SHOW NOTES
Lessons Learned, pt6
Leadership in Context with Keith Tucci
Episode 166
Lesson #1: Anger is a manifestation of selfishness.
Lesson #2: Slow down.
Lesson #3: Become a listener.
Lesson #4: Be a giver.
Lesson #5: Always be submitted.
Lesson #6: Cherish people.
You can cherish people in your heart and mind and not do a good job of walking it out.
Growing up we moved around a lot. I attended many different schools. I never had life-long friends or people I grew up with. I was always passing through someone’s life. It wasn’t until I got married that I had any kind of family, stable address, nucleus to work from. Without being intentional, I think I lived my life without cherishing people, even though I really loved people.
I’m an A-type personality leader, and, as a result, I tend to relate to people who are doing what I am doing or helping me do what I am doing. I’ve never been shy about the vision I had or what God has called me to do. Because of that, I was always inviting people and challenging people to be a part of it without apology. Without realizing it when you are like that, you can draw a circle around those things and unintentionally exclude people who aren’t a part of what you are doing at that moment.
It is healthy to think about people who aren’t a part of what you are doing right now, who are really great people that you need to spend time with that are healthy relationships. Recently, Penny and I got to have lunch with some old friends that we don’t see often. It was really refreshing to sit down with someone when it wasn’t about a project or accomplishing something. We miss some richness in life when we don’t include people like that.
A few years ago, when I was transitioning out of pastoring, I felt like the Lord put it in my heart that He was going to bring some old friends across my path. I began being sensitive to that. In the last few years, it has been really neat as the Lord has brought back to my mind people whom we have lost contact with, and we have reached out to them. It has been a real treasure to reconnect with those friends. I’m so appreciative that the Lord stirred my heart like that.
People ask me if I had to do it over again, what I would do differently. One of the things would be to keep track of some of those relationships—even if it was just a Christmas card or a birthday call or a word of encouragement occasionally. Maybe you won’t interact with those relationships like you did at one point in your life, but those are people who added something to your life. So looking back, I would have done a better job at cherishing those relationships.
Learn to live outside your circle. Cherish people. It could be your neighbor, someone you used to work with, a relative, a friend of one of your kids. The older I get, the more I delight in those types of contacts.
Often leaders are giving, driving, working with incredible people, but there are people beyond that. Someday, the people you are working with now will leave to do other things. I want to stay their friend. I don’t want people just passing through my life.
When you think about it, who generates warm and kind thoughts in your heart who you haven’t talked to in many years? Reach out to them. Connect with them. Let them know that you are thinking about them and you are so thankful that they have been part of your life.
Open your heart and cherish people.
Join us next week as Keith Tucci continues to put leadership truth in the context of the local church. And as always, please like, share, rate/review, and invite others to listen. See you next week!
