The Sandpaper of the Mind - Part 1

Microagreements and the Erosion of Conviction

In woodworking, there comes a time in every project when you move from rough cuts to finishing passes. You start with coarse grit sandpaper to take off the worst splinters, then move to finer grits until the piece feels like silk. But keep sanding too long (most notably when you’re without a plan), and you'll round over the details, blur the edges, and eventually erase what made the piece distinct in the first place.

So it is with the mind of modern man.

From the jump, I want to be sure that everyone understands what is meant by ‘man’. Typically I am going to be writing to that boy, guy, man crowd… those of us made in the image and likeness of God like Adam before us. This, however, is in the broader and more classical sense of the term. Eve, you are welcome here and I would ask you please take note for yourselves, your children, and the Adam of your life because Lord knows we are want to forego hand sanding and move on, like Tim “The Tool Man” Taylor before us, to something with more power to make the job more expedient. That is to say, refer this series to the men in your life so that they can be sharper in mind and detail going forward. Exeunt prelude; enter, stage right, the main text.

Every hour we spend scrolling through social media, watching clips, hearing catchy slogans and hot takes, we're not just entertaining ourselves. Each clip we imbibe we are making an agreement or disagreement with what is said. Those things that we disagree with, we can plainly see and often are algorithmically routed out of our feed. The things we agree with, or more sinister… the things we might agree with… those wait in the wings for their 15 seconds of fame. Each time we find something that we see and, more or less, agree with despite some bigger picture convictions, we're sanding down the fine details of our own convictions.

Each video, meme, or infographic presents an idea. Sometimes it’s blatant propaganda (that we will agree with or disagree with), other times it’s just a catchy emotional appeal. Either way, we engage in what I call a microagreement: a passive nod of assent via consumption. We don’t stop to think deeply, we don’t question the premise, we just say, "Yeah, that kinda makes sense," and move on. Like or dislike, comment or not… by this point the battle is over; the content’s message has been conveyed and is now being processed.

Repeat this process thousands of times, and what do you get? A man who can no longer tell you what he believes, only what he feels in the moment. A conscience blurred by constant exposure to unfiltered, untested ideas. Like a wooden beam sanded into dust, his soul lacks structural integrity.

The Apostle Paul warned about this very thing when he said:

"Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect" (Romans 12:2).

Testing. Discernment. Deliberate transformation. Renewal. All of these require resistance. Thought. Pause. Meditation. Being one of those who ‘wrestle with God’.

But today, we're being discipled by speed. The digital world doesn’t ask for reflection; it rewards reaction. It doesn't care if you’re wise, only that you engage. And with every microagreement, our mind is shaped: not like steel in the fire, but like clay in the hands of whatever trend is currently fashionable (leaving no time for the kiln to fire the piece into something usable and reliable).

Plato wrote of men chained in a cave, watching shadows on the wall and mistaking them for reality. He was warning about the human tendency to settle for imitation when truth requires labor. That allegory is no longer hypothetical. You don’t need chains; you’ve got notifications.

In Brave New World, Aldous Huxley saw this coming. Not a dystopia of force, but one of distraction. He warned that men would come to love their servitude because it came with entertainment, release, and pleasure. Instead of boots on necks, we have infinite scrolling. Instead of thought-police, we have dopamine dealers in Silicon Valley.

Or consider T.S. Eliot in "The Hollow Men": "We are the hollow men / We are the stuffed men / Leaning together / Headpiece filled with straw." What is a man filled with microagreements but stuffed with ideological straw? He looks like a thinker, speaks like a pundit, but beneath it all is hollow consensus an inch deep and a mile wide.

Our capacity for critical thinking, for doctrinal depth, for moral clarity… all of it is being erased by incremental, passive agreements. Each one wears away at the structure of our worldview. Like white noise, it becomes imperceptible until someone finally asks, "What do you believe?" and you respond with a blank stare or, at best, offer the 5 second elevator pitch and then have the mental equivalent of a dial tone when asked a follow up question.

We need sharper minds, not smoother ones. In 1 Peter 1:13, we’re told to "Prepare your minds for action, and be sober-minded; set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ." The Greek there literally says to "gird up the loins of your mind"; that’s not just any garment preparation but rather a warrior's preparation to keep the garment from tangling the legs as a man rushes into battle. A mental readiness for war, not a mind dulled by easy entertainment and empty agreement.

In this series, we will take stock of your inputs. How many ideas are you saying "yes" to without thinking? Are your convictions being shaped by Scripture and reason, or by repetition and rhythm?

Think like a craftsman. Don’t sand away your mind. Shape it. Sharpen it. Let the Word of God and the great voices of the past be your grinding stone. Tolle lege your Plato, Cicero, Augustine, Acquinas, Luther, Calvin, Eliot, and even Orwell. Set a millstone around the neck of your TikTok feed.

Because if you keep nodding to shadows, you'll forget what the sun looks like. And worse… you’ll start to fear its light.