How often do you find yourself at a crossroads? At a place where you must choose between two seemingly inviting paths just veering away into the distance. I for one find myself there quite frequently. But never so frequently as when I find myself deceived.

Along the walk that is my life, I find, like so many do, that walking with partners and friends makes the journey. . . well, more . . . livable. And as is the nature of people, from time to time, it is those partners that lead me astray. In reality, it is more often that I am the one leading myself right over a cliff all of my own accord, but from time to time it is another who holds my hand.

It is at those times of companionship that I've felt the more betrayed, even though the more serious and intentional missteps were surely of my own doing. Why the intensity I feel? Perhaps because of the deception involved. Now self-deception I'm no stranger to and forgiveness for it gets easier every day. After all forgiving myself seems to be an activity I practice daily. ;-)

But still it is when I've been led that troubles me most. When someone has held my hand and whispered words to soothe my soul and keep me walking, traipsing along the path they've laid out with their lie. As down the road we go, I lose my way. I lean more and more on the deception and wonder more and more where my way went.

Only the soft stillness of self-reflection orients me again. Finding time to delve the Word and find the Way again in what is Written. Because of one thing I am certain. Whenever I am lost, He is looking for me. Crook in hand, calling my name, tirelessly searching and longing for my return. If I simply stop and listen, allow the Father to find me, my path will be straightened. As it is written:

I waited patiently for the Lord to help me, and he turned to me and heard my cry.
He lifted me out of the pit of despair, out of the mud and the mire.
He set my feet on solid ground and steadied me as I walked along.
He has given me a new song to sing, a hymn of praise to our God.
Many will see what he has done and be amazed. They will put their trust in the Lord.
-- Psalm 40: 1-3

This is the only way I know to handle the destruction from a deception. Or most anything really.

Just goes to show you that I'm a pretty simple guy really.

There are lots of reasons to be mad at me. I deserve to be snapped at
for lots of things.

But I don't get the point of being mad at me for honesty. Sure I
understand discretion. And some assumption of privacy.

But if you are the one who lied, you don't get to yell at me for
telling the truth. Period.

The only words that mattered were those:

"I don't want you to be with her. I want you to be with me."

If only.

Have you ever felt you weren't a priority in the life of a friend? Have they ever told you they feel that way about you?

Figuring out where your real priorities lie is something you can only do indirectly. Like many things we might want to know about ourselves or others, we need to sort of sneak up on it. You can't very well just ask someone what is important to them. They might very well tell you what they believe, but that doesn't make them right. You can ask yourself these same types of questions and be assured you'll find a way to fool yourself often enough.

When it comes to understanding what is really driving us, motivating us, important to us, we can only look at our behaviors and actions to learn the truth. When we look at the choices we make, how we spend our energy, time, and resources, we are able to take the true measure of what we value.

For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
-- Matthew 6:21

When it comes to understanding if your choices are upholding your core values, it is worth it to first understand the impact of those choices. Are you impacting those around you in the way you want? Do you find yourself apologizing a lot? Do you find yourself on questionable moral ground?

When it comes down to it, we care about things we put ourselves into. Anything that isn't important enough to warrant changes in our behavior, isn't important. Those things that are not a priority enough to alter the choices we make with our time or attention, are simply not priorities.

Are you worried about making your faith a priority? Look for how much of your time is concerned with matters of faith? How many of your conversations come back to your faith? When you are making decisions, how often are the reasons for your choices based on faith?

The important things in your life, are the things that are so prevalent you don't have to think about them. When there is enough time and attention that they are constantly in your thoughts. The first way you think to spend free time is among the things that are most important to you. The first person you want to call with good news is among the people most important to you. The same with the person you would call in an emergency. When you find a twenty in a jacket pocket you'd forgotten about, the first thing you think to do with the money is among the things most important to you.

For me this is a struggle because I want my priority on my Savior and my Faith. Which is where "Pray Without Ceasing" becomes a reality. If I spend all my thoughts on someone (or something) else, I can't very well say my faith is the most important thing to me. By disciplining myself to pray, I make a feeble attempt to ensure my heart follows my treasure.

Or at least a close enough approximation that I can say I did my best.

When I want someone to feel they are priority, I make them the priority. I call them first. I pass up other people and activities to spend time with them. I work my schedule around being able to talk and be with them. If I can do this for others, how much more should I do for my Lord?

Lately, I've found myself having to teach a lot of beginner-level engineering techniques. Any time I work with people who are just getting started in their chosen fields, the same type of conversation occurs. They inevitably want to know how to get better. In some cases, they want to know how to be the best.

The funny part happens with those who take a while to get to the point of asking for help. You see, the good ones usually have achieved some small measure of success already. So they're feeling particularly competent and capable. And faced with demanding situations, where they find themselves out of their depth, they don't always immediately recognize it. And even if they do sense the impending doom, they don't necessarily want someone else to help them. They want to try and swim a little on their own first.

So whether they are really good, or they just think they are, they ultimately end up having to ask for the opinions of more senior people in their field. The more they flounder, the less helpful I can be. The less they struggle, the more help I can give them in specific situations.

Now the truly gifted ones don't just ask for help with a specific situations, they want to understand the principles involved. They want to know how to become better, which is more than just sucking less.

Over the years, I've found myself giving a lot of the same specific principles that are built on only a couple of foundational tenets.

1. Learn the basics completely and comprehensively.
   Reading voraciously. Read everything you can get your hands on from people who are actually doing the type of work you want to do. Know the conventions they use, learn the language, the vocabulary and the slang.
2. Build up your style, your repertoire of techniques, and stick with them.
   Pick the tried and true methods that you prefer and practice. Have defensible answers for your choices, so make them deliberately. Keep the number of techniques manageable and deviate as little as possible. Don't switch without overwhelmingly compelling reasons.
3. Fail fast and when failure is cheap do it often.
   If you are doing something new, don't be afraid to take risks. Just make sure they are recoverable and inexpensive. Prototype, mock-up, white-board, sketch, and pseudo-code as much as possible. If something has the potential to go down, get to the stress point as quick as possible so you can address it quickly or get passed it.

A few things to consider about these tenets is that they aren't just about learning quickly. They are about unlearning quickly as well. You can't embrace something new until you get past your hang-ups from your history. When you can unlearn quickly you will be more creative and nimble in your solutions going forward.

Being deliberate in your choices means you will be more consistent and reliable in the majority of things you do; specifically the things that matter. You'll know the choices that matter because they are the things you chose early and from which you rarely deviate. When your choices can withstand fads, trends, and the stylistic preferences of others, you'll know they are well chosen and important.

There is more to just making quick choices. Your choices need to either fail quickly or last a long time. This is usually measured as effectiveness. To make more effective choices, you need focus, creativity, and deliberation.

This notion of making deliberate choices and sticking with them is an aspect of mindfulness. In the 2004 edition of Scientific American Mind, the first issue, you'll find some great technical details about the notion of mindfulness from a neuro-scientific standpoint.

I just know that people who are more mindful are more effective, and being the best is usually about being the most effective.

My friends always make me change. Selfish bastards.

Alone in my room, I was writing some code on the Mac Mini (working on an iPhone app), and in walks @kylemck. He says, "I never thought I'd see the day that you were using OSX." A sentiment I shared with him until only very recently. I still hate it and think working on a Mac is like being back in 5th grade using a Commodore 128.

Driving to the airport with @jwalking we started singing the lyrics to "I Will Follow You Into The Dark". At one point last year, he said "I wouldn't take you to see Death Cab. I'd rather take someone who likes the music instead of someone I know actively hates the band I'm going to see." He's kind of jerk sometimes, but he means well and he did seduce me with that silver tongue of Bens. I saw them in concert in December and loved it.

The thing that makes some of my friends so influential to me is that I respect both our differences and our shared values. You can't keep appreciating their values and decision-making without being impacted by them. Even things I resolutely disagreed with, I begin to understand. And that's the first chink in the armor.

I still have my own opinions and think their taste in music and movies is horrid and immature. But I've been immersed in it for so long my tolerance has built up. And from time to time I manage to grow a little and change my perspective on something.

I'll close now because my phone is blowing up with all the tweets.

Much of my day is spent convincing engineers that there are simpler ways of implementing their designs. Much of the rest is convincing executives and managers that what they want isn't simple at all.

Invariably some little hot-head tries to argue with me that implementing a general case is more complicated than a special optimized case. If the punk in question has cracked a book they'll likely bring up some metric like Cyclomatic Complexity.

Thomas McCabe socialized this metric in the 70's as a mechanism for predicting where code would have future maintain problems. It's often thrown into the blender when people are trying to construct qualitative measures for code quality. Here's the formal equation:

CC = E - N + P

E = number of edges N = number of nodes P = number of connections or exits

It can be hard to see how equations like this apply to code so let me say it a different way: Cyclomatic Complexity represents the number of code paths through a section code.

How do you count the code paths? Start with one for the entry into the code, and add one more for every decision point. Decision points are the control of flow statements like If…Then…Else or Switch. The CC for the following snippet is three (3).

public int adjustRange( int rangePrimary ) {
bool adjustedValue = 42;
if ( rangePrimary == 6 ) {
    adjustedValue = 42;
} else {
    adjustedValue = 9;
}
return adjustedValue;
}

This example was really simple but is illustrative of how the CC may be calculated.

So how complex is complex? As with most metrics, the interpretation is very subjective. Since the higher the number, the more complex the code, it stands to reason that code with higher numbers would be more prone to issues. Perhaps bugs because of the logic convolutions, or issues with maintenance because of the number of things impacted by even simple changes. In a sweeping generalization I can say that for my reviews, code with values higher than 20 would be suspect, and higher than 30 would likely not pass.

The important thing is to realize it isn't a measure of quality, just an indicator where better organization or testing might be advisable. Personally, I tend to gauge an engineers competence inversely to the CCs of the code they routinely produce. In my experience, engineers who write better code routinely produce code with low CCs and vice versa.

Sometimes the world doesn't make sense. For me, the world often doesn't make sense. I might want it to, I might need it to, that doesn't mean it will.

The most interesting part for me of watching other people react and interact is how inconsistent and conflicting their interpretation of events can be. Like when witnesses are questioned at a bank robbery and 3 different people swear to 3 different descriptions of the robber. Or perhaps the story of the 3 blind men and the elephant is more suitable here.

We interpret our world through these filters that we don't even realize are there. Like smells we can't experience anymore because we are immersed in it every day. Or that obnoxious phone ringer that you've become so accustomed to it doesn't scare the bejangles out of you any more. When we wallow in patterns and habits of experience we lose the sensitivity we need to savor the world around us.

"When I was hurling my body onto yours, you did not seem to want to be with me."
-- Ginnifer Goodwin as Gigi in He's Just Not That Into You

Why doesn't anyone hurl their body any more? In the movies we see it, but we know the movies aren't real. So therefore we can't possibly do that. We are tentative and reliable. We don't go after what we want, we wait for it to show up.

When we do come across that person with the ambition, or desperation, or sheer unmitigated desire who hurls themselves at us, how do we handle it? Duck? Run? Push?

I don't know about you, but I want more hurling in my life. More bouncing, more flouncing, more Boom Crash Opera, and definitely more "yummy".

From time to time, I lose my words. Usually it is those things which I don't want to face head-on. Whatever the reason, at those times I find myself leaning on the words of others. Kendall Payne is one such poet whose well I retreat to from time to time.

So much deeper than the oceans is the heart of man
So much higher than the mountains
Are the things that I don’t understand
Like why I’m crying over someone who will never give a damn

We have boarded up the basement for the storm has found its prey
I have bottled my emotions and saved them for a rainy day
Now I’ll drink the bitter poison of a love that’s been delayed

Since You’ve been gone, I can’t fight it I can’t fight it
I’ve tried for too long I can’t hide it I can’t hide it anymore

This has called for desperate measures
We have left our pride behind
We are aging with the hours of this superficial life
And I refuse to be a failure, I have to give it one more try

But I doubt that you are listening and I doubt that you are moved
I have doubted every step along this long and darkened journey
But I have never doubted you
Now the longing has awoken and I don’t know what to do

-- One More Try from Paper Skin by Kendall Payne

It's okay to be overwhelmed. Wanting to give up is natural. And for some things, you do need to let them go. Stop trying. Let them fade.

Just don't give up on the big stuff. Like life and living. You always have to keep living. And breathing is usually a good idea also. Unless it's really smoggy out.

Do you have friends that are continually pursuing the same goals? They have something they want/need and they talk about it all the time but never seem to get it? They might want a better job, to be in a relationship, more time, more money, or less stress. And with this friend, it doesn't matter what they do, the goal is always eluding them. Sound familiar?

I certainly run into my share of individuals like this. They always want advice, or help, or a connection. With enough practice, these individuals are easy for me to spot, even when I'm not very familiar with them. The trick for me is to notice the inconsistencies in their presentation. It's a bit general, but usually when the non-verbal signals get really disconnected from what's being said, it's a good sign that it is the words can't be trusted.

When our internal maps gets messed up, it can be hard to realize that about yourself. And if you are trying to help someone like this, you have to be aware that you can't necessarily trust what they say about their maps either. That's why being able to reconcile the physical signs and the spoken words is so important.

In cases like this you can do real damage if you take the words at face value. I have a colleague who has been switching jobs for years. He was never satisfied with the work, or the peers, or the bosses, or this or that. He would talk about his "dream job" all the time. Within weeks of taking any position he would invariably start to find all the flaws and unravel why this job wasn't perfect. Within months he'd be looking for a new job no matter how well he was performing, or how much was going "right" about the current job.

Over the years, I've done my best to help him with connections, references, etc. After all, you want competent, good performers to be successful. And for those years I was always listening to the words. One day I was distracted for some reason I stopped listening to what he was saying. That's when I noticed what he wasn't saying.

This prompted a round of questions to help figure out what was on his internal map. When we spoke about his current job, he reverted to a different verbal map and physical representation. After a few conversations exploring his maps, he was able to bring his maps into alignment and has been very happy in his latest job for quite some time.

What was difficult in this situation is that I'd spent so much time providing my friend what he asked for instead of what he needed. I was missing something so simple, so natural, so obvious. It was too obvious. And that's the quickest way to identify this situation, the sheer simple obviousness of what's being requested.

If the goal is so straightforward but the language and presentation aren't in alignment, there is usually something twisted in the maps underneath. Let me restate this with a few examples:

• What's being asked for is the same thing as what they want. They want a better job so they'll . . . be in a better job.
• What's being asked for can't be clearly stated. They want the "right guy" but describing what that looks like is vague and uncertain or changing.
• The weight of the request is significant enough they have to change state to make the request. They have to change posture, stance, or level of fixation.

Once you've identified a misalignment with the underlying maps, you can take steps depending on the specific maps.

If you are finding yourself cycling on the same issues over and over, or just can't seem to reach that goal that is always just out of reach, try doing some map work. Make sure you aren't missing that crucial symptom that's just too obvious for you to have seen already.

"It's way to early to be awake", my body said this morning.

Have you ever had one of those mornings where you were so tired you
got dizzy? You wobbled on your feet and felt woozy? Yep. That was my
first feeling when my toes hit the floor.

Then I looked out the window. The moon was bright and round. The water
was reflecting the moonbeams and the waves were barely rippling. A
ferry all glowing strode silently across the Sound. The scuplture
park was frosted with white and there were no fresh tracks disturbing
the quiet.

It's head-twisting to dress in short sleeves knowing you'll be
sweating later even as you watch the white flakes falling softly on
the balcony.

Cab's here. Reverie ends.

If you run a major international company, you shouldn't be dropping cuss words in public. IMHO.

In a recent article, the SAP co-CEO Leo Apotheker was quoted making some of the dumbest CEO comments I've ever heard. I wonder what how big his *ahem* bonus must be for him to so blatantly disregard common sense.

The follow-on article was equally hilarious. It shows how much pressure the Old Timers are under to stay relevant. Add this to the recent absurdity of the Satyam Scandal and it becomes clear some house cleaning is in order.

I found the most insightful comment in the follow-on to be:

The core of most cost/time overruns stems from CIOs committing to ERP, but middle managers insisting after implementation is already well underway that the software be changed to accommodate legacy business processes rather than the other way around. -- Eric Krangel

Amen, brother.

But wait, it doesn't stop there. You have to read the comments too. Here's my favorite:

Accenture made me rich when we IPO'd it in 2001.
I'm willing to forgive all else.

-- Maurice (commented on the Alley Insider article)

That pretty much sums up how the Bozo Effect is getting worse. I think it's time to go back into retirement. Again.

Or maybe a start-up? Hmmm...

One of the best parts of knowing so many people smarter than myself is that I get the chance to try out my thinking and have it corrected or validated quickly. This post has nothing to do with that. But I did learn something interesting by reading someone who is "book smart" and I wanted to share it.

I was reading a back issue of Psychological Science (from last January), specifically an article by Drs. Kathleen Vohs and Jonathan Schooler. In the article they discussed two experiments in which they observed the impact of determinism on morality. That sounds pretty heady but it's just big words.

In the first experiment, they had two groups read a two separate texts. One text encouraged people to believe they were the result of environment and genetics. The other was neutral. Both groups then took a math test that was rigged to allow passive cheating. The group that was told they were the product of their environment and genes cheated more.

In the second experiment, the texts had one deterministic and one endorsing free will. The group that read the deterministic statements actively cheated, the group reading about free will did not.

Now when I consider these results as applied to my personal world view it comes clear why I choose a doctrine of dual-responsibility instead of a the more Calvinistic extreme. Don't get me wrong, for practical purposes I usually align with the Calvinists. But like most aspects of my world view, I don't agree with the extremes they tend towards. Here's why:

I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.

I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. This is to my Father's glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.

As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father's commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit - fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. This is my command: Love each other. -- John 15:1-17

There are lots of other passages that speak to either grace or free-will. This for me is the clearest example of how they are to be reconciled in my world view. We are chosen, and we choose to accept and live with what is offered to us.

The notion of dual-responsibility is outside any of our social norms and you see how far outside we've fallen when you read about experiments like these. Just the suggestion that our free-will is gone, removes the guilt block and allows our true depravity to surface easily. Contrarily, suggesting we are responsible for our own choices increases the block and allows our better nature to come clean.

What was my take-away? Regardless of how I got here, spending time in the Word helps me stay clean and bearing fruit.

Perhaps it was the clarity of a weekend both devoid and overflowing with intimacy but my subconscious mind wouldn't let me skip over this post. It's wildly emo which emulates my on-edge mind smoothly. It's called The Ledge Behind and I wrote the draft some time ago. I was finally able (or should I say forced) to polish it now that I finally understand what I was trying to say.

It's a clear morning but my eyes are hungry
there is only fog before me
White knuckles normal on this ledge of life as
freedom finds me in your name
No more the mediocrity or
mellow morass is my mundane
I evict the everyday and
shatter the status quo with a step
Absurd and extra ordinary
no limiting lines will hold me now
Your quiet Yes resolves me
quicks my blood
and binds my fate to the fantastical
At long last I leap and leave this lonely ledge
No lust or simple longing moving me
It was your want of me that
countenanced my confidence
Your whispered words wove wings that
force my fall to flight