From the perspective of the education system I was and am a less than ideal student.  It is not that I didn't (usually) get acceptable grades or that I have problems learning, rather, the problem is that I do learn and most of us have lost sight (if we ever knew) of what it really means to actually "know" something.

Knowledge is power - Sir Francis Bacon
Power Corrupts - Lord Acton
I am dedicated to the pursuit of corruption - Shannon Dealy :-)

Whenever I see a problem, I like to ask myself one simple question: was this a problem for the caveman?  All of our problems big and small fall into one of the following caveman categories:

1. It was a problem for the caveman. 
2. We don't know if it was a problem for the caveman.
3. It wasn't a problem for the caveman.

Throughout my life, I have found that in most cases when I fail to achieve something, it is because I have set myself up for failure.  Success is often difficult if not impossible if we do not make proper preparations to ensure success before we begin.  As I start this article, I am sitting in Chengdu, China, taking a break from studying Mandarin.  I have no particular aptitude f

A number of years ago I met a young woman with all sorts of naive ideas about politics, communism, and human nature, so  I thought I would enlighten her a bit about the real world.

Perhaps the greatest gift I ever received was given to me by my father.  I'm sure he didn't realize it at the time, it is just part of who he is, but my brothers and I all now possess this same gift.

When we were children we watched (and often helped) our father and learned.  He always assumed that he could do pretty much anything that came his way, whether it was fixing cars, the house, or assembling some new gadget he had purchased.  If it was something he didn't know anything about, he might buy a book on the subject and use it for reference.  It wasn't just his assumption that he could do it that taught us, it was also what became sort of a standing joke: he would say to us "When all else fails, read the instructions!"