{"id":3346,"date":"2007-11-29T12:30:00","date_gmt":"2007-11-29T12:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/deaconsbench\/2007\/11\/appreciating-the-beginners-mind.html"},"modified":"2007-11-29T12:30:00","modified_gmt":"2007-11-29T12:30:00","slug":"appreciating-the-beginners-mind","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2007\/11\/appreciating-the-beginners-mind.html","title":{"rendered":"Appreciating “the beginner’s mind”"},"content":{"rendered":"

While everyone picks apart last night’s GOP debate, and ponders what lies ahead in Iowa, the Wall Street Journal takes a wider view<\/a>. This is one to clip and hang on your refrigerator. Or, maybe, in your cubicle. Key snippet: <\/p>\n

Leadership is, at its marrow, the chronicle of judgment calls. These will inevitably write the leader’s legacy. Don’t get us wrong. We are not discounting the importance of experience. Seminal and appropriate experiences must be drawn on and understood before judgments can be informed. But experience is no guarantee of good judgment. There is a huge difference between 20 years of experience that advances one’s learning and one year of experience repeated 20 times.<\/p>\n

In fact, there are numerous times when past experiences can prevent wise judgments. Barbara Tuchman long ago observed how generals tend to fight the last war, refusing to face new realities, almost always with disastrous consequences. And often, especially in today’s dizzying world, we need to understand what Zen Buddhists call the “beginner’s mind,” which recognizes the value of fresh insight unfettered by experience. In this more contemporary view, the compelling idea is the novel one. Perhaps no one articulated the nature of the beginner’s mind better than the composer Hector Berlioz when he said of his more popular rival Camille Saint-Sa\u00ebns: “He knows everything. All he lacks is inexperience.”<\/p>\n

Judgment isn’t quite an unnatural act, but it also doesn’t come naturally. And speaking from decades of experience, we’re not sure how to teach it. (We know it can be learned.) Wisely processed experience, reflection, valid sources of timely information, an openness to the unbidden and character are critical components of judgment as well. As David McCullough reminds us over and over again, “Character counts in the presidency more than any other single quality.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Read the rest. There’s a certain wisdom there. (And maybe a homily or two?)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

While everyone picks apart last night’s GOP debate, and ponders what lies ahead in Iowa, the Wall Street Journal takes a wider view. This is one to clip and hang on your refrigerator. Or, maybe, in your cubicle. Key snippet: Leadership is, at its marrow, the chronicle of judgment calls. These will inevitably write the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":204,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3346","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics-and-politicians","category-this-and-that"],"yoast_head":"\nAppreciating "the beginner's mind" - The Deacon's Bench<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2007\/11\/appreciating-the-beginners-mind.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Appreciating "the beginner's mind" - The Deacon's Bench\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"While everyone picks apart last night’s GOP debate, and ponders what lies ahead in Iowa, the Wall Street Journal takes a wider view. 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Prior to that, Deacon Greg worked for 26 years as a writer and producer for CBS News, where he contributed to \"The CBS Evening News with Katie Couric,\" \"60 Minutes II,\" \"48 Hours,\" (Emmy Award, Writers Guild of America Award) and \"Sunday Morning.\" He was co-writer for the acclaimed documentary \"9\/11,\" hosted by Robert DeNiro. (Emmy Award, Christopher Award, Peabody Award, Writers Guild of America Award.) His radio essays were featured in the bestselling book \"Deadlines and Datelines\" by Dan Rather. He's also a two-time winner of the Catholic Press Association Award. Other places you may find him: AMERICA, U.S. CATHOLIC, CATHOLIC DIGEST, REALITY (Redemptorist Communications) and THE BROOKLYN TABLET. He also contributes homiletic reflections to the parish resource CONNECT!, published by Liturgical Publications. In November 2009, he began serving a three-year term as a consultant to the Communications Committee of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). Deacon Greg grew up in Maryland (Go Terps!) but he and his wife today live in the beautiful borough of Queens, New York. You can contact Deacon Greg at dcngreg@gmail.com.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/author\/gkandra"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3346","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/204"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3346"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3346\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3346"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3346"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3346"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}