May 8, 2023
by Rod Smith
A golden key -one of many- to leadership resides in the wisdom to know how to handle anxiety provoking events in any community.
There are people in your business, church, school, any workplace, who tend to step-up or amplify anxiety.
They react to any circumstance provoking stress or worry.
Their reactions exaggerate matters and tend to make things worse.
They overreact at stressful times and spread anxiety to all and sundry, even to those who can do nothing about it.
They apparently cannot be anxious alone and must be sure all in their environment – and beyond – are as anxious as they are. These people act as step-up transformers when it comes to stressful times that come to any community.
There are people – wherever people gather – who step-down anxiety.
They hold onto it, giving themselves time to assess and time to respond to whatever the trigger for the anxiety in a community may be. Step-down transformers assess who needs to be included and who does not and try to decide what will be helpful to the community as a whole.
Step-downers include those who are empowered to take steps to reduce concerns in a community. They try to take steps to reduce anxiety and know who and what will only serve to escalate matters and do so unnecessarily.
Posted in Business, Leadership, Listening |
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May 6, 2023
by Rod Smith
Things to try for a few days in the hopes will soon see they are life-style habits worthy of developing:
Plan your day.
Plan who you will seek to empower and encourage.
Write (using a pencil and paper) a few ideas as to how you will empower others no matter what your station in life.
Oddly, the more you plan, the more you will allow for a serendipitous life.
Besides, getting yourself ready for a great day will sharpen your eyes to recognize when great days come your way.
Plan your day as if planning a great day is in your power to do so.
Write a few notes to yourself about how much money you will spend, how much you will try to save.
Plan what and whom you will avoid because some things suck the life out of you.
As you plan your day, remind yourself that you are not all-powerful and that things happen to derail the best made plans. This does not mean a plan is not worth making.
Plan your responses to tough or challenging circumstances and situations so that you are unlikely to spend the day in a reactive mode with fight or flight as your defaults. Write a few notes to yourself about what you will or will not say and whom you will and will not engage.
Posted in Anxiety, Blended families, Boundaries, Children, Communication, Differentiation, Education, Faith, Family, Family Systems Theory, Forgiveness, Friendship, Grace, High maintenance relationships, Leadership, Listening, Love, Space, Therapeutic Process, Triangles, YWAM |
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April 25, 2023
by Rod Smith
Love is seeking another person’s highest good, every time, day in and day out. It’s holding nothing back if it’s in the highest interests of whomever you love.
Love is being willing to be unpopular because some truth is tough to hear and receive. It is being willing to be corrected by the people you love when they think you are wrong or need correction.
Love is finding legitimate ways to earn the extra money needed to protect and educate and serve the people whom you love.
Love is thousands of loads of laundry for the baby and then toddler and a young boy or girl and then it’s teaching young teenager to do his own.
Love is dealing with men and women who will tell you you are a bad parent for not giving rules and not checking phones or monitoring teenage behavior as if your teenage son or daughter cannot be trusted to exercise good judgment. Their unsolicited scoldings clearly mean they do not trust themselves or their own children.
Love is being committed to telling you the truth as lovingly and as efficiently as possibly.
Love is learning to love and embrace and fully accept the people whom your loved ones love.
Posted in Blended families, Boundaries, Children, Communication, Differentiation, Education, Faith, Family, Family Systems Theory, Forgiveness, Friendship, Grace, Leadership, Listening |
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April 14, 2023
by Rod Smith
I am I
You and You
We are We
Let Us not ConFuse
The Three
(Rod Smith 4/12/2023)
Posted in Attraction, Boundaries, Communication, Differentiation, Education, Faith, Family, Family Systems Theory, Forgiveness, Friendship, Leadership |
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April 2, 2023
by Rod Smith
At the start of a new work week may I offer you encouragement?
Stop hiding who you are behind a desire to be accepted or to fit in.
Let people know who you are and what you want.
This does not mean you have to be pushy or overbearing.
In both strong and subtle ways define yourself.
Leave little up to guesswork.
Do this, even if you start in very small and incremental ways, with the people you are close to and to the people whom you love. This may take some people by surprise and even catch them off guard, but the people who love you will be delighted to hear your voice.
You will immediately begin to feel less anxious when you begin to define yourself. As you advocate for yourself, even in the smallest of ways, you will begin to like what you see and what you feel and think, and you will grow even more beautiful than you already are. If you have been a “I just fit in with others” or “I hate conflict” kind of person you will begin to notice you will have lower levels of anxiety as you reverse your “fit in” and “avoid conflict” tendencies and allow your personality and your wishes to emerge and ultimately shine.
Welcome to a great week.
Posted in Anxiety, Blended families, Boundaries, Children, Communication, Differentiation, Education, Faith, Family, Family Systems Theory, Friendship, Grace, In-laws, Leadership, Listening, Reactivity, Responsive people, Therapeutic Process, Triangles, Trust, Voice, Womanhood |
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March 30, 2023
by Rod Smith
Today, and every day, try to be the adult you hope your children will become. How else will they learn what it means to be an adult? Who else will teach them?
Try to stop blaming the teachers, coaches, or the school for your child’s every challenge, difficulty, or hurdle. Blame restricts maturing, yours and theirs.
Try to stop blaming the government, the economy, or prejudice for every distress or dilemma you face, unless you think blame will be a good tool for your child to take into adulthood. If you want your children to be adults who take responsibility for their lives then show them how it’s done. Your children won’t forget your temper tantrums no matter how young they may be; and they will probably emulate them.
Demonstrate, by your own display of excellent manners, the manner in which you hope your child will navigate life and relationships. It is true, they are going to watch and learn from multiple sources, but you are their primary resource when it comes to how they will respect and treat others. Little eyes are watching.
Respect, visit, and be kind to the elderly so they know exactly how to do it when it’s your turn.
Dismiss no one; look down on no one. Young eyes and ears are absorbing how to be in the world, and we, we parents, are the primary teachers.
Posted in Adolescence, Blended families, Boundaries, Children, Communication, Difficult Relationships, Education, Faith, Family, Friendship, Grace, Leadership, Parenting/Children, Single parenting, Step parenting, Stepfather, Stepmother, Teenagers, Voice |
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March 29, 2023
by Rod Smith
“If the cap fits……. wear it,” as my dear dad would say.
Am I writing to you? I hope not.
Dear Business Owner
Your life impacts the lives of many others. Your decisions create waves for others to sink or swim. Consider it an act of compassion to think about the impact your decisions have on many others. Live to empower and encourage rather than plunder and accumulate.
Your financial status has power and how you use or misuse it reveals everything about your character. You appear unaware that some people are intimidated by wealth and feel beholden to you, while also welcoming their adultion.
Walk gently.
Hold onto the knowledge that there are people wealthier than you who have managed to be wealthy, kind, and generous.
It is possible.
Try not to forget there are people who are much poorer than you who are vastly happier and more content than you appear to be. Your concerns, worries, anxieties, successes, conquests, apparently give you the idea that you are the center of the universe.
You are not.
A moment of compassion from you expressed toward others – beginning with your vast payroll – many of whom are struggling, will make all the difference both to you and to many others.
At present your life is heartily affirming the age-old idea that money cannot buy happiness.
A Very Distant Observer
Posted in Addictions, Anger, Betrayal, Business, Education, Leadership, Listening |
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March 28, 2023
by Rod Smith
“Writing in the sand” is a strong metaphor for me.
My usage is in reference to a New Testament moment.
When confronted by men who desire to trap him, Jesus twice stoops to draw or to write in the sand.
Theologians have postulated much on what it was he wrote or drew.
I believe he was “steel-ing” himself. He was readying himself for a strong, suitable reply to what may have appeared to bystanders to be an impossible dilemma. Jesus was thinking, mulling things over, reminding himself of his calling and the power that was his and and was not his.
He was doing what you and I are called to do when faced with dilemmas, complex or easy.
When we take time to write or draw in the sand we give ourselves the time we need to consider many options when we make decisions.
Taking the time offers time for increased perspectives.
He was no loose cannon and we know how damaging they can be.
I have been writing or drawing in the sand for months, designing and planning suitable responses to tough situations.
It has taken me far more than two stoops and I know I will make many more.
But, I will emerge and act on decisions made while stooping these many times and drawing in the sand.
Posted in Anxiety, Betrayal, Boundaries, Communication, Education, Faith, Forgiveness, Friendship, Grace, Grief, Leadership, Reactivity, Responsive people, Sabotage, Triangles, Trust, Voice |
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March 26, 2023
by Rod Smith
I believe we are fully adulthood when:
We can be authentic with all people, including our parents, treating all others respectfully as equals, despite rank, position or the apparent lack of it.
We respect mutuality and equality, and want both in all of our relationships.
We have acknowledged our hurts, grieved appropriately, and decided to live to the fullest.
We can delay gratification.
We have stopped blaming others for the condition of our lives, especially our parents.
Ambiguity, mystery, and uncertainty are allies, not enemies. We can hold seemingly conflicting thoughts and beliefs without becoming unsettled.
We are able to recognize when and how we were victimized but no longer think, speak, feel, or behave like victims.
We have a small group of people to whom we talk about almost everything, but feel no compulsion to tell anyone everything.
We stop apologizing for things for which we could never be held responsible and efficiently clear up misunderstandings.
We can see that all things are related and are therefore hesitant to apply quick solutions to complex problems. We respect the law of unexpected consequences.
We learn to appreciate and love “the moment” rather than live as if we are perpetually waiting for a day when things will be better.
We can perceive when others do not have our best interests at heart yet remain appropriately engaged with such people.
Posted in Blended families, Boundaries, Communication, Differentiation, Education, Family, Friendship, Grace, Leadership, Listening, Love, Parenting/Children, Triangles |
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March 26, 2023
by Rod Smith
Managing will consume you. If you don’t watch your step you’ll be seduced into thinking that managing IS leading. The two will become confused and leading will morph into managing – not the reverse. Endless administrative tasks will drown you. The risk-averse, the anxious employees among you (mostly managers) will exercise power and keep you managing to keep you from leading. They are managers. That’s what they do. Of course they will try to manage you. Then, the very same people will complain, “There’s just no leadership around here!” It’s a sinkhole. Avoid it.
Over-listening to whiners. If you allow the whiners among you too much of an ear they will drown out healthy voices. Whiners are often very aggressive, especially when ignored. They’ll feel entitled to shape your job. Don’t let them. Whiners are NEVER satisfied. Whatever you do will never stop their whining. Listen to whiners, yes, but listen to the healthy, the enthusiastic, and the busy, motivated people six times as much. Pole-vault this sinkhole.
Tripping over the remains of your predecessor. I am all for honoring the past, but leaders must determinedly point to a greater future. Resist the understandable urge to protect the memory of whomever you follow, especially if you are doing it in the hopes of gaining acceptance from those who loved the previous leader. It’s a sinkhole. Flee it.
Posted in Communication, Differentiation, Family Systems Theory, Leadership |
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