overemphasize mechanical inventions, which might tend to put the focus on the West. He points out that the development of more efficient and productive crops and agricultural practices in Asia were also important technologies.

Another important technological improvement centered on organization and abstraction. As technologies became larger and more complex, they exhausted what could be experienced directly by craftsmen. Improvement depended on developing new ways of thinking about materials and work. Scale drawing and model-making became a way to deal with complex construction. New principles of organization were applied to work, such as specialization and division of labor, especially as people began to work with powered machinery. Some technological improvements even required a new way of understanding materials, spurring interest in the development of sciences, especially chemistry.

Pacey follows this progression through guns and railroads and into the 20^th century with computers, nuclear power, and flights to the moon. He doesn’t stop there. Instead, he takes a look, seemingly “back,” to survival technologies. Technologies related to agriculture, sanitation and environmental health in the 20^th century have a huge impact on the way we live today. In the decades since this book was published, the Internet has revolutionized the way we think about computing and communications, but in many ways our health, wellbeing and lifestyles depend on technologies that are centuries old and we cannot neglect them. Perhaps in an ongoing cross-cultural dialogue about technology, new and old, we can find solutions to current and future problems (climate change, water shortages, clean energy, food security and more) that are adaptable to the various needs, scales and organizations of cultures around the world.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Dreams of Iron and Steel by Deborah Cadbury

Pacey, Arnold. Technology in World Civilization: A Thousand-Year History. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 1990.

The Vulnerable Fortress by James R. Taylor and Elizabeth J. Van Every

Taylor, James R., and Elizabeth J. Van Every. The Vulnerable Fortress. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993.
ISBN 0-8020-7773-0

Taylor and Van Every explore the traditional model of organization as machine and the difficulties discovered in attempts to map real organizations into machines (computers and information technology). They conclude that the machine model is inadequate and offer as an alternative the model of the organization as conversation and text.



Perhaps the most useful thing is the book is the demonstration of the inadequacies of the machine model; the authors show it is necessary to look elsewhere. The alternative model is perhaps too new and theoretical to be of immediate use, but the authors introduce some interesting concepts as they develop their model. These concepts are frames and scripts. Frames are templates or archetypes that we overlay onto situations and give us perspective on how the elements of a situation are related. Scripts are similar to frames, but specify behaviors or sequences of events. It is interesting to think of learning as the reframing of a situation that allows one to examine the old frame.

The book is a lot to take in at once. The concepts and arguments are sometimes so abstract that they become difficult to follow. While I think it has merit, the model of conversation and text does not readily illuminate or simplify understanding of organizations because conversation and text themselves are difficult to understand. It is difficult to put a frame around, learn about, language, conversation and text because these form a frame that encompasses most human activity. The authors are right to say that conversation and text cannot be ignored and cannot be reconciled to the machine model, but they ask the reader to make a large conceptual leap to say that the organization is conversation and text.

How to Improve Your Memory by James D. Weinland

James D. Weinland’s How to Improve Your Memory is, in my mind, primarily a book on study skills. Weinland’s interest is learning, and memory is an important part of that.

As I read the book, it seemed to me that learning successfully is built on four areas: intention, attention, repetition and organization. Weinland has tips related to all of these.

Intention to learn is easy to come by when you have an interest in a subject. If you’re not interested, you’ll need to find some other motivation. Think about why you’re studying a subject and the benefits you hope to achieve. Even if you’re a student and you “have to” take a class, think of the opportunities that might open up to you if you get a good grade.

Attention is very important to memory and learning. If you forget something, it is very likely you weren’t paying attention to begin with. Remove distractions from your environment and mind (this wasn’t an issue when this book was published in 1957, but put away your cell phone and put it out of your mind). Engage as many senses as you can.

Remember that attention isn’t an infinitely available commodity. Get the rest you need. Don’t burn yourself out by focusing too long on one subject or closely related subjects. Give your mind, especially the executive functions a break, by alternating unrelated subjects, switching back and forth from mental to physical activities and making a little time for rest and recreation.

Repetition is important to memory, but it doesn’t need to be boring. Allowing time between practice sessions can actually improve performance.

Organization can go a long way to making learning easier. Some of the most successful mnemonic techniques involve arranging and associating things we want to remember with things we already remember well, especially locations. For instance, pigeonholing involves creating a spacial arrangement, such as a grid, with things to be remembered in each space. Mind maps do something similar with a more free-form arrangement that also takes advantage of our ability to remember images and colors. Memory castles are sophisticated applications of this strategy. Understanding how things are divided into wholes and parts or groups can help you break down subjects into smaller, easier to remember, parts that are connected so that remembering on item helps you remember the others.

I tend to connect the use of meaningful association to the idea of organization. Meaningful association builds on what you already know. This could be building on or filling in your background on a subject, finding analogies to familiar or using acronyms and rhymes. A related practice is it to come up with an outrageous image that represents what you want to remember. We find it easy to remember images—the more unusual the image the easier it is to recall—so we can take advantage of that by associating what we want remember with a crazy image that reminds of it.

The book is dated, but I think the advice is applicable even if the science of memory has advance. In addition, the book has the advantage of being short.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Double Your Brain Power by Jean Marie Stine

Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer

The Organized Mind by Daniel J. Levitin

Rapt by Winifred Gallagher

Your Intelligence Makeover by Edward F. Droge, Jr.

Weinland, James D. How to Improve Your Memory. New York: Barnes & Noble, 1957.

On Becoming a Leader by Warren Bennis

I wrote this for a class in public administration back in 1997. You can tell it’s for a class because it’s longer than the reviews I’d normally write for this blog. I have the sense from reading it that the assignment must have involve answering particular questions about the book. I got an A-. The hyperlinks are added, but I haven’t changed it otherwise from what I wrote the first time.
Bennis, Warren. On Becoming a Leader. New York: Addison-Wesley, 1994.

Bennis’ premise is that leadership comes out of the state of being of the leader. Leadership starts with a leader’s capacity for self-invention, to shape himself with learning and reflection as opposed to being shaped by circumstances. In Bennis’ words, “No leader sets out to be a leader. People set out to live their lives, expressing themselves fully. When that expression is of value, they become leaders.”

Bennis’ process of self-invention begins with self-knowledge. He proposes four lessons to gaining self-knowledge. First, “you are your own best teacher”; learning is essential. Second is to accept responsibility for your own education. Third, “you can learn anything you want to learn.” Finally, reflection is necessary to develop understanding and a leader must question his experience to learn. Leaders innovate and learn from experience without fear of mistakes. According to Bennis’ definition, a leader is someone in the front, doing things others have not done.

A leader must add knowledge of the world to self-knowledge. Bennis says that a leader should learn about the world through participation rather than reaction. One learns by trying to change something as well as experiencing it as it is. The conscious learner seeks broad experience, learns from others and from mistakes.

A leader must trust his instincts. Bennis uses Emerson’s term “blessed impulse.” Blessed impulse is a tool for making decisions in a world to complex to be completely understood.

Leaders must deploy themselves. By this Bennis means a leader must practice self-expression. Deploying oneself is offset against being deployed by others or the voices of others on one’s head.

Leaders must “get people on their side.” Bennis prescribes constancy, congruity of words and action, reliability and integrity.

Bennis also speaks more generally about the characteristics and roles of leaders. These are similar to what might be found in other books on leadership.


Bennis calls the organization the primary form in American society. He challenges leaders to shape their organizations, and shape society, to make them work in a rapidly changing world. He encourages executives to empower junior leaders in their organizations to teach them leadership through experience.

Throughout, Bennis uses the experience of twelve leaders gleaned from interviews. Bennis includes a brief biography of each leader at the end.

At first, it seems that Bennis says that one becomes a leader by being a leader. This is what he says, but he does not leave the reader hanging. Bennis’ perspective is what is unique about the book. Leadership is the expression of the character, qualities, values and personality of a leader. His is not a direct call for us to become leaders, but for us to become ourselves. Leadership will follow.

This may be a difficult lesson. Buyers of books on leadership are probably more interested in learning the skills of leadership and management to help them in their current situations. Bennis says express yourself. If you are doing what you think you ought to do, if others deploy you, you will not be a leader. Self-expression may take you to something different.

The first step to leadership is self-knowledge. A useful tool is self-evaluation, what Bennis calls “tests and measures.” Bennis offers a set of four tests—really four statements. One could apply the tests with pencil and paper, making lists in response to each statement. Of all the tools and suggestions in the book, this set of tests is the most clear and immediately applicable. A reader wanting to apply Bennis’ lessons would do well to start here.

Little else can be used immediately. Changes in point of view and lifestyle take time. One might argue that only a few Bennis’ suggested activities are specific to developing leadership. To me, much of it sounds fun and interesting. That is the point Bennis is trying to make: leadership comes out of broad experience, education, perspective, desire, mastery of one’s discipline and synthesis of ideas.

My own experience validates this. I am as proud of my single published poem as I am of my accomplishments as an engineer or public servant. The skills and abilities exercised by writing are different from those exercised by engineering. I am persuaded that, though seemingly unrelated, one improves the other in me.

Bennis’ somewhat artificial distinction between managers and leaders is a shortcoming. He makes a manager sound like something one would not want to be. He list skills and characteristics developed from the “education” of a leader and the “training” of a manager. All seemingly undesirable things are on the manager side. On might argue tat several management skills, like deduction and common sense, would be useful to a leader.

Most of the interviews are businessmen, but some come from public service agencies and professions. In may seem that businessmen are more susceptible to “surrendering to the context”—the bottom line, the corporate culture, the style of a boss to be pleased—but public service leaders must face their own context. A public servant may readily accept his organization’s view of the way things should be or done, what is important and who to involve without ever considering his own vision, ability and desire.

It may be more important for public section leadership to use self-expression. While a business leader may have the satisfaction of bringing a product to market, making a profit, even gaining notoriety, a public leader may never see his vision achieved. A public leaders’ satisfaction may have to come from living the life he wants to live.

A particular item addressed by Bennis that may be of use to one in public service is getting people on your side. A public leader may have little to rely on besides his integrity and “voice”—an ability to change the climate of his organization and shape it to work more effectively. As important as it is, Bennis can offer little on the subject except constancy, congruity, reliability and integrity. He says to be someone others might follow. He offers no lessons on persuasion, though if persuasion can be taught, it may be of little benefit to those who lake those characteristics.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in
The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership Tested by Time by James L. Garlow
Blink by Malcolm Gladwell
Developing the Leader Within by John C. Maxwell
The Difference Maker by John C. Maxwell
Winning with People by John C. Maxwell

The Dawn of Innovation by Charles R. Morris

Over the course of the 19^th Century, the United States transformed from a frontier nation dependent on trade with former colonizing nations to a leading manufacturer and exporter of goods. Charles R. Morris describes how America accomplished this change in The Dawn of Innovation.

The forces that led to the development of an American system of manufacturing were practical and cultural. There were labor shortages, especially for skilled labor. Americans in every field were interested in mechanizing work to get it done with the people and skills available. Americans were also largely middle class, at least in their way of thinking. They had to have the means to cross the Atlantic, and once here wage pressure and the availability of resources quickly made many people middle class. The middle class valued improvement and economic independence. In the U.S. they were free from the limiting class structures of Europe.

The middle class were also consumers. They were interested in the goods and lifestyle associated with wealth, but at prices they could afford. And there were a lot more of them that the handful of rich people who were the consumers of traditional luxury goods. Americans wanted to produce, market and distribute goods on a mass scale that was hard for Europeans of the time to even imagine.

The cloth-making industry was one of the first to bring together the aspects of modern manufacturing: specialization, organization of work flow, mechanization and automation. American cloth makers took—sometimes stole—these things from the British. A leap that the Americans made, but not the British, was to apply these same concepts to all kinds of production.

The organization of work was especially helpful in the U.S., where the skilled workers needed for precision machine making were few. Morris uses the arms industry as an example of American leadership in the transformation from craft piecework to an organized workflow with uniform standards.

Morris also undertakes some myth busting. Eli Whitney is associated with first rifles—really the first manufactured goods—to have interchangeable parts, which is a hallmark of modern manufacturing. Whitney and others promised interchangeability to win contracts with the Army, but he never achieved it; it took him a while to even become a good gun maker. It took decades of work by others to achieve interchangeable parts. This was both a matter of organizing work and developing more precise machining equipment.

Morris shows how innovations accumulated over time to create American manufacturing leadership. He shows how the culture and natural environment were incubators for such development.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

The Gentleman Scientists by Tom Schachtman

Mayflower by Nathaniel Philbrick

The Power Makers by Maury Klein

The Society for Useful Knowledge by Jonathan Lyons

Waste and Want by Susan Strasser

Morris, Charles R. The Dawn of Innovation: The First American Industrial Revolution. New York: Public Affairs, 2012.

Old Testament History

The historical books of the Old Testament (the first 17 books in the typical organization of Christian Bibles) tell the story of the rise and fall of the Israelite nation. The big chunks of history are organized in this manner:

1- Founding the nation and receiving the Law (the Pentateuch, which includes Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy),

--The conquest and early settlement of Canaan (Joshua and Judges),

3-The early roots of a kingdom in Israel (Ruth and I Samuel),

4-The Israelite Kingdom (II Samuel, I and II Kings, I and II Chronicles), and

5-The end of captivity and rebuilding of Jerusalem (Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther).

The books are not organized in a strictly chronological order. In addition, there are overlaps and gaps.

A theme that runs through the books is the active engagement of God. He is engaged in all of His creation, and particularly in the history of the Israelite nation. He called them out to be His people, he caused them to rise and prosper as a nation, and when they turned away from them, He brought them low.

Another theme in these books is the importance of moral leadership. When the nation had morally upright leaders, the people tended to also be morally upright. When the leaders were selfish, greedy, lustful, and following false gods, the people followed them into every kind of sin. We are strongly influenced by others, especially our leaders.

The Holy Bible. New King James Version. Nashville, TN:  Thomas Nelson, 1982.

James

James.  The Holy Bible.  New King James Version.  Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1982.

James wrote to Jewish Christians.  His letter is full of practical wisdom for all Christians.

*

Several related themes run through James.  These are trials, self-control, practical faith, and humility.

James begins his letter with a discussion of trials.  We all have troubles.  Disconcertingly, sometimes our worst problems arise from doing the right thing.  Though it may seem like God has abandoned us in such times, God is at work.  Facing trials with patience and faith builds our character.

Part of a godly character is self-control.  A mature Christian will discipline himself.  In particular, he will watch what he says.  It is hard to control what we say, refraining from idle and harmful words.  It is hard to speak convincingly about the love, grace, and faithfulness of God when you just spewed a lot of gossip, lies, and nonsense.

James writes of faith in very practical and active terms.  Sermons, exultations, and moral sayings are hollow and useless if they are not coupled with service, aid and upright living.  If we really believe the Gospel and have call to be followers of Christ, we will act like Christ who humbled Himself to labor with men, heal the sick, feed the hungry, and care for the needy.

Emulating the humility or Christ is a theme of the letter in itself.  James extols believers to act with humility and treat everyone fairly.  Wealth and position are temporary, but in our eternal relation to God we’re all the same:  each Christian is a sinful person saved by the grace of God.  Pride is a source of strife, people in conflict as they all try to get their own way, but humble people trust God and can let go of strife.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Deuteronomy

Exodus

Genesis

The Gospels

Hebrews

Leviticus

The Most Effective Organization in the U.S. by Robert A. Watson & Ben Brown

The Pauline Letters

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Superman versus the Ku Klux Klan by Rick Bowers

On February 5, 1946, The Adventures of Superman radio program opened with a new introduction:

Yes, it’s Superman.  Strange visitor from another planet, who came to earth with powers and abilities farbeyond those of mortal men.  Superman, defender of law and order, champion of equal rights, valiant, courageous fighter against the forces of hate and prejudice!

This announced the beginning of the radio Superman’s struggle with post-war social issues, especially a campaign against racial and religious intolerance.  In this adventure, Jimmy Olsen infiltrated the Guardians of America, a fictional stand-in for pro-Nazi groups that were operating in the United States at the time.  This was only the beginning.  Later that year, Adventures would feature a 16-episode story in which Superman took on the Clan of the Fiery Cross, a stand-in for the Ku Klux Klan (KKK).

Behind these fictional stories of Superman were real-life adventures.  The KKK was attempting to launch a new national membership drive, playing on the insecurities people felt after World War II.  There were real infiltrators of the KKK and other organized hatemongers who exposed the workings of these organizations in the media.  Rick Bowers tells the story of these men and the producers of the comic book and radio Superman in Superman versus the Ku Klux Klan.

Superman had been dealing with cultural concerns from his beginning.  When Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, Jewish high-school students in Cleveland, created Superman in the 1930s, they pitted him against criminal gangs and crooked politicians.  As Nazi Germany began to rise as an aggressive European power, the hero opposed Nazis at home and abroad.  During the war, he protected the home front.   Though it is not the focus, Bowers describes how Superman has changes with the concerns of the times.

The Klan has roots going back to the Reconstruction era after the Civil War.  It started as a jokey order of former Confederate Army officers in Tennessee who imitated the mystery religion-inspired fraternal orders that were popular at colleges, with mysterious rituals and strange names.  It spawned imitators that secretly gathered in Nashville to organize themselves in 1867.  Former Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest was the first Grand Wizard, who lead the Klan in opposition to Reconstruction, including domestic terrorism against blacks and white proponents of racial equality and Reconstruction policies.  The violence of the Klan members, called Ghouls, eroded the organization’s popularity.

William J. Simmons launched a campaign to revive the Klan, taking it national in 1920.  For Simmons it was largely a moneymaking scheme, though he seemed happy to promote intolerance of blacks, Jews, Catholics, immigrants and anyone else who wasn’t a white, male Protestant.  (I’m a white, male Protestant and I find nothing in Protestantism, or Christianity in general, that justifies the intolerance promoted by the Klan.)  Successors led the Klan to political activism in the 1920s, and it became very powerful, but front-line violence and leadership hypocrisy undermined their position.  The post-war membership campaign, led by Samuel Green who was Grand Dragon of the Georgia Realm, was thwarted by law enforcement and equal rights advocates with help of medial like Adventures.

The library helpfully labeled Bowers’ book with a sticker that reads, “TEEN.”  I suppose it is a young adult book, though I think it is within the grasp of many middle school students.  It is an unusual introduction to the history of bigotry in American and the movements that promoted equality, but the tie to a popular superhero might make the subject more appealing to kids in school.  It made me pick up the book, and I’m far passed my school days.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon

Maus by Art Spiegelman

Men of Tomorrow by Gerard Jones

The Ten-Cent Plague by David Hajdu

Bowers, Rick.  Superman versus the Ku Klux Klan.  Washington, DC: National Geographic, 2012.

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General Epistles

The General Epistles are so called because most are addressed to the entire church. This is in contrast to the Pauline Letters, which are typically addressed to particular people or congregation. They are sometimes referred to as the Catholic Letters, catholic in this case referring to universal or for everyone.

These letters were written by different people at different times with somewhat different intentions. Even so, some common themes can be found in these books. Some themes that I observed are

-the importance of the Gospel taught by the apostles, and a defense against false teachers,

-that Christians should imitate the love and character of Christ,

-that helping others is a particularly important way to of practically emulating Christ, and

-encouragement for Christians, especially those who are suffering or persecuted.

The Gospel

The Gospel was central to the teaching of the apostles, as it is central to the church today. The writings of the apostles particularly emphasized the deity of Jesus Christ, His death on the cross for the atonement of our sins, and His bodily resurrection from the grave as proof of who He was and the authority of His teachings. Even in that first generation, the church was beset with people who tried to alter, twist, or reimagine God’s Word, putting aside the truth to suit themselves and their own agendas. These authors defend the Gospel against false teachers.

Character

Salvation involves an amazing transformation. It is also just the beginning of a life walking with God. God’s Word works in our minds, and the Holy Spirit works in our heart, to change us so we are increasingly more like Christ. The authors of these letters encourage believers to embrace this process and actively imitate Christ. If a person belongs to God, their character will show it, and it will show more as they mature.

Helping Others

One of the most practical ways to show what Christ is like, and to imitate him, is to help other. The authors of these letters encourage Christians to help the widowed, orphaned, hungry, imprisoned and oppressed, especially if there is a fellow Christian in need.

Encouragement

People suffered in the First Century, even as they do today. Christians in those days sometimes faced active persecution. Even where they were tolerated, their new beliefs and behaviors sometimes brought them into painful conflict with family and friends. The writers of these letters encouraged them to stick with the truth. God is with them and will help them overcome. Often it is the character of believers, especially the way they behave in suffering, that is the testimony that touches the heart of a love-one or even a stranger in a way that eventually brings them to Christ.

The General Epistles are

-James,

-First and Second Peter,

-First, Second and Third John, and

-Jude.

If you’re interested in reading these books, you may also be interested in reading

Deuteronomy

Exodus

Genesis

The Gospels

Gospel of John

Hebrews

Leviticus

The Most Effective Organization in the U.S. by Robert A. Watson & Ben Brown

Pauline Letters

Proverbs

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Anything is possible if a person believes

Bibliography

Christians are not so to be so much quitters as starters

Google Doodle Celebrates 107^th Anniversary of Little Nemo

Other cool doodles include

-Alan Turing

-Golden Gate Bridge

-Heinrich Hertz

-Star Trek

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Hebrews

I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me

If you want to conquer fear...go out and get busy

The Most Effective Organization in the U.S. by Robert A. Watson & Ben Brown

New & Interesting Stuff Oct. 16, 2012

Pauline Letters

Case Closed (Vol. 2) by Gosho Ayoama

Gosho Ayoama. Case Closed. Vol. 2. 1994. San Francisco: VIZ, 2004.

Case Closed is a collection of short detective stories in comic form (manga). They were originally published in Japan under the title “Meitantei Conan” (Detective Conan). That is the straightforward part.

The hero is a teenager with a genius for solving crime, Jimmy Kudo. He stumbles onto something and a crime organization poisons him. Instead of killing him, the drug shrinks him down to the size of a first grader. He commits himself to finding the men who did it. To protect himself and his friends for the criminals who think he is dead, he takes on the name Conan Edogawa (from mystery authors Conan Doyle and Rumpo Edogawa) and takes up with his unsuspecting girlfriend, Rachel, and her father, mediocre private investigator Richard Moore. To get this back-story, you’ll need to read the first volume or see early episodes of the anime series that closely follows the manga.



Other than that, the stories are straightforward tales of ratiocination in the Western tradition started by Edgar Allen Poe and taken up so well by Doyle in his Sherlock Holmes stories. For someone interested in getting familiar with manga, Japanese comics, this may be a good place to start. The mystery story is familiar to Westerners and the art is in the manga style.

This particular volume has three stories. Gosho Ayoama’s method is to present a complete mystery story and occasionally include stories that touch on Jimmy’s broader quest to return to his normal size and bring his shrinkers to justice. You don’t have to be invested in the larger story to enjoy reading the individual mysteries.

Though Jimmy appears to be a young child, and has adventures with kids from his elementary school class, the stories are not for children. There is murder and other crimes, violence and gore, and children in imminent danger. Conan has a particular knack for provoking killers into coming after him.

Lost Connections by Hari Johnson

Depression and anxiety are growing problems in the West. The model of depression as a chemical imbalance in the brain is breaking down, and antidepressants are ineffective. (I’m not suggesting you should stop taking antidepressants. Even if they are not working out for you, discuss it with your physician first.) Where do we turn to find relief?

 Johann Hari considers this problem in his book Lost Connections. Hari was a long-time sufferer of depression and taker of ever-increasing doses of antidepressants. He was happy with the model that depression was a chemical imbalance that was beyond his control and a pill could fix it. The problem was that a pill didn’t fix it; he was still depressed.

 First, it isn’t all in your head—or even in your chemistry. Though there is a physiological, and even hereditary, aspect to depression that can make some more susceptible, depression is triggered by our experience and social environments. Depression is a symptom of problems in your life. To Hari, depression is essentially a social disease and it requires social treatments.

 Though Hari does not claim to have completely uncovered the causes of depression, he outlines several that are supported by research. He describes them all as types of disconnection.

 For example, many are disconnected from meaningful work. They have no sense of control over their work. There is no connection between effort and reward, and the work can be humiliating drudgery. In addition, work has become much less secure; many have no idea if they’ll have work next week or even tomorrow.

 Related to this is disconnection from status. Research of primates suggests that depression is an expression of low status intended to protect apes from the abuse of their neighbors. In highly stratified cultures, like the United States, stress is higher than in cultures with more status equality. Low status people are under constant stress, and high status people experience extreme stress when their status is challenged.

 Most of all, we are disconnected from other people. We are less likely than ever to belong to a church, club, civic group, professional organization, sports league or similar structure of getting together with other face-to-face, bonding over common interests and building relationships. Neighborhoods are no longer communities; they’re just clusters of homes.

 Though it is more challenging than taking a pill, the solution to depression is to reconnect in those areas where we have become disconnected. It is especially important to reconnect to other people. If you want to feel better, do something to make someone else’s life better.

 The difficulty is that it is hard to get better on your own. Fortunately, if you’re willing to take a step, there are things you can do. On the bigger scale, we need cultural reform that supports personal relationships, meaningful values, meaningful work, empathy, hope and time in natural settings. There is no money to be made in prescribing a community garden, a book club or a job where one is treated with respect, so the money will probably continue to pour into drugs (whether they work or not), until we demand—and start to create for ourselves—something better.

 If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

The Beethoven Factor by Paul Pearsall

Change Your Brain Change Your Body by Daniel G. Amen

The Last Self-Help Book You'll Ever Need by Paul Pearsall

The Relaxation Response by Herbert Benson with Miriam Z. Klipper

Switch on Your Brain by Caroline Leaf

Suggestible You by Erik Vance

Timeless Healing by Herbert Benson with Marg Stark

Vital Friends by Tom Rath

 Hari, Johan. Lost Connections: Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression—and the Unexpected Solutions. New York: Bloomsbury, 2018.

Triumvirate by Bruce Chadwick

Chadwick, Bruce. Triumvirate: The Story of an Unlikely Alliance that Saved the Constitution and United the Nation. Naperville, IL: Sourcebooks, 2009.


A fragile nation risks falling apart as its ineffective and poorly organized government slides deeper into gridlock. Jealous geographic factions threaten to tear the fragile country apart. To fix these ills, a new form of government is proposed, but is greeted by many opponents. Three men orchestrate a campaign to overcome this opposition and see the new government approved. Along the way, they produce a series of essays that are still read by students of politics and democracy more than two centuries later.

This is the true story of the United States and the ratification of its Constitution. The men are James Madison, Alexander Hamilton and John Jay, authors of The Federalist. Bruce Chadwick recounts the tale in Triumvirate, a readable book of history that retains the sense of a story while conveying the facts.

The Federalist is well known, if no longer widely read, as a factor greatly advancing the cause of the Constitution’s supporters. What is less known is that it was only a part of a plan to rally support for the new government and give it a solid foundation by seeing through its ratification in every state.

The sense that comes from the books is that it is Madison, Hamilton and Jay’s early insight that a concerted effort was needed, and the steps they took to put together, organization and their supporters with forceful arguments for their cause, that carried the victory. Opponents of the plan, the Anti-Federalists, seemed to be in the majority in the larger states and included brilliant, respected and patriotic men who also forcefully argued their cause in essays and assemblies. However, Anti-Federalists disliked the Constitution for different reason, lacked clear leaders, were late to organize and had no coherent, consistent set of arguments for their position.

It’s easy to paint the Anti-Federalists as shortsighted enemies of union, as the Federalists did. Many wanted nothing more than a bill of rights added to a plan of government they otherwise liked, though some had additional objections. Chadwick treats the Anti-Federalists fairly and points out the weaknesses and blind spots of the Federalists.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in
46 Pages by Scott Liell
Common Sense by Thomas Paine
His Excellency by Joseph J. Ellis
The Politically Incorrect Guide to Western Civilization by Anthony Esolen