Which Do You Feed, Anxiety or Hope?
An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life. “A fight is going on inside of me,” he said to the boy. “It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil – he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority and ego.” […]
Making a Difference Is Scary
Seth Godin recently had a blog post entitled “Feels risky.” He writes every day and his posts are usually brief. Here is the entire post: “The gulf between “risky” and “feels risky” is huge. And it’s getting bigger. It turns out that value creation lives in this gap. The things that most people won’t […]
Four Ways Humor Can Make You a Better Leader
Nobody takes the class clown seriously. But that doesn’t mean you need to be serious all the time to be an effective leader. In fact, that will make you less effective. Left unchecked, seriousness creates anxiety and makes it harder for you, and the people you lead, to work effectively. In family systems theory, Edwin […]
How Keystone Habits Help Me Grow as a Spiritual Leader
Both the spiritual life and leadership are like riding a bike. You’re either moving forward or falling down. Growing in faith and growing in effectiveness are ongoing tasks for the spiritual leader. John Wesley, founder of the Methodist movement was a paragon of habits. The term “Methodist” was a pejorative coined by those who mocked […]
Four Simple Things You Can Do to Improve Your Health
“Or do you not know that your body is a temple[ of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you were bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body.” 1 Corinthians [6:19]-20 Taking care of your body not only honors God, it is good […]
How to Take an Emotional Stand-Part 2 of 2
In Part 1, I shared what I have learned about taking an emotional stand. I defined taking an emotional stand as being able to say what I feel and what I believe in a non-anxious way. That post was mostly about technique: using “I” statements, not blaming, giving others the freedom to disagree and […]
Does Your Family Make You Anxious? (And Why It Matters for Leadership)
I was once at a meeting of mostly clergy colleagues. There were eight of us sitting around a table. It was August and the leader asked everyone to share about what they had done that summer. As we went around the table, the answers were pretty consistent. “I just got back from a week of […]
The Spiritual Foundation for Leadership
I mentioned a blog post in the video about developing habits. Here’s the link. So I’m doing more video, but I realize that some of you may prefer to read the post. So here is the transcript. Please keep in mind that it is verbatim, so it won’t read like a term paper. Thanks! Hey, […]
The Problem with Annual Goals: They’re Too Long (and Too Short)
As we begin a new year, you might be thinking about annual goals. This could be personally or professionally. It could take the form of the dreaded New Year’s resolution. Or it could be part of an annual plan that you’ve developed at work. Regardless, a year is too long. I’ve made annual goals before. […]