Pain has an element of blank;
It cannot recollect
When it began, or if there were
A day when it was not.

It has no future but itself,
Its infinite realms contain
Its past, enlightened to perceive
New periods of pain.

Emily Dickinson.

A senior manager at Cisco once suggested to me that there are two types of challenges in organizations — capacity problems and complexity problems.
Capacity problems are those that require more, fewer or different resources.
Complexity problems require new thinking and a creative approach.

Ron Ashkenas on the HBR Blog Network.

Convenience combined with low cost-per-unit of production has robbed us, I think, of the proper mindset that goes into the making something new. The general rule of thumb is that it takes more time to produce something than it does to enjoy it....As someone who has been constantly moving from the consumer mindset to the producer mindset, I’m discovering the difficulties of changing my expectations with regards to time. It’s like looking into the wrong end of the telescope: what should be NOW and IMMEDIATE looks so far away. ...Distilling the stuff of raw experience into something that stands out is supposed to take a long time. There’s no getting around it. You might get lucky and find some great shortcuts, or stumble upon something that can serve as the vehicle for your grand idea, but when it comes to making your own, special, unique part of it…it’s going to take a while. A long while.

David Seah. Time to Greatness.

The Pareto principle (also known as the 80-20 rule, the law of the vital few, and the principle of factor sparsity) states that, for many events, roughly 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes.

Wikipedia. PARETO PRINCIPLE.

A sailor must know two things before he can chart a course: his current location and the location of where he wants to go. Picking a destination may be easy – the Bahamas perhaps – but determining the precise distance and direction the ship must travel to get to the tropical paradise requires a skipper know his exact location at the time of his departure.
During his journey a navigator also must constantly measure his progress. Unexpected weather conditions, changes in ocean currents and breakdowns in equipment all conspire to throw him off course. To reach his destination safely and successfully requires an accurate assessment of the ship’s progress compared to where it started from and where it needs to go.

Kevin Craine. Where are you now? Where are you going?

Recognizing these four postures of life helps us make sense of the church's work. Much of the church's activity is spent trying to move people from one of these four postures to another. 

Skye Jethani. WITH.