The Right Tools for the Job

The Right Tools for the Job

Theresa and I live on a small farm outside San Diego California, which was originally a large olive orchard. Our nine acres has the original eighty-year-old farmhouse, and many out buildings, and barns typically used to support a farm. The property had been a dumping spot, and the home was not lived in for years before we purchased it. Theresa is a farmer at heart, and it has been a lifelong dream of hers to live on a working farm. Within a few years we decided to develop a pick-your-own blackberry farm, blackberries are a weed in some states, but in Southern California they are a rare treat, and a pick your own experience is something parents can bring their kids to, and enjoy the experience together. Because of the size, age, and condition of the farm we expected there would be lots of work, but we had no idea of just how difficult it would be, we just do not own all the tools required to do it right. We had dreams for our farm, but without the right tools we cannot properly till the ground, plant, manage the vineyard, repair the buildings, and build fences. We are also missing the knowledge required to properly maintain a vineyard of blackberries. In its third year the berries were attacked by a fungus, and suffered a tremendous amount of damage. It took outside help to find out just what was wrong, and what we needed to do to correct the problems we were facing, we did not have the experience we needed to be successful on our own.

Learning the basics of how God designs people gives parents the tools they need to guide their children. It is not possible to provide the different tools you need in the context of a book,[1] but I can give you the basics of how the tools work, and a general outline of what insights each test provides as a foundation for understanding the rest of this book.

[1] Complete descriptions for each of the tests accompany the test itself or can be found online or in related books, for a complete listing of resources see attachment A.

Taken from chapter four of my book "Raising High-Octane Kids".