I have lost count of the times I have heard someone tell me that they are so stacked that they are not sure when they can fit me in. The person will even sometimes tell me all the appointments in their diary to make the point! Talk about being made to feel non-special.
The ugliness of this situation is compounded further when it is your direct boss or church pastor telling you this. You hope your relationship with them might elicit a different kind of initial response. And I believe it probably should.
Recently I got a ‘wake-up call’ when someone I love alluded that I was an over-stretched pastor busy doing other stuff. Actually, there was an element of truth in it, but nevertheless, it really broke my heart. This experience, I know, is far from unusual.
So here are a few things I have learnt along the way to stop being a busy, ‘unavailable’ leader (these pointers are also just as relevant whatever you do in church, family or work life):
1. What is prior is not necessarily a priority.
Because we put dates in our diary does not mean they cannot move. Be prepared to let the urgent become more important and learn to be flexible.
This can be wonderfully illustrated by our MPs this week. The Conservative leader cleared his diary of all appointments on Monday to deal with the Expenses crisis. The Labour leader didn’t. Guess which one had the more favourable press coverage?
2. It’s easy to fill a schedule, less easy to empty it.
Allow 20% of your day to stay unplanned, so when someone comes up to you with a problem your face won’t drain of colour and be saying “I can’t cope with your life too!”
3. It’s easy to make a promise, less easy to break it.
Respect the power of the P-word. I learnt from the business world a long time ago to always under-promise and over-deliver, never the other way around. To get hopes up and then dash them will always take longer for people to recover than you think.
We can often cancel something because we have not given enough thought about the implications of that appointment beforehand. As we try and cram more in we naturally get stressed, but what others see is likely to be an impatience with them.
People may also see a broken promise as flakiness and, worse case, shallowness. Don’t let someone go away thinking, “They are all talk!” You know you are not.
4. It’s easy to commit, less easy to break a commitment.
The world is full of half empty projects, not least in the poorest parts of the world where well-meaning people/churches have started something, but not been able to fulfil it. The legacy of that can live on for many years, even generations.
We love amazing people and equally hate disappointing them. Leaders, for example, try not to be people-pleasers, but the truth is everyone wants to be loved. There are few exceptions to this rule. We want to show people we deeply care, so the language of commitment, as in marriage, is powerful. So when vows are broken, so are people. Golden rule: don’t spread yourself thin. As John says, we can only do what we see the Father doing, however much we might want to do the other stuff.
5. Pastors take phone calls, leaders make them.
How many times have we received a phone call, email, SMS text or card through the post that has said, “Just thinking of you, how are you doing?” Probably not enough, but when we do, it feels great, doesn’t it?
I once saw a cartoon in an American pastor’s office that showed a picture of Noah’s Ark with the animals going in as it starting to rain. Underneath it simply said, “Plan ahead!” We need to plan to see people. The physical and head space won’t present itself willingly. We need to create it, sometimes fight for it. This week I said to someone on the streets I would be back to help. I needed to help there and them. I didn’t. I came back later and they had gone. I felt gutted.
Often we can walk away from a situation feeling a failure.
Don’t! Listen and respond with grace and
a willingness of heart. We serve God before all others and he certainly doesn’t
consider you a failure.
In fact, there is nothing we can do to get Him to love us less and nothing we can do to get Him to love us more. We are loved and accepted as we are.
Don't let yourself be deceived that being successful is becoming important in people’s eyes. The fallout of that is that they will feel, reversely, less important.
Lastly, although there are many definitions of success, depending on perspective, one I quite like is this: success is the management of life that brings fulfilment and purpose not just to one, but to all.
Simple really.
ASD
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