Food for the Body and Soul

Last week, I completed the 5K101 program (for the 2nd time)!  I say I'm a two-time graduate, because I completed the program last year and ran my very first 5k in November.  But I hadn't run since.

I re-started the program a  couple months ago, and on Tuesday, I ran 3.1 miles in 40 minutes.  This might be slow by some standards, but it is 2 minutes faster than my 5k last year. On Thursday I attempted the same run, but as I approached the 1 mile marker, I thought I was gonna pass out.  So I walked the rest of the way home feeling like a total loser. Saturday morning, however, I ran the 3.1 miles in 38 minutes!  And then yesterday, I rode my bike up Howell Mtn. Road.  It was about a 4-mile climb.  Tough, but I got to the top.  Surprisingly though, I had just as tough a time on the last leg of the ride - rollers - which should have been relatively easy.

The difference - nutrition.  Food to fuel the fire.

I've noticed that I can barrel my way through the day often forgetting to eat. I can still function, but when I don't eat, my physical body gets weak, and I "hit the wall," so to speak during a hard run or ride. And I am reminded that when I don't feast on the Word of God, I get spiritually weak as well.

I'm learning that if I'm thirsty or hungry, I've waited too long to replenish my nutrients and am running on fumes.  In the same way, I can't wait till the hard stuff comes to binge on the Word of God.  Instead, I need to graze - to eat small portions throughout the day - consistently and frequently to power up for whatever may lie ahead.

Lead Where You Are

On August 5-6, 2010, ten of us carpooled to Folsom to attend the Global Leadership Summit - one of the best investments a leader can make in himself. Personally, I was poured into, refreshed, energized, challenged, and sharpened.  If I could, I would take all of you next year!

Below are this year's speakers, their topics, and my take-away from each:  

Bill Hybels - Opening Session

• Leadership involves moving people from HERE ---> THERE!
• Assemble a team of fantastic people who possess character, competence, chemistry, and fit with our organizational culture.
• Inspire people along the journey by establishing mile markers and celebrations.
• Listen to the whispers of God.

Jim Collins -Never, Ever Give Up

5 Stages of Decline

1. Hubris of Success (outrageous arrogance)
2. Undisciplined Pursuit of More
3. Denial of Risk and Peril
4. Grasping for Salvation
5. Capitulation to Irrelevance or Death 

• One can be in stages 1-3 and look great on the outside, while the inside is diseased.
• Do regular diagnostics.
• Count your blessings - account for all the good things I didn't cause!
• We spend too much time trying to be interesting; we should spend more time being interested.
• Most of us have a to-do list. We also need a stop-doing list.
• BHAG - Big Hairy Audacious Goal

Christine Caine -Leading on the Edge of Hope

• It doesn't take a lot of light to dispel the darkness.  It just takes courage.
• Serve out of obligation, and you do what you have to.  Serve out of passion, and you do what you want to.
• We can serve with passionate hope and an unshakable confidence in God.

Tony Dungy -The Mentor Leader

• He was just there to help his players play better.
• Work efficiently. Don't mistake hours for productivity.
• Look for a mentor and look for someone to mentor.
• Get interested in someone's life and speak into them.

Adam Hamilton -When Leaders Fail

• Giving --> Emptiness --> Vulnerability --> Temptation --> Addiction --> Shame --> Alienation

• Attraction

          > the movement of the maybe; rationalizing the sin
          > nothing good can come out of telling the other person
          > maybe eventually becomes a yes
          > find the strength to stop saying maybe and say NO

• 5 R's of Resisting Temptation

1. Remember who you are.
2. Recognize the consequences of my actions - fantasize about the worst possible outcome.
3. Rededicate self to God in prayer (stop/drop/pray)
4. Reveal struggle to a trusted friend.  The power of temptation is secrecy.
5. Remove self from the situation.  Erect clearer boundaries.

Dr. Peter Zhao Xiao - Beyond Economy:  China's Transformation with the Cross

• He was commissioned by the Chinese government to study the success of the American economy.  He concluded that a moral foundation allowed our economy to flourish, argued that China's economy would benefit from the spread of the Christian faith, and embraced Christianity himself!

• Leadership is not just about influence, but direction; so we have to be aware of changes.
• There are only 2 kinds of transformations: that with the cross, and that without the cross.
• I will not give to the Lord that which costs me nothing.

Andy Stanley - The Upside of Tension

• Our opposing thumb creates pressure resulting in progress.
• Some problems never really go away.  They're not meant to be resolved, but rather to be managed.
• Don't think in terms of balance.  Think in terms of rhythm.

Jeff Manion -The Land Between

The land between is fertile soil for:

• complaints, not just against their situation, but against God himself
• melt downs
• God's provision, though sometimes not in the way we think
• God's discipline
• transformational growth (inviting trust evicts complaint)

Terri Kelly -When Leaders Emerge:  The Story of W.L Gore & Associates

Established common foundation of values:

• Value of the individual
• Power of small teams
• We're all in the same boat
• Take a long-term view

Daniel H. Pink -What Motivates Us:  Not What You Think

• Autonomy - Management is an archaic technology designed to get compliance. It doesn't lead to engagement.  Self-direction does.
• Mastery - Making progress is the best motivator, and the best way to get people engaged.  Help people see progress.
• Purpose - With the limited profitability of the times, we've seen a rise of purpose as the motivator.

Blake Mycoskie - Making Conscious Capitalism Work:  The TOMS Shoes Story

• It's never to early to give!
• Incorporate giving into work life, into your culture.
• 4/15/2011 - One Day Without Shoes - to spread awareness about the impact one pair of shoes can have on a child's life.

Jack Welch - Leader to Leader

• Authenticity - Be comfortable in your own skin, be someone people can count on.
• Engery / Energize - Unless the leader feels the fire, it is hard to pass it on.  Tell a story how their lives will change.  Get them excited about the journey.  Get them to tell their stories to each other.  Raise the intellectual power of the meeting by drawing out other people.
• Candor - Fight desperately to get what people are really thinking/feeling/believing on the table.
• Differentiation - Identify the top 20%, the vital 70%, and the back-end 10%.
• Create an appraisal system that creates conversation that lets people know where they stand.
• Attitude/Behavior of Top 20% People - filled with energy, excites others, like-able, good values, loves to see people grow, loves to reward people, not mean-spirited or cheap/stingy, they celebrate people. Generosity of spirit, don't have a lot of envy, celebrates success of others.
• The Vital 70% - hard and consistent worker, but isn''t always there in the clutch
• Bottom 10% - not a team player, acidic

T.D. Jakes - Combustible Passion

• People are assets.  They are passionate when they can do something within their reach.  They want to be stretched, not ripped apart.  Evaluate what people can do.  Challenge them without overwhelming them.  Don't want them to feel defeated.
• Assess who they are, where they are, what they do, and allocate them appropriately.
• Confidant - Some people are for you.
• Constituent - Some people are for what you are for.
• Comrade - Some people are against what you're against.  Some people are fighters! Direct these people towards the target, instead of making yourself the target.
• Don't hold on to people too tightly who are meant to come and go.

Prayer Slacker

My pastor has been challenging us to grow in our practice of prayer and dependence on God ... to not let prayer be just another thing we do ... but that prayer would be the way we do everything.

Personally, I've tried to live an abiding type of prayer life; because being the check-list kind of person that I am, my approach to a scheduled "quite-time" has often resulted in it being just another thing on the to-do list. But while most would say the abiding kind of prayer life IS the one we should hope to develop, I'm realizing it has become somewhat of an excuse for me.

I know this because there have been times I've sensed in heaviness of heart the need to just sit in quiet before God - sometimes to pray in silent, sometimes to read His Word, sometimes to write - often times not knowing the person or circumstance I'm praying about.  I have sensed and avoided these encounters more often than not; so it's a cop-out for me to say that I pray with out ceasing throughout the day, when in my heart I know I've only offered Him my distracted attention.

I have discounted these calls. Why? Because to purposefully pull away from the noise of life, to sit without agenda or study guide or grocery-list of needs, leaves me emotionally raw, organically transparent, naked ... and it scares me. But I don't want to walk in fear. So yesterday, I acknowledged and confessed the condition of my heart to some friends, because I truly do want to answer the call to grow in my practice of prayer and dependence on God.

On a lighter note, later in the afternoon, I was reading Pete Wilson's blog. His friend recently wrote a book which he was giving away to 5 random winners.  All we had to do was post, on a scale of 1-10, how our prayer life is these days.  So I did.  (I'm currently a 2.) I woke up this morning to an email saying I was randomly selected to receive Dianne Moody's Confessions of a Prayer Slacker. 

God - you are too funny.