Session 13 Facilitator Guide

WHYZMEN · FACILITATOR GUIDE · SESSION 13

The Essential Few

and First Steps

From the map to the first mile

“Who dares despise the day of small things…?”

ZECHARIAH 4:10 (NIV)

CONFIDENTIAL · FACILITATOR USE ONLY · NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION

Monday, March 8, 2027 · 9:00–10:30 AM · New Community Church · Wise Men Still Seek, Knowing Their Why’s

Built to deck r15 (Session_13_The_Essential_Few_and_First_Steps_r15.pptx): 24 live slides, 3 hidden backups (25–27). r6 added The Bridge (slide 15) at the start of Move 5; r11 fills the Bridge worksheet in the room. r13 adds You Have Permission (slide 13) to Move 3.

Session Overview

Purpose

Session 12 let a man see the life he was made for. Session 13 is where he chooses it and starts it. It is Willard's order from Session 4 (see it, choose it, build it) with the first shovel in the ground. The mood is a trailhead, not a final exam: packs on, boots laced, one man pointing up the path.

Almost nothing this morning is new. True North went into the top pocket at Session 11, rhythms were drafted in Sessions 8–10, and the vision was written last week. What is new is that the men act: each man sets something down, builds a Rule small enough to keep, dates one personal experiment, and, for the first time, his triad commits to doing something together rather than talking about something together.

Session outcomes

• Every man has read back his four Tuesday lines and reported his conversation or door from Session 12.

• Every man has re-read his October gauges, named what moved and what moved it, and circled three priority domains.

• Every man has written one thing he is setting down in each priority domain, before anything he adds.

• Every man has a daily and a weekly practice on his card, each with a cue and a two-minute version.

• Every man has filled his Bridge worksheet and has one thirty-day experiment with a start date, and every triad has one project with what, for whom, a date and a convener.

• Nobody leaves without a partner, a date, and a "Before Friday, I will…" sentence. Every man has heard the words First Fruits.

The First Steps Card is the whole morning

Everything lands on the two sides of one card, which is also the first page of the Participant Guide. Side A is My Essential Few (mission line, three priority domains, one thing set down in each, the Rule). Side B is First Steps (the experiment, the triad project, the check-in rhythm, Before Friday, First Fruits). The move numbers printed on slide 3 tell a man when each line gets filled, so nobody fills ahead and nobody panics about blanks. Pencil is fine. It works like the one thing in the box, turned into a document.

TIMING SPINE · 90 MINUTES · POST IT BESIDE THE TIMER

Before Men Arrive

Welcome (1 min, slide 1)

Tone: a trailhead. Zechariah 4:10 is the permission for the whole morning: small is not a lesser start; it is the only kind of start there is. Say the promise before anything else.

The path (1 min, slide 2)

Point, don't read. Eight moves; the men will do most of the talking. Name Move 6 as the new thing: the first time the brotherhood does something together. (Ignore the minutes on this slide; run the spine.)

The card (1 min, slide 3)

Hold up a blank card. "Everything we do this morning lands here. Nothing else goes home with you." Point at the move numbers: each line gets filled when its move comes. Mention that you have filled one yourself and will read from it at Move 5.

Practice check-in (2 min, slide 4)

The slide's new line comes first: "Before the triads: one moment with this week's practice, 'One level deeper.'" Round the room before anyone moves to a triad. One moment per man, about ten seconds, no commentary. This is the practice from the end of Session 12: share one true thing you would usually keep back.

The read-back (9 min, slide 4)

This is the review of the Session 12 homework: finish the Tuesday page (§2.2) and its four closing lines, with the underlines, and one conversation or one door about the mission. The men open to §2.2. Read the four lines, not the whole page; the whole page was heard in triads last week.

1. You go first (about 60 seconds). Your four lines: already living (the listening), reaching for (the two-in-the-morning friend), setting down (the advice-giver), one step this week (yours, from your page). Then your conversation or door, one sentence.

2. Triads, about three minutes a man. Four lines, then his conversation or door in one sentence. Call the switch every three minutes.

3. One listener question only: "Which line do you want to tell us more about?" It keeps the round from becoming advice.

4. The rest of last week, no extra minutes (r11). A man who read his page to his wife (optional this week) adds one sentence in the triad: which part she said he is already living. There is no hands-up check: the underlines show on the open page and Move 4 starts from them; the conversation or door becomes plank 3 of the Bridge, filled in the room at Move 5. Slide 4 carries the line "Open to §2.2."

If time allows, one report to the room: "Who heard a line that surprised him?"

Bridge: "Keep the page open. Your Tuesday is the compass for everything this morning. Now let's see whether the gauges agree with the page."

This is the formal Readiness review, kept short. At Session 2 the men read their gauges for the first time: two strongest (solid ground, and tools for the rest) and two weakest (invitations). Now they compare. It is a re-rate, not a retake.

Then and now (6 min, slide 5)

1. Find October. On the Weighing Page, copy the two strongest and two weakest from the Session 2 scores.

2. Re-rate today. Gut level, 1 to 10. "Don't retake the test. Where am I now, honestly?"

3. Name the change. One line each: what moved, and what moved it. A session, a conversation, your wife, your triad?

Five minutes silent. Growth & Learning and Recreation, Adventure & Joy aren't scored by the assessment (its seven sections leave them out), so each gets a one-line self-rating. Then one minute, turn to one man: "The gauge that surprised me most was…" (The slide says two minutes; the r5 check-in took the other one.)

Step 3 is the heart. Men will name a session, a triad, a wife's comment. That is mastery evidence in their own handwriting: the process works when it is engaged.

Three domains ride heavy (4 min, slide 6)

Callback to the forty-pound pack: three domains ride heavy this season, seven ride light. The men circle three on the Weighing Page and write them on Side A of the card. Two signals to weigh by:

• The Tuesday page: the part a man is reaching for is usually a priority domain.

• The gauges: the one that stayed low may be asking for his best hours.

They usually agree. When they don't, the Tuesday page wins, because it is the vision.

The fifth Weighing Question is the only one on screen: "What in my life would look no different if Christ were not in me?" The other four are on the Weighing Page. The men will recognize it from the Galatians Test at Session 11; the recognition is the design. It keeps the choosing honest rather than administrative.

Bridge: "Choosing three is the easy part. Making room for them is the hard part. Let's talk about why."

Setting something down is the hardest thing the program asks, so it gets its full case. Seven slides, one argument: subtract, then select, then shoulder, and then the permission that makes room usable. Keep the teaching brisk (about seven minutes of talk) so the write at the end is never squeezed.

The Pack Test (3 min, slide 7)

Promised since Session 1: "we weigh the whole pack at Session 13." True North went into the top pocket at Session 11; this morning the rest of the pack is weighed. The order is the teaching. Men who select first overpack; men who never shoulder carry alone.

• Subtract first. Nothing new goes in until something comes out. (Charter §1.0 what I am setting down; §3.1 what I set down in each priority domain.)

• Select: clear yeses only. McKeown's 90% rule and the one thing in the box. True North rides in the top pocket.

• Shoulder: roped to other men. What you cannot lift alone, the triad lifts with you; what you should not carry at all, you lay at the cross (1 Peter 5:7).

The four questions (does it serve the summit, is it mine to carry now, will I be glad at Jubilee, what does it cost per mile) are for any single item: a board seat, a consulting gig, a grudge, a hobby. Point at the Bunyan box and say one sentence: Christian's burden did not come off by effort; it fell at the cross.

We are wired to add (3 min, slide 8)

The diagnosis before the prescription. The point is permission, not shame: every brain in the study reached for more. Tell the Lego story in one breath: a wobbly roof over a figurine, adding a brick costs ten cents, removing one is free and is the best fix, and without a reminder only 41% thought to take one away. Then point at the 11%: a university president asked for ideas and nine in ten said "add."

Do not teach the Nature paper. Tell the brick.

Less, but better (1 min, slide 9)

Point at the two panels before you say anything: same energy, two lives. Three truths, one sentence each. Land truth 3 for this room: "Retirement did not end the requests. It only removed the boss who used to say no for you." Then the Jubilee turn at the bottom (Ephesians 2:10), and ask the slide's question: "What good thing in your week scores a 60, and is still there?" Let it sit five seconds. No answers yet. New in r5, under the subtitle: "You cannot live every life. Choosing the essential few is choosing your particular life." Say it once; it is the Session 2 callback, meaning lives in the particular.

Mark, told in full (2 min, slide 10)

Tell it; don't read the slide. The script is in the slide notes. Then point at the two bars: before, 33 of his 38 pounds was one thing, being the fixer; after, four things, 24 pounds, and the heaviest is his grandchildren.

Ask the question at the bottom and let it sit: "What weight are you carrying because you do not yet know who you are without it?" Do not say "this might be you." Watch the quiet ones; the men who were fixers will know. Mark, David and Tom are composites; say so once if asked.

Three men, one lesson (2 min, slide 11)

You just told Mark, so read across David and Tom only. They are mirrors, not solutions: "David chose three circles; should I?" is the wrong question. "What is my weight, and what is my move?" is the right one. No triad round here. One minute in the margin, pencil, three sentences (they are in the Participant Guide): one thing I'm leaving at the trailhead; one thing I'm carrying up and why it passes; one thing I'll ask another man to help me carry. Sentence 3 is what he reads at Rope Up.

Why a man does this hard thing (2 min), then write (4 min, slide 12)

Four reasons, one line each; don't read the cards in full. Time is finite (Burkeman: about 4,000 weeks in an 80-year life; at seventy, about 520 remain, one printed page of boxes). Your yes is someone's no (Tom's wife got three pounds of his forty). Empty hands can receive (the Tuesday page cannot grow where there is no room). You do not carry it alone (the triad, and the cross). Then Mary and Martha: "few things are needed, or indeed only one."

You have permission (1 min), then one line (1 min, slide 13)

The other half of setting down. These men spent forty years as the responsible one, and many will not set anything down until someone tells them they are allowed to. Point at the four cards; don't read them: to rest, to spend, to say no, to enjoy what he did not earn. Read Ecclesiastes 9:7 slowly and land on "already approved": the permission is God's to give, and He has given it. Card 2 is the one most men need; many retirees regret spending too little, too late, after decades of being told to preserve capital. If a man's money is genuinely tight, translate it to time, not dollars. Give no financial advice.

Clock check. Deck r13 adds up to two minutes the spine above does not yet pay for. On time at 0:40: run the slide. Behind: skip it and say one sentence before the four-minute write on slide 12: "Under your set-downs, write one permission you are giving yourself." The line on the card stays either way.

A Rule of Life is a trellis, not a cage. Regula first meant a straight stick, the frame a vine grows along. Last week showed the fruit; this morning the men tie up the trellis. Open with the underlines: “Last week you underlined what happens every day or every week on your Tuesday. Start there. That is your Rule, already growing.” A man with no underlines starts from his "already living" line instead.

Two kinds of men are in the room:

• Men who drafted rhythms in Sessions 8–10. This is the first seasonal pruning. Ask: "Which practice held? Which one quietly died?" Keep what held; let the dead one go without guilt.

• Men who did not. This is a first draft.

Either way: one practice per rhythm, each with a cue (when and where) and a two-minute version (what he does on the day he doesn't feel like it), tied to a priority domain where possible. The whole Rule must fit on Side A. In the room: daily and weekly, eight minutes silent. Monthly and seasonal go home and are reviewed in triads at the start of Session 14.

The red-chair line on the slide comes from the Rule of Life guide. Better: read your own daily line from your card.

Keep Fogg and Clear below the waterline. Name the practice; don't lecture the theory.

A prototype, not a vow. Each man picks one piece of his Tuesday in 2031 and tries it for thirty days. He is not promising a new life; he is testing one piece of it.

The Bridge first (6 min, slide 15). Hand out the Bridge worksheet. Walk it left to right (2 min): the near bank is his mission line (it carries no number); plank 1, his "for" blank (his row on the Opportunity Map); plank 2, his T-shirt verbs (his column: Make, Gather, Tend, Carry); plank 3, what last week’s conversation or door said; plank 4, the square where row meets column, keeping the candidate with three yeses. Then four minutes, silent, on the worksheet: copy the mission line, circle a row, circle a family, one line for the door, two or three candidates and their yeses. Nothing new to invent. Say: "Every plank is something you already wrote. Now we cross the last plank: the experiment now, the triad project next." Close with the Tuesday test. Watch for the man whose door was "not yet": "Then your experiment is a door. Pick one from your row and knock."

1. Read your own card first (60 seconds): Side B, the experiment line. This is where you model Deliver.

2. Three minutes silent, three questions: What will I try? How will I know it's working? When do I start? His Bridge worksheet did the thinking a minute ago.

3. Ninety seconds to check: small enough to start this week? A date, not "soon"?

Question 2 is where men go wrong. They write a compliance measure ("did I do it every day"). Steer them to a noticing measure: "Am I more present with him? What is different between us?"

Hebrews 10:24. The first time the brotherhood does something rather than talks about something. One outing, about three hours, together. It is Rung 2 of the Cogenerative Ladder (a co-project, one morning) and the seed of what comes after the program.

Hand out the Triad Project Menu with the real, dated slots. Triads choose from real dates; nobody cold-calls. The menu categories: a youth group meeting (one story, a coaching moment, or a panel of three); a mentoring morning; a church need; a community need (Urban Impact, NCC Goes, a neighbor); or their own idea.

The three rules (from the Ladder research)

1. Go in as a learner, too. Ask what they could teach you. Co-mentoring is the standard, not a bonus.

2. Shoulder to shoulder first. A task together before a talk about life.

3. No one needs to be an expert. This removes the one excuse retired executives reach for ("I'm not qualified") and replaces it with the skill they've practiced for twelve weeks: show up and ask.

Before the triad stands up: four things

What · For whom · Date · Convener. The convener's only job is to send the first text. Pick the most doable project, not the most impressive. Completion can fall after Session 15; the finish line is First Fruits.

Ecclesiastes 4:12. About two minutes a man, then two minutes for the triad's rhythm. Call the switches.

1. Read your mission line, the T-shirt version, out loud.

2. Read your experiment: what, how you'll know, when.

3. Listeners ask one question only: "What will you do the week you miss?" He writes the answer on Side B.

4. Say one sentence: "Before Friday, I will…" and write it on the card.

Then, as a triad, set the check-in rhythm: a text every Monday morning, coffee every other week, a call the day before the project, or their own.

Have the men pull out card T4 (15 seconds, inside the rhythm minute): “Stay on Your Side of the Net” goes with the check-ins. Say: “When you see a brother drifting, say what you saw and what it did in you. Never what you think he meant. You’ll use it next Monday on each other’s Rule.” Do not teach it; the card carries it, and Session 14’s Tend review is its first use. Background: Session 10 guide, Facilitator’s Kitchen, “Connect.”

The Session 10 rule stands: nobody leaves without a partner and a date. Walk the room in the last minute and look at the cards.

Plant, tend, check, harvest (2 min, slide 19)

Not a finish line: a farmer's year (Deming's plan, do, study, act, told as a harvest). We come back to what was planted this morning three more times:

The summit is Jubilee (slide 20, your call)

Live since r5 (it was a hidden backup in r4). r6 corrects its wording for a spring morning session and points it to First Fruits. Default: click past it. If a man has asked why carry anything at all, give it one minute: the climb is provisioned before it starts (Leviticus 25:20–22), and the abundance at the summit is shared, not stored. Say "this morning."

Carry the card (1 min, slide 21)

Three things with honest minutes, about 65 this week (conveners about 70), and the practice inside the week: start the experiment on the date written (30); copy the First Steps Card into §3.1 My First Steps and §3.2 My Rule & My Triad, adding the monthly and seasonal Rule lines as he copies (20); fill in Charter at a Glance, page 3 of the Charter, from what he has already written (15). Then: Keep a small promise, the Practice of the Week, whose first instance is his Before Friday; keep the triad check-in rhythm set at Rope Up; conveners send the first text and confirm the project date with you (5). The triad project itself (about three hours) runs to First Fruits and is not counted this week. Say it with its floor:

Readings (30 sec, slide 22)

Point, don't teach. Nothing is required this week: "Carry the card." Name Going Deeper once, lightly, and say where it lives. Slide 22 now has two cards. Books: Essentialism, Subtract, Range ch. 1. Shorter Readings (WhyzMen, in the Session 13 folder): Essentialism for the Second Half (9 min), From Range to the Vital Few (9), The Opportunity Map (12) and Grant’s Three Myths of Mentoring (4), the research behind the triad project’s co-mentoring rule. If a man asks where to start, point him to Essentialism for the Second Half. The Behavioral Checklist (r3, rebuilt as a year-two triad tool) comes out at Session 15.

Practice of the Week (1–2 min, slide 23)

Read the practice: Keep a small promise. Name its skill and section: “It is section 5, Build & Host, in your Toolkit — the card is the menu, the Toolkit is the kitchen.” Then one minute, in pairs, right now: Make the man beside you one small promise you can keep before next Monday. Then swap. Out of time? Each man names the one person he will try it with this week. The tracker is weekly, not daily: “Tried it this week ☐” and one moment line on the card. Rooted in Luke 16:10: whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much. It fits the First Steps Card: the “Before Friday, I will…” line is this practice. The box is on the Practice of the Week card, not the First Steps Card.

Benediction (2 min, slide 24)

Read Philippians 1:6 slowly: "…he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus." Notice who does the carrying: the verse promises God's completion, not the man's. The card is his part; the completion is not. Pray, then send them out with the card in hand.

The Facilitator's Kitchen

Frameworks below the waterline, for your pocket, not the screen.

Why subtraction comes first (Klotz)

Adams, Converse, Hales & Klotz, "People systematically overlook subtractive changes," Nature 592 (2021): eight experiments, more than 1,500 people. In the Lego task only 41% removed the one brick without a cue; with a reminder that removing was allowed, about six in ten did (reports give 61–65%; say "about six in ten"). In the grid task 18 of 91 people subtracted. Of 651 suggestions to a new university president, 11% proposed removing something. A second task (cognitive load) made subtraction rarer still. Klotz is an engineer at the University of Virginia; Subtract (2021) is the book.

Less, but better (McKeown and Rams)

Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less (2014). The 90% rule: score the option; below 90, it's a no. "Less but better" is originally Dieter Rams's motto (Weniger, aber besser); a good fact for the room if a man enjoys design. The Jubilee turn replaces McKeown's "highest point of contribution" with Ephesians 2:10: what God prepared in advance.

Why the Rule is small, and why the experiment is thirty days

Lally et al., European Journal of Social Psychology (2009): automaticity took a median of about 66 days, with a range of 18 to 254. From Session 13 to First Fruits is roughly six weeks, so the experiment only has to be begun and noticed. The cue and the two-minute version are Fogg (Tiny Habits) and Clear (Atomic Habits); the men met both in the Rule of Life readings. Don't name them unless asked.

Why dates matter so much (Gollwitzer)

Gollwitzer & Sheeran's 2006 meta-analysis of 94 studies: people who form implementation intentions (when, where, how) follow through far more reliably than people who only hold the goal (d ≈ 0.65, a medium-to-large effect). "Before Friday, I will…" and the triad project's date are exactly that.

Why the first step is the lesson (Bandura)

Bandura (1997) ranked mastery experience, doing the thing once, as the strongest source of self-efficacy, above encouragement or example. Step 3 of Then and Now ("what moved it?") is the men writing their own mastery evidence.

Why the triad project goes outward

Session 11 taught Erikson's generativity as a drive the men were built with. Adam Grant (Give and Take, 2013) found that givers who serve with others and can see their impact gain energy rather than burn out. The three rules come from the Cogenerative Ladder (Session 12 design note): co-mentoring, shoulder to shoulder, the non-expert rule. The Ladder's Rung 3, a ten-week champion pilot, is the invitation at First Fruits.

The pack, the burden, and Jubilee

Bunyan, The Pilgrim's Progress: Christian's burden loosens at the cross and tumbles into the sepulchre. Some weight is not packed lighter; it is laid down. Slide 20 carries the Jubilee theology if a man asks why carry anything at all: the climb is provisioned before it starts (Leviticus 25:20–22), and the abundance at the summit is shared, not stored.

Mark, David and Tom

Composites, not real men; say so once if asked. Mark and Tom were met at Session 11 (Tom first at Session 5); David at Session 10. Their full case slides are hidden backups (24–25).

Sourcing notes

• Burkeman, Four Thousand Weeks (2021): 80 × 52 = 4,160; at seventy, about 520 remain.

• The Thoreau line on slide 7 is a paraphrase. The Walden wording: "The cost of a thing is the amount of what I will call life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately or in the long run." Quote that if a man asks.

• Saint-Exupéry's line is from Wind, Sand and Stars (1939). Annie Dillard's is from The Writing Life (1989). Willard's is from The Great Omission (2006).

• The Mountaineers' Ten Essentials (hidden slide 27) date from the 1930s climbing courses in Seattle.

• Luke 10:42: henos de estin chreia, "one thing is needed."

The Watch-Points

Post-Session: Same Day

• Text the cohort once before evening. One sentence, e.g. "Whatever you said before Friday: go do it. —Dave"

• Write down every man's Before Friday sentence and each triad's project, date and convener. You open Session 14 with the first; you hold the spring calendar with the second.

• Confirm each triad project's date with its host within 48 hours, and send the convener the host's contact.

• Send the Participant Guide and the deck to any man who was absent, with his triad's project and a note to call his convener.

• Note the watch-point men. Call the quiet fixer and anyone with no Before Friday by Wednesday.

• Update the First Fruits invitation with the date if it firmed up this morning.

Appendix A: Scripture (NIV)

Appendix B: If You Are Running Late

Cut in this order. Never reverse it.

Appendix C: Recovery Prompts

IF A MAN CAN'T CHOOSE THREE PRIORITY DOMAINS

• "Read me your 'reaching for' line. Which domain is that?"

• "Which gauge would your wife say needs your best hours?"

• "Choose two. The third can wait until Session 14."

IF A MAN CAN'T FIND ANYTHING TO SET DOWN

• "What would you take away if taking away were allowed?"

• "What in your week scores a 60, and is still there?"

• "What would Mark's facilitator ask you?"

IF A TRIAD CAN'T CHOOSE A PROJECT

• "Which slot on the menu has a date you can all make?"

• "Which of you has a connection to one of these already? He's the convener."

• "What would be easiest to say yes to? Do that one."

IF A MAN'S EXPERIMENT IS A COMPLIANCE MEASURE

• "Suppose you did it every day. What would you hope to notice?"

• "Who would notice first, and what would they see?"

Appendix D: Homework → Charter

The table follows Charter v12 (the old §3.0, §2.1b, §3.1b, §3.3, §1.5 and §1.6 are folded into §3.1, §3.2 and §1.4). Shelf expansions, all optional: Appendix D (all goals), E (the full subtractions audit), L (My Rule of Life).

Appendix E: The Hidden Backup Slides

Appendix F: Your First Steps Card, the Exemplar

The design brief asks you to fill your own card and read from it at Moves 1 and 5. Below are candidates drawn from your Tuesday in 2031 page, not a card written for you. Choose, cross out, rewrite in your own words.

Materials Checklist

• Deck r15 on the PC; hookup tested; hidden slides 25–27 reachable

• Triad Project Menu, dated slots filled, one printed per triad

Cards: T4 · Stay on Your Side of the Net and C1 · First Steps are in each man’s front-cover pocket, labeled Session 13; print five spares of each

Pencils for the C1 · First Steps Card

• Participant Guide, printed and hole-punched: one per man at the door

• October gauge summaries (copies); spare S12 PGs; Bridge worksheets r5; spare Opportunity Maps

• Your own filled card; timer; the First Fruits date if set

Scripture quotations taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.