Posts Tagged ‘attitude’

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What Is Our Influence on People

December 16, 2015

Oh, sweetie, just put on a smile and you’ll get over it.

God will heal you if you believe hard enough.

Just stop sinning and then come to our church.

Sometimes I wonder whether in my social awkwardness whether I’ve said something as callous and stupid as one of those statements. Or maybe in a spiritually blind moment.

Have you ever heard someone approaching someone in need and just trampling all over their feeling seemingly oblivious to the person beneath the skin?

There are two reasons that people don’t come to know Jesus

  1. They don’t know any Christians.
  2. They do.

People need a guide and a mentor. They need someone who has battled the demons and come through on the other side. The 12-step people have something there.

There are people who think they have great knowledge and want to go around like Santa depositing gifts of advice on everyone.

Then there are people who really do have knowledge and wisdom, but they don’t realize it. They don’t know when they really could step in and help. These people need to be awakened. Then they could join the mentor group.

Lean Manufacturing, or Lean Thinking, teaches us that people are important. It also teaches to keep probing around a problem until we finally come to the “root cause”. Then, and only then, can we begin the process of finding a solution.

Same with people. If we don’t want to be either 1 or 2 above, then what we do is stop thinking advice and start thinking about the person. The problem probing technique is called “5 Whys.” If you keep asking Why, eventually you will come to the root of the problem.

When you are working with a hurting person, you don’t begin with advice. You ask them in a trustworthy way what is wrong, how they feel, why they think it happened, when did it start, who caused the problem. Rudyard Kipling’s six faithful serving men, who, what, when, where, why, and how.

Asking shows interest. It helps the other figure out things. Answer when asked, ask when they’re silent.

Be the type of Jesus-follower who shows concern and offers help–not the “Christian” who pompously showers advice upon unsuspecting victims.

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Respond To Others Rather Than Giving Speeches

December 15, 2015

“My wife told me about a situation at work. I told her how to solve it. Now she’s mad at me. What gives?”

“I told him over and over about the gospel, but I can’t seem to make him understand.”

Have you ever heard comments like those or something similar?

I’m following up on yesterday’s post on listening.

Did the wife ask for advice? I doubt it. She’s probably smart enough to work out things. Why treat her like a child?

What would be a better response? Discussion. And Empathy. “Gee, honey, that’s too bad.What are you going to do?” (OK, the actual conversation would be longer, of course.)

Let’s look at evangelizing.

How well has speaking at people worked for you? Not well? Of course not.

Once again, what does the other person want? Did you ask? Are you merely offering simplistic advice? No one appreciates advice.

Paul, in his letter to the Colossians, said, “Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer everyone.”

What is that key? Respond. In order to respond properly, first we must listen actively.

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Why Is It So Hard To Listen?

December 14, 2015

Why is it so hard to listen?

I walked into the President of the company’s office. I was head of marketing and engineering at the time.

“Gary, nobody listens to me,” he moaned.

“Huh?” I tactfully replied.

“Nobody listens to me.”

“Huh?”

“Gary, nobody listens to me,” he tried again.

“Huh?”

I finally broke his mood, and we got productive.

OK, what I was trying to do was break through his “woe is me” mood and move on. Problem was, the team of vice presidents (including me, too) just didn’t listen to him. He had lost us.

One reason people don’t listen is that either you don’t have much to say, or you say it way too frequently.

More often the problem is with the listener. We just don’t practice active listening.

Some are trapped inside a narcissistic personality. They are so focused on themselves that they don’t hear other people. Ask a narcissist if they are, and they’ll tell you. “You seem to think about yourself first.” “Well, yes, of course.” (As in, doesn’t everyone?)

Narcissism is a major problem in society right now. But not everyone is narcissistic.

Some just have problems of their own. Like my boss, they just can’t break out of the cycle of despair to even see other people.

Some people are easily distracted. They may be talking with you, but their attention keeps drifting elsewhere. Smart phone notifications anyone?

How about caring? I should have known about the Baby Boomers’ self-centeredness way back in my senior year in college. I was tutoring a guy in German so that he could graduate and accept a good job. I said something about having empathy for a professor. “I don’t have time for someone else,” he replied. Well, at least his wife smiled and thanked me when he passed and graduated.

Why is it so hard to listen? Probably because we just don’t try.

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Leadership: What Do You Look For In People

December 11, 2015

When you are building a team for your business or task at church or for community service, what do you look for? A warm body? Particular skills? Relatives?

There has been a consistent theme to my reading and conversations this week. It has been around people.

Andy Stanley says that you should look for who before what. Look for good and talented people first. Then figure out what to put them to work at.

Google looks for curiosity.

An interview I heard on the radio with the head designer at Go Pro talked about learners. When asked about her own learning, she said it’s the people she hires. They are learners. When they learn something new, they want to teach it.

Chuck Price, leader at Campus Crusade and a friend, says to hire character. You can teach skills. You can’t teach character.

When I’ve hired or brought people into  teams, I look for a basic skill set. I want people who can teach me something. I’ve learned the hard way to not hire people with agendas. Especially when that comes with weak character.

Family and friends? Be careful.

Personality also counts. It depends a little on how customer-facing they will be. But still, they must fit in with the team. Avoid people who are negative, arrogant, or, on the other hand, weak and timid.

Hiring is a major decision. It’s game changing. Make a wrong hire and you can destroy an organization, business, or committee.

Take is seriously. Make it first priority when you have to hire or are building a team.

I like the philosophy of these characteristics: Character, Curiosity, Learner.

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He Broke The Walls

December 10, 2015

He knew there were people on the other side of town. But no one from his group ever went there. Rumor was they spoke a different language, didn’t wash, were vicious.

He told the stranger who came to town not to go there. They were violent. Had guns. He’d just get in trouble…or worse.

But the stranger went. He had a mission to see people.

Upon his return, he reported, “They are just like you. They even suspect the same things about you that you suspect about them.”

People are people the world over or the neighborhood over. Hopes, fears, needs, desires. Same feelings of being lost and needing connection with God.

Paul, the apostle, lived that situation. He was often that stranger who went to the outsider group. He found that they were open to learning how to live with God.

He wrote to his friends in Ephesus, “Jesus has broken down the dividing wall, that is the hostility that is between us.”

What better calling in life than to make it your mission to break down walls. It is easier, of course, to build walls. We feel safer. We can be important in our own little fenced in area.

I was there once. My friends were Catholic. Don’t go to that place, they told me. Those are Protestants. They get into fights and will hurt you. Funny, I was Protestant. I grew up thinking that way about Catholics. Now they were my friends and I was warned about my people.

But it was OK, I told them. They are people, too. And this was Ohio, not Northern Ireland.

Ah, but to break down the wall and invite others to the party. That is the calling.

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Attitude Says It All

December 9, 2015

It’s all in the attitude.

How do you say, “Merry Christmas”?

Americans, especially us rural ones, are struggling to understand how to live in a diverse community. As recently as 20 years ago, most communities outside the cities would count greater than 90% of their populations as Christian. As recently as 10 years ago a local small city not only had no residents of color (either African or Asian Americans). Not only that, black people routinely warned their out of state relatives to pray their cars didn’t break down in that area at night.

In my area, there are still a few villages that are white, German people only. Outsiders not welcome. But most of us live in areas with white people, black people, east Asians, south Asians, Africans, people from the Middle East. There are now a variety of religions.

Add to this retail businesses that wish to be inclusive.

So, the greeting “Happy Holidays” prevails in many venues.

One of our pastors got up Sunday and had people practice saying “Merry Christmas.” Now, she said, you can go out and say that and not happy holidays.

Back to attitude. How do you say that?

Is it joyous greeting among those in the community? Or, is it an “in-your-face” command? Kind of like a challenge. Sort of, “I dare you to disagree.”

Then I thought why make such a big deal?

I’m secure in my faith. I don’t need the validation of someone else. You can say whatever, if said with a smile and a sense of generosity, it conveys a proper meaning.

Or, you can get the words right, but miss the feeling. Sort of like the Pharisees who got the religion part (sort of) right, but missed that heart thing.

It’s all in the attitude.

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A Life of Service

December 2, 2015

It was somewhat “accidental” that the government sent him to work with youth in one of the poorest neighborhoods in the US.

You wonder how much of an accident it was. For the government, it was a form of punishment for not being drafted in the VietNam War era. He chose service.

There are people who love to quote passages from the Bible such as all things work for good for those who have faith. Whether God was behind the decision or God worked in the moment, the decision led to a life of service.

After some years of service, he went into business. But the service continued. He began adopting children whom no one else would care for. Severe handicaps and abuse. Some would never be able to leave his care (also his wife’s by the way who shared the entire journey).

He and his partner were good at that business thing. Became quite wealthy. The resources enabled the growing family to build a suitable estate to house them all.

A life of service done in the name of God. A life of service of which he never boasted. He and his wife “just did it.”

I heard the story once. It stuck. It makes me wonder what I’ve done with my life. Christians used to call this feeling “conviction,” in the sense of being convicted of a crime.

Stories such as this from my lifetime force me to recall Acts 2 and 4 where the church grew rapidly because of the way the members of the fellowship lived and cared for people.

Our witness of the power of Jesus gains credibility when done from a life of service to others.

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What If We Had a Ceasefire?

December 1, 2015

CEASEFIRE!

I’m sure it was “bumper sticker philosophy.” I have no clue what the rest of the words were on it. But the one word blared out distinctly.

Then a line of thinking began. What is it about that word?

Ceasefire describes a momentary (or hopefully longer) cessation of hostilities between the combatants. Rifles and artillery fall silent. People can breathe. A certain amount of relaxation seeps into the body and the group.

What if we invoked that word a little more often? And in other contexts?

Here’s a thought that I believe a large majority of Americans would go with–what if we took Nancy Pelosi (leader of the “liberal” wing of the Democrats in the US House) and Jim Jordan (leader of the “conservative” wing of the Republicans). What if we forced them into a room together and wouldn’t let them out until they forged a ceasefire?

Maybe we could get them to work within their differences (which are OK in themselves) with the purpose of an effective government? Let’s stop shooting at each other and see how we can work toward some common objectives–say the overall welfare of the people of the US?

Then I heard about white, male, Christian who took his firearms to a crowded shopping area that contained a Planned Parenthood clinic and started shooting.

What if we had a ceasefire among all the competing brands of Christianity? What if we learned to live with the variety of opinions and then focused on living out the commands of Jesus? Very simple–love God, love your neighbor.

Yes. A ceasefire. We need one of those. Maybe we could begin with the Christmas season and then extend it.

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The Status of Your Heart

November 25, 2015

John Ortberg, author and pastor of Menlo Park Presbyterian Church, has called Jesus the first cardiologist–“He is always interested in the state of your heart.”

We use metaphors of the heart often in our culture. In meditation we use breathing to calm the heart, slow the beating, bring order to the body. We talk about heartbreak. There are affairs of the heart.

Kevin Roberts, executive chairman of Saatchi & Saatchi a creative agency, recently wrote about the status of the heart in relation to the brain.

“We often think of the brain as the command center, responsible for how our whole body functions, but scientists now know that the heart in fact sends more signals to the brain than the brain does to the heart. The heart therefore affects how we think and function emotionally; conscious awareness comes from the brain and heart working together,” wrote Roberts.

We were taught in elementary biology that the brain does not really control the heart. Turns out the heart really is the center of our being.

Roberts says, “Perhaps this shouldn’t really come as a surprise. From everyday experience we know that when we are calm and the heart beats steadily, we are more able to think clearly. When we are in a stressful situation or panicking, our heart tends to race and our clarity of thought is hindered making it more difficult to think, remember or learn. So different emotional states send different signals to the brain and affect our cognitive functions.”

We really do need to check the status of our hearts. Not only from the view of keeping it calm. But also from the view of such things as empathy, gratitude, joy, love. Let’s inform our brain about the higher gifts.

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Speaking About What We’ve Experienced

November 17, 2015

Coffee lovers have come to the opinion that their drink must be incredibly strong to be good. That is the power of advertising and peer pressure where you go to places that must over-roast their coffees to make up for the variation in the quality of the beans. In process control it’s called compensating for the variables of the input material.

When the quality of the raw material is more carefully controlled which can be the result of the way the coffee is purchased from the farmer, then the roaster is free to bring out the true flavors of the different varieties of the bean. The result is a coffee that is more pleasing to the palate.

We cannot help from speaking about what we have seen and heard. — Peter and John recorded in Acts 4

Christ-followers call it “witnessing.” Originally it meant “speaking about what we have seen and heard.” For us it is speaking from experience.

Sharing an experience is powerful. It is your story. But it is a story that can relate to other people. It is a story pleasing to the palate.

Followers of our faith for centuries have given us a bad name by coming on so strongly like that overpowering cup of coffee. They try to force feed their beliefs–often emphasizing peripheral beliefs ignoring the central belief that we have experienced new life as a Jesus-follower after coming to belief in his resurrection.

I’m thinking about Galatians 5 and Paul’s description of changed lives. And also of the especially powerful first five chapters of Acts.

Think of the growth of the early church and the lives that were changed because they:

  1. Shared what they had experienced
  2. Served others with no thought for themselves or their own well being

And we wonder why we’re not growing and thriving.

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