Winnowing, v. — the act of freeing grain from chaff by wind or driven air. Also: a method of evaluating raw ideas.

This uncommon word has coincidentally appeared twice in readings from this past week. One in a biblical context describing the action of a grain threshing floor (can’t think of a better way to spend Friday night than pinching wheat between my fingers), the other in a book authored by a computer graphics artist.

Whether sifting wheat from chaff or good ideas from bad ones, the act of winnowing requires shaking the status quo basket. Disrupting the norm may not be the easiest option, but who said ease was the goal? Excellence is the real goal, and anything short of that is bad self-negotiation within my brain.

Out here in the less-than-wild-wild East, most conflict I face is self-produced; a choice, rather than a requirement. Outside of school, my time, pursuits, and lifestyle choices are my own, and even on campus, what I teach is left to my own devices.

With little to no oversight, reaching for goals can become difficult—both physically and mentally, you need another person(s) to kick you in the butt to get a move on it. What Nike’s old ad copy from the 1980s is true: “Beating the competition is relatively easy. Beating yourself is a never-ending commitment.”

In Jeonju, with high school boys and lifetime education administrators as office mates five out of seven days a week, there is frustratingly little for me to compare or aspire to; a huge driver of my past success was always being in the position to chase the coattails of someone more talented, more driven, more disciplined, and/or more successful. Here within a different cultural context, apt comparisons fall flat. And so it goes that each week is comfortable, and no week is extraordinary from a growth-oriented perspective. Discipline and perseverance are lofty ideals that must be chased, rather than tacitly imposed by the communities around us that I’ve had since elementary school. But reaching for those ideals requires thinking of horizons, rather than the hands-on, everyday demands of the now.

Life is growth. You grow or you die. The man who moves a mountain starts with the smallest of stones. Mantras like these start the blood flowing, but can the keep the heart pumping down the road? It’s burdensome to have the guilt that every time I fail to take action now, I may be forfeiting a piece of my future later.

As I slowly climb my way towards mental goals set for myself, I have to gently remind myself that I shouldn’t be in such a rush to finish this chapter of life that I fail to ace the lessons that the current page is trying to teach me. And that is inherently difficult, when each morning feels similar, each day blending together, the autopilot button easily within reach.

Logically, I know that to sharpen myself into a better tool, I need to winnow my thoughts, shaking them often out of mediocrity and laziness so they can incubate and grow. Sometimes, however, I wish some other outside force would do the shaking for me.