Associate's Mind

  It is not only the strong who win. While the exercise of brute force can lead to or be the sole cause of victory, it is not always the key. Indeed, dumb brute force often falls to the schemes of the intellect and to the disciplined execution of preconsidered and practiced concepts and maneuvers. [...]

  Virtue seems illusive, if it can be considered a reality, at all. There are so many ways to err at work, in relationships, for your clients, in life; but it’s hard to always do the virtuous thing. If you’re fortunate, you’ve had the opportunity to observe a virtuous person in action, and, hopefully, to [...]

  In light of the Sequester, generously brought to us by our public servants, I have been considering the personality and traits of our leaders. To be sure, the contrarian tactics of the Republicans (I’m looking at you, Tea Party), have made political compromise and deal-making closer to a thing of myth than of reality. [...]

As you good folks probably have heard by now, the Pope’s resigning. From the outsider’s point of view, that’s a reasonable move for a man coming up on his 86th birthday. He’s worked hard. He’s done his service. He’s getting a little weaker. Totally reasonable move; maybe we should even have expected it. But that’s [...]

So Muhammad Ali, William the Conqueror, Philip II of Macedon, and Themistocles walk into a bar… That joke was not going to end well, but it gets you where I want you. What do these dead old white men have in common with a modern sports icon? Strategy. Specifically, Rope-a-dope. Maybe I should say, “What [...]

  Two events spurred the idea for a series of posts about strategy. The first was when I was talking with my wife about ways to win arguments with people. My favorite tactic is to lead my adversaries down a string of seemingly logical statements which are building to their position (with them agreeing with [...]

  It is a peculiar time. For the past two hundred thousand years of our existence, all we’ve had to rely upon is constancy. The seasons turn; we sleep and rise; our loved ones are born, and then they die. Any perturbation of what is and always has been brought anxiety–sickness, drought, astronomical aberrations, war.  [...]

  In my last post, I mentioned the Greek maxims Know yourself and Seek the mean in all things. Today, I’d like to touch on  the latter and one of its implications. While I prefer the above translation, usually MHDEN AGAN is translated “Nothing in excess,” and that is certainly the spirit of the saying. [...]

  When Pausanias, the traveler and geographer, visited the Temple of Apollo at Delphi in the second century A.D., the inscriptions in the forecourt were nearly a thousand years old. They read ΜΗΔΕΝ ΑΓΑΝ and ΓΝΩΘΙ ΣΕΑΥΤΟΝ: “Seek the mean in all things” and “Know yourself.” He seems to have been passing through, but the supplicants [...]

I’ve always liked old things, so when I embarked on my Curriculum during my fourth year of medical school (screw studying Medicine), I was right at home.  I had always felt that I couldn’t fully appreciate anything without first understanding its origins. So I figured I might as well start at the beginning.  Since the [...]