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October 26, 2015 By B. Baylis Leave a Comment

Visual Story Board for Manuscript Title, Part V – Student Version

Image from GraphicStock. Used with permission

This post is the last in a series on the development of the title of the manuscript, An Explorer’s Guide to Biblical Life Planning: Student Version, on which I am currently working. By working, I mean interacting with my computer. This process is not as straight forward as it was prior to 2009. I am still generating ideas in my head. After my most serious bout with seizures in December, 2009, the ideas have almost always been in the form of visual images. Since I am not an artist, the coins in the realm of communications are words, I must translate the pictures I see into words.

This translation is a multi-step process. I first do a very rough draft in my head. I then mull over that draft several times before sitting down at my keyboard and inputting a more refined rough draft into the memory banks of my computer. I print out a copy of my work so that I can review it away from that machine that beckons me to investigate all the wonderful new reports on education, sports, world events, food and cars that it has to offer.

I usually leave my office, taking the hard copy of my document to review later. I have found if I try to edit the material immediately, I do not find problems or alternative ways of expressing my ideas. I am too invested in what I have just committed to my computer. I must wait minutes, hours or even days before I can truly edit my own work.

Why do I need the printed paper copy of a document to edit? There are several reasons. The first reason is that I am not a digital native. I will admit that, although I consider myself fairly fluent in digitalese, I am still a digital immigrant. In addition, the aging process has taken away some of my reaction time. Even spoken or hand written communications take much longer now than just 7 years ago.

Aging and other health concerns have also caused changes in how I do things. My middle range vision, i.e., computer screens, is deteriorating. If I enlarge the screen type font large enough to easily read it, some documents will not fit on the screen. In addition, the lines of type do not always run straight across the page for me. I get mixed up as to which line I am reading. With my changing vision, I have had to go to two pairs of glasses. One pair for distance vision and up-close “book” reading, and one pair for middle range (computer screen) and reading distance. I tried trifocals, but I couldn’t use them. They gave me severe headaches. Exchanging glasses has quickly become a pain, especially when I forget where I put the other pair of glasses.

This post concentrates on the phrase Student Version. With this phrase I am attempting to identify the target audience of the book. It is intended for mid-to late-adolescents. This phrase actually comes directly in verbal form from my pre-Traumatic Brain Incident days. As far back as 1990, colleges were looking for ways of addressing those traditional “college-age” individuals whom they were trying to attract to come to their institutions. Colleges had to walk something of a tightrope in addressing these individuals. Officially, in the eyes of the law, most of these individuals were not adults. They were still children in the eyes of many of their parents. Many parents were financially responsible for these individuals. Parents also wanted to protect “their children” from the harsh realities of the real world for as long as they could. The “children” were getting ready to leave the nest. They wanted to be on their own as much as possible. So as not to offend the parents or the young people, colleges started using the term “student.” This gave the young folks a sense of freedom, while still not completely off-putting the parents. In the ’90s at college recruitment or orientation days, we talked to parents about “their students.” When we addressed the prospective students, we used the term “students” to give them a sense of maturation. The term may not have completely satisfied everyone in either group. However, it didn’t disgust them either.

As these prospective students engaged in the college selection and preparation processes, there was one question that kept surfacing:

That’s the primary reason for writing this book. I wanted to help prospective students and their parents answer the questions that arise naturally in the processes of selecting, applying to and preparing for college or careers. This book is addressed to the students. I am also working on a second volume, addressed to the parents. I am intending to call it An Explorer’s Guide to Biblical Life Planning: PG Version. The abbreviation PG stands for Parental Guidance. This is not the parental guidance that the movies rating system suggests. The book is intended to provide guidance to parents as their students navigate their paths to college or a career. The PG Verision will contain all the material in the Student Version, but it will contain additional information. The added bonus material is meant to help guide the parents as they work with their students. I will encourage families to work through the common parts of the books together.

October 20, 2015 By B. Baylis Leave a Comment

VIsual Story Board for Manuscript Title, Part IV – Biblical?

This post is the next to the last in a series on the development of the title of my manuscript, An Explorer’s Guide to Biblical Life Planning: Student Version. In the series I have illustrated the application of a visual approach to thinking through a pictorial story board. In this post, I concentrate on the adjective Biblical, and some questions surrounding it. Since there are so many Life Planning processes, I wanted an adjective that would specify the type of process I was developing.

This adjective needed to convey a number of things. I wanted it to indicate something about the audience to whom I was addressing the book. The first adjective that I selected was the word Christian. I experimented with this word because I developed this process in conjunction with my work at four different Christian colleges. In those contexts, the students whom I was counseling and mentoring were almost exclusively Christian students. The few who were not Christians had made a conscious choice to attend a Christian college and knew the kind of education in which they were participating.

Yet I hesitated to use the adjective Christian. Why was I exhibiting this uncertainty? The main reason for my uncertainty came from the fact that there are many different forms of Christianity. Each form has its own nuances. In some of those branches of Christianity there is a strict exclusivity: “You are only a Christian if you belong to our group. We are the only group that has the truth.” Christianity does have an exclusivity. Christ is the only way, truth and life. No one can come to God except through Christ. In the Gospel of John, we read:

Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. (John 14:6 KJV)

However, there is a wide-open invitation to all to come to Christ. There is no set of restrictive rituals that one must perform to come to Christ. You must just believe that you are a sinner, that Christ died for your sin, and you must accept his free offer of salvation. Christ did not save us to enslave us. He died to make us free, as he spoke to a group of Pharisees and other Jews,

³⁰As he spake these words, many believed on him. ³¹Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed; ³²And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.³³They answered him, We be Abraham’s seed, and were never in bondage to any man: how sayest thou, Ye shall be made free? ³⁴Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin. ³⁵And the servant abideth not in the house for ever: but the Son abideth ever. ³⁶If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed. (John 8:30-36, KJV)

In Paul’s letter to the Galatian church he wrote

Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage. (Gal 6:1 KJV)

I have had my own life journey in Christianity. I have been a Christian for more than 60 years. I spent 40 of those years as a faculty member or administrator at four different Christian colleges, of various denominational and theological stripes. Over those 40 years I witnessed many arguments about whether a particular college should have the right to call itself a Christian college. These arguments arose mainly due to the sectarianism, parochialism, or pettiness of legalists, who have infiltrated the ranks of churches. My personal views are built upon many years of personal studies of the scriptures, theology and the history of the church. I believe in a richness and breadth of Christianity. I did not want to limit the appeal or application of my work to a narrow segment of the universal church, a segment which would force Christians into a small box of man’s making.

In my projected manuscript I didn’t want to restrict my audience to a particular portion of Christians desiring to find God’s plan for their lives. However, I know that not all who call the Lord, “Lord” are of the House of God.

⁴³For a good tree bringeth not forth corrupt fruit; neither doth a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. ⁴⁴For every tree is known by his own fruit. For of thorns men do not gather figs, nor of a bramble bush gather they grapes. ⁴⁵A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is evil: for of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaketh. ⁴⁶And why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say? ⁴⁷Whosoever cometh to me, and heareth my sayings, and doeth them, I will shew you to whom he is like: ⁴⁸He is like a man which built an house, and digged deep, and laid the foundation on a rock: and when the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently upon that house, and could not shake it: for it was founded upon a rock. ⁴⁹But he that heareth, and doeth not, is like a man that without a foundation built an house upon the earth; against which the stream did beat vehemently, and immediately it fell; and the ruin of that house was great. (Luke 6:43-49, KJV)

If we come to Christ and do the things he has said, we will be shown to be like Christ, and worthy to carry the label Christian. Where do we find the things that Christ has said? I do not deny that in the past God has spoken directly to individuals, and even today he may still speak directly to some individuals. The word of the Lord may not necessarily come audibly, but rather through the work of the Holy Spirit in our hearts and minds. However, our primary source of the words of the Lord today are the Scriptures. When individuals believe that God has spoken directly to them, those individuals, and anyone who listens to them, have the responsibility to test the words they believe came from God against what God has said elsewhere.

Since we know and believe that God is our primary authority, we must look to our current main source of his instructions, which is the Bible. That thought tipped the balance in my thinking toward the use of the word Biblical in the title of my manuscript.

However, as I thought more about this choice. I studied applications where the term Biblical has been used, such as Biblical counseling. There I found significant discussions about the use of the term Biblical, particulary in that context. The primary criticism of the use of the term Biblical Counseling seems to be related to the use of the Bible as the only source of knowledge and methodologies related to counseling, and the exclusion of other sources such as psychology and psychiatry. Thus we have two pictures. The picture to the left includes only the Bible and no other sources. While the picture to the right includes another source of knowledge, but does put the Bible on top in the place of ultimate prominence. I believe that God has given us brains and expects us to use them for His honor and glory. So my thinking leans toward the picture to the right.

Back to my question of this post: “What adjective do I use to describe the process that I am proposing?” May I ask for your help? What adjective should I use? I welcome my readers input.

October 12, 2015 By B. Baylis Leave a Comment

Visual Story Board for Manuscript Title, Part III – Life Planning

Life Planning: What do I do now?

This phrase is very different from the other phrases or words in my manuscript title in one very distinctive way. I have had the phrase Life Planning firmly fixed in my mind for many years. I started working on the idea of Life Planning a number of years before I had my traumatic brain incidents. During my years at Indiana Wesleyan University, in working with and supervising the staff of the IWU Life Calling and Leadership Center, I developed a five step process outlining how I believed God works in the lives of Christians. I labeled this process Life Planning because it helped individuals answer the question: “Which way do I go now?” My proposed manuscript explains this process and helps individuals work through the details in their own lives.

When individuals face the question “Which way do I go now?” they are really facing a multitude of questions. It is a time of challenge trying to balance many questions at once. There are so many choices and so many opportunities in an individual’s future. It can literally have a person’s head spinning.

As individuals face this challenge, they can be overwhelmed and find themselves buried under the weight of many questions.

At this point in their lives, they may have reached a point where they really can’t dig out on their own and they definitely need help extricating themselves from this tangled mess. The first place to find help is another person who can lend a helping hand. This person can be a parent, friend, teacher, pastor, or professional counselor. I believe that a second source of help could be my book, if the person is willing to spend the necessary time working through the book.

What is my five-step program? In words from before my TBI, the LIfe Planning process begins with God reaching out to individuals and inviting them to enter into a personal relationship with Him. It continues with those individuals responding to God, and then looking inward to satisfy their own inner questions, needs and desires. It concludes with individuals reaching out to other people.The five steps may be summarized in the following manner:

CALLING is God’s summoning individuals to enjoy the benefits of His grace, and then empowering them to participate in His grand plan for the universe.
MINISTRY is God’s assignment of an individual to a particular function, office or area of service.
VOCATION can be seen as the means of fulfilling God’s assignment. It is giving voice and hands to God’s calling and one’s inner self. It is the means of fulfilling one’s inner spiritual need to follow God’s summons and assignment.
PREPARATION is the individual’s personal response as the best way to equip one’s self for one’s vocation.
ENGAGEMENT is the final step, as an individual takes action in one’s ministry and vocation to fullfill God’s plan in his or her life. It almost always involves reaching out to others.

At this point in this post I diverge from the prepared script written prior to my TBIs and rejoin the battle between verbal and visual thinking. In the above discussion, I have given a short outline of my understanding of the process of life planning. I really have not defined life planning. So I ask the question: “What is life planning?” I have already hinted that life planning is a multi-faceted process. Some of the facets include setting a goal and racing toward it, defining success and measuring it, and navigating the maze of life

It involves investigating all the opportunities available to any individual and the open doors before that individual:

It involves balancing work and life, setting the bar high and striving to vault over it, and climbing to the summit and planting one’s flag on it.

Sometimes it involves an individual search for and finding the missing piece that fits right into the open slot of a pie, or the right key to open one’s mind to what lies in front of the individual

Finding the adjective Biblical may have been the most difficult aspect of constructing the manuscript title. In my next post I will explain how I decided to use the term Biblical. I will also discuss some of the implications of using the term Biblical to describe my Life Planning process.

October 5, 2015 By B. Baylis Leave a Comment

Visual Story Board for Manuscript Title, Part II

In my previous post, I indicated that in this post I would attempt to explain how I decided that the next word in my manuscript title, An Explorer’s Guide to Biblical Life Planning: Student Version, should be Guide. After coming up with the word Explorer, I wanted a word which would describe the type of book that I was writing. I wanted the word to describe how an Explorer would use this book. Every author somewhere needs to answer the question, “How should this book be used?” What better place to answer this question than in the title? What visual scenes came to my mind as I contemplated this question? I will admit that the first scenes that I saw were scenes that I immediately rejected.

I did not want my book to be a cook book that provided a step-by-step recipe for living one’s life. I did not want to convey the idea that God is a puppet master pulling our strings and controlling every movement.

My book is not a book of do’s and don’ts that portrays God as a policeman that is waiting to pounce on an individual for overlooking one commandment. I don’t mean for my book to be a law book. It’s also not a book that portrays God as a vindictive judge that is ready to “throw the book” at everyone who comes before Him. Yes, God is a righteous judge who has a set of laws that He intends for us to obey. However, as David reminds us in one of his morning prayers:

⁸The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy. ⁹He will not always chide: neither will he keep his anger for ever. ¹⁰He hath not dealt with us after our sins; nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. ¹¹For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that fear him. ¹²As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us. ¹³Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him. ¹⁴For he knoweth our frame; he remembereth that we are dust. (Psalm 103: 8 – 15; KJV)

If those are not the images I wanted to use for my title, what images did I want to use? They were images that portrayed assistance to the reader. I wanted my help to help the reader find his or her way through the maze of life to find the fulfillment that God intended for them. The first three visuals did exactly that. However, the words that emanated from the visuals, (compass, maze, diagram, map) didn’t convey the ideas that I wanted or needed in the book title.

Finally, I can check off this desire. With the fourth visual, I found the word that I was seeking.

The term is Guide. A guide dog doesn’t tell its user where to go. The blind person directs the dog to where he or she wants to go. It is the responsibility of the human member of the team to listen for the movement of traffic and other sounds in the environment to determine whether it is safe to proceed. A guide dog doesn’t tell the human user where to go. The human picks the intended destination. The guide dog helps the human maneuver around fixed obstacles. The human is still responsible for avoiding any moving obstacles. A travel guide book doesn’t tell the tourist what sites to visit. It highlights places and things worth visiting. The human tourist makes the final choice of where to go and what to do.

In my next post, I will explain the phrase Life Planning. I will discuss where it came from and what I mean by it.

September 28, 2015 By B. Baylis Leave a Comment

VIsual Story Board for Manuscript Title, Part I

In my previous post, Writing Using Visual Thinking as a Starting Point, I indicated that I was working on a book manuscript with the working title, An Explorer’s Guide to Biblical LIfe Planning: Student Version. In this current series of posts I will take you through the story boards that I built to come up with that title. Due to the length and intricacies of these story boards it will take at least five posts to explain my thinking. In this first post I will concentrate on the first phrase in the title, An Explorer. I wanted this first phrase to indicate both the type of individual to whom the book was addressed and the approach to studying the book the reader should take.

I wanted to focus on individuals who, when standing on the edge of a precipice, are willing to look across to the other side and consider whatever crossing avenues are available, no matter how frightened they might be. I wanted to address those individuals who are courageous enough to try to cross that rickety bridge.

I wanted to address those individuals who are willing to use a number of different paths and modes of transportation to achieve their goals. They are willing to do whatever it takes to reach the summit. They aren’t afraid to change mid-stream to a different approach.

I wanted to reach individuals who are willing to search high and low for answers.

I wanted to speak to individuals who are not afraid of books, particularly the Bible. These individuals have an affinity for books and are eager to spend time studying them deeply.

I wanted to speak to individuals who have a deep curiosity about the world and are not afraid to investigate it. They spend time looking carefully at the surface details, but also are brave enough to look beneath the surface.

Digital Illustration of a Viking Ship from Graphic Stock

The individuals to whom I am writing may have a good idea of where God is leading them, but don’t know all of the details. Even with their incomplete information, they are still ready to sail off into stormy waters and unknown seas like Leif Erikson or Christopher Columbus.

More modern versions of brave adventurers of this type include New Zealander Edmund Hillary and Nepalese SherpaTenzing Norgay, who were the first to reach the top of Mount Everest, the highest mountain in the world, at 11:30 a.m. on May 29, 1953. In the intervening years, more than 2000 climbers have reached that peak. However, a number of attempted climbs have ended tragically. More than 200 climbers have died on Mt. Everest’s treacherous slopes. The current year, 2015, is the most costly in terms of human life, with more than 20 climbers perishing as a result of an avalanche in April.

One more recent event than the initial climbing of Mt. Everest that caught the imagination of the world is the moon landings of the American space program. Neil Armstrong and Edwin (“Buzz”) Aldrin, two of the three astronauts in the Apollo 11 space craft, were the first two men to walk on the moon. Since their historical steps, there have been 10 more men to walk on the moon. There could have been two more. However, while en route to the moon, Apollo 13 had serious difficulties. It circled the moon but never landed on it. Almost everyone remembers the famous line from the movie account on this expedition: “Houston, we have a problem!” This is actually a misquote of the line spoken by Apollo 13 commander, Jim Lovell, who really said, “Houston, we’ve had a problem.” Notice the past tense in the Lovell version of the line. The present tense in the movie line makes for a more dramatic moment.

As we look to the future, who can forget the opening lines from the space-based science fiction television series, Star Trek? “Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before.” There is the word, I am searching for: explore

With all these images floating around in my head, I finally found the word that I needed to use in my title to describe the people to whom I am addressing my book. The one word that fits all of my images is EXPLORER. Hence the opening phrase, “An Explorer’s…” In my next post I will break down the images behind the next word in the title, “Guide“.

September 3, 2015 By B. Baylis 2 Comments

The consulting and counseling practice of Higher Ed By Baylis LLC is suspending operations indefinitely

This blog posting is first a very important announcement concerning the future of my dream to run an educational consulting and counseling practice in my forced retirement. It is secondly an admission that I have failed to live up to the desires that I expressed in my July 31, 2014 post entitled, An important announcement concerning Higher Ed By Baylis LLC and By’s Musings. In that post I noted that I was temporarily suspending HEBB LLC operations and curtailing posts on By’s Musings until at least the beginning of 2015. We are now well over half way through 2015, and I am coming back and announcing the indefinite suspension of the counseling and consulting practice of Higher Ed By Baylis LLC. I am closing up this portion of my dream, in order for me to accomplish at least something from the long list of things that I have wanted to do. After much prodding from my neurologist, I have finally agreed to concentrate only on my writing. Thus for the foreseeable future, I will spend my waking time writing books and posts for By’s Musings. I know that I have enough material to keep me busy because I have accumulated ideas for more than 40 books and more than 400 posts.

However, don’t worry! I may have been a slow learner, but I have learned this lesson well. I will not overwhelm you with these treatises all at once. I will dole them out, one at a time. I do not take this step lightly. I have had so many things that I wanted to do, and things that I believed the Lord had given me to do. However, the Lord has been teaching me daily that we are basically weak, and only He is strong. We can only accomplish what he allows us and enables us to do. Many of us believe that it is better to burn out for the Lord, rather than rust out. However, I have somewhat reluctantly come to the conclusion that neither option is what the Lord intends for us.

For the past six years, I have been suffering from severe fatigue. A plaque on my desk has turned very prophetic. It reads,

“When I works, I works hard.
When I plays, I plays hard.
When I sits, I sleep.”

For 45 years as a student, faculty member or administrator in higher education I lived the first two lines of that plaque. Early every morning, I was the first one in the office, with my ever present cup of coffee. I was also usually the last one to leave the office in the late afternoons or early evenings. I almost always took work home with me. However, given that schedule, I still managed to average ten hours a week in the gym playing basketball. One of the nicknames I picked up over the years was “ Old Iron Legs,” because I could play longer than the other players, most of whom were much younger than I. The gray hair and beard in the picture taken more than a dozen years ago may have fooled new opponents for the first two minutes on the basketball court. However, after just a few quick trips up and down the court, they realized that I came to play, and it wasn’t going to be easy to take advantage of this old geezer.

For the past six years, battling severe fatigue and other medical infirmities have restricted me to the world of the last line of the plaque. Six years seem like a long time. As a result of my neurological difficulties, one of the sensory dysfunctions that I am experiencing is not being able to hear string instruments. Instead of “hearing” such instruments playing music, I feel vibrations in various places in my body, or I see images of the sinusoidal waves of the sounds produced by the string instruments. I hear voices and other types of instruments perfectly well. You may ask, “How do you know what music is playing?” If the music is familiar, my brain translates the stimulus that the auditory receptors in my ears pick up into the vibrations or visual images that I perceive. Then my brain goes into the library of my memory banks and finds the particular music piece that is being played.

Although, I don’t sing aloud very often, so that others can’t hear my off-key singing, I have found comfort in singing silently the old gospel hymn, Just a Closer Walk with Thee. With a sovereign God in control, I don’t believe in coincidence. So it was a God moment, this past week, when at the funeral service for a friend we discovered that this hymn was part of the congregational singing. The presiding pastor explained that this hymn was the closing hymn of the last church service that my deceased friend attended the morning of the day he died. His wife asked that it be included as part of his service. I close this post with the words to that hymn:

I am weak, but Thou art strong,
Jesus, keep me from all wrong,
I’ll be satisfied as long
As I walk, let me walk close to Thee.

Refrain:

Just a closer walk with Thee,
Grant it, Jesus, is my plea,
Daily walking close to Thee,
Let it be, dear Lord, let it be.

Through this world of toil and snares,
If I falter, Lord, who cares?
Who with me my burden shares?
None but Thee, dear Lord, none but Thee.

Refrain

When my feeble life is o’er,
Time for me will be no more,
Guide me gently, safely o’er
To Thy kingdom’s shore, to Thy shore.

Refrain

“Road Closed” image provided by PresenterMedia. Gray beard picture provided by Indiana Wesleyan University.