If It Can't Be Measured, It Must Be Really Important

In business, I'd be laughed out of the office with such a claim. Everyone in business (and among a number of church leaders) knows that it's supposed to go this way:

"If it can't be measured, It doesn't exist."

Those words have never sat well with me, but usually my beef was that there are important things that are hard to measure. Love, just for openers, right?

But a few days ago my brother directed me toward a TED talk (given by Brene Brown) that began with this fabled business nostrum. And then the woman went on to discuss, for some twenty minutes, topics of vital importance. Vulnerability. Gratitude. Joy. Belief.

None of these things could be measured. Not one.

And the more I reflected on it, the more I came to the conviction that the business claim didn't merely fall short of reality. It literally is flip-flopped with reality. It's not sorta off the mark. It's wildly off the mark.

That's not to say that nothing that is measurable matters. Far from it. The business claim arose because we've discovered how many things in life can be improved if we just start measuring things and paying attention to the numbers.

Fair enough. And true.

But if we look closely at those things we can improve by those means, they are peripheral things to what is, at core, most important about life itself. Paying attention to the numbers when examining immunological results may result in a better vaccine. Too true. But the thing that matters more is the lives we were trying to save in the first place.

As if to drive this thought home, the next TED talk that walked, uninvited, into my browser space, dove right into the heart of what I'm trying to say.

As Brene Brown's talk wound down, TED.com flipped me to the next talk in the queue. In this next video, Barry Schwartz spoke on the loss of wisdom.

Mr. Schwartz began his talk by projecting on screen a list of the duties (all quite measurable) that a hospital janitor needs to perform.

There was nothing surprising about the list of duties. Mop the floor. Empty the trash cans. Etc. etc.

But then Schwartz pointed out that none of the duties in the list made reference to any other human being. Not one. "The janitor's job could be done in a mortuary just as well as in a hospital."

But Schwartz then began to explain the sorts of things on that list that janitor's did or didn't do. And why.

The janitor who didn't mop the floor because patient X was trying to relearn how to walk and needed a dry hallway.

The janitor who didn't vacuum the visitor's lounge because exhausted family members on vigil were presently napping there.

Some quibbler could try to quantify and codify better janitorial instructions, but that would be to miss the point. Matters of the heart cannot be measured. But you can tell who is listening to the whispers of wisdom. They will do their job better than anyone overly focused on the numbers.

I have work to do today. I'm behind on that work. Is the time spent on this blog well spent? Good luck answering that one.

But if the time spent putting these thoughts down helps me to remember that unmeasurable things are generally the most important ones, that will make this blogging excursion a profitable one. I will hopefully (like those janitors) drop my job the moment I hear the whisper of God telling me I need to do something that nobody is measuring.

Not with numbers, anyway.

(34 + 47) <> (35 + 46)

In mathematics, I'd be on shaky ground with my headline claim.

But (unusually, for me) I'm not talking math. I'm talking Psalms.

This reflection will be brief. I am, again, pecking with one hand, pretty much, as I sit here and type. My tendon injury (mentioned in prior blogs that I am too lazy/constrained to locate) re-ruptured.

It's amazing how efficient you get on activities that are no longer easy. You find ways to economize. After writing the above, it occurred to me that I could just post (here) a recent update I emailed to people. It should cover the gist of my recent travails.

(This update comes on the heels of a 2nd surgery I underwent in which the goal was to borrow a tendon from my ring-finger and transfer it over to my thumb. There are two tendons in each finger, and the one we wanted was the one that bends the joint "closest" to the ring. The tendon that bends the last joint... that's the tendon we wanted to leave in place.)

Ok. Here comes the update.

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The short update is that surgery went fine except for one thing. When the doctor opened up my hand at the base of my ring finger so as to get a new tendon for my thumb, he snipped and took the wrong tendon.

Have I got your attention yet?

Yeah, sadly this is not a joke. The good news is that the oops apparently isn't such a big deal. We hope.

[Sidebar commentary. I have a long history of winning the tendon lottery, and it's not the kind of lottery one wants to win.

Ruptured left Achilles as a 22-year-old. That injury is supposed to happen to 40-year-olds. Lottery win #1.

Ruptured right Achilles tendon 10 years later. My ankle doctor could only think of 1 or 2 other cases where someone had ruptured both ankles. Lottery win #2.

Ruptured thumb while washing dishes. Lottery win #3.

Re-ruptured thumb 3 months after the repair surgery. 1% chance of that happening so late in the game. Lottery win #4.

The stage is now set for our next win....]

It played out like this: the doctor came out to my wife after surgery and said that after he snipped the proper tendon, my finger reacted strangely. Upon investigation, he discovered that the tendons in my finger were reversed from the normal top/bottom order. "I've been doing this surgery for forty years." he told her, "I've never seen the tendons reversed before. And tendons are my specialty."

Lottery win #5. Friends, I am getting tired of winning the tendon lottery.

So the deed having already been done, the doctor went with the tendon he had already snipped. Not like he had a choice, at that point.

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So what does all this have to do with Mathematics or the Psalms?

Just this: I turned 47 years old late last month.

That doesn't explain much, does it? OK, OK, here's what I mean. Each year I memorize two Psalms. When I turned 41 I memorized 41 and 40. When I turned 42, I did 42 and 39. If I should live long enough, I'll eventually memorize Psalms 80 and 1. By then I'll be old enough to justify reducing my load to one Psalm per year. When I'm 81 I'll just memorize Psalm 81.

*IF* I even live that long!

So last year I memorized Psalms 35 and 46. Strangely enough, the Psalms for each year have been ringing true to my circumstances, and I'm sad to report that Psalms 35 and 46 are not happy Psalms.

Psalm 46 covers turmoil in the world. A twist on Jesus' words about the poor is apropos here. "World turmoil you will always have with you." Nevertheless, my own personal world was more roiled than normal last year. The words "Be still, and know that I am God" were well received by yours truly last year.

Psalm 35 is an expression of personal grief, however, and rather explicit about the cause of the problem: treacherous non-friends. Well, I nearly made it out of the year with that one proving not-so-applicable to my life.

Until, that is, my wife was essentially accused of theft at work by a person we can only guess was jealous of her. The accusation was made (and the interrogation by two police officers)... yep. On my birthday. Psalm 35 reads like a script for this unwelcome drama. Scarily spot on.

I will wrap this rather odd reflection up with an observation, and it's this: Psalms 34 and 47 look really, really, really good right about now. They are repeated exhortations that we praise God without ceasing. Celebrations of God's goodness.

That sounds awesome. Last year, to quote queen Elizabeth, really was an "annus horribilis". Repeated tendon injuries, work problems, and the crowning honor of my wife's interrogation for petty theft she did not commit.

So I hope and pray indeed that it proves true. That (34 + 47) <> (35 + 46).

But even if it doesn't work out that way, the exhortations are still welcome.

Psalm 34: 1-3

I will extol the Lord at all times;
   his praise will always be on my lips.
I will glory in the Lord;
   let the afflicted hear and rejoice.
Glorify the Lord with me;
   let us exalt his name together...

When did David write this? We're told! Psalm 34 is... "Of David. When he pretended to be insane before Abimelek, who drove him away, and he left."

David wasn't celebrating because his life was calm, tranquil and defined by ease. Not by a long shot. He wrote that Psalm because he was alive and not dead. 1 Samuel 20-22 covers the situation, and it is a horrifying mess. King Saul is out to get David. To kill him.

Psalm 34 (a song of celebration!) was written by a man who had only days earlier been marked out for death by the highest authority in the land.

Whether the last Psalm I memorize is 46 or 81, I hope I am able to recite it with gratitude to God in my heart. Regardless of the circumstances.