Emotional Intelligence Archives

Do you ever hear your mother’s voice in your head? I do at times, and one of the messages I hear most often is, “you don’t have to say everything you think.”

I’ve gotten tripped up more times than I’d care to admit when I’ve ignored that voice. It might be that testy thought that I share in a discussion with my wife when it would have been better to hold my tongue and use my two ears instead. It could be that unkind word about a colleague who is not in the room that gets back to them, leading to a much longer discussion.

Then there are the comments in online discussions. I’ll see that patent falsehood or cruel remark about another person. And it is SO-O-O-O tempting to jump in. Usually, that is a great way to waste a day, leaving me thinking, “why couldn’t I keep my mouth shut.”

I’m the admin for a book page on Facebook (also called Bob on Books). Most of the time it is a pretty pleasant place and most people participate to get away from the unpleasantries of the world, or even the rest of Facebook. We have a “no ad hominem attacks” policy toward any person–politicians, authors, or each other. Yet I still find I have to deal with the comments of the person who uses the most innocuous post to attack a public figure they don’t like (but that others might). I find myself wishing they’d heard their mom saying, “you don’t have to say everything you think.” She probably did at some point.

Then there are the people who like to spoil others’ good time. We may be talking about mysteries and in the middle, someone feels they just have to let us know, “I don’t like mysteries and never read them.” Couldn’t they have just scrolled past?

The one thing I wish I’d asked my mom would have been “when do you speak up about what you are thinking?” There are times when our silence is assent to something that is terribly wrong and against what we hold most deeply. I recall a time in an online conversation where a person known to me in real life as someone who shares my religious convictions was mocking someone for a physical disability. I felt I couldn’t let that pass and wrote that I felt this was unbefitting of his professed faith. I still saw political statements I couldn’t agree with, which was fine–the world doesn’t have to agree with me. But no more like this, and thankfully we are still at least Facebook friends.

Then there are the times when a thought or an insight as your team grapples with a difficult question may be helpful. My own approach tends to be the “reflective observer” approach. I like the saying, “I read books and I know things.” Sometimes, it is actually important not to keep them to myself but to put them out there, not as pronouncements but as proposals: “I wonder if something like this might help…?”

I think what our mothers (and our wives!) were (are) trying to teach us is what is often called EQ or emotional intelligence. My wife will sometimes turn to me after a social gathering and ask, did you see what was really going on in that room? I’m learning that when you don’t say everything you think, you end up paying more attention to your context, what is really going on, and not just what is being said, which may not be the most important thing. Then you have a better chance that when you do speak your thoughts, they are worth hearing.

I don’t think not saying everything you think will solve global warming or bring world peace. It could make the online world a bit more pleasant. Often, though, the best reward may just be all the time you save by not having to clean up your verbal messes or trying to defend them. Mom knew what she was talking about.

Resilient Ministry: What Pastors Told Us About Surviving and Thriving by Bob Burns
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I’ve watched pastors burn out and drop out. While it is a privilege to shepherd God’s people, it is also just plain hard and demanding work. You don’t do pastoral work, you are a pastor. In some sense, you are always on. The project of this book is to explore what is necessary for pastors to burn on, not burn out. And it is pastors in fact who developed the content of this book as part of a Lilly research project in which pastors were gathered in Summits that explored the keys to sustaining pastoral excellence. Out of these summits five key factors emerged:

1. Spiritual formation: resisting the temptation of workaholism by building rituals, maintaining accountability, growing through hardship, and practicing spiritual disciplines.

2. Self-care: resisting the pressures of work and fostering spiritual growth, emotional self-awareness, relational depth (particularly helpful here was identifying who can pastors share with), and intellectual and physical self-care. Self-care, the authors point out can actually be self-denial as one refuses to heed the siren calls of ministry to tend to the self in a way where you are able to bring the best to those you serve.

3. Emotional and cultural intelligence. Does one understand one’s own emotions and is one aware of the emotions others are manifesting? Likewise, they explore how we all work out of a cultural context and a growing awareness of both one’s own cultural identity and the cultural differences we encounter among those we minister is critical to ministry success in a culturally diverse world.

4. Healthy marriage and family life. Normal life stresses marriages. The ministry lifestyle means one may never feel off the clock and spouse and children get the leftovers or are often the dumping ground for pressures of ministry. Sometimes this may lead to conflicting loyalties or even abandonment of one’s family to ministry. There is the question of who ministers to the spouse. There were a number of practical recommendations in this section ranging from setting aside intentional time together and pursuing shared hobbies to annual marriage “check-ups” with a therapist.

5. Leadership and Management. The authors described leadership as “poetry”, that which captures the imaginations and has systems in place to channel the energies of people. Administration is “plumbing”–modeling, shepherding, managing expectations, supervising conflict, and planning.

The book concludes that it isn’t enough to have summits that recognize these themes or even to make resolves to change. Negotiating these changes with spouses and church leadership and finding continuing support from cohort participants is necessary to consolidate these insights. It seems to me that this may be the most critical insight in terms of pastoral transformation in the whole book.

The book includes appendices with various tools, the most helpful of which may be the emotions checklist, which helps one give a name to the emotions one feels (especially helpful for men). I would recommend this book as a resource to pastors, others in ministry, and to church or ministry leadership, who need to understand the stressors and key factors to pastoral success in order to support their pastors.

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