Monthly Archives: October 2018

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Are your relationships overdrawn?

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In any area of leadership, your most important asset is the people you lead. The worth of this asset increases or decreases, depending on how you treat them.

In the relationship between leader and follower, the banking principle of deposit and withdrawal is constantly at work. When something positive is said or given to a follower, a deposit is made. When something difficult has to be said, such as talking to someone about poor job performance or consistent tardiness, a withdrawal is made. Things can go very wrong if the withdrawal turns out to be larger than previous deposits.

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Do You Have a Safe Place?

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Where do you go to be completely honest with what you are feeling, thinking and going through without being judged? Who hears your heart with all its fears, joys and concerns? Who do you have to be straight up in your face honest with you, to let you hear the hard truth even when you do not want to hear it? Many of us, especially leaders, do not have such honesty and accountability in our lives. And for many, the consequences have been tragic.

I have come to learn that such honesty and accountability is essential for us as leaders. It helps to avoid the disillusionment of self-sufficiency. I have heard many people, myself included, say, “I know if I had a place to be honest and be held accountable, I would not have made many of the mistakes I made.”

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Pursuing Healing for Your Wounds

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We all have been wounded. Last week I blogged on the topic, “We All Have Wounds That Need To Be Healed.” We must face and deal with our wounds in order to be freed from the shame, embarrassment and dysfunction of them. Only then is it possible to become wounded healers as we use our journey of healing to help others.

Today I want to focus on the process of facing our woundedness, so we can experience the healing we need to become wounded healers.

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We all have wounds that need to be healed

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Many years ago while in graduate school I read the book The Wounded Healer, by Henri Nouwen. That book forever changed my life as I was learning to deal with wounds of my life. I recently read a quote from that book that reminded me once again of the importance of recognizing that we all have wounds which continue to shape our lives. Here is the quote:

“Nobody escapes being wounded. We all are wounded people, whether physically, emotionally, mentally, or spiritually. The main question is not ‘How can we hide our wounds?’ so we don’t have to be embarrassed, but ‘How can we put our woundedness in the service of others?’ When our wounds cease to be a source of shame, and become a source of healing, we have become wounded healers.”