Good Evening, God!
I was idly flipping through this book when I was stopped by his use of EMPATHY. It seemed that was a key to one of the best Venture Capitalists in Silicon Valley. I had thought of “empathy” as a virtue . . . a stand-alone sort of character quality. I’d surely never thought of it as being essential to successful Venture Capitalists! Or to generals, spies, etc.!
Our secular culture tends to ignore or deny the practical benefits of being able to put ourselves in other people’s shoes, minds and hearts. Yikes! I was doing it too.
Apparently, empathy allows us to understand a much wider array of people and thus learn more. And updating our information . . . learning and growing and adapting . . . is essential. As Laurence Gonzales said. “Some people update their [mental] models better than others. They are called survivors.”
Hmm. One last point — from a book FULL of them — was about the different “success rates” of Foxes vs Hedgehogs. Hedgehogs know ONE area very well. Foxes know a lot of areas. And when asked to make predictions on what would happen in five years — the foxes were way out in front and the hedgehogs way behind. The foxes were widely interested in the world around them. They updated their understandings frequently. And they were skeptical of one big answer.
I can understand curiosity as useful. But empathy — the ability to feel with other quite different people — that was a huge surprise. But, then isn’t empathy intertwined with love? And so as You are Love . . .it shouldn’t surprise me that love would be a useful virtue . . . not just “spiritual”.
Story teller,
A Moment with God 
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