Brent C Abrenica

“It’s awfully hard to define consciousness. But I’d start by saying that it’s the subjective experience of the mind and the world. It’s basically what it feels like, from the first-person point of view, to be thinking and perceiving and judging.”
― Sam Harris, Making Sense: Conversations on Consciousness, Morality, and the Future of Humanity

“Third, a message always brings the greatest benefit when I teach it or go through it with a group of friends. Choose some close friends and work through this together. After you complete the chapter on your own, with just you and the Holy Spirit, get together with your friends to share what He showed you. Do this on a regular basis.”
― John Paul Bevere, The Awe of God: The Astounding Way a Healthy Fear of God Transforms Your Life

“Not all of Blizzard’s employees took to the intense office culture, such as Andy Weir, a programmer who hated being dropped into the pressure cooker. The day before he left on a weekend trip for which he’d provided weeks of notice, his bosses criticized him for taking off, then demanded that he leave them with a phone number. “Over the course of the weekend they probably called me twenty times,” Weir said. “And I was not an important engineer.” During the game’s final stretch, when everyone was expected to test out the game during their spare time, Weir complained to a colleague that he was sick of doing extra QA work and not getting paid for it. Weir became the target of endless bullying around the office. Colleagues would dismiss him, ignore him, and deride his ideas. “So many people were shitty to me, I have to assume I brought it on myself in some way,” Weir said. He was criticized for delivering inadequate code that broke the game’s launcher, which made things more difficult for everybody. He’d fume: How could he live up to expectations when nobody was mentoring or teaching him? There were no structures in place to help younger employees learn how to fix bugs or write better code. “We were so busy running as fast as we could, there was no culture of mentorship or training,” said Wyatt. Less than a year into the job, Weir was fired for his poor performance. “This was a dream job for me, working at Blizzard,” Weir said. “I was absolutely crushed.” But Andy Weir wound up doing just fine. Two decades later, he published a novel called The Martian, the film adaptation of which would star Matt Damon and earn more than $630 million worldwide.”
― Jason Schreier, Play Nice: The Rise, Fall, and Future of Blizzard Entertainment

“First, I am your field training officer.10 Second, as your FTO I have one simple rule for you, reader. As you read this book, you are only allowed to receive from God all that he has for you in Christ through the Holy Spirit. Third, as your FTO I will teach through telling stories, looking at various Scripture passages, and asking questions. I, however, will not be answering the questions posed; we will be listening to God and writing down the answers he gives through his Spirit. Fourth, as the disciples of Jesus spent time abiding with him, they became more attentive to the things of God, which led them to a greater awareness of the world around them. This awareness impressed upon them their great need to hear and understand the annunciations11 of Jesus, which directed them into lives of transformative action. Abiding = Attention, Awareness, Annunciation, Action. In our shift together, we will walk through this process. Finally, the narrative that follows is from an actual ten-hour (7 a.m.–5 p.m.) interaction between three hundred people and me as we spent a day together abiding with Christ. I suggest that you also set aside a day to work through the material in a single encounter and see how it impacts you. I want you to experience how much can happen in your life in just one day with Christ. Trust me, you’ll want more.”
― Jamie Winship, Living Fearless: Exchanging the Lies of the World for the Liberating Truth of God