@HomeWithDean - 2/20 Homily - a podcast by KFI AM 640 (KFI-AM)

The book I’ve been reading this week is entitled The Island of Knowledge, by Marcelo Gleiser, Professor of Physics and Astronomy at Dartmouth College. It’s not what you’d call a page turner unless you read calculus like poetry as Dr. Gleiser clearly does. For as much as I enjoyed higher math in school I still prefer my poetry written in English instead of linear algebraic equations.

Nevertheless, Dr. Gleiser is one of those people who knows of what he speaks and my policy with anyone who actually knows what they’re talking about is to listen as best I can and try to mine out what few gems my mind can manage. One of those gems was a quote from the legendary quantum physicist Werner Heisenberg. It went something like this …

“What we observe in nature is not nature in itself but only the part exposed by our method of questioning.”

It means in science, as in life, the answer you get has everything to do with how you ask the question.

I find that idea immensely valuable because it reminds me that Reality—with a capital R—is always and will always be too big to be within my feeble grasp. It reminds me to check my ego and my assumptions at the door and remember that everything and everyone is deeper and more nuanced than they first appear. It reminds me to exercise empathy, no matter how difficult it may be, because Ian Maclaren was right when he said, “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a great battle.”

It reminds me of a truth I’ve tried to live by for some time now. That the smartest person in the room is not the one who appears to be giving all the answers but the one asking all the questions. Tina and I talk about this whenever someone praises us for our insightful design skills. Yes there’s gifting involved, especially in Tina’s case, but we’ve come to believe that what truly makes us different from so many other architects and designers is … it appears we ask more questions and listen more closely.

If you think about it, that’s our brand. That’s what a whisperer does. A whisperer—be it for dogs or horses or houses—is what you call someone who can tame what others have failed to tame. How do you think that happens? Does a whisperer possess some never before revealed hidden knowledge of dogs or horses or houses? No. But like a good detective a whisperer is simply asking questions no one else is asking. Which is why they’re getting answers no one else is getting. That’s it. Our secret is out.

“What we observe in nature is not nature in itself but only the part exposed by our method of questioning.”

What we think we know is all about the questions we’ve asked, or in most cases, haven’t asked. In life the easy path is to just go with your ego, your first impressions, your limited knowledge, your assumptions, your presuppositions, your biases, your prejudices. But those things never expose the truth. They only expose you.

If you want the truth you have to care about the truth. To get the right answers you have to ask the right questions. Only then will you be able to whisper the truth out of a dog, a horse, a house, a person. Only then will you solve the mystery and discover what stands between you and building yourself a beautiful life.

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