I’d like to share a quote that I thought was fantastic (I sent this to my Wife’s Dad several years ago with the comment that, “there’s a sermon in there somewhere). There was a poster on the TH site quite a while ago named Walter, and he came up with this great analogy (which I will borrow) and then move to a slightly different conclusion.
Quote:
Look out at the night sky ... if you are in an area that hasn't become polluted to the point of blotting out nature’s beauty. The lights that we can see give us a picture revealing both distance and time. Simultaneously, we are seeing light that originated both recently and long ago. The light reflected off of the moon started its journey only seconds ago. The light from some of the planets has been traveling a for several minutes; but we see it at the same time. Now realize this: Some of the light that we see has been traveling for periods of time that we can barely even imagine; but there it is ... right next to the light that's only seconds old.
We can read the words of inspired writers and hear the music of great minds, some of whom are living with us, some of whom lie in the earth. We are indeed fortunate.
But as the night sky that has become opaque so that we can't see the stars anymore, many of the gems of our culture and others are difficult to see because of the haze created by our societies.
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When I read or hear the ideas of David Krauss, James Thompson, Dave Hickman, Emory Remington, Chris Gekker, Manny Laureano, Peter Bond, Pat Harbison, Bill Bergren, Bill Adam, Wilmer Wise, Jens Lindemann, James Pandolfi, Mark Gould, John Hagstrom, Charlie Vernon, Russ DeVuyst, Charles Schlueter, Vincent Cichowicz, Ed Carroll, and so many others that I’ve had the good fortune to meet or read about, I think about the above analogy.
Great ideas are very often faint, and in the background when discussing topics in these forums. Ideas that are “minutes” old and come from every direction many times will shroud those brilliant ideas that are travelling toward us from across time. They are typically heard or understood by a very small percentage of the population, and dismissed by those that have not been exposed to them before.
I know that the more I read, and the more that I am exposed to great players, the better I understand the ideas that I write about. There are still lots of areas where I fall short, and I hope to be able to express myself much better in these areas once I really get my arms around these topics.
With the gymnastic example above I can clearly see that “visualization” should be tossed around in combination with strength and balance.
My intent in posting this is simply to mention that I really like to weigh a person’s words against what I have read or heard in the past. I take what I can from these words and write about it myself. The more that I do this, the better I find I am able to express the really great ideas!
This topic can clearly go in lots of directions! Have fun!