Sometimes You Just Need A Someone Else

I've played many team sports throughout my life, starting out playing baseball and then basketball, and eventually settling into golf when I hit high school, where I found my sweet spot. I believe part of it was because I was mostly playing individually despite being on a team, each player was responsible for his/her score at the end of the day. The team would not get any better if each player did not get better. Now we helped one another out quite a bit to improve our games, but at the end of the day, it was an individual sport.

One could say I much prefer to play individually, take things on myself, and ultimately challenge myself to get better. There is still something special about a team, a group, and a congregation that works together, encourages one another, and supports one another. When teams do not do this, they fail. Why? Because in a team sport, your ability to work together is the key to the success of the team. While golf was an individual sport, we all encouraged and supported one another (for the most part).

Many times in life we are focused on some goal or achievement on our own, or maybe we are doing our normal routines and not making any progress. In some parts of our lives, we have become stuck or stagnant. It is like we are in quicksand, flailing our arms to try to get out, but not making any progress and unfortunately, in some cases getting worse. If you know this analogy, you know the only way you are going to get out is with the help of something outside of your reach. You are going to need someone to come alongside you, throw you a rope, and help pull you out. You may need a team to help you across different areas.

In life, there are many aspects where we can grow and develop. For me, I focus on a few key areas.

1) Spiritual: How am I growing as a Christian leader for God? Where can I improve? For me, this is a lot of self-study and focus on the word of God and prayer. But, we cannot be successful if we are not surrounded by good Godly influence in our lives to point out those areas that need to be corrected. I was blessed this weekend to be with 115 men together on a church retreat to enjoy some time of fellowship together, hear some great preaching from the word of God, and challenge one another.

2) Physical: I've been consistently working out for 20+ years, from general lifting to running, to CrossFit and more. Everything from 3 days a week up to 6 days a week, continuously moving week over week. Over the last 5 years, I've settled into my current weight of 185 and stopped pushing for new records, but I know if I wanted to I could. However, I would probably need someone to come in and shake some things up in my training. Don't get me wrong, my training is good, but an extra set of eyes would push me. Often I tell people I workout so that I can eat what I want, which is 90% accurate. If I really wanted to get serious here, having someone else shape and control my diet would probably drastically change my physical state.

3) Mental: This is a combination of many aspects. It comes from how we feel, how we grow, and how we work. To me, this area is an area where many senior leaders will bring in executive coaches and outside entities to help shape/curb some behaviors, and help executives get to that next career level.

Underlying all of this is a financial aspect that many do not want to talk about, but our finances directly impact our stress or Mental area, which then impacts our physical side, since it can impact our sleep cycles and finally, it can impact our spiritual walk as well, since I believe the tithe is the Lord's and when you are not tithing according to Malachi you are robbing God.

We need to check in on each of these areas and see how we are doing and bring in a specialist, another set of eyes, that can look at what we are doing and stir things up. Why don't we do this? Much like me, we like to do things ourselves, do our own research, and do what I call a Google diagnosis. Sometimes this can help, but when you are struggling time and time again, it is time to call for that lifeline. Get someone to throw you in the rope before it is too late.

Spiritual Help: Talk to a Pastor and get connected with other men/women in the congregation. Connect with a small group and find that connection

Physical: Get a coach to direct your programming, support the right nutrition, and encourage areas of your life that need to be corrected

Mental: Get counseling if needed, or an Executive/Life Coach.

Financial: You have options here, A Financial coach (I happen to know a good one) can help you to get your money in order, prioritize goals, and set you on the right path. A financial planner may be what you need to make sure you are properly set for your future, and/or an Advisor who can help get your investments in the right place to set you up for future years.