The late USC philosopher Dallas Willard used to describe the body like a battery pack for the soul. For about a year, that definition didn’t make much sense to me. But lately, it has started to click and has been helping me think better about rest in my life as a husband, father, teacher, and […]
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The Case for Lumpiness
All right: finite creatures, only 24 hours in a day, only 4,000 weeks or so in a life. Got it. We’ve looked at DECIDE, CONSTRAIN, OBSESS — now today, a riff on the discipline of ELIMINATION. (You may already be noticing that the disciplines overlap one another. Quite right. There’s really not a ton to […]
Let’s Pick Some Sled Dogs
During a five-year period in the 2010s, researcher Morten Hansen conducted one of the most comprehensive surveys of worker performance ever. He found 5,000 managers and employees, from all types of professions, and he analyzed their work habits, tracked how many hours they worked each week, and followed their performance. The highest performers, it turned […]
We’re Too Hospitable to Pointlessness
“In the year 1930, John Maynard Keynes predicted that, by century’s end, technology would have advanced sufficiently that countries like Great Britain or the United States would have achieved a fifteen-hour work week. There’s every reason to believe he was right. In technological terms, we are quite capable of this. And yet it didn’t happen. […]
A Simple Syllabus Language Change that Helped a Teacher Get the Breakthrough
This past school year, our colleague Tanya Ramm shared a simple shift in her syllabus language that gave her added life and agency as a teacher. Here’s all she altered: Practice: (50% of Marking Period grade) – This category includes student participation such as in-class practice with speaking, listening, reading & writing activities, as well […]