Sweet Ch. 5 - Big Ears

Big ears huh? I wonder if the amount of wax you have is dependent on the size of your ear? And if so, who or what represents the wax? But I digress already...

There seems to be quite a bit of repition in this book and it seems to be pretty herky-jerky - probably not unlike my blog - but no one pays to see my blog.

GREAT THOUGHTS
1. Is actually point 3 in his list of learning a living - "When I was learned, knowledge was everything. Now that I'm a learner, kindness is everything." This just echoes that relationships and valuing people are the key compenents to life period. People aren't going to share with you or listen to what you have to share if you don't value them or care for them.

2. The components of a hearing aid - decompression chamber, selective hearing, self cleaning, hearing partners and play. I appreciated these and thought that they pretty much tell the story of the book in a much shorter and more concise way.

QUESTIONS I HAVE
1. If change is our only constant in an organic world, then how do we train ourselves and others to be ready and adapatble to change? How do we train ourselves to have effective filters to sift through all the information, sounds, noises, images and stories to find where God is moving and where its just hocus pocus?

2. Does anyone else have the feeling that Shackleton would have just been a complete jerk in any setting other than survival?

3. How do I find my voice in the midst of all the voices? How do I find God's? (and no I don't think those are the same)

4. If leadership is primarily about listenting, then why does it seem that a leader must speak to begin transformation?

5. How come I can't see Matthew Broderick as anything but Ferris Bueller after all these years?

Fish and chips

Grilling Salmon tonight. Going well. Salmon done. Moving from grill to plate, and then... OH! Salmon down! Salmon down!

One piece fell into our box of wood we keep on the back porch for our fireplace. bummer. I reach into the box to get the piece of fish out and - did I mention that the fish just came off the grill? - ouch!! Fish falls into pieces, I begin to Christian cuss, burning my hand, finally getting fish back onto grill. That piece of fish was covered with bark and wood chips. A real fish and chips.

Then Carol sticks her head out the door and says... "I saw that." How do you not love being married?

Sweet Ch. 4 - Surround Sound

Things I liked:
1. A leaders job is to involve people in a mission that will change their life and the world. - That's just good.
2. and to go with it - Everyone has a mission and can make a difference.
3. Mission needs to be related in narrative form. - praise God for those who get this. We need to go somewhere, not just hear three thoughts from you that float in space forever.

Questions I have:
1. Why can we not get away from the business world in our stories and dreams of vision? Are we that similar? Is the church and the Fortune 500 company really going the same places, needing the same leaders?

2. If we were to use metaphors as part of our narrative, and the leader is a gardener cultivating growth and health, letting each plant grow in its time and way, bringing what it was created to bring to the garden, then could we also say that the best leaders are those who let others lead the group to places that they themselves would not have gone and in ways that they themselves would not have gotten there? What if a leader spent more time releasing others than controlling them? If this is the case, then how do I as a leader spend more time painting the picture of what I believe in people and where we could go, instead of logistics and direction?

3. The title of the chapter is surround sound... how do we surround ourselves with people who we can trust, who can trust us and who can survive in community?

4. Does every great leader have to suck at home? I understand that many people who don't have a mission seem to falter, because what makes them great is their mission, but what about just being a person. Why can't that bring us infinite value? Is it too much to ask a leader to be a whole person?

5. Why can't I perfect the breakdancing move "the head spin"?

Europe 2006 looks good

I'll never be able to go... but if you can check this out. "Calling All Nations" is in Berlin in July next year. Andrew Jones posts on it and it looks good. If my name were David Rebello I'd be there!

Darth Pilgrim?

I'm not saying anything conclusively and I don't want to alarm any Star Wars fanatics... but I'm finding a striking resemblence here. I'm not trying to wreck anybody's dreams, so no hate mail please... just a brief observation. You form your own opinions.

What I do know is that the one on the left is for sure my son Jahred who is 6 and did a great job with his line in the kindergarten pow-wow last week! I have the best family.

Sweet ch. 3 - I Hear You

I liked this chapter much better than the last. Not just because I agreed with more, but because it was easier to read as well.

Here's the 3 main things for me:
1. Hiring the right person - let's not pretend that what we hire someone to do they actually end up doing. In fact the same can be said for anything you journey with someone on. You may have some ideas about the road ahead, but it's incredibly arrogant to believe you've forseen all the missteps, dangers and adjustments that need to be made. Finding the right person who can adapt and be a part of the whole group of you and be adaptable to the things that come up has to be far more important.

2. Taking risks - This is huge to me because I'm largely a coward in my own eyes. One of the things that the Lord of the Rings (I know a tad overused story) taught me is that nothing is as bad as it may at first seem. As bad as things seemed like they were going to get, there is always a way through somehow. But you're not going to see it until you get there. The risks we take in doing what is right are enormous. Most of the risks are ones we dont' want to face, like relational conflict. But doing what's right is far more important than feeling good about a falseness for a while. I also believe that we've taught an entire generation or more of people that failure is worse than not trying at all. So many of us operate mostly out of fear and not out of dreams. We make choices based not on what we really believe in and want to see happen, but on what if it doesn't work and I fail and look foolish? How can we teach ourselves and others that being faithful to what we're called to is the greatest success, even if it means falling down?

3. Relationships - this is by far the most important piece in all of this to me. No matter who you are and no matter what you've done, if you don't have relationship with people, then you aren't really going anywhere. This is my mantra for life and ministry. Relationships, relationships, relationships. (All my Bel Air youth workers are groaning somewhere because they heard it so much! Right now as I write this they probably have a little twitch starting up and they don't even know why.)

Jesus modeled this for us in the incarnation. If we are following Jesus, living life in his way, then this has to be the vital piece of the puzzle.

Oops!

Have not been able to post the last couple days due to some internet issues (I'm on the road again ... should be a song!).

In other "oops!" news I guess I didn't add a link to the Scrandrette post. So here it is...

Summoned to Lead Ch. 2

Yes. I'm a tad late on this post. Two days to be exact. My bad.

Annoyed a bit

I get the point of his metaphor - hearing is what leadership is about, not vision. Got it. All the examples he uses are all well and good, but not only do they beat the point to death, I also feel like they are examples that quickly could fall apart. For example, submarines may not have windows and so "hear" their way through, but they would have windows if they could see well enough or wouldn't compromise the structure of a ship, not just cause its better. Vision is important too. Let's not throw it all away.

Liked it
I really enjoy his emphasis on not just doing lots of stuff, but stopping, listening and responding to what we see. He uses this example of da Vinci and that he probably only did 30 paintings (of which we have maybe half). There is much to be said for that. Sometimes I think I get so caught up in hearing that others are doing things, thinking about things, writing things, preaching things, etc, that I feel like I should be too. Let's focus on catching the wave that God has sent our way and riding that out and then going back out and finding another one. I wonder if there is a rhythm to following God and living in the way of Jesus?

Missed it
I saw the heading "hearing heart" and thought for sure he'd bring up Solomon and his request not for wisdom, but for a hearing heart. But he swung and missed mightily on that one. I can only hope that he'll hit it later and that he's saving it. Or that he's reading this blog now and making the adjustments to the second edition. [If you are, Mr. Sweet, I've actually met you and enjoyed a "black eye" with you at Starbucks in Indianapolis.]

I Think I'm b-flat too
Cool point that everything makes sound. Black hole is B-flat 57 octaves below middle C.

Love It!
I really love the "and God sang" instead of "and God said". What an awesome picture to me! How great to think of the God of the universe YHVH, actually singing us into existence, creating in a new way!!! That so connects with the way music as a whole can take us places we've never been, can cross time and space, can go to levels of the spirit and heart that nothing else can seem to touch or name. And it explains why music is so important to the spirit of life.

Shawshank Redemption has a great part that brings this out. When they find a record of these two Italian women singin opera and they lock themselves in and play it over the loudspeakers for only a few minutes, one of the prisoners (Morgan Freeman) remarks, "We didn't really know what they were singing, but then it didn't really matter."

Encouraged
I'm encouraged by this book to stop and step back more. To listen more and not just do because I feel inadequate or unworthy or like everyone is watching. My ears hear a different song and I need to dance to that one. Even the rests.

Perhaps its the stuff we've been going through, or perhaps something I ate, but I think taking a step back and gaining perspective is SO IMPORTANT. Sorry God for all the times I rush on into foolish behavior and decisions, when I should just listen.

Darth Vader Lives in my House

Jahred got some money for his birthday that he socked away for a big purchase. Here is part of the purchase...

It has a voice changer - when you talk into the mask you sound like Darth Vader. Awesome! My head won't fit in it unfortunately. I'm not sure why Darth Vader is cool though. I wonder if I should be worried??? When I was a kid I wanted to be Luke Skywalker. Jahred also has started liking the song "Mr. Roboto" quite a bit. Hmmmm.

Jahred was so excited. When he got home from the store he put it on right away and walked around showing the family, saying, "Hey! It's really just me, Jahred!," so he wouldn't scare anyone. Kids are awesome.

Teacher? Teaching?

Mark Scandrette has a great post on what it means to be a teacher and also what it means to be a follower of Jesus here. You really should check it out. I love his picture too it is classic.

I've posted before on some of this, but I really do feel that following life (not just words coming out of the mouth) is the best and real teaching. Look at kids and their parents. "Do what I say, not what I do, never works." Anyway, check our Mark's thoughts, cuz I think they are right on.

Tomorrow we're going to try to resume our sweet book study/conversation/chat. It's not too late to join!

Some Details on the Accident

Warning: these pictures are a bit tough for some to take.

We are recovering from the accident. Physically the family is getting better, but otherwise, we still have our days and times that are tough. We're not sure how the kids are going to do in the long run. We've had a rough few days. Appreciate the prayers and support.

The story as I understand it to this point is as follows:
Carol and kids were in the Eurovan driving in the left lane going north on I-35. In the middle lane was a semi and in the right lane was another car. The semi changed lanes into the right lane hitting the rear end of the car that was there. That car was then spun by the semi perpindicular to traffic and towards the left lane where the Eurovan was driving.

The car then went in front of the Euro towards the median wall. The Euro hit the car at that point spinning it back into traffic and sending the Euro flipping in the air. The Euro wound up on its side, hit the median wall, then flipped onto its roof. Where it skidded and finally came to a stop upside down. Gas and fluid were leaking out all over. Carol unbuckled herself and the kids, kicked out a window and got them out to safety.

Amazingly Kate had only some cuts on her head and a little glass in it. She had some staples put in and they are now removed. The other kids had some buises and that's all. Carol has some nasty bruises on her leg and head.

I was in Chicago while this happened. Carol called me from the ambulance with the kids. I quickly got a flight back to KC - which was the longest flight ever - and made it to the hospital as the kids were being released.

We are so thankful and praise God for the safey of our family.

Below are some photos of the van after. We are HUGE Eurovan fans now for sure. After all that it held up pretty well.

Accident

On Wednesday evening around 6:30pm Carol and the kids were in a terrible car accident. They were hit in the front by a car that had been hit by a semi. They flipped, hit the median wall and wound up skidding to a stop on the roof upside down. Carol unbuckled, kicked the window out and got the kids out. They went to the hospital.

Thankfully they are all home and pretty much okay. To say it is a miracle is an understatement. Kate has a couple staples in her head from a cut and some glass in it. Carol is of course, banged, bruised and sore. The other kids are pretty much okay.

I'll share more later, but we'd appreciate all prayers as we pull ourselves back together and try to sort through all of this.

Chapter 1

I began this chapter a bit discouraged, because for his "anti-leadership" book stuff, it is ultimately about leadership as we often define it. You have Sweet starting off here talking about leaders "turning possibilities into realities", which to me is a statement about DOING more and not BEING.

But he quickly rallies in the fight for anti-leadership and says that the way we are positioned to do that "turning" (still weird language a bit - perhaps not matching up) is to be who we are - except embracing it.

A few questions out of this:
1) What if I don't like who I am (or think I am)? Why would I want to be more of that? Or why would anybody else?
2) How do I really discover who I am? What's the difference here between reality and my own perceptions? Is there any? Of course there is the point to be made that while I may be good at basketball at the end of the day I'm still only 5'7" and so good isn't good enough. But what if I thought I was? Is my not playing in the NBA a denial of my true heart or an acceptance of reality? How do I know the difference?
3) At what point is being me just about me and not really about anything bigger?


A comments on this:
1) I love that the focus here is being and not doing.
2) I love the emphasis on truth telling and being. Let's face it, if we all just did what we know is right and said what we know is true, then a lot of problems would be diverted and the problems created would be worth it. But it's just plain hard.
3) Originality is big for me as well. The population as a whole is trying way too hard to be only 3 or 4 people.

I again am loving the Shackleton quotes and stories. A few things need to be clarified to me however. Perserverance is important, but it only really matters in the context of commitment to relationship. I can make a difference and work through things with others if there is a commitment to the relationship. If I stick around and just continue to make my point for the sole purpose of getting MY way and making Brian clones, well the world may get better looking, but it's not going to get better.

Time for bed.