spirit to move

liz davenport says "that the average business person receives 190 pieces of information each day and that they also waste 150 hours each year looking for stuff." not looking up stuff or researching; but looking for stuff on your desk, in your office, or in your inbox. with all that information coming our way, it is imperative that we as leaders discover proper channels to handling all this potential. so many young leaders want to be free...free of structure. they believe that stucture is anti freedom, anti organic, anti progressive, anti fun and that it saps the life or soul from the heart of the idea. these are the same people who have 9 different journals all pretty much empty. i use to be this way until a few years back when I had the privilege to attend the national pastors conference in san diego. one night, i got to grab a meal with Francis Chan, Erwin McManus, and Rob Bell as they discussed the art of teaching. each of them talked about the process of living with the text and how that shapes the message they give. at one point in the conversation, Francis asked this question,

"Have you ever been preaching and while you're on stage speaking this random idea comes to mind and so you abandon the teaching a little bit and follow the idea which ends up taking the message to a whole new level?"

Rob nodded and Erwin responded, "You know why that happens?"

Francis said, "No. Why?"

Erwin responded, "When you are prepared you actually give the spirit more freedom to move."

i never thought that structure could actually invite more freedom. that the more organized i was, the more room i would be giving to the spirit to take the ideas even farther. the problem was, i had no idea how to to get structure. maybe some of you are feeling the same thing as you read this. so here's what i did, i called the most type-a person i knew, a friend who is a talented personal assistant for a design firm and took him out to lunch. i shared with him that i needed his help to get my schedule to work for me, so that the spirit had freedom to move. in less than 60 minutes, he grilled me with what i actually do and the amount of time it takes me to do it. after lunch we went back to my office and on my computer he began blocking out times for study, message prep, meetings, lunches, and various other things that my job required.

what my friend taught me was that what i do is important and that if it isn't booked in my calendar i probably will do something else instead. he gave me 4 hours a week that were open for appointments (1 breakfast, one lunch and two afternoons) to meet with people that didn't interfere with my study or message prep time. now with this schedule the way it is, i'm giving my art validity in my life and freeing up the spirit to do what it does best, move...

Comments

[john chandler]

Stevey,
I'm on an eternal quest to be both productive and creative. Is having your schedule this organized something that appeals to you naturally, or do you find it's something you want to rebel against?

[steve carter]

john, great question. i wish it was natural for me...i've found that i won't rebel against it if i believe in the potential outcome. i've found success in creating the space to be creative and it frees me up to say no which has probably been the most difficult thing.

[steve carter]

John, what has worked well for you in your eternal quest to be both productive and creative?

[joe hays]

"i'm giving my art validity in my life and freeing up the spirit to do what it does best, move."

this is so great to hear you say.

Your teaching and leading gift is too great to let it fall beneath distractions and good intentions. I'm challenged to look at the time i have as a chance to make the most of what i've been given.
thanks for these ideas.

joe

[Jeremy Peterson]

Great stuff bro. This is a huge problem for me. This feeling like I always need to do more and leave too much flexibility in my schedule. This eventually ends up pulling me in all kinds of directions I don't really need to go. Thanks man.