The Anatomy of Spring Influence Part II

Last time I started on how powerful and influential one's history could get. The physical analogy used is spring force. The main lesson is that compressed emotions and mistakes are powerful and potentially explosive so it's in one's own best interest to be wary of them. Consider the following examples.

David was a king in ancient Israel for whom everything was going. One day he spotted the beautiful wife of one of his soldiers, took her in, slept with her and the pretty woman became pregnant. Didn't he use protection? That's a very stupid question to ask because even if he did, his actions would still not be justified. Even if he did use protection, what should he expect when the woman told her husband? As soon as he realised what he had done, his desire to save the king's face led him into killing the woman's husband in desperation. I like the way Adeolu Akinyemi told the story in a recent post of his. King David would never imagine himself killing one of his finest soldiers but he did it anyway. Just because he thought the explosion of the spring was more than he could bear, he simply packed on more load. Ultimately what happened was that he married that woman, lost the child from that first pregnancy and most unfortunately, landed his children, generations yet unborn, in trouble. It was said to him that, "Now, therefore, the sword will never depart from your house because you despised [God]...Before your very eyes [God] will take your wives and give them to one who is close to you, and he will lie with your wives in broad daylight." (emphasis mine). And you know what? "So a tent was put up on the roof for Absalom, and he slept with his father's [David's] concubines in plain sight of Israel.". And then came incest, hatred and obituaries: Amnon and Absalom and Adonijah. If only he did not load the spring further!!!

Most people do not know the story behind the man after whom the O'Hare International Airport, Chicago was renamed. The man Edward Henry "Butch" O'Hare was the son of Edward Joseph O'Hare. Edward J. was a lawyer who worked closely with Al Capone before turning against Capone and helping convict him of tax evasion. 

This is how it happened. When Edward J. moved to Chicago in 1927 he started working with Al Capone, a gangster who led a crime syndicate that was in virtually in control of Chicago. They both collaborated in business and law, Edward J. providing the legal expertise that supported the syndicate. However, sometimes in 1930, apparently realising that he was doing something wrong, O'Hare volunteered to start working undercover for the authorities with the sole aim of bringing Capone to justice. Slowly, discreetly and steadily, he started providing evidence to investigators; and one of the investigators, Frank Wilson, actually acknowledged his finesse openly, stating in a 1947 magazine issue, "On the inside of the gang I had one of the best undercover men I have ever known: Eddie O'Hare." The evidence provided by Edward J. during Capone's tax evasion trial in 1931 and 1932 helped in proving Capone's guilt. 

There is speculation that Edward J.'s actions were spurred by one or a combination of three reasons: to ensure that his son, Edawrd H. got into the Naval Academy, to set a good example, or to attempt to right his wrongs. Whatever reasons he had, his actions meant only one thing - gently easing the load on the spring. Eventually in 1939, he was shot dead but that didn't seem to matter much anymore because that same year, his son started flight training at the Naval Air Station Penascola in Florida. The son, Edward Henry "Butch" O'Hare went on to become one of the finest airmen in the US Navy during and after World War II. So fine was he that only 9 years and 10 months after his father's death, the Orchard Depot Airport in Chicago was renamed after him. What would have happened if his father had not unloaded the spring? My guess is that Edward H. would probably never have gone to Naval Academy, eventually Al Capone's syndicate would have been busted and Edward J. would probably still be working there and he would also have been incriminated.

Compressed springs are powerful but not only in the negative sense. In the next post I'll discuss the positive side to compressed springs and the aspect of stretched springs.

The Anatomy of Spring Influence Part I

In basic physics, a spring is a device that stores potential energy. Potential energy is the type of energy that is stored within an object; the energy is there but its action cannot be felt until it is released. The amount of potential energy stored in a spring defines how much force (technically known as spring force) the spring can exert. The spring force is the force exerted by a compressed or stretched spring upon any object that is attached to it. 

Most springs obey Hooke's law. In very simple language, Hooke's law states that the amount of force that a spring exerts increases or decreases as the length by which it is compressed/stretched increases or decreases. Thus, the amount of potential energy stored in a spring corresponds to the amount of load it carries. By extension, the spring force also corresponds to the amount of load on the spring. The reason for these relationships is that the length of compression or stretch in a spring depends directly on the weight of the load on the spring; the heavier the weight, the more the compression or stretch, the more the potential energy stored in the spring, and the greater the spring force.

One important thing about springs and the load they carry is that if the load is removed suddenly, the potential energy in the spring is released explosively and all the spring force pushes the spring back to its original uncompressed/unstretched position. In other words, springs store energy when they are loaded and they tend to 'explode'  when the load is suddenly removed. The greater the load, the greater the 'explosive power'. That's the exact reason why auto-mechanics are extremely careful with shock absorbers. And it's the exact reason why you should also be wary! Springs, whether compressed or stretched, are powerful. For the rest of this post I will only consider the compression part.

Suppressed emotions, hidden sin and past mistakes are like compressed springs. They will one day explode if the load is not carefully eased; and the the aftermath is hardly ever nice. As a matter of fact, the more effort goes into the suppression, the more energy is stored and the more potentially explosive the whole thing gets. Being aware of the potential explosion, most of us simply pack more load onto the spring - for instance, we tell a lie to try to cover up some misdeed, we tell an additional lie to cover up the one already told, we start avoiding the people who hold us accountable and gravitate towards those with whom anything goes... 

However, that is not a reasonable course of action because every additional load, rather than alleviate or remove the problems, simply aggravates them. In fact, packing more load onto the spring leads to some sort of vicious cycle where the potential explosiveness becomes worse and we try to prevent it by adding more load thereby increasing the potential explosiveness, until someday....God forbid! Even worse, the spring begins to influence one's line of reasoning and approach to issues, wanting to desperately avoid anything coming to close to the spring even if they're beneficial, and gravitating towards anything that takes attention away from the spring even if they're deadly.

The best thing to do once you sense a spring - a grudge, a sin, a mistake, suppressed anger, bitterness, whatever - is to immediately stop loading and start easing the load already added, carefully and steadily. That is the only way to avoid the explosion. In the next post, we'll consider two true stories as examples.

Two Major Things - Part IIa

As humans, we are incurably social. Everything we do is situated within the context of relationships and interactions. It is within this context that loyalty becomes a highly relevant virtue. Every marriage, friendship, team, army etc cannot thrive in the presence of disloyalty. Unfortunately, the world today tends to treat disloyalty as the norm and loyalty as the exception. And that is closely connected to the way we define success and honour. It is such that everything that matters is what we see, whatever is not seen does not count for much. That is why you see people investing so much in their façade - cars, houses, certificates, money, power...and they will do anything to save their faces and deny their wrongs!

It doesn’t matter how desperately you think you need to save your face and reputation in the present, you create much more problems for your future than you could ever solve if you are disloyal.  As far as I am concerned, there is nothing wrong with being wrong, what is wrong is not admitting it when you are wrong. It is completely pardonable to err, but to pretend like nothing ever went wrong is what is inexcusable. If a man falls, it is wrong for him to stay down like nothing can be done. He needs to get up, deal with the issues and get going. But what we often see in today’s society is that people get caught up in errors – in short, they fall – and they pick themselves up, shake off the dust and pretend like nothing ever happened! Such men will always stop short of their ultimate destination, never reaching their greatest heights because one day, the prints they left in the sands of time will be discovered – and how lethal such discoveries are. 

Just two comparative examples: Tiger Woods was for 5 years the World’s No. 1 in golf until his marital disloyalty was discovered, mostly blown open by the many women he was involved with. In one year, the man slipped down 4 places and his entire family, let alone his wife could not help him. Dr. Ben Carson, the famous neurosurgeon, was once accused of extramarital affair by a strange woman. It was going to be a scandal because the woman claimed that she and Ben had a love affair but Ben’s wife came out to say it can’t be true; and that saved Ben.  The difference between the two men: LOYALTY!

More to come…