{"id":553,"date":"2013-11-02T05:12:01","date_gmt":"2013-11-02T05:12:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/beta.dminlgp.com\/?p=553"},"modified":"2014-08-13T21:34:29","modified_gmt":"2014-08-13T21:34:29","slug":"leadership-and-chronic-anxiety","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/leadership-and-chronic-anxiety\/","title":{"rendered":"Leadership and Chronic Anxiety"},"content":{"rendered":"

Of all the reading I have done on leadership during the recent past, Edwin Friedman\u2019s book A Failure of Nerve: Leadership in the Age of the Quick Fix <\/em>has been the most challenging and yet quite stimulating. Friedman\u2019s approach to addressing the leadership crisis is from quite a different angle than that which most of us are commonly familiar with and used to. \u00a0Unlike other leadership gurus of the present day who focus primarily on accumulation of skills, knowledge, data etc, Friedman attributes the crisis to \u2018a failure of nerve\u2019. \u00a0\u00a0This book has had my mind going in many directions trying to identify where I stand and what I am not doing right.\u00a0 It reminded me of a prior reading of Wheatley\u2019s Leadership and the New Science <\/em>where the author argues that \u2018chaos\u2019 is acceptable and even helpful.\u00a0 That was a revolutionary thought for me and put my mind at ease freeing me from struggles I have had thinking that my call to leadership was to set the whole world just right.<\/p>\n

Even though Friedman discussion concerns itself primarily with the crisis of leadership in America, it does speak well for the direction in which the remainder of the world is also headed whether it is a nation, state, the schools, business or family.\u00a0 The various ways we have learned to address ailments in the social realm sometimes have adverse results rather than correcting them.\u00a0 That is because data, techniques and empathy are placed on higher planes of value rather than maturity, endurance and personal responsibility and one\u2019s ability to take risks.<\/p>\n

One of the issues Friedman deals with in Chapter two is \u2018chronic anxiety\u2019 and its major effect on leadership.\u00a0 \u00a0I am giving a great deal of thought to this particular aspect of my leadership in the light of several things that have transpired in my personal life, family and ministry. \u00a0It is one of those times in life when all of these seems to converge simultaneously and those times are not quite rare for leaders.\u00a0 Or are they? \u00a0How will I face the reality of the present and emerge as a successful leader with a \u2018well differentiated\u201d self as defined by Friedman\u00a0(FRIEDMAN 2007, 231).\u00a0 Or will I allow the present stressful circumstances to drive me to regression.<\/p>\n

Drawing from the family therapy theories of Dr. Murray Bowen the author sites the following characteristics of chronic anxiety:<\/p>\n