Last week I talked about the ways we work too hard and take too much responsibility. But church leaders are not only overfunctioners. We often underfunction in some areas, as well. Some clergy who work like crazy at church underfunction at home as parents and spouses. And even in church life itself, some clergy underfunction. Some are depressed and not doing their job as a result. Some are just not working very hard.

For some, their underfunctioning shows up in missed appointments and late deadlines. Over time (and it’s a long slow process) we can get better in some of these areas if we are willing to work on them. One of my colleagues who struggles in the area of administrative life has asked one of her church leaders to help her. It can be humbling to ask for help, but when the people see a leader who is willing to work on areas of weakness while still focusing in his or her strengths, that sends a powerful message.

Where do you underfunction? I’m hate dealing with cars, and for years I let my husband take care of it. At least I take my own car into the mechanic for regular oil changes now instead of depending on him to do it. But when there’s a real problem I ask him to take care of it.

Both overfunctioning and underfunctioning are driven by anxiety. When we overfunction, we are anxious about others and so we step in where we shouldn’t in ways, that don’t help them grow. Conversely, we may be anxious about some area of our life and so we never pay attention to it, in the vain hope that it will go away, or in the not-so-vain hope that someone else will take care of it for us.

Where do you need to step up?

This Thanksgiving, I’m thankful for church leaders. Leadership is vital, and rarely easy. I’m thankful for all of you who day by day and week by week lead churches, judicatories, councils and boards and committees, adult learning classes, ministry teams, choirs, church institutions of all types. I’m thankful for your willingness to deal with the joys of leadership as well as the moments when your heart pounds or you want to roll your eyes. I’m grateful for your commitment to something larger than yourself, to God’s work in the lives of individuals, the church and the world.

Thank you.

Do you feel like you are working too hard? It’s a busy time of year for clergy and other church leaders with the start of the program year, stewardship and budgeting, and the Advent/Christmas season. It’s easy to feel like you are hanging on by your fingernails.

The notion of overfunctioning from family systems theory can help clergy think through their responsibilities. We overfunction when we take emotional responsibility for things that don’t belong to us: the course of someone else’s life, for example (including our own children). This will wear us down over time, and rarely produces the results we would like, at least in the long term. When we overfunction in relation to others and consistently take responsibility for them, we step over a boundary.

Overfunctioning takes place in reciprocal relationship with underfunctioning. It always takes two: one to be too responsible and one to be not responsible enough. Usually those who are too responsible blame those who are not responsible enough: “If they would only step up to the plate, everything would be different.” Many clergy are overfunctioners, at least to some degree. We learn this in the families we grew up in, whether it is related to birth order, irresponsible parents, or overresponsible parents who taught us the same lesson they learned.

Now, being busy and working hard are not necessarily overfunctioning. When your ministry is important to you, it makes sense for you to work hard. But when you feel like you are carrying others on your shoulders, chances are you’re taking more responsibility than you need to.

Where do you need to step back?

I keep hearing stories of leaders who leave and later discover that people have undone some or all of the wonderful changes they had instituted. Programs are discontinued. People who left (and should have left) are back. I’ve experienced this myself as a former leader. It’s discouraging. It contributes to my ongoing sense of humility about the ability of leaders to fundamentally change a system. Old patterns, especially those which were laid down at the time of founding, whether that was a decade ago or a century ago, persist. Sometimes they lie low, but at times of high anxiety they re-emerge.

So what’s the point of leadership, anyway? While I remain humble about the long-term impact leaders can have to bring fundamental and lasting change, I do believe how the leader functions while present has critical implications. If the leader functions well, chances are others will, too, and the institution as a whole will do better. When people function better, things go better. They make better decisions, which can have a long-term impact on the institution. For example, a thoughtful decision to purchase land to build can have an effect for decades.

In a way this takes the pressure off. Functioning well is not at all easy, but transforming others is impossible. And it allows us to focus on what we can control: managing ourselves.

What does a well-functioning leader look like? Here are some areas to pay attention to:

1. Be clear about your own purpose, direction and goals (especially your goals for yourself). This helps others find their own clarity, both now and in the future.

2. Pay attention to relationships, especially with key leaders. They may be present long after you leave, and their growth can benefit themselves and everyone else.

3. Respect the boundary between yourself and others. If the leader can’t respect boundaries, no one else will be able to, either. This can have a long-term impact on everyone.

4. Manage your reactivity when others get reactive, and work on your own areas of vulnerability, where you are inclined to get hooked: anxious, defensive, angry or afraid.

5. Keep a sense of humor about others, and most importantly, yourself. This includes remaining lighthearted about your ability to change others.

If you pay attention to these areas it can make a big difference in how the institution as a whole and individuals within it function: how they relate to you, to each other, and their own future. This may be the leader’s biggest contribution.

I’ve been watching some episodes on DVD of the Vicar of Dibley, the hilarious BBC series from the 90s about a woman vicar who arrives in a small English village. In the episode “The Christmas Lunch Incident,” Geraldine, the vicar, ends up eating multiple Christmas Day meals because she can’t say no to any of the invitations offered. She has to eat four dinners (one of which includes a Brussels sprouts eating contest).

In an over-the-top way the story illustrates the difficulty we often have in facing the disappointment of others. Geraldine can’t bear to let anyone down, so she says yes, with some real implications for her health and comfort. Her parishioners are also very skilled at maneuvering to get what they want. For church leaders to sustain ourselves over time without wearing out or burning out, learning to say no is an essential skill. To get there, we have to deal with our own discomfort with disappointing others.

Where do you need to say no?

Some years into my ministry, I attended a retreat on spirituality led by Joan Hickey of the Shalem Institute in Washington. She assigned us as a meditation exercise using the words of Jesus to his disciples: “Who do you say I am?” (Matthew 16:15) She suggested that we ask Jesus that question in prayer, about ourselves—asking Jesus imaginatively, “who do you say I am?” I took that exercise away with me and used it over and over in the weeks to come. And I began practicing meditative prayer for the first time in my life. I found, and still find, that I never do it “well” (good learning for a perfectionist), but it benefits my life and leadership in ongoing ways. It helps me know who I am and what God calls me to be and do.

We can engage in all kinds of prayer and spiritual practices which can help sustain us. Meditation or contemplative prayer is one of these practices that have the potential to help us grow. Jesus said, “Why do you see the speck in your neighbor’s eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye…first take the log out of your own eye and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor’s eye.” (Matthew 7:3-5) In meditation we can pay attention to ourselves.

A Zen story illustrates the spiritual steadiness that can result from years of this kind of practice: “The students in the monastery were in total awe of the elder monk, not because he was strict, but because nothing ever seemed to upset or ruffle him. So they found him a bit unearthly and even frightening. One day they decided to put him to a test. A bunch of them very quietly hid in a dark corner of one of the hallways, and waited for the monk to walk by. Within moments, the old man appeared, carrying a cup of hot tea. Just as he passed by, the students all rushed out at him screaming as loud as they could. But the monk showed no reaction whatsoever. He peacefully made his way to a small table at the end of the hall, gently placed the cup down, and then, leaning against the wall, cried out with shock, “Ohhhhh!”

For most of us, to be able to manage our response in the face of an “ambush” (like the church member who decides to take us on right after a draining sermon) is a distant dream, but we all can get better at it. When we engage in the practice of sitting quietly in meditation over a period of months and years, we learn to deal better with our own anxiety, essential for better leadership. Meditation, when engaged in as a process of growth and not merely a technique, can help us learn to sit with anxiety without reacting or acting. It can help us to learn more fully who we are.

Why do we stop doing things? Sometimes it’s simply to have more space in our lives, a worthy goal in itself. But sometimes we want to make space so we can start something that is important to us.

At the beginning of the year I started writing three pages a day, every working day. I’ve kept it up on the road, scrawling three pages on a lined pad, sometimes describing the inside of an airplane: anything to keep writing. I’ve wanted to be a writer since I was a little girl, and I’ve been writing papers, articles, and my newsletter for over ten years now. But I’ve never before written this consistently for months at a time.

I was inspired by Julia Cameron’s fascinating memoir, Floor Sample, where she described her experience of saying to God, “You provide the quality, I’ll provide the quantity,” and committed to producing at least three pages of work every day. It takes about 20 minutes or less for me to write those pages. Some days I write much more, but I do at least that. And it hasn’t been that hard, much to my surprise.

The result: a new sense of myself as a writer, many pages of writing (some usable and some not), a book draft and proposal, and I’m on the verge of a book contract. And of course, this blog.

What do you want to start doing?

I’ve read several different people who suggest that a stop doing list is as important as a to-do list. This year I decided I was going to stop saying yes to additional volunteer commitments. I just said no to a second term on a non-profit board. It was difficult, but I’m working on a book and I know I have to stop doing some community-related stuff to finish.

I’ve written before about my attempt to stop checking e-mail so often. So far I’m failing. I can’t help wondering if someone out there is thinking about me (especially about wanting to publish my book). It’s still on my stop-doing list even if I haven’t stopped doing it. Related to this is my decision to get off a lot of the cool e-mail newsletters I subscribe to and don’t read, or do read instead of doing something else more important, like doing my own writing.

On my personal stop doing list are these: complaining how the house looks when I get home from a speaking trip; eating snacks out of the container (instead of writing…); and worrying about my children’s future.

What should you stop doing in your ministry? In your personal life?