As I write this, it’s less than three weeks until 2022. Budgets are, by and large, complete. The staff Christmas party is right around the corner. Staff members are wrapping up the last of their activities. Performance reviews are well underway. The big retreat for church leadership in 2022 is scheduled.

If it seems like the right time to take a deep breath, it is. It’s time to take inventory. It’s not an inventory of what’s left to be completed. It’s not an inventory of what you’ve accomplished in the last year. It’s not even an inventory of your personal or professional growth over the last year.

An Inventory of the Soul

How is it with your soul? How would you know? The answer is, a rule of life.

A Rule of Life has been a common practice throughout the long history of Christianity. Simply put, a rule of life is a commitment to live your life in a certain way. It’s not about what you do—goals, outcomes, etc. It’s about who you’re becoming. It’s about the kind of person you will seek to be. It’s about how you will seek to follow Jesus deeper and further.

For the sake of simplicity and clarity, let’s use a phrase we remember from childhood, or from our drivers’ education: Stop. Look. Listen.

Stop

So, what do we do first? We stop. We do nothing. Commit to silence in solitude for 5 minutes each day. For many of us, prayer is about requests, confessions, and gratitude. These are all good things, but they are neither silence nor do they require solitude. “Having a sit,” as one of my role models says, is about clearing your mind of everything. Stopping makes space to see and listen.

It will be awkward at first. You’ll be easily distracted by stray thoughts and noises. You may sense or experience nothing. That’s not just OK, that’s good. Stopping is about setting the habit of being OK if nothing happens. That is a transformative practice in a staff role that requires goals, actions, and outcomes.

Stop.

That concept, that single word, might be the best rule of life we executives can have.

Look

Neuroscience teaches us that the more often we look at something, the less we notice it. Our brain fills in that space with what it has seen again and again. Choose to look deeper in 2022.

Pay attention to …

  • … yourself. Even more, allow key persons to pay attention to you. Invite a spiritual director and/or therapist to walk with you in 2022.
  • … spaces where numerical expectations are driving choices and determining success. Stop seeking success; start seeking Christ in unlikely places. Resist the temptation to redefine success rather than releasing the need for success.
  • … outcomes you cling to. Instead, hold outcomes loosely. Acknowledge how little control we have over them.
  • … boundaries and theologies that determine fidelity. Our dependence on categorizing people and stiffening our lines dividing us is evidence of our failure to see others.

Listen

In spite of our job descriptions, Jesus invites us to back seats, not drivers’ seats. The back seat may be unfamiliar. What’s more, the only control over direction and destination in the back seat is whining, so it’s best avoided. Instead, the best back seat experience is one where the rider enjoys the scenery and the company. In 2022, take a back seat and leave the GPS to someone else.

Practically speaking, where are you counted on because of your power, influence or presence? Try adding one of these practices to help you listen rather than speak:

  • Let something go. Move from the front seat to the back of a project, ministry, or other responsibility. Release it to others. Watch from the sideline without interference, helping when asked. Some of these projects or ministries will fail. Embrace failure without defensiveness or justification. Modeling a release from the tyranny of results will be a mirror into the soul of churches. It’s a mirror into our own souls, too.
  • Do the grunt work. Join an already existing ministry and do the grunt work. Do the work no one else desires to do.
  • Practice being the last one to speak in spaces where you’re the expert.

Stop. Look. Listen. What if your rule of life was defined simply by these three words? What would that look like for your life? How might that make space for you to remember that you are the Beloved of God?