Leaders and Self-control

A Proverb
"A person without self-control is like a city with broken-down walls."

A common characteristic of failed leadership is a lack of self-control - a lack manifested in many ways: but most important among them is the blame game.

Taking full responsibility for our actions, learning from mistakes and using what you have been given to its full advantage are “walls” that will protect the leader.

Learn self-control by:

Curbing curiosity – everything is permitted, but not beneficial – explore carefully also evaluating impact

Checking pride and vanity – it’s not about you – it is always about them (customers, staff, suppliers, stakeholder of any kind!)

Containing anger and revenge – these drain you; and equally important, expressing them will not draw others to you

Confining personal ambition – When yours is palatable, it pushes people away – they will not follow.

Emptying yourself of destructive curiosity, vanity, revenge and self-centered ambition creates a void that is crying out to be filled: fill it with the God who created you. He will build strong walls to protect you. It is his indwelling that will grant you peace and safety as you learn to control self by giving control to their Creator.

Which of those four “Cs” do you need to work on?



Copyright © 2009-11 by P. Griffith Lindell

Servant-leadership - CONTROL Yourself: Integration – Body, Mind, Spirit in Sync.

Proverbs 4:20-23 (MSG)

Dear friend, listen well to my words; tune your ears to my voice.
Keep my message in plain view at all times. Concentrate! Learn it by heart!
Those who discover these words live, really live;
body and soul, they're bursting with health.
Keep vigilant watch over your heart; that's where life starts.
Don't talk out of both sides of your mouth; avoid careless banter, white lies, and gossip.
Keep your eyes straight ahead; ignore all sideshow distractions.

The first important step in “controlling self” is to have a process for keeping congruent your body, your mind and your spirit. As a leader, what marks your journey to develop the “soft side” of leadership - sensitivity to the qualitative aspects and character issues? For example: Are you expecting your sales team to produce revenue to the exclusion of integrity – white lies, exaggerations, manipulations, “dealing,” etc? Or, do you reward both results AND character?

How do you go about nourishing your body, your mind and your spirit? At work, do you allow your team to actually take real vacations – or are they on call 24/7? Not only is that probably a violation of the law, more importantly it is a violation of God’s law that rest is good and important for his creation. Just as you do not take a drink of water only one day a week, neither can you nourish your mind and spirit for two hours on a Sunday morning. You nourish your body by drinking liquid every day: how are you treating your spirit and your mind? (The Biblical term “heart” is a unique combination of both.)

What about your mind? Did school teach you all you needed to know? What the latest leadership book you have read – and studied (meditated upon)? How are you nourishing your mind with more than technical data about your products/services, the industry or the marketplace?

What of art, music, fiction, poetry, gardening etc. provides nourishment for your mind and spirit?

The “heart” fuels the engine of your mind and body. How do you practice reflection to keep your heart pure? Motives pure? When you look at the results you have produced at work, home or even play, how do you reflect upon them to change behavior to produce a different result? What is your experience with apologizing – recognizing that the results you just produced did not honor God, or other people?

Integration of body, mind and spirit takes work. Do you have a work plan?


Copyright ©2009 P. Griffith Lindell

Servant-leadership: KNOW YOURSELF – a Summary

I have posited that to become an authentic servant-leader, one must begin with “knowing self” and that knowledge is the result of integrating your understanding of ultimate purpose (your relationship with God), your ethical framework (how you treat fellow humans) and your teleology (your worldview that combines purpose with ethics to understand the past, respond to the present and to build for the future).

The fundamental question is: Were you created, the result of a supernatural, self-existent, all powerful being who made matter, energy and time and also made you in His image? Or, are you a developed being, the result of a random, materialistic process, that, somehow, in a vast amount of time, not only organized your physical substance to make you human, but also your mental and spiritual identity? Your answer shapes your understanding of self and how you go about living an “examined life.”

Understanding what it means to “know yourself” is not about “self-enlightenment.” I would go so far to say that it is a concept that is antithetical to today’s view of self. It is not becoming a lover of self - satiated with self, encouraged by a society that accepts “me” as a nominative case pronoun (“me and John went to the store….”). This is not a trivial grammatical error – it demonstrates the shift in culture that has permeated our thinking with a self-hyphenated language (self-awareness, self-actualization, etc.)

The great philosophers of the past (like Socrates who said: "The unexamined life is not worth living") understood the fundamental nature of this examination of self. All of our interactions with nature, with the spiritual world and with each other begin with a true understanding of self. God says that the effects of sin is death and that man, created in His image, was fully intelligent, capable, creative and controlled their environment developing what was needed to life successfully.

Man did not emerge from some animal-like state to the supposed current evolved intelligence. Humans, Scripture demonstrates, have moved in the opposite direction from their original created state. Humans are less equipped today to deal with the environment, each other and their own natures than Adam and Eve.

Examining your life, moving from where you are at birth (dominated by a sin nature Rom. 3:23) to where you need to be to have fellowship with your Creator is found in God’s revelation to his creation: 2 Tim. 3:16-17 "All Scripture (not some, not the ones you want, this is not a menu!) is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work."

Knowing your self is not an exercise in “self-esteem” but it is a journey of humility. It must be noted that nowhere in Scripture are we told to seek “self-esteem;” rather we are warned repeatedly “not esteem ourselves highly” in relationship to others whether the ruler or the ruled- Deut. 17:14-20; 1 Kings 19:3-18; Proverbs 16:19; 25:6,7; Luke 14:7-11; Luke 16:15; - Romans 12:3.

A person at peace is better fit to lead. A person at peace with themselves is a result of having a deep peace with their purpose. They are at peace with others – their ethical framework works to benefit others and them. They are a peace with a troubled world because they have a clear sense of God’s sovereign control. As Daniel Schuman points out:

“The Scriptures speak of fixing one’s thoughts on the positive too, but it is not simply replacing negative thoughts with positive ones. Instead, the Bible indicates that for one to experience the benefits of the peace of God, that person must first experience “peace with God”. Romans 5:1-5 reveals this truth. It states: Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through whom we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. More than that, we rejoice in the our sufferings, knowing that our suffering produces endurance …character…hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. (Daniel Schuman © Website: www.renewABQ.com)

Are you really at peace? Do you know yourself, God’s way?



Copyright ©2009 by P. Griffith Lindell