Tag: Blog

A Tomb or a Library

~ David Willis ~ Leave a comment

Day 71 of 280 | The 7-40 Challenge

I’ve spent nearly twenty years working in data management. It’s my day job. I think about how data flows through systems, how it gets organized, how it turns into something useful. I think about the architecture behind it — the tables, the databases, the business processes, the people who care enough to enter things correctly and the people who throw things at random into places they don’t belong.

And about ten years ago, I started seeing the same framework everywhere — not just at work, but in life.

In my field, there’s something called the DIKW pyramid. It works like this:

Data is raw. It’s the unprocessed facts of your life — the events, the numbers, the experiences piling up with no context.

Information is data with context. When you start to organize what’s happened to you and see patterns, you’ve turned data into information.

Knowledge is information you’ve absorbed. The books you’ve read, the lessons you’ve been taught, the principles you can recite from memory.

Wisdom is knowledge tested against your own life — wrestled with, questioned, and earned through action.

Most people stop at knowledge. They read the book. They save the post. They listen to the podcast. They can recite the principles. And they stay stuck. Because knowledge without action is just a shelf full of books you never opened twice.

I didn’t learn this from a textbook. I learned it the hard way.

I was lying in a hospital bed during my second bout with cancer. I had time to think — more time than I wanted. And I started seeing the connections. The way data moved through my company was the same way information moved through my life. Raw inputs get processed into something contextual. Context builds into understanding. Understanding, if you act on it, becomes wisdom.

And I realized: if I control the inputs — what I read, how I eat, how I exercise, what I feed my mind and my spirit — I can, in a lot of ways, influence the output. That’s true in data management. And it’s true in life.

Here’s the question that keeps coming back to me: What’s the difference between someone who reads Atomic Habits and changes their life versus someone who reads the same book and puts it on the shelf?

Same book. Same information. Same knowledge available to both.

The variable is agency. The willingness to act on what you know. The realization that nobody is coming to save you, nobody is going to do it for you, and the information sitting on your shelf is useless until you decide to apply it.

That’s the leap from knowledge to wisdom. Not reading more. Doing something with what you’ve already read.

My data management brain sees things in a different way. I see systems. I see related sets of information that join together. I see frameworks and architecture. I think about how things connect — and more importantly, I think about what happens when they don’t.

And here’s what I notice about how most people organize their lives: their inputs are at odds with their stated goals.

Someone says they want to be a writer but never sits down to write. Someone says they want to get in shape and fills their body with garbage. Someone says they want a strong marriage and spends their energy tearing their spouse down behind closed doors.

A data architect would look at that and flag it immediately: you have a structural problem. Your inputs don’t match your desired output. No amount of motivation will fix that. You need to redesign the system.

That’s what healthy habits do. They redesign the system. They align your daily inputs with the life you say you want. And when the system is aligned, the outputs start to change — not because you’re trying harder, but because the architecture finally supports the goal.

So if you’re sitting at your desk right now, with a shelf full of books behind you and a head full of knowledge that hasn’t changed anything — I have one question for you.

Is that shelf a tomb or a library?

A tomb is something that’s never opened because it’s full of dead bones. Decay and rot and silence live there. The information inside has stopped moving. It serves no one.

A library is alive. It’s rich with possibility. It’s full of words that want to guide you somewhere better. It’s waiting for someone to pull a book off the shelf, open it, and do something with what’s inside.

If you’ve been collecting books the way I collected books for twenty years, I have a feeling you want more than you have right now. You want to be more and do more than you are. But you’re stuck on this word: agency. You don’t feel like you have any. You feel like every time you try to move forward, something pushes back.

Here’s what a data architect would tell you: that pushback is a system conflict. Your old architecture — the habits, the patterns, the defaults you’ve been running on for years — is fighting the new inputs you’re trying to introduce. That’s not a sign that you’re failing. That’s a sign that the redesign is working. Every system resists change at first. The old processes don’t want to be replaced. But if you keep feeding the new system with the right inputs, consistently, the old one loses its grip. The architecture shifts. And the outputs start to change.

So I’ll ask you plainly: what do you want?

And if you know what you want — what are you willing to do to get it?

I spent twenty years with a shelf full of books and a head full of knowledge that wasn’t going anywhere. I had data. I had information. I even had knowledge. What I didn’t have was the willingness to put it to work — to wrestle it into wisdom through daily, unglamorous action.

Don’t let your shelf be a tomb. Turn it into a library. Take what you know, apply it to your life, and start the climb from knowledge to wisdom. Do it today. Do it again tomorrow. And pretty soon, you’ll look in the mirror and barely recognize yourself — not because you became someone new, but because you finally became who you were always supposed to be.

Day 71 Scorecard:

✅ Bible study and prayer
✅ Walking
✅ Reading (Die Empty — Todd Henry + Keep Going — Austin Kleon)
✅ Calories tracked
✅ Water (100 oz)
✅ Gratitude
✅ Exercise
✅ BiblePictures365
✅ Creative hour

740Challenge #DIKW #DataToWisdom #TombOrLibrary #Agency #Transformation #LivingProof #DayByDay #LifeOnPurpose #ToddHenry #SystemsThinking

The Robbie Hart Insight

~ David Willis ~ Leave a comment

Day 70 of 280 | The 7-40 Challenge

I went to college on a full music scholarship. Bass baritone. Show choir. The whole deal. Singing and dancing literally paid for my education.

I sang in everything I could find — college choir, a professional chorale that was just starting up, church worship teams, a summer-long ministry tour where I sang at a youth camp for over two months. By the end of that summer, I was sung out in ways I didn’t even know were possible.

And when I got back to campus that fall, I realized something had shifted.

It wasn’t that I couldn’t sing anymore. I could. It was that the environment around music had started to change me into someone I didn’t want to be. The music department had started a critical spirit in me — a snobbish perfectionism that I was fighting without realizing it. And I didn’t have the tools at that age to separate the pursuit of excellence from the culture of superiority.

If I’d had the work ethic I have now — the ability to self-assess and improve — I probably would have excelled. But at nineteen, I didn’t have that in my toolbox. And honestly, I didn’t need to stay. That path wasn’t going to serve me. I just didn’t have an adult come alongside me at that moment to help me figure out what should come next.

So music faded. Gradually. Not with a dramatic exit — just a slow drift into other things. I even spent a season as a music pastor, where singing was my entire job. And it took the fun out of it completely.

Years later, I found my way back to performing. Not as a career. Just for the love of it. I joined a theater group in the DFW area and ended up playing Maurice in Beauty and the Beast — ten shows, not an empty seat in the audience.

Something was different this time. I was just there to do my best and enjoy the ride.

In the version of the show we performed, the original script had included a duet between Belle and Maurice. But the musical’s writers had replaced it with a short solo that Maurice sings as he gets lost in the woods. The removed the duet completely. They did it because the duet weakened Belle’s character — it undercut her agency in the story.

Would I have loved singing a duet with the actress playing Belle? Absolutely. She was an incredible singer. But it’s not what the story needed. It’s not what the character needed. It told a better story without it.

And I was completely okay with that.

That’s when I knew I was a different person. The younger version of me would have been devastated. This version understood that the talent exists to serve the story — not the other way around.

I’ve been thinking about this because I just started reading Todd Henry’s Die Empty, and he talks about identifying your through line — the thread that runs through everything you do and connects it into a single coherent purpose.

My through line isn’t singing. It never was. Singing was a tool. A resource. A gift I was given that served me well for a season and still sits on the bench ready to be called up when the moment is right.

But it’s not the thing.

The thing is what I’m doing right now — writing, creating, documenting, building something that helps people see what they already have and use it on purpose. That’s the through line. Phase Defiant, the 7-40 Challenge, BiblePictures365, this blog — they’re all expressions of it. The singing, the thirty voice impressions I can do, the odd jobs I do around my house — those are resources. They’re talents. They just don’t run the show.

There’s a moment in The Wedding Singer where Robbie Hart, played by Adam Sandler, realizes something about himself. He used to play in a band. He performed at weddings. But what he really wanted wasn’t to be the guy on stage. He just wanted to express the feelings and create the things. He wanted to write songs people loved. He didn’t have to be the one up there singing them.

That’s me.

I’ve written over fifty songs. I’ve performed on stages large and small. I can sing, and I can do it well enough to hold my own. But I don’t need to be the guy on stage. I need to be the guy at the desk — writing the story, building the framework, documenting the journey, creating something that lasts longer than a performance.

If you’re reading this and you’re in that spot — talented at something, maybe even genuinely good at it, but sensing deep down that it’s not your thing — here’s what I’d tell you:

There’s a difference between what you’re talented at and what matters to you.

Start with what you value. Your family. Your faith. The work that makes you come alive. The problem you can’t stop thinking about. Then ask yourself which of your talents actually serve those values — and which ones are just things you can do.

Your talents are resources, not assignments. The through line decides which ones get deployed. And having a real gift sit on the bench isn’t waste — it’s wisdom.

Let the story decide what it needs. Not your ego.

Day 69 Scorecard:

✅ Bible study and prayer
✅ Walking
✅ Reading (Die Empty — Todd Henry)
✅ Calories tracked
✅ Water (100 oz)
✅ Gratitude
✅ Exercise
✅ BiblePictures365
✅ Creative hour

740Challenge #DieEmpty #ToddHenry #ThroughLine #TalentVsCalling #TheWeddingSinger #RobbieHart #ShowYourWork #Transformation #LivingProof #DayByDay #LifeOnPurpose

Flow and Stock

~ David Willis ~ Leave a comment

Day 65 of 280 | The 7-40 Challenge

I started reading Austin Kleon’s Show Your Work today. To me, he sounds like a modern-day Seth Godin — an artist who’s figured out how to say, very poignantly, not just how he found success, but how he built it. And he shares it in a way that’s both relevant and timeless.

Three things hit me today.

Maintain your flow while collecting your stock.

My flow is what I do every day. The habits. The routines. The framework. The stream of ideas, creativity, and writing that comes from showing up and doing the work. Flow is the engine.

My stock is what I produce over time because I stayed in the flow.

What have I produced over the last two rounds of the 7-40 Challenge? I edited one novel and got it published on Amazon. I wrote another novel and took it through its revision passes. I’ve blogged every single day this year — not just on challenge days, but during the assessment weeks too. This blog has become my daily creation habit — my response to how the habits are affecting me, how the reading is impacting me, and how I’m starting to put things together and see the world in ways I never have before.

Some of the visions and thoughts I’ve had over the years are coming back to me now and making more sense in the context of where I am and what I’m doing. The ideas didn’t change. I did.

Maintain your flow. The stock takes care of itself.

Small things over time get big.

We know this. If you’ve ever put money into a bank account and watched compound interest work, small additions over time can get really big.

If you’ve ever thrown your clothes down in a room and kept throwing them down, something as small as a single shirt on the floor can end up being something as big as your wife not being happy with you and a whole lot of cleaning to do because you let it go too long.

There are so many examples. But here’s the one that matters to me right now: if I proactively practice my habits every day — if I put in my time writing, put in my time creating, put in my time connecting on social media — then I will see those things get big. The same is true for exercise, eating well, drinking water. As I put in the repetitions, my body is getting more fit. The pounds are going down.

Sixty-five days of small things. And they’re starting to get big.

Your website is your own little corner of the internet.

I’ve heard this before. But Kleon added something that turned on a light bulb for me: your social media platforms — Instagram, Facebook, TikTok — can be taken from you. If the overlords of those companies decide to change the rules, your content lives on their land, not yours.

Your website is different. It’s yours. It’s where your content is stored, where your central hub lives, where you’re building the brand of you so you can speak on anything you want — and it’s a place you can lead people back to so they can see exactly who you are and what you do.

I saw a Gary Vaynerchuk video the other day where he said one of the things that’s working in social right now is making content about everything — not boxing yourself into one lane. I identify with that. I have interests in many different areas. I have many different things I want to work on. And having my own corner of the internet where all of that comes together? That’s the hub. The social platforms are the megaphones. The website is the house.

Maintain your flow while collecting your stock. Small things over time get big. Your website is your own little corner of the internet.

Three good nuggets from today’s reading. And every single one of them confirms I’m on the right track and doing the right things.

Day 64 Scorecard:

✅ Bible study and prayer (finished Numbers!)
✅ Walking
✅ Reading (Show Your Work — Austin Kleon)
✅ Calories tracked
✅ Water (100 oz)
✅ Gratitude
✅ Exercise (Workout B with Trey)
✅ BiblePictures365
✅ Creative hour

740Challenge #ShowYourWork #AustinKleon #Flow #Stock #SmallThingsGetBig #Transformation #LivingProof #DayByDay

You Showed Up

~ David Willis ~ Leave a comment

Day 64 of 280 | The 7-40 Challenge | Thank You Campaign

Last night, I knocked on a door I’ve been refusing to knock on for quite some time.

The door of telling people what I’m up to and inviting them to be a part of my creativity.

I don’t know what I thought would happen. I don’t know if I thought I was by myself, or that nobody was paying attention, or — honestly, I don’t know what I thought.

But I was more than pleasantly surprised.

People I haven’t had the opportunity to talk to in several years reached out to me today. To congratulate me. To buy my book. To give me immediate feedback on a few things that need to be corrected — which I thought was awesome. Real feedback from real people who took the time to read what I wrote.

I’m overwhelmed. Because the support that came out of just putting myself out there — just trusting that there are people who care about who I am and what I do — was amazing. It was really, really good.

So this isn’t a long post tonight. It’s a simple one.

If you’re reading this — know that I’m thankful for you.

Whether you bought my book, or left a comment, or shared a post, or just sent me a message — thank you.

Thank you for hanging out with me long enough to read the words I’m saying. Thank you for the feedback. Thank you for the comments. Thank you just for being you.

I spent a long time convinced that nobody would care about what I was creating. I was wrong. You showed up. And that means more than I know how to say.

I really appreciate it.

740Challenge #ThankYouCampaign #Gratitude #PhaseDefiant #DMTWillis #IndieAuthor #Community #LivingProof #DayByDay #YouShowedUp

1,200 Letters

~ David Willis ~ Leave a comment

Day 62 of 280 | The 7-40 Challenge

In A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, Donald Miller tells the story of the first time he met Bob Goff.

Miller and his friends had been paddling through an inlet somewhere near British Columbia when they came across a house tucked back in the water — a retreat that Bob had built for visiting world leaders. Bob saw them coming. He didn’t know who they were. He waved them in anyway.

They were wet. They smelled horrible. They had planned to stay for an hour. They stayed for almost eight.

What Miller learned during those eight hours is one of the best stories I’ve ever heard about what happens when you throw your family into a better narrative.

Bob Goff had become — I forget the official title — essentially the honorary consul for Uganda. Part of the job meant meeting with foreign diplomats, and he’d come home and told his kids he was a little nervous about it. So he asked them what they would do.

His youngest son said he’d invite them over for a sleepover. Because you get to know people better when they stay with you.

His daughter said she’d ask them what they hoped in. Which might be the best question you can ask any human being — not what do you do, not where are you from, but what do you hope in? What’s your vision for the future, and how do you hope it will happen?

Their oldest son said he’d want to record it.

And Bob, being Bob, took all three ideas and turned them into a mission. His kids wrote twelve hundred letters to world leaders around the world. The letters said, essentially: we want to know you, and we want you to know us. If you’d like to come visit, here’s a key to our home in San Diego. And if you’d rather we come to you — we will.

Twenty-nine responded. Out of twelve hundred.

And Bob kept his promise. He flew his children to every country where a leader said yes. Those kids got to hand world leaders a key to their home, ask them what they hoped in, and film the conversation. One leader actually came and stayed with them in San Diego.

What Bob realized was simple and profound: people are people, no matter where they’re from. Get past the hype, and we’re more alike than we are different.

But here’s what hit me about the story.

Bob didn’t just teach his kids about diplomacy. He gave them an inciting incident. He threw them into a story where what they thought mattered — and where what they thought led them halfway across the world to make connections they never would have made otherwise.

The children were changed by the journey. Not by reading about it. Not by watching someone else do it. By doing it themselves.

Twelve hundred letters. Twenty-nine yeses. A lifetime of stories.

I have to look at my own life right now.

Am I writing letters to dignitaries? No. But I’m standing at the edge of my own inciting incident, and it’s one I’ve been avoiding.

I am not uncomfortable with writing. I’ve been blogging for years. I have hundreds of posts out there with my opinions on everything from faith to fatherhood to data management. I am not afraid to write a book and put it online. I’m not afraid to sing a song and upload it. I’ve done these things.

When I create something and put it out into the world, it feels like giving a gift. Here it is. If it does good for you, I’d love for you to see it. I’d love for you to have it. I’d love for you to experience it the way I have.

That part doesn’t scare me.

The part that scares me is asking.

Not just “it’s here if you want it,” but “will you go look at this? Will you actually take time to consider reading what I’ve written? Will you consider buying what I’ve published? Because I think it will do good for you.”

That’s a different sentence. That’s not leaving a gift on a doorstep and walking away. That’s standing on the porch, knocking, and saying — I made this, and I believe it has value, and I’m asking you to give it your attention.

So here’s what I’m going to do.

Instead of twelve hundred letters to world leaders, I’m going to start posting to the people in my life — and the ones I haven’t met yet — and saying something I’ve never quite said before:

In case we haven’t talked in a while, this is who I am.

I may never have shown you this side of me. I may never have mentioned that I write novels, or that I’m sixty-one days into a personal transformation experiment, or that I’ve been creating daily Bible illustrations since January 1st.

But this is genuinely who I am. And I’ve done some things that I think, if you’ll go check them out, you’d really like.

Would you do that for me?

I’ll be honest. That freaks me out a little.

Not because I don’t think the work is good. I know it’s good. I’ve put too much into it to doubt that.

It’s because asking is a different kind of vulnerability than creating. Creating is between me and the work. Asking is between me and you. And “no” hits different when you’re the one who extended the invitation.

But I have a feeling — the same kind of feeling Bob Goff must have had when his kids started sealing those envelopes — that if I do this, I’ll be changed by the journey.

I’ll continue to write and create and produce things I believe are valuable. I’ll continue to want to get them in front of people who can use them. But I think something else will happen too. I’ll learn what I’m capable of. I’ll develop a confidence that can only come from stepping out and declaring to the world: this is what I want to do, and this is who I am.

Bob Goff threw his children into a story. Twelve hundred letters. Twenty-nine yeses. Changed forever.

I’m throwing myself into one. Day 62. The inciting incident isn’t the creating. It’s the asking.

Here’s my letter. I hope you open it.

Day 62 Scorecard:

✅ Bible study and prayer ✅ Gratitude ✅ Reading (A Million Miles in a Thousand Years) ✅ Calories tracked ✅ Water (100 oz) ✅ BiblePictures365 (Numbers 31, 32) ✅ Exercise (Workout A with my son) ✅ Creative hour