Have you ever had one of those ideas that you thought were really cool, and inspired — and you were certain would never work? Maybe it’s the complexity, such that execution is never perfect. Maybe it’s the sheer number of things that could go wrong, or the consequences if they do. Or maybe it’s just that the idea is so simple, you worry there’s no way it could work. Oh – there’s also the fear of failure… that gets in the way too.
Sunday afternoon, my four-year-old daughter wanted to go outside and do some Kung Fu. Not the Spongebob Squarepants “kah-rah-TAY!” variety, but actually some of the Kung Fu she sees daddy teaching out the window on Tuesday nights. She is obviously too young to learn much of value, and I’ve already slipped in a couple of concepts that might help protect her. Still, I was waiting for her to get a little older before asking so determinedly, and has such had to rely on an old answer: logic.
When I used to do presentations for Junior High and elementary kids, I’d invariably get asked about my hobbies, or what I did for fun. In one case, I knew the teacher, who took it upon herself to let the class know that they needed to behave because I knew “Kung Fu.” The natural response for a middle-school student is “Show us some Kung Fu!” — which would lead to the whiteboard for a lesson in logic. [Read more...]
