Lost In Conceptualisation

This is a spoon I use everyday.

However, to six year old Zara, she exclaimed,

"WHAT A KOOL SPOON!!!!!!!!!!!!!!".

"Why is it a kool spoon?" I asked.

"Because it is so colourful!" she replied.

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Yes, come to think of it, now that she has mentioned, it is a 'kool spoon'! I did not notice that it is such a colourful spoon, though I look at it everyday. Looking is different from observing. To me, I saw it just as a spoon with a function, that falls into a category conceptualised as 'a spoon'. When we conceptualise things, we stop looking at the true characteristics and finer properties of the 'thing', and the true 'thing' gets lost in conceptualisation.
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Conceptualisation, categorisation or labeling is useful in our everyday thoughts and communications, but we need to be careful not to be blinded by them. We learn about concepts and labels early in our life, right from the time when someone told us that 'it is a bird' that flew by, or 'that is an aeroplane', etc. It would have been better to have been taught that "the feathered creature that just flew over is something we call a 'bird'" or such like. There is a difference. In the latter, it would encourage me (as a child) to continue to be observant with all things around me as they are, not blinded by the labeling, but still made aware of their names or labels.

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Being observant is fascinating, as we notice the simple beauty in all things around us and understand them better. By observing, we discover new things everyday and remember what we see better. Have you wondered why some people have a better memory than others? That is because they live in the NOW. Being observant is living in the NOW. That's how children below six, develop photographic memory.

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Photographers, painters and writers produce works from their detailed observations in life. I have found photography to be very relaxing as it makes me observe the various and varied colours, geometry and expressions of all life forms. Likewise, writing and painting are relaxing because the painter or writer has to observe the intricate details of his object.

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As adults, we have missed a lot in life by ceasing to be observant. Sometimes, when we see a new shop opening along the high streets, we wonder what was there before. Even though the shop was much bigger than us and we pass by it everyday, we couldn't remember how it looked like or what was there. Sometimes, a whole building got demolished and we wonder what was there before!

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We perform better when we are observant and it helps us serve people and organisations better. By observing the needs of our customers, remembering their names and what they purchase before, costs us nothing, but gives much. Being observant and not being distracted by labeling and conceptualisation helps me a great deal in my role as an information security specialist - the sort that outwit hackers.

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My knowledge about information security emerged from the old days of computing, the time when we instruct computers with strings of 1s and 0s. It was extremely tedious going through switches and punch-cards, but it compelled us to go through every necessary logic. Then, we have to observe each blinking light, and laboriously enter every '1' and '0'. It was painful, but it made all of us remember.

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As the knowledge developed, the 1s and 0s got collectively generated by programs written in more English-like computer languages. This in turn, got generated by programs that writes programs. By the 1990's, some application programs became so popular that just knowing how to operate the application becomes a commercial skill.

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As programming evolves, the 'programmer' now becomes more and more distant from the core computer and lack the intimate experience to understand its fundamentals directly. Meanwhile, program development are continuously abstracted, conceptualised, de-skilled, and drifted further from its happier pioneering days.

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[Incidentally, drawing parallels with computing, this is the same for human beings. I find that the more I understand about my innerself, the happier I become.]

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An information security specialist has to be highly concerned over details, as understanding what goes on in a system is critical. 'System' here goes beyond technology, to embrace the whole operating environment, like people, procedures, business needs...etc. In such a breadth and diversity, it would be impossible to know everything by mere logic. However, by careful observation a lot can be discovered intuitively. This is what they call the "Aha!", or "when the coin finally drops", much like how detectives unveil mysteries.

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In one of my investigations, an executive I interviewed claimed that morale was high in the company and therefore information security was not a problem. I accepted that at face-value. However later as I strolled the corridors of the company, I noticed broken door knobs in the offices and a cracked mirror in the elevators, that looked like acts of vandalism.

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This led me to suspect that what the executive said wasn't true. I then decided to mingle around during lunchtime, and it was then I found out that the company was firing many people and morale was all-time low. If so, there will be more disgruntled employees and security would be a problem, since most security breaches in organisations comes from within. So, what started out as seemingly unrelated observations, aggregated into useful information that suggested for more internal controls.

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Just like computing, information security has been over-conceptualised, compartmentalised and have distanced the present day practitioner from fundamentals like identifying risks to strengthen the weakest link and aggregating clues in investigating incidents. In the old days, we started on the ground, work through the fundamental data, aggregate them into useful information and implement the controls.

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These days, this intuitive process is de-skilled into standard checkboxes built into 'standards'. Expectedly, these standards now become yet another buzzword demanded by the industry. So now, they start from "standards" to dictate what should be done, or not to be done, with the naive expectations that everyone will obey, and the fallacy that they are working with the fundamentals.

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While specialised fields grow in scope and conceptualisation, it will be useful to induct professionals from other fields that are not lost in inbred conceptualisations. These introduced professionals from other fields will observe and ask questions akin to those from an infant and discover the hidden colours of the field. Devoid of previous conceptualisation, labeling and blindspots, new designs, improvements and new knowhow can more easily be developed.

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At the beginning of this article, I mentioned that Zara saw the colourful kool spoon while I didn't. Now I do.

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How about you? Have you passed by your life missing the many colours?

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You may also like to read Universal Law Part 2 where subjects like 'the observer' and 'living in the now' are further discussed.

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Cat's Play

My cat likes to bring back dead mice into the house, meant as presents for me. It is his own way of saying "thank you" to me. However, I don't really want these dead creatures like, mice, frogs, birds, dragon flies...etc, in the house as I will have to clean up and throw them out again. It is work for me. Also these creatures, including the mice, are from the woods and are not house pests, they had been minding their own business until they were caught by my cat.

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Isn't life sometimes like this? Each of us acting out our own part in our own nature, often meaning well and hoping that we fit into the grand picture?

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Like the teenage daughter bringing her 'cool and hip' friends home, to the worry of mum and dad when they meet them? Or the industrious husband coming home after a long day, only to be met by the wife's distressing naggings about his long hours at work? Or the overzealous boyfriend chasing the girl of his dream, eventually scaring her away?

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Each of them are acting out their part in their own nature, often perceived to be well meaning, but with conflicting desires, demands and results.

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Other posts:

Bucky Group - Thankful

Somedays we forget

To look around us

Somedays we can't see

The joy that surrounds us

So caught up inside ourselves

We take when we should give... more

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Daily Contemplation

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Now here is what I know will bring you joy. Decide that the rest of your life -- every day, every moment, every word -- is something that you will share with everyone whose life you touch in a way that ensures that they will know there is nothing they have to do, nowhere they have to go, and no way they have to be, in order to be loved by you right now. Let them know that they are perfect just as they are, just as they are standing there.

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-- Neale Donald Walsch

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Daily Contemplation is a free email service from Bodhi Fellowship / Center For Inner Peace to inspire and empower you to live a spiritually-centered and loving life.
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Invite A Friend: subscribe@bodhifellowship.org

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You may also like to read my post on "Conversations with God". Click here

Kids Play 14 - Golden Spirituality

The family was watching a documentary on Venice that explained the art of Italian mosaic and its adding of real gold to symbolise the spirituality of Jesus, Mother Mary and the various saints.

Vic (12 years old) immediately commented that it should be more useful if they melt the gold and convert it to cash. Dad then asked Vic what he would he do with the cash, which Vic was a little shy about his love for money and merely grinned. Mum mocked him by suggesting that he spend the money to buy spiritual books. Dad thinks that Vic would end up spending it on spiritual gurus! People who eventually got all the cash would still seek for their spirituality. :)
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Gross National Happinesss 2

This is a letter that my friend Clinton has sent to the local newspapers on the 26th Jan 2006, in the aftermath of the tragic Tsunami devastation in South East Asia.

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The Editor

Forum Page

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Dear Sir,
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“ NATURE at its worst, humanity at its very best” ( ST, Jan 26 ) was thought-provoking and warrants some postulations, some possible solutions.
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The tsunami taught the world two key lessons – how small and inter-connected our “global village” is and the power of globalisation. Just as it had “globalised” 11 countries in less than 24 hours, mankind responded magnificently and was equal to the challenge, as unprecedented compassionate aid was globalised to the affected areas in double-quick time.
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One month later, many – myself included – are left wondering not only why nature reared its ugly head so devastatingly, but perhaps with much gratification, why mankind responded so compassionately, so magnanimously.
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Scientists tell us that everything in the universe is a movement of energy. And nothing is 100 per cent solid. Under a very powerful microscope, at the sub-atomic level, everything and everyone vibrates, at different frequencies.
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Mankind comprises two words – man and kind. Man was born kind – a sub-property of love, which is one of the two most basic and powerful of our emotions ( the other is fear ).

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Man is a total energy system, not just comprising cells, fluids and bones. Within us, too, is an energy system of thoughts, feelings and emotions. Love, which vibrates at the highest level, is capable of converting lower energies and possibly impacting everyone, whether close by or far away.
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So, like it or not, at the spirit or soul level, everyone on Planet Earth is connected. Each one of us is like a scoop of the mighty ocean. Humanity is one immense, infinite, immortal soul. And that is one key reason for the outpouring of love, compassion, empathy and sympathy.
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The other possible reason is that for most people, contentment and happiness are not measured by just material wealth alone. Equally important is for one to be fulfilled mentally, emotionally and spiritually. And this in itself is a cry for help… for love, for happiness.
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World leaders would do well to take a leaf from the book of the tiny kingdom of Bhutan, the only country in the world to measure its well-being by Gross National Happiness, instead of Gross National Product. In Himalayan cultures, the whole society’s economy was meant to serve the quest for happiness.
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If for nothing else, this tsunami catastrophe has led to an awakening for, and the creation of more love, more happiness amongst us all, then the thousands of lives lost will not have been in vain.
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Gross National Happiness, anyone? )
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Thank you.

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Yours sincerely,

Clinton Lim

Gross National Happinesss

Some of you may have heard of Bhutan's Gross National Happiness index. I have not been to Bhutan, but found some informative videos on Youtube, which I have included here, as they have helped me to reflect on my life and the priorities I set for myself daily.

Some data about Bhutan (from Wikipedia):

Location: In the Himalayas, in between China and India.

Capital: Thimpu

Land area: 47,000 sq km

Population: 672,425

Per capita GDP: $5,477

For more on the history and geography of Bhutan, click here

Here is an introductory video of Bhutan:

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Click here to watch this video entitled, "Dragon Kingdom Bhutan". It depicts the country, its culture rooted in Buddhism and their reverence to their King, who embraces happiness above their GNP.

Early this year, Bhutan became a constitutional monarchy, with their first democratic elections:
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As Bhutan opens up, some of the social ills found in the West have started to surface in the country. The following documentary depicts the situation, where alcoholism and drug abuse has become an increasing problem.

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Questions:

1. Do you think Gross National Happiness can be applied to the country you live in? Does it apply to a densely populated city-state like Singapore that relies heavily on industrial efficiency, foreign labour, foreign trade and tourism?

2. Do you think Happiness should be the ultimate end of companies and organisations in their quest for material wealth? Watch the commuters in mass rapid transit in the morning rush hour. I have tried observing this in London, Paris, Brussels, Amsterdam, Budapest, Singapore and Hong Kong. They always give me a quick and rough guide to a city. Is GNH feasible amid the vagaries and the harsh cut-and-thrust forces of the market economy? Is there a better economic model? Communism failed. Socialism is expensive! :) How about Bucky's vision of the 'World Game'? Read here . Or Alvin Toffler's Revolutionary Wealth? Read here

3. Do you think as an individual, you can put happiness first? Is this feasible with the meritocratic and competitive school system you go to, or the organisation you serve?

4. As a parent, do you tell your child to study hard to make more money and have a comfortable life after that? Or do you remind your children to be educated so that they will grow up to be useful citizens that can put a smile on every other person he meets everyday?

5. In the quest for happiness, does it necessarily mean that you will have less material wealth? Do you think it is worthwhile to sacrifice material for happiness? Or does sacrificing happiness for material wealth makes more sense to you?

6. Many of us have been happy children when we were little, yet we didn't realise we were poor at the time, until years later as an adult. Why is this so?

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...till death do us part - Part 2

I have not heard about her since I visited her place some twenty years ago in her village. My friend knows her son. Then, she seemed a happy woman and her husband at that time was a teacher in the local school.

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Now, I heard she has remarried six years ago after divorcing her husband who has turned alcoholic. She found her present husband through the Internet and she re-married around the age of 60. What is more surprising is that her present husband used to be married to an alcoholic wife who eventually died of overdose.

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Just as I was about to think that it is the Law of Attraction at work, she told me that she believes in the law and encouraged me to watch "The Secret" DVD.

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In a way, I am happy that both of them got out of the rut of their previous marriages which were troubled by alcholic spouses.

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Incidentally, I have a friend whose wife have left him because he was an alcoholic. He haven't touched a drop of alcohol since the divorce. He said he drank to cover his depression. Alcoholism is a cover for manic depressive people. Such people may not even know they are drinking for that reason. They are trapped in their unhappy state.

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My friend, who has now recovered, would like to set up such a charitable foundation to help this group of people. According to his doctor, one in four persons are clinically depressed, but few people will ever notice it and many callously regard such depressive people as "bad characters".

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Bucky Group 31 - Leonardo Da Vinci

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This is part 2 of the Leonardo Da Vinci documentary screened during the Bucky Group today.
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(This discussion notes are emailed to me by WhatIDiscover. I was only there in spirit.)

Discussion:

Clara, Rachel and I feel that Leonardo da Vinci is a person of many talents. He is an artists, scientist, engineer, inventor… Bucky is like that too.
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Leonardo and Bucky are T Talents (very large ones as they know so much). I like to introduce my idea of T Talents..

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They are curious people who have deep expertise in one subject matter (the vertical leg of the T) and broad interest in one or many other subject matters (the horizontal part of the T). For example, Joo Hock is an expert in hairdressing and he also have broader interests in training, community management, events management, singing…etc.

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The T Talents idea is a shortened version of the T-shaped people idea. It is like using TinyURL.com to shorten a long web address to a short one. T-shaped people are people who are so inquisitive about the World that they are willing to try to do what you do. They have a principle skill that describes the vertical leg of the T – they might be mechanical engineers or industrial designers. But they are so empathetic that they can branch out into others skills, such as anthropology and do them as well. They are able to explore insights from many different perspectives and recognize patterns of behaviour that point to a universal human need.

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Source:

Strategy by designFast Company Tim Brown of IdeoFast Company 2005 Jun

http://www.ideo.com/pdf/FastCo-StrategyByDesign(TimBrown).pdf

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I share the same view that we need T Talents in the future with Steve Mills of IBM.

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The following paragraphs are taken from his thought leadership paper.

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In the past and to a great degree, the present - the work force is dominated by two kinds of people:

1. Business generalists with broad horizontal understanding of the business issues affecting their area.
2. Hands-on implementation specialists or people with narrow but deep expertise in a specific, often technical, area.

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The future of business demands a new breed of knowledge worker: the T-shaped person who combines broad understanding of business processes (the top, horizontal part of the T) with deep practical execution in a specific functional area (the bottom, vertical part of the T). People who share the same understanding of the business process (top of the T) can team with colleagues with different I-shaped specialties bottom of the T) to cover the waterfront of a business need without losing that common vocabulary and understanding of their shared business objective.

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Source:

The future of business, Steve Mills IBM, Thought leadership paper 2007 Jun

http://www.ibm.com/services/us/cio/pdf/wp-enbusflex_raw11032-usen-00_hr.pdf

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My Notes:

Leonardo was fascinated with everything he saw and went on to work on his areas of interest until they stopped fascinating him. When he was working on something, he would be totally focused on that something.

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This means that our schools are very wrong! Our current system works on structured and rigid syllabus that will give little time, if at all, for the student to explore his fascination to the fullest until he has discovered enough and the subject ceases to fascinate him. The current system assumes that every child has the same interests and talents and starts everyone at the same time and progress to the next class at the same intervals. This is what Alvin Toffler calls "Second Wave Industrial Age Education", which is standardised education for everyone. For more about what Toffler said, read here.

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Leonardo's going around Europe seeking new patrons to sponsor his works reminds me of my time I spent as an freelance consultant. Then I was moving from Australia to Europe, Europe to Africa, then to Asia. During those heady days, I was endlessly catching up with new technologies (there is no end to newer stuff coming) and how they could be applied to varied industries like banking, government, power stations, steel mills,...etc, at the same time pressured to sell and land my services with some clients internationally, so that 'I can eat'. I was constantly having to adjust to local languages , fiscal systems, new accommodation, public safety, driving on the wrong side of the road and varied seasonal climates. Sometimes we meet easy and pleasant clients, but more often ruthless heartless ones. It was exhilerating, but over time, the different time zones, climates, and intense mental activities accumulates into fatigue! :)

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In the early years when IT started, as long as you could write a program in a computer language, you were hired. Later, you have to be highly specialised in specific languages, sometimes even specific to the operating systems and machines. However nowadays as programming got commoditised and are outsourced to offshore programming centres, clients demand broad business knowledge and technical skills, similar to the T talents that was described above.

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An example of a T talent job requirement is one of an information security specialist. Unfortunately, many people think of information security as identical to IT security, especially in Asia where the knowledge in the field is in its infancy. They would further simplify it as anti-virus software installation and firewall operations.

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As information does not reside only in computers and most of its users are humans (the weakest link), it must extend its scope beyond technology to be pervasive and embrace physical security, human procedures and processes, policies, human resource profiling, management structures, legal requirements and constraints, business needs and user awareness. Even technology involved should not be restricted to just computer and networks, as there are laser eavesdropping systems and other data recovery methods that are not centred on computers. Thus, the 'specialist' now needs to broaden his understanding in organisational behaviour, the relevant laws and most critcially the psychology of what makes people tick to cooperate with the often claimed onerous security procedures, not forgetting that most of the time, the hacker comes from within.

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Keeping a nerd hardwired to firewall commands, and who can recite all the attack signatures by heart, would not be enough to protect your information.

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Bucky Group 30b - Leonardo Da Vinci

Below is an email from Clinton, a Bucky Group member after the Leonardo DaVinci documentary screening last Saturday at Hair Affair in Singapore.

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Hi,

Many thanks for your ongoing contribution, adding much variety to the topics being discussed at the Group. Leonardo da Vinci is of particular interest to me, especially in the areas of " whole brain thinking " and "sytems thinking". I marvel at the fact that more than 500 years after his time, the world is only his realising his genius, his masterpieces and discoveries. To think with just paint brush in hand, colours, canvas or wall, some egg yolk and a lot of imagination, perserverence, the rest of the world is able to have a life-like impression of ' The Last Supper '.
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To think too that LDV was already expounding the 'whole brain thinking' concept 450 years before Dr. Roger Sperry in 1953 ( inconjuction with Prof Robert Ornstein ), was awarded the Nobel Prize in medicine for his ground breaking work in this area. Through my own work and interest in this subject in, I am totally convinced that man's genius lies in making greater use of both the left and right brain for learning, thinking and creating, thus turning one's brain into a multiplication machine, not an adding tool.
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Man is wired to be a genius. It was Bucky who once said that " Man wasborn a genius. It is living that degeniuses him". And if I may add, using more of just one side of his brain through sheer habit, and becoming left or right brain DOMINANT! I think the genius of Bucky would probably not be fully realised for another 100-200 years.
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As for 'systems thinking', it all began with the universe itself, I would think. Everything else is a sub, sub, sub.... system. PeterSenge's " Fifth Discipline' is an excellent read on this.
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See you guys around.
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Cheers,
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Clinton

Read also Clinton's Mind Games

Bucky Group 30a - Leonardo Da Vinci

Below is an email from the previous Bucky Session about Leonardo DaVinci.

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Hi Bucky Fellows
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Leonardo da Vinci was different from conventional people. Let's explore what was different about him versus conventional people. He had the following 9 characteristics that creative people have. I feel Bucky had these characteristics too.
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Sense from: You and Creativity Don Fabun Kaiser Aluminum News 25
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Sensitivity
A propensity for greater awareness which makes a person more readily attuned to the subtleties of various sensations and impressions. Eric Fromm writes, "Creativity is the ability to see (or be aware) and to respond".
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Questioning Attitude
An inquisitiveness, probably imprinted in early home training that encourages seeking new and original answers.
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Broad Education
An approach to learning instilled from a liberal education that puts a premium on questions rather than answers and rewards curiosity rather than rote learning and conformity.
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Asymmetrical Thinking
The ability to find an original kind of order in disorder as opposed to symmetrical thinking that balances everything out in some logical way."The creative personality is unique in that during the initial stage she prefers the chaotic and disorderly and tends to reject what has already been systematized". Ralph J. Hallman
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Personal Courage
A disregard for failure derived from a concern, not for what others think, but what one thinks of oneself. "They seemed to be less afraid of what other people would say or demand or laugh at ... Perhaps more important, however, was their lack of fear of their own insides, of their own impulses, emotions, thoughts". Abraham Maslow
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Sustained Curiosity
A capacity for childlike wonder carried into adult life that generates a style of endless questioning, even of the most personally cherished ideas. Eric Fromm: "Children still have the capacity to be puzzled...But once they are through the process of education, most people lose the capacity of wondering, of being surprised. They feel that they ought to know everything, and hence that it is a sign of ignorance to be surprised or puzzled by anything".
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Time Control
Instead of being bound by time, deadlines and schedules, creative individuals use time as a resource - morning, noon and night - years, decades - whatever it takes, unbound by the clock.
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Dedication
The unswerving desire to do something, whatever it may be and whatever the obstacles to doing it.
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Willingness to work
The willingness to continue to pursue a project endlessly, in working hours and so - called free hours, over whatever time might be required. Roger Sessions said, "Inspiration, then, is the impulse which sets creation in movement; it is also the energy which keeps itgoing".
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I got the list of these characteristics from reading the design thinking article in the Design Research Quarterly 2006 Dec. It was written by Charles Owen of Illinois Institute of Technology's Institute of Design. He quoted Don Fabun for creating the list. I amnot able to locate Kaiser Aluminum News 25 ( published in 1968 ). If there is any one who has a copy, please let me know.
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Regards :)
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WhatIDiscover
What is the meaningful connection I can make between what you are curious about and what I know?