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Love

Verbal reactions, useful as they are, are insufficient. (William James)

As long as the superiority between words and pictures can't be determined, it makes sense to use both, where applicable, when communicating information. (Richard Saul Wurman, follow the Yellow Brick Road)

The occidental mania for seeing all things in terms of mutually exclusive opposites builds in limitations. People view themselves as either right-brained or left-brained, artistic or scientific, numbers- or word- oriented, logical or intuitive. In truth, excellence in one side of these pairs doesn't mean an inability in the other, nor are they mutually exclusive opposites. It is possible to be proficient in both numbers and words, to be artistic and scientific. (Richard Saul Wurman, Follow the Yellow Brick Road)

To search for the perfect channel for an instruction is pointless. There is no such thing. The way to instruct people is to offer a variety of forms. The perfect instruction manual is perfect only if the reader thinks in the same patterns as its writer. To someone who needs to be told how to operate something, a clear, easy-to-read manual is just one more dust-gatherer. (Richard Saul Wurman, Follow the Yellow Brick Road)

The impulse toward openness, as O'Brien says, "is the spirit of love." Love is, of course, a difficult word to use in the context of business and management, but O'Brien does not mean romantic love. In fact, the type of love that underlies openness, what the Greeks called agape, has little to do with emotions. It has everything to do with intentions--commitment to serve one another, and willingness to be vulnerable in the context of that service. The best definition of the love that underlies openness is the full and unconditional commitment to another's "completion," to another being all that she or he can and wants to be.

"I can practice all the analytical steps in the world toward openness," O'Brien says, "and it is not enough. If you have the fundamental spiritual disposition, without the skill you'll be ineffective. But, on the other hand, if you develop the skill without the spiritual disposition, that won't work fully either." (The Fifth Discipline)

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