{"id":9939,"date":"2016-10-27T20:54:45","date_gmt":"2016-10-28T03:54:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dminlgp.com\/?p=9939"},"modified":"2016-10-27T20:54:45","modified_gmt":"2016-10-28T03:54:45","slug":"we-are-the-aptissimi-who-love-right","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/we-are-the-aptissimi-who-love-right\/","title":{"rendered":"We Are The Aptissimi Who Love, Right?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Broadway+For+Orlando\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got some good news and some not so good news.\u201d This is way my director approached me as a young manager many years ago. \u201cI\u2019m going to increase your staff,\u201d she said. \u201cYou get an additional person to help with the workload.\u201d That seemed<\/em> like good news, so what could be bad. \u201cThe staff person who will be joining you is Sally (not her real name).\u201d Well crap. The one person no one wanted on their team. The complainer. How was I going to make THIS work? I knew the only way I could do it was to talk to the best manager I knew and ask her advice.<\/p>\n

Looking back almost 20 years, I suspect the Queen of Managers had read Heroic Leadership<\/em> by Chris Lowney, or at least had learned the Jesuit principles of leadership. She told me that every person has a leader within and that great leaders \u201clove\u201d that leadership into fruition. She encouraged me to become Sally\u2019s greatest cheerleader, defender, and ally, but to shoot straight with her in private about anything that might be getting in the way of her success. I took the Queen\u2019s advice to heart and, to this day, I have never loved an employee like I loved Sally. She worked hard, she had my back, and she was constantly thinking of new ways to do business better. When she retired, I cried as if my favorite auntie was leaving town for good. What I learned from that time with Sally is that loving is the best way to lead. If I live out of a place of genuine love, the leaders I am responsible for training can trust me to equip them and let them do their work. I screwed it up all the time, but my failures were met with love and compassion if I lived those qualities first.<\/p>\n

I had lost sight of so much of this before reading Heroic Leadership<\/em>. Lowney reminded me that the four essential pillars of the Jesuits \u2013 self-awareness, ingenuity, love, and heroism (9, 294) \u2013 are more than a method or a system, they are a way of life for those of us who choose to be world-changers and to equip other world-changers. I realized that I need to go back to the basics of self-reflection and awareness. \u201cWhat do I care about? What do I want? How do I fit into the world\u201d (19)? These are questions that need clear, concise answers. I need to write the answers on my wall and refer back daily for course correction. My self-reflection has been hit and miss for quite some time so it is crucial for me to get back into the daily habit of examen<\/em>, touching base with what I know to be my goals and sizing up my response to opportunities.<\/p>\n

Honestly, reading through the personal strengths (110) and the aspects of self-awareness essential for personal ingenuity (166) left me feeling discouraged and disheartened. I do not have the indifference needed to go all in. I do not reflect on my own weaknesses and habits that block progress. Most of all, I do not appreciate myself as loved and important. Just writing that sounds so lame, but how can I promote other voices if I don\u2019t value my own? How can I reassure others that they are deeply loved if I can\u2019t act like I believe that I myself am also deeply loved? Ugh. This stuff is so messy. This must be why there are so many \u201c7 Steps\u201d books that promise to make me a good leader if I just work hard enough. No one really wants to hear that the first step is \u201cappreciate yourself as loved and important.\u201d<\/p>\n

So, step one is this (at least for me): I am printing out the \u201csteps\u201d Lowney gives in his conclusion under \u201cHow Do You Grasp Your Own Leadership Role\u201d (294) and putting them over my desk to use as part of my daily examen<\/em>. If you know me, I am giving you full permission to ask me how I am doing on these, and if I am following the habit of examen<\/em>. Here are the steps, in first person:<\/p>\n