Life lessons at In-N-Out

I am a fiend for the In-N-Out Burger here in Pasadena. Particularly after a long day and a hard workout, nothing sounds quite as good as a double-double with grilled onions and a chocolate-strawberry milkshake. I am definitely one of the regulars.

Tonight, however, I encountered a new situation. As I pulled into the drive-in area I saw that one of the drive-in lanes was empty, while the other had three cars in it. My first thought was "great, a clear lane; this will be the shortest wait I've ever had for a burger here." Then the social animal in me spoke up: "hold on, though: there's got to be a reason that everyone is in the right lane. The left lane must be closed or some of these people would be in it." I had never seen this lane closed, and there were no indicators anywhere that this was the first time. Furthermore, a perfectly reasonable alternative explanation for the situation existed--namely that the cars in the left lane had just made it through a little quicker than the cars in the right, and I just happened to drive up at an opportune time. With about 3 seconds to make my decision, however, none of this came to mind and I defaulted to the herd mentality. About 5 seconds later a woman drove up behind me, got in the left lane, and ordered her meal.

I stewed over this as I sat in my car, childishly resenting that lady for being more sensible than me. It wasn't the wait that bothered me, but the realization of how easy it had been for me to follow a completely mindless decision making process. I like to think of myself as an apart from the crowd kind of guy, but here I was confronting powerful evidence to the contrary. And it wasn't just the weight of what I perceived as the group wisdom that introduced the seed of doubt. It was also an irrational fear of failure and embarrassment--"what if I take the left lane and it is actually closed?!"

Whether it's holding your own in a discussion dominated by group-think, adhering to your moral values in an environment that undermines them, or making tough judgement calls as a leader that run contrary to the prevailing wisdom, the ability to make a cool-headed assessment of the situation and act according to what you know/believe is an essential life tool. This example may seem trivial, but the same principle applies in situations where the stakes are higher than how long I have to wait for my burger.

The cure to a herd mindset? Self-reflection, brutal honesty about one's intentions and motivations, and the willingness to try despite the possibility of failure. Cultivate these virtues, and a substantially more independent mindset will follow.

a reminder

Worked out with the usual crew of fellas in the Navy Special Operations pipeline today. After we finished Coach Jackson looked over our scores: "Polhamus, you did better than everyone at everything except for the swim. You need to lead the way in PT."

Hopefully a foreshadowing of many more training sessions to come...

two good articles

The first, thanks to my friend Rakim Brooks, suggests the development of a federal banking institution in Europe as a means of addressing European debt crises. In pointing out that Alexander Hamilton thought of this over 200 years ago, the author seems to implicitly celebrate the American ingenuity that would lead that young nation to become a global power just 100 years later:

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-07-01/will-crisis-ridden-europe-find-its-own-alexander-hamilton-view.html

A question that a lot of people seem to be asking now is whether our present day elected officials can rally in a similar spirit of ingenuity (and compromise--Hamilton surrendered New York's claim to hosting the capital) to meet this generation's pressing fiscal challenges. Hopefully they figure something out before August, when the U.S. Treasury will exhaust its means of meeting current financial obligations and slowly begin to default. Unfortunately, it seems to be an article of absolute and unchallenged faith among congressional Republicans that any move to raise taxes would be a mortal sin against 'the American people.' In spite of holding core conservative convictions, I see no compelling reason why certain tax loopholes are continually left open and believe it is appropriate to tax the personal incomes of America's millionaires and billionaires at a higher marginal rate. Nicholas Kristoff made this point today in a decent Op-Ed.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/07/opinion/07kristof.html?_r=1&src=ISMR_HP_LO_MST_FB

something that doesn't happen every day

This week my church has been hosting a ministry team from out of town--from Pittsburgh, I think--and they've been leading the congregation in a Holy Spirit revival weekend. Despite being a protestant Christian of a moderately-charismatic persuasion, I tend to be extremely skeptical about anything involving the Holy Spirit. This is the result of (a) the fact that I'm kind of a cerebral person whose bias is to believe that everything that we encounter in our day-to-day can be explained in terms of the non-supernatural, and (b) disappointing experiences I've had in the past when I tried to connect with this enigmatic presence.

It was mostly a sense of obligation that prompted me to sneak into the Sunday night meeting two hours late, after enjoying a pool party in Beverley Hills. I'd told one of the elders in our church that I planned to make it after morning service, and didn't want to let him down. I took a seat in the back, still wearning my sandals and a too-small white v-neck, pleased by how easy it was to slip in more or less unnoticed.

Between songs and praise, our guests would call up members of the congregation to the front and pray over them so all could hear. In these prayers they would give them prophetic words about things God was doing or planned to do in their lives. I've heard these kinds of prophetic words before, and have never been convinced that those who administer them speak with authority or divine insight. I take most prophetic words to be comfy generalities that can apply to most people in some way. After the giving of the words one of the pastors would put their hands on the individuals' forheads, and they would drop to the ground, 'slain in the spirit.'

I wasn't at all convinced, but as I have so often in the past I offered up a short, silent prayer, that went something like 'Lord, if you are in this, if this is real, please affirm your presence by slaying me in the spirit. I dare you to show yourself to me tonight.' Then I sat and absent-mindedly started reading the lettering on the logo T-shirt of the kid in front of me.

Then I looked up and realized that the guest pastor who was leading this time of prophecy was about four feet away, pointing to me and motioning to come with him to the front of the church. 'Yeah, you--you were hard to find all the way here in the back!' Whatever else you want to make of this, I was bewildered right away by what seemed to be an extraordinary coincidence of timing, since I'd issued my challenge to God only 5 or 10 minutes before.

Once we reached the altar, this man stood before me, and in front of a congregation of several hundred people said something like "Man, I don't know what it is that you do, but you have such joy! It's all over you. I see that through your life people are going to come to Christ. Many people are going to hear the Gospel preached." Cool, I thought, I'm familiar with this. I welcome this word, but don't see anything prophetic in it. But then he went on, "And I actually see that you're going to reach a lot of people in the military. The Navy, I think. You're going to end up in San Diego and have a big impact on that community" Now I was paying attention, and a look of bewilderment came over my face. "How do you know all this?" I asked him. Instead of responding he laughed and put the microphone in my face: "How do you know about me?" I asked him, and the whole church started laughing joyfully. "Brother," he said, "the Holy Spirit knows all of us inside and out." He continued, saying that he saw my life reaching young people, as well. Then the woman who had been slaying people in the spirit said "You remind me of my grandson--are you musical?" I told her that I played guitar, and she prophesied an expansion of my ability to play and bless others through music.

Then they laid hands on me and started praying. The woman put her hand on my forehead, and as she prayed I could feel her starting to push on it. This was an interesting dilemma. I was reasonably convinced that I had just been blessed by the giving of an authentic, prophetic word, and yet here I was being pressured to support the kind of church theater that I'm so skeptical of. Stand tall, and resist the peer pressure to fall down, or let the moment take over? I chose the latter, and as I lay there on the ground not really feeling much different for having been 'slain in the spirit,' but still very much moved by the word I'd been given, I tried to pray through the experience.

I'm still wrestling with it, but with a bias toward accepting its overall authenticity. There are very few people who know enough about me in my church, particularly among the leadeship, that could have provided that kind of detail about my aspirations to the speaker. Both of the two that I know of who could seemed genuinely thrilled about the event, apparently believing whole-heartedly that they, too, had witnessed something supernatural. If the speaker had heard about me (because, naturally, I would be a topic of conversation during his short time with the church leadership), it's highly unlikely that he would be able to connect my face with those stories, even if I am one of the few young white guys in my church. It's possible that all the pastors had a meeting beforehand to discuss what they know about which members of the congregation and decide in advance who they will 'prophecy' over. This, however, would require a level of intent to decieve and manipulate that I see absolutely no evidence of in the whole-hearted, joy-filled community that I've found in Pasadena Church. In spite of the hardness of my heart, I feel compelled by the alternative explanation: God told that man some things about me that are true and wonderful, and I should hold on to them.

And yet I know from the engineered slaying that not all aspects of the experience were from the Holy Spirit, and a seed of doubt lingers. Even something that feels like it should be so clear requires an act of faith to believe. An encounter with God's divine pressence is mixed with the theatrical and artificial.