Pour yourself a cup of tea, get cozy, and let’s chat about some hard stuff.
Leadership isn’t always easy and I want you to know you have a friend here who gets it. I want to pour into your tired, worn out, and maybe cynical heart. It won’t be easy but just like tea, love will make it a little more palatable.
Sometimes when things happen that throw you for a loop it can be difficult to even get your bearings and figure out which way is up. If you have made a big mistake, trusted someone you shouldn’t have, said something wrong, or handled a situation poorly often times it is public and embarrassing.
I think in these times when our thinking isn’t always the clearest it is good to have some guidelines to follow. I have laid out what I think is a great way to move through these situations so that they are valued correctly in our minds (not too big, not too small) and so that we can move on.
We’ve all been there but we don’t all handle it well. Part of being an excellent leader is learning from your mistakes and moving forward productively.
Today I’m going to talk about the internal work that needs to be done and next week I’ll discuss the external.
1. Process the situation
It is first important to do the work to process the situation well. This starts with our own work. Do what you need to do to figure out what happened. If you need to journal, talk it out, sit and think, be sure to take the time to work through what and how the situation happened.
It is crucial to review the facts. Because I have a big emotional personality I often have a hard time relating a story without adding layers and layer of emotion. Do your best to stick to the facts as you know them.
Often times doing this can help you realize what in fact was something you did wrong and what someone else did wrong.
This is not an exercise in laying blame but rather, if you are like me, portioning out responsibility to the correct parties.
I tend to take all the blame rather than realizing that perhaps I didn’t do everything wrong. Perhaps you are one who avoids all blame, this would be a time to examine where you really went wrong.
2. Get trusted advice or talk to a mentor
Since often times we can get things mixed up in our minds very easily it is important to continue processing your situation with a spouse, mentor, or trusted friend who is not under your direct leadership in the situation you are processing.
I find it best to find someone who is outside the immediate emotions and aftermath of the situation to go through things with. This is often a good time to get some real clarity on the work you need to do to resolve the situation as well as figuring out your true role in it all. This leads us to the next thing to do.
3. Don’t take on fault that is not yours
Were you really the evil villain orchestrating manipulating plays to take down the innocent villagers or maybe…..just maybe could you have been a human who made some wrong decisions based on poor motives?
Often having another pair of eyes and discerning spirit on a situation can really help you figure what your true role was and perhaps the root cause of why you acted the way you did.
If you can sit with some who can really help you mine your own heart this work can be some of the most freeing work you do in this process aside from repentance.
4. Be clear about your sin and repent
On the flip side if you are truly are an evil villain only looking for the demise of others you need to see the gravity of your sin, confess, and repent. (Whew! Those are all words that are not popular these days!)
Stick with me, the gavel of condemnation is not waiting to strike you. If you have truly tasted and seen the mercy and goodness of God you know the freedom and deliverance that comes with confessing your sin to God. He is gentle and wants you to be restored to himself.
If you are still burdened with the sin you carry it will make the restoration process with others that much more difficult because you will be looking for their forgiveness and acceptance as a means to be able to move on.
What you truly need is God’s forgiveness and then you will have the freedom to allow others to react how they want to react while you are secure in God’s mercy and grace.
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