Finding Leadership

Think of your very first experience as a leader or in a leadership position. Did it involve a promotion? Any special benefits? Was it a pleasant experience or were you over exerting yourself? Did you have balloons and a party? Was it for a special event or for an extended period of time? Did you enjoy the experience? Did it teach you alot about yourself?

I came to this subject today as I resumed planning an idea that was put on hold by unfortunate events. I wondered what qualified me? Why would I come up with this awesome event? What makes me think that I am credible to lead in this sort of way?

In my work place I am not a leader, I have no authority, I am a clerk. Now don't misunderstand me, I adore my job. I love working behind my desk. I genuinely love my co-workers. I enjoy helping my customers and dealing with difficult situations. However, I am not any one's boss.

In my personal life I am a mother and a wife. I consider these great positions of leadership, but my husband is head of the household.

This is when I realized that I have never had experience (in the formal sense) as a leader. I am a traditional gal, so I moved straight from my parent's house to my husband's house whenever we were married a mere 2 years ago. I have always been a great team player, but I have never led anything. Then I started thinking about my character and my personality and how I became the person that I am.

When I was young I had many friends with older siblings, and I saw all the movies about the cool older brother who would beat mean kids up and the cool older sister who could teach you how to put on make up and how to talk to boys. I always wanted an older sibling, then when I was 7 years old my little sister came into my life. I didn't know it then, but she taught me how to be a leader. I was not always the greatest leader, but I like to think that I taught her how to be compassionate and that it is always better to laugh than have an attitude. I wanted to be that cool older sister, and I only hope that to her, I was. I saw my friends picking on their younger siblings and leaving them out of beach trips or milkshake runs at the Tasty Freeze and I always tried to make a space for my sister. Sure there were times when I wanted my space, but she taught me to watch myself, because she was always watching me.

There were also times when my sister led me, if I was down or broken my sister was usually the person who came to me first. She holds many of my deepest secrets, and she has a big piece of my heart.

This thought led me to many of my friends and kids that I have mentored through churches or relationships. At the time I had no idea what I was doing, but as I look back I know that when I was just lending an ear or a shoulder, listening and loving and giving advise from personal experiences that I was mentoring, I was leading.

So, now that you have your first leadership experience in your mind, think about who you led and how they are now. How has your leadership affected them in their lives today? Have they, in return, led you in anyway? I think it is important to remember that no age or race or religion is exempt from learning or being led in some way or another. Now think about yourself right now, who are you currently leading? Are they leading you in any way?

Just because you are leader, does not mean that you are not being led. If you look hard enough you may find leadership that you didn't even know existed.

Time

It is Friday morning, I am closing a week that has been sort of rough on me, and I am thinking about last Friday when the rough week started. I got a call Friday morning from my aunt, who had news to share that I was sure of as soon as I saw the caller ID. She called to inform my that my Granny had passed away that morning, something that we had been anticipating for a few weeks. I spent the past weekend with family I haven't seen in a very long time, and I had the pleasure of introducing them all to my daughter. We sat around talking about Granny's life, the difficult days leading up to her death, and strumming banjos and guitars and singing old southern hymns. It was a bitter-sweet time, and after her funeral on Tuesday I returned to work on Wednesday to get back into the swing on my daily to-dos.
One of those daily to-dos is reading the posts for the blogs I follow, a fairly recent one of those is Michael Nichols' Grow on Purpose, today his post was on time and life and what to do with the small amount of time we have, which just fit perfectly with where I am at right now.
We all have a point, I have reached this point many times in my life (and I am only 20), where we think about all of the things we have done so far with our life, failures as well as achievements, and we think that there is so much more we could be doing. Then we wonder HOW, how am I going to fit in an hour of exercise when I can hardly manage dinner most nights, how am I going to squeeze in a early morning devotional, when I hit the snooze button repeatedly most mornings, and the hows go on and on.
I am a very organized person, I love agendas, and I am an avid planner; sure I can be spontaneous when the moment calls for it, otherwise I am structured and planned out. I know how tough it can be to find extra time in your day, there is always something that I wish I could have worked on when I go to bed at night. It is in those times that I slow down, unwind, and remind myself that it isn't about what takes up my time during the day, but the reasons behind why I do the things I do.
This is why I review my agenda on a regular basis, to re-evaluate myself. When I can find the time in my day, I like to whip out one of my many notebooks and take some time to have a little heart to heart with myself, I ask myself some of these questions.
What are the things filling up my time? Why am I doing those things? Are the things I am doing productive? Is there anything I can cut out? Is there anything I would like to add to my schedule? Am I spending plenty of time with my loved ones? Am I doing anything just for fun? Do I have any off time to take care of errands or for down time? Do I have a back up plan, in case anything unexpected happens?
These questions, among other questions, are the things I like to think about when it comes to my time management. It is very important to make sure that you are being productive and taking care of the things that need to be taken care of, but it is also important to remember the people that matter in your life. Make sure you take time to enjoy your family, they are there for a reason. Take time to encourage the people around you, be passionate about something, take up a hobby (and make time to enjoy it!), relax, and learn to fall in love with things.
We all have a clock around us, at any minute the battery can go out, and our time can run out. Make sure that the time you spend, is time that means something to you. Forget about mundane living, I know that we all must work to pay the bills, put other before ourselves, and there are going to be rough patches, and down hill stumbles; but you must find the bright side, and learn to smile, because even if everything is going against you, you still have time.