Ready or Not...

"It's better to be ready, than to get ready."

This was a quote from one of our lectures given by Colonel Mike Bell in Colorado for the Signature Leadership Capstone.  It's been playing in my head nonstop since mid-March.  In one case, being ready for something is great in leadership.  And it's a great question to ask, "Am I ready? If not, then I will study and get ready and perhaps my chance will come."

In another case, your level of readiness is hard to measure, and there will always be a part of you that is not ready.  That's the part where you learn by doing.  Hopefully, you emerge victorious (whether you win or lose is another question.)  Do you see how paradoxical this quickly becomes?  There's so many factors when you examine readiness.

I think there are many times in life in which you are ready but you don't even know it.  And it takes synchronicity in order to wake you up.  Synchronicity is a state of harmony or congruence; when our lives just seem to fall together for reasons beyond our control.  I love this word, because it describes those moments where you can see evidences of God moving in your life.

So even if you're not ready; you're a lot more ready than you were.
This is a good place to be.

And this is the place where I am.

But I think all this synchronicity is like God saying, "You're ready to move into an area of your life where you don't feel ready at all."

I can't help but confess that I am ignorant of the unknown.  

This is the Johari window.  I saw it in the book I'm reading, The Ascent of a Leader written by Bill Thrall, Bruce McNicol, and Ken McElrath.  See the lower right corner in the quadrant? Those are the things that you don't know that you don't know.  See the dotted lines moving into the unknown square?  Well, the more you go through life experiences, learn from others, disclose to others, learn from mistakes--the more that dotted line expands.  And it moves in tangent with the other areas in the quadrant.

Later on in the book is this quote, "God places people he can trust in to the right places at the right time.  He tests and refines them...so that when the right opportunities arise, they are ready for the challenge."

Ready for the challenge.  That is the unknown area; the place where God makes you ready to enter a state of unreadiness.  The refining fire; the times in which His strength is made perfect in our weakness.

And it's okay to feel unready.  

I was challenged last week by the College Group sermon with these scriptures from John 17: 6-11.  In this passage, Jesus prays for His disciples. It's an incredible thing to know our Lord is praying for us.  It's basically God saying that He believes in us.  He is our biggest advocate, wanting nothing but the best for us.

 “I have manifested your name to the people whom you gave me out of the world. Yours they were, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word.  Now they know that everything that you have given me is from you. For I have given them the words that you gave me, and they have received them and have come to know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me.  I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours.  All mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I am glorified in them.  And I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one."

Even when you feel unready, even when you just don't believe in yourself anymore... God is there and He's ready to open more doors, to pray for us, to arrange events, and to do His will.

"Create A Space"

Here's a paragraph from one of the assignments of my current leadership class.  I went to a leadership summit for my class last week, and this is just something that has changed the way I view almost everything.  And it's something I can apply (and have started to apply) whether or not I'm in a leadership "position."  I just had to share it on this blog.  I will probably write about some takeaways and things I've been applying from this leadership class.  

My biggest takeaway from the Capstone was from the lecture material.  What stood out to me the most, was looking at the world through the lens of "creation, fall, and redemption."  Jeff Myers said, "The very outward working of God is relational.  From the beginning of time He was there."  In the events since creation and the fall, we can see how God's bigger story of redemption is made manifest through the various "small stories" of our lives.  This understanding of redemption affects how I potentially will lead:  It affects how I view people, how I communicate, how I move toward goals, and how I equip future leaders.  Through this lens, I have begun to understand that God gives you organizations for the good of the people, not people for the good of the organization.  It takes self-expenditure (namely, empathy) to work toward the good of people around you.  The best way I can do this, is by creating a space for people.  Everyone has hopes and dreams and those who won't dare to have them, are only that way because their opportunities were stolen from them.  I was challenged at the Capstone by this question, "Can you create a space for them?  A way in which they could have hopes and dreams again?"  I believe God's plan of redemption--through effective leadership--can help people to have hopes and dreams again.  A way to foster individual callings, and unite them together to work toward a vision that will impact everyone involved.