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Selecting Your Key Information Areas, Part Two
What must you know—and what can you safely ignore?
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Final check: If your list holds more than five key information areas, you probably are still not giving up enough. Remember the powerful premise of this chapter: you do not need to know everything. Less is more. Refuse to be pulled out of your key areas by insecurity over what other people know—or claim they know. Alan Nelson, who pastors a church in Scottsdale, says, "It's easy to get intimidated by leaders who tell you about 12 books they've just read. But I have to ask, If I were to read those books, how would I really benefit? How would my people benefit? What good comes of it?"4 Cave ArtOkay, okay, now that I've insisted you can't list more than 5 learning areas at a time, I'm going to open a loophole. A big loophole. Everything I've said so far assumes you want greater focus and effectiveness in your work. But that's not the only reason we read or the most important reason we read. We also read to escape, to meditate and reflect, to recalibrate our lives, to grow spiritually, to enjoy learning. I think of those early humans, 17,000 years ago, who speared mammoths and painted cave walls in southern France. They were masters of hunting and masters of art. Some of the time, probably most of the time, they focused on hunting, stalking bison and ibex, spearing their game, just trying to eat in order to live another day. But they felt another impulse, to create something of beauty, to pick up a piece of charcoal or iron and sketch large red cows, a herd of yellow horses running wild, a fierce black bull with massive forelegs and curved horns sharpening to a point. What possible benefit did they derive from painting the walls of their cave? Paintings didn't fill their stomach or warm their body or protect their family. But as humans, they needed to paint, and today we know about them and care about them because they did. Similarly, there is a focused study for everyday effectiveness—the Reading of the Hunt. Just as essential to life is a meditative, meandering, muse-led study for the expression and expansion of our soul—the Reading of the Cave Art. |             |
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