We have to be very careful about taking a reductionist view of everything. It’s actually a rather childish way to think.
Growing up, my sons’ responses to complex problems would often be, “Well, that’s dumb! Why don’t they just not do that?” I remember coming to the same conclusions in the wisdom of my ignorant youth.
I still see people write or hear people say, “Just do the work and you’ll be successful.” That isn’t always true. There are dozens of variables involved in whether someone is successful or not. You could have 50 people all doing the exact same amount of work in the same way, at the same intensity, for the same duration, and have 50 different results.
What are their proclivities?
What is their circle of influence like?
What is their personality type?
What are their current beliefs about themselves and the world?
How do they react to those beliefs?
Who had prior experience in the industry and who didn’t?
There are 1000 questions that could be asked that influence the outcomes of “just doing the work”.
The people that tell you to “just do the work” are the ones who have worked hard (they didn’t get lucky) and have achieved a lot of success, but who were also in a position mentally, relationally, emotionally, etc to chase down business success. Good for them! Others are not there yet. Still, others never will be.
The point is that reductionist thinking and language isn’t helpful or accurate.
The same is true for current events. Never look at a current event at face value and reduce it to it’s simplest form. That’s what the news wants you to do. The main stream media wants you to be a consumer of headlines, and then deep in the story, they’ll bury some elements of truth (and a whole bunch of untruths) that you won’t find out by reading just the headlines.
These stories are always multi-faceted and far more complex than we are lead to believe. It is up to you to do additional research and find out more…understand historical context of the region and parties involved in the story, do research on the money trail of the organizations reporting the story and those involved in the story, understand what’s going on in the world geopolitically, etc.
Absolutely nothing in this life should be taken at face value. Even the Bible should not be read through reductionist glasses. That’s how cults get started, isolating certain passages to fit into a personal bias they already had. Learn to become a good Berean and understand not just Biblical context, but also historical context, the original languages and translations, etc. Become exegetical in your approach.
The point of all of this is for us to not do the things that lazy people do. We have to become critical thinkers and not just reduce everything we see to it’s simplest form. Everything is not as it seems on the surface. We are in a psychological war and have been for quite some time. Be awake, be sober-minded, and be critical thinkers. THAT is how you win a psychological war.
Have a great week! 
Don’t Let Reduction Be Your Deduction
