Osler's Razor

It sounds like things in Tulsa did not go the way President Trump hoped. The arena was one-third empty (which, on the plus side, lowered the COVID risk) and the overflow area outside the arena--pictured above-- was pretty much vacant.

Randy Potts posted something on Twitter that I thought was really insightful and deeply sad:

"Seeing a new connec between Trump and my grandfather, Oral Roberts: Oral didn’t have friends. Zero. Zilch. His “friends” were the crowd; his social moments happened on stage. He loved his audience *as an audience.* Seeing that with DJT tonight, too. He’s talking to friends."

There is a lot there, in that short statement. At the core, though, is the emptiness of measuring your success by adulation.

I sometimes end a class with a little soliloquy about this: That when you do the best thing in your life, something that really makes things better, they probably won't have a parade for you. The truth is that the brave, good actions are often unpopular. They usually threaten to upset a status quo, change the lives of the rich or powerful, and that is something that the rich and powerful do not like. Think about how many of our heroes were actually killed for the courageous things they did (starting, but not ending, with Jesus).

The roar of approval can lead you to some bad choices. Following adulation is not the same as following your principles or your God. Humiliation and condemnation are more often the rewards for making hard, good choices.

Parenting is like that, too. Sometimes the most important things a parent does isn't the most popular with the kid. I know that was true of my dad- he wasn't someone to be mean or controlling to us three kids, but he was certain to do or teach the right thing even when it wasn't really what we wanted to hear.

It's probably not an accident that all three of us kids have gone on to be adults whose work has been focused not on making money but on making other people's lives better in some direct way.

One thing that fascinates me about my dad is that he is the person who takes the picture, not the one who is featured (as you can see on his blog here). To be good at that, you have to be kind of a visual listener. That takes a certain kind of insistent humility, where you make decisions while not getting the attention the subject of the photo or painting does. I think that has deeply influenced us all.

Aren't we lucky kids?