*Typing*

When you are young, you think that your next step will lead to breakthrough and so you step tenaciously rather than wisely. For a time, this tenacity carries you forward. But, not without a cost. Bulls cover tremendous ground but leave behind destruction. As your youth gives way to experience, you start considering direction. You think not just about the step in front of you but how this step will transpire three and four steps down the road. In this season, as you learn to reach for wisdom first, tenacity becomes a last resort. In the rare occasions tenacity is required, it is remembered. It is like the Tiger that sleeps for 20 hours a day, lounges for 3, hunts for 1 and then strikes.

As a child, John D. Rockefeller's mother would preach frugality to he and his siblings. One of her favorite sayings was, "Willful waste makes woeful want." This followed him into adulthood. Rockefeller hated needless waste. Two stories speak to this hatred.

Shortly after purchasing his first home in Cleveland, Rockefeller wanted to expand his gardens. So, he purchased the adjoining lot. He didn't particularly like the look of the house on this lot so he immediately saw to getting rid of it. He decided to donate it to a new girls' school being built a block away. Rockefeller had the house lifted onto dozens of greased logs and rolled it down the street.

On another occasion, Rockefeller was inspecting a Standard Oil plant in New York City. Cans of kerosene were being soldered shut before being shipped all over the United States. He asked the engineer, "How many drops of solder do you use on each can?" "Forty," the engineer replied. "Would you mind having some sealed with thirty-eight drops and let me know?" The engineer used thirty-eight drops of solder, found that a few leaked. Rockefeller then advised him to try thirty-nine drops. None of the cans leaked. "That one drop of solder," said Rockefeller, "Saved $2,500 the first year."

Maslow's Hammer is a cognitive bias caused by an over-reliance on a single, familiar tool. In his own words, "If the only tool you have is a hammer, it is tempting to treat everything as if it were a nail."

To become a better problem solver, you must add a few more tools to the tool belt. Once this tool belt becomes too cumbersome to mule around, you must then invest in a toolbox and fill it.

This doesn't mean you shouldn't specialize in the use of any one give tool. There are, after all, great advantages in becoming the best in the world at a very specific trade. However, it does mean you should gain a working knowledge of many different tools.

K.S. Lashley was a psychologist famous for running a slightly inhumane experiment. He taught a bunch of rats how to visually navigate a maze. This learned habit involved a small area in the very back of the brain called the occipital lobe. Lashley then surgically removed this part of the brain and attempted to reteach the rats how to navigate the same maze. To his astonishment, the rats learned how to navigate the maze in the same number of minutes by using other parts of the brain. This led Lashley to believe that memories aren't strictly stored in a single part of the brain but rather across the brain. Fascinating.

Survival of the fittest doesn't just mean the fittest. It means the most variant; the most different. This is a mistake most of us make when we think of Darwin. We assume the biggest, fastest and strongest species prevail. But, this isn't the case. It's the species that are the most variant and, in turn, adaptable.

Take the Mammoth for example. They thrived during the most recent ice age because they were perfectly equipped for it. They were practically giant winter coats. They had 20 inches of hair covering up an inch of thick undercoat covering up 3 inches of well-insulated blubber.

However, after the world warmed up and humans started hunting Mammoths with sharpened sticks, these slow-moving winter coats soon went extinct. Mammoths were all the same. Because of this sameness, they collectively thrived when the conditions were right. But, as soon as the conditions changed, they started dropping like flies.

Darwin was a huge proponent of variance and believed homogeneity to be a death sentence. If Mammoths had variants within their species that were lighter, more skittish and agile, they might have adapted to the changing circumstances. These variants would have survived, mated and produced more Mammoths with these same variations.

So, how does this apply to us? Homogeneity is more comfortable than variance. Because of this, we have to actively work to fight against it. Both within ourselves and our communities. It's very dangerous to create environments where everyone acts the same, looks the same and talks the same. Because we approach new, highly diverse problems with the same old solutions.