Transitional Ministry Leadership - Resiliency and Self Care

In these days of chaos and economic pressues, it seems critical to think about our ability to be resiliant in the face of such pressures. Resiliance, as I use it here, refers both to our personal resiliance in the face of change pressures but also the resilience of the congregation as they confront leadership change in the midst of cultural, economic and shifts in religious/theological thinking.

In any change process the transitional leader will recognize the value of two key factors, resistance and resiliance. Resistance to change occurs much as the the elastic band in the picture above. The further it stretches, the more resistance is built up as kinetic energy. Resilience in this case refers to the ability to stretch out and return without breaking or weakening.

Pastoral transitional leaders can model resiliency for congregations by excercising good self care. When I excercise regularly, I am able to stretch and bend easily. Good self care practices in the areas of physical exercise, emotional/relational life, intellectual and spiritual is like filling a reservoir of energy resources behind a dam. When change and pressure push against the dam, some of the filled capacity is released. In very turbulent times, huge amounts of resources are pushed through the dam so that it does not break.

However, the resources must be replenished if the reservoir is to be resiliant - to return to its full capacity and role of storing energy resources. What activities restore you, build up the capacity for leadership, keep you centered? Attending to our self care will be one key way to be resiliant in the face of ministry pressures.

Bob Anderson

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Being the paragon of self care that I am :) I know that I have more capacity for challenging experiences when I am rested, physically fit, nurture life giving relationships and spend time working in the areas of my gifts and passion.

Resiliancy and Transitional Ministry

Personal resiliancy is a hot commodity in today's economic environment. The ability to "bounce back" after a financial portfolio hit, ministry faux pas or relational storm is critical to leadership.

This will be the first of a conversation regarding "resiliancy" in ministry, particular the "short stops" we call intentional interim ministry. I will commit to contact our various interim ministers around the country with the blog spot site so that we can communicate thoughts about interim ministry and transitions. When we exhaust that topic, we will take up a topic that seems to be current for our practice of interim ministry.

Resiliancy is an admirable charcterisitic. Leaders who keep their calm in the midst of anxiety, think on their feet when "under fire" or make tough decisions (that are "right on") in the midst of chaos are a rare breed. Most of us are too interested in "looking good" that we forget to focus on our leadership mission.

Resiliance, in my experience, is the ability to flex to incredible lengths and then return to the original configuration. For transitional ministry leaders this is an incredibly helpful characteristic to develop. My personal skill is lacking at times but I do teach myself to stay calm, extend myself to others past my normal thresholds, connect and then return to my "original shape" - kind of like the Slinky in the picture above.

When I was in college I spend several Christmas and spring breaks working in a factory in Cambridge's (MA) Kendall Square loading clip fasteners (much like the one in the picture) into shipping boxes for GM to use in attaching trim to cars. My location was next to the heat treating department, the last stop before shipping. The heat treat foreman took a liking to me and explained the entire process. The metal clips arrived to his department perfectly formed. By all appearances, they were ready to ship. He took one of the clips, bent it out and snapped it. It didn't. The clip bent outward and stayed in that shape. He took one that had gone through the process of high temperature exposure over time and did the same thing. The steel clip stretched out and then snapped back to its original form.

Resiliance is about snapping back after stress. Like the clip. Congregations with leadership change these days are full of stress and and anxiety. The leader will get caught in that turmoil and seeking to be "less anxious than the most anxious person in the group" needs to be able to stretch out, connect, minister, lead, and then snap back to normal (well, what ever normal is for us). In the next few blogs I want to consider some ways to develop and support resiliance.

One way to increase personal resiliance is to draw on spiritual practices. I recently went through one of my most stressful and difficult situations that threatened to undo me. My spiritual practice over the past couple years has been to "pray the hours" using a breviary (www.explorefaith.org/prayer/prayer/fixed.index.php). As I attended this practice through each day, I was startled by the increase of peace and centeredness. I had been stretched to a breaking point and the practice of praying the hours snapped me back into the shape God is creating for me.

Join the conversation - share your experiences and thoughts through the feedback posts available with this blog...

Lenten Blessings,

Bob Anderson

Pittsburgh, PA