January 29, 2015

3 Lessons of Fatherhood

Yes in case you’re wondering that is my son… and I can hardly believe it is 2015, January has concluded and what seemed like a distant fantasy at my last blog three months ago is now an immediate reality. I am a father.

But what have i learnt from my first week of fatherhood?

Women are capable of amazing things for their Children: Linda delivered Joshua into the world with no anaesthesia. Watching this was the most painful and amazing thing i’ve ever seen. I’ve never seen her so strong, determined and in her element. The moment they placed Joshua on her tummy after he was safely delivered was probably the most beautiful moment of my entire life. He looked at her and she at him and immediately an indescribable, unconditional bond of love was formed between them. She turned to me with tears in her eyes told me “i love him so much already…” I had never seen love like this before and in this moment i knew this woman would be a fantastic mother.
Grace: This moment hit me like a lightning bolt when i was changing Joshua’s dirty diaper. He was crying, as i wiped his poop more kept coming out, whilst wiping it he pooped on my hand, the proceeded to pee on his on face and spit on milk, all this while screeching tears that can only be described as a blood curdling. The odd part was that i enjoyed every minute of it. I did it with pleasure and felt no resentment toward my son. In that moment looking at him i realised there was nothing he could do that would make me love him less, and that helping him clean up his mess, as dirty as it was gave me pleasure.
Capacity: It is true when people say there is nothing that can prepare you for parenthood, in reality nothing can. You have more in you than you ever thought you did. It was 4am, Linda had been awake all night and she asked me to help her. I rolled out of bed held my son and he fell asleep, as did my wife. In love with Linda and Joshua i decided to sit there holding him for as long as he would sleep so Linda could sleep. I sat there with my arm completely numb for 3 hours before he awoke again. It was in this moment I realised with love as my motivation there is more I could achieve then I ever thought.

The most amazing thing about all this is that God likens his relationship to human beings as that between a father and child. We are never disgusting and even when we are it is his pleasure to clean up our mess. He has and will do more than we ever could conceive because he loves us. He sent his only son to the cross to redeem us.

I truly believe that this journey of fatherhood is more than simply a journey for Joshua, but a journey for me and God. The more i learn to love him, the more i understand God’s amazing love toward his children.

July 8, 2014

Hypertrophy, Stretch and Business

I’ve thought a lot about hope, vision, perseverance, focus, strategy, vision and many other buzz words, but as I return from Hillsong Conference 2014 the recurring thought was now any of the above it was about stretching my capacity.

We live in a society that relentlessly speaks about burn-out and the importance of not burning out. But alas with this in mind how does one balance the avoidance of burn out while pushing yourself to do great things? I look back to the early stages of my company i was working 60 hours + a week, whilst leading a youth group for my church, singing monthly for our church and studying at seminary. I was doing what people would consider foolish, that i would burn out. Yes i did burn out in the end BUT do i regret it? no. because it definitely made me stronger, and it definitely put me ahead of my competitors. When i burnt out i just took leave and returned fresh to try again.

When you see people go to the gym they always talk about pushing themselves the last set until they can’t do anymore then after a week of post gym soreness known as DOMS they return and they can lift more.

In the same way business, life and leadership requires us to push ourselves. But today’s self-help books and relentless articles on burn out tell us to avoid pain at all costs, it victimises us. It creates a culture that judges those who work hard as foolish rather than ambitious – as if some sort of terrestrial force will give them the burn-out disease for their sin of ambition.

It is the dichotomy of burn out vs pushing yourself to be better. I have come to the place today in this season of my life and our company in understanding that both are essential. I am a firm believer in burn-out and avoiding burn out, and i’m a firm believer in hard work. How does one reconcile the two?

2 key principles:

Always be uncomfortable, never be dysfunctional – You must work hard enough that you’re uncomfortable, but not too hard that you’re impossible to be around, you never run at the gym at a sprint level, you run at a level where you sweat and achieve gains whilst avoiding serious danger.
Always prepare for burn out – We prepare by our red flags, we give authority to our team to call us out if it appears we’re burning out, we have replacements for every person, we have mandated breaks, retreats and vacation time

This will be an interesting season in our company with this theme in mind. At a start up phase of a business burn out is always risky, but if you mentally prepare i find people can sustain if we manage their expectations. At a mature level it’s always the temptation to be comfortable.

June 16, 2014

If there was a …

If there was a controlling power outside the universe, it could not show itself to us as one of the facts inside the universe – no more than an architect of a house could actually be a wall or staircase or fireplace in that house. The only way in which we could expect it to show itself would be inside ourselves as an influence or a command trying to get us to behave a certain way… C.S Lewis

June 13, 2014

Hope and Business

only love of the immutable can yield tranquility – Augustine

It’s been a while since i’ve blogged.

As of recently i’ve observed the impact hope has on success in business or really in success of pursuit. Pursuit of what? well the pursuit of anything worth pursuing hope appears to be key, not in the commencement of the pursuit but rather the sustained and lasting pursuit of this hypthothetical thing worth pursuing.

Let me elaborate.

For the last 3 years our company has been start ups, i mean every 3 months i find myself opening a new health centre, and the challenge to overcome with mobilising leaders in a start up is not about hope but simply about faith. What they need is a vision and a belief that this vision i worth leaving a comfortable state take a risk and chase this vision. Faith is rooted on trust and they must trust me, and trust our company’s systems in effectively starting up their dream. This takes courage, and the ability to act.

I found myself pursuing a certain type of personality for such a task.

But here is the dilemma, as we enter 3-4 years, the company’s that were start ups, now have 8-12 staff and are no longer a start up but are a small team. When these businesses are profitable and money is coming in, the challenge is no longer let’s get going it’s “let’s keep going”. Truly as Jim Collins said “Good is the enemy of Great”.

Two challenges to the “let’s keep going mindset”

Vision must not have been achieved – you’re nearly where you dreamed but not quite yet – this being said if your vision is achievable then it is too small so this should always be there
The understanding that Quality is greater than quantity – Having one vision achieved, is far more valuable than having 20 “nearly there” visions.

People either get bored at this stage, or they burn out because they went too hard in the start up phase.

Continual pursuit is founded on hope. But what is hope? Hope is a worldview that is completely focused on a future vision. Hope sees every event or situation as moving you forward toward that vision, and hence no event good or bad is bad, but rather both good and bad events are considered useful in accomplishing the mission.

People with hope can persevere and endure because nothing phases them, they are constantly pushing themselves because they aren’t satisfied, they are constantly at peace because they see every event as useful, they are constantly learning because they see every event good or bad as an opportunity to grow and learn and lastly they get closer to their dreams than anyone else because they are focused and see the world in the continual perspective of achieving one sole task.

What is your hope? Christians believe your hope should be something that the world cannot take away or change, because if your hope fades, you fade. So they believe you hope in the immutable. What will you hope in?

I’d lastly leave it that there are 2 steps of hope. Your ultimate hope is something no one can take away and it should be a picture of character not objectives. For example mine is to become a person who completely emulates Jesus in Character and integrity. This is a picture of who i want to be when i die, at 80 or 90 whatever.

The second hope is a hope to do with accomplishment in getting there. For example it might be involvement in a church or a not for profit, – the question i ask is this hope must be a large accomplishment, it is what you will accomplish in competency if you become who you hope for in character.

I leave these questions with you, as i’m still answering them for myself

But hope is essential.

June 2, 2014

CS Lewis – The Problem with Pain

Today i was listening to a sermon by Timothy Keller who read an absolutely profound quote from CS Lewis:

We might have learned, even from the poets, that Love is something more stern and splendid than mere kindness. Kindness, merely as such, cares not whether its object becomes good or bad, provided only that it escapes suffering. If God is Love, He is, by definition, something more than mere kindness. He has often rebuked us and condemned us but he has never regarded us with contempt. He has paid us the intolerable compliment of loving us. We are, not metaphorically but in very truth, a Divine work of art. Over a sketch made idly to amuse a child an artist may not take much trouble. But over the [magnum opus] of his life—the work which he loves—he will take endless trouble—and would, doubtless, thereby give endless trouble to the picture if it were sentient. One can imagine a sentient picture, after being rubbed and scraped and re-commenced for the tenth time wishing that it were only a thumb-nail sketch whose making was over in a minute. In the same way it is natural for us to wish that God had designed us for a less glorious and less arduous destiny; but then we are wishing not for more love but for less. You asked for a loving God; you have one. Not a senile benevolence that drowsily wishes you to be happy in your own way…but the consuming fire Himself, the Love that made the worlds, persistent as an artist’s love for his work. It is certainly a burden of glory not only beyond our deserts but also, except in rare moments of grace, beyond our desiring. We should not ask that God’s love should reconcile itself to our present impurities—not more than the beggar maid could wish that the King should be content with her rags and dirt. What we would here and now call our ‘happiness’ is not in the end God chiefly has in view: but when we are such as He can love without impediment, we shall [finally] be happy. – C.S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain

Truly it a powerful thing to know that once in Christ whatever we experience be it great success or great trial is at worst an act of discipline motivated by love in order that we can become better, become more like Christ. With that in mind we can live with constant hope because any light and momentary trouble is achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs it all (2 Cor 4:17), the eternal glory where God can truly love us without impediment.

April 14, 2014

Just a Thought: Faith

The gospel is distinct from other world view and religions: In it’s view, everyone is wrong, everyone is loved and everyone is called to recognise this and change. – Timothy Keller

I was having a think this morning, and found myself asking, “what have I done right?”.

I was in the midst of thanking God for everything i’ve been given and the question was posed in my mind. At which point i realised that the only thing right i had ever done was to realise i couldn’t do anything right. Let me explain.

The one right thing a person can do is to know they are incapable of not sinning, of not falling short and at the same time incapable of achieving their dreams independently. Humility is knowing that you can’t the world or even yourself. Humility is reaching out for help as a result for that realisation. Every great innovator, christian or not would attest that they didn’t change the world on their own. The crux of Christianity is simply based on this logic, if you’re going to ask for help why not from a omniscient and omnipotent God.

As a result a life of Christian humility is one in constant thankfulness for the help received and continual courage as you step daily beyond what is in the realm of your ability and into the realm of what you can do in him (God).

This is an amazing life to live and a beautiful worldview to hold.

Just a thought

February 27, 2014

The Entrepreneur who didn’t stress: Tranquility

only love of the immutable can yield tranquility – Augustine

What does peace look like? We live in a society that is fast paced, constantly moving with information constantly being bombarded in every direction. Stress and anxiety have become the norm, no matter your socioeconomic status, age or gender. It has become an epidemic, with depression and suicide higher than it’s ever been and it’s not hard to see why. The pressure to excel, the pressure to have just basic human fundamentals such as housing, food and education are more extensive than ever before and more expensive and therefore more stressful than ever before. This coupled with our need to look good, be good, live beyond our means whilst promoting it to all our social circles in facebook and instagram mean we are more exposed than ever. It is exhausting.

Conversely i was speaking to a friend who is a doctor who had recently returned from a 3 month stint working in a rural town in Africa. It caused me to reflect on my own third world experience 4 years ago. The people were so behind in technology , had next to no money or possessions and at first glance, I like many first world wannabe philanthropists would think “i can’t wait to help them”. Only to discover that in reality I left more helped and changed than perhaps i’d like to admit. The same is true for anyone who has ever worked in a third world country properly for an extended period of time, it is impossible to leave unchanged.

Although they have nothing and seem so behind us in so every possible way, there was a sense of tranquility about the simplicity of their life – depression is close to non-existent, children are full of life and joy, no matter their circumstances. They were so joyful, thankful, life was simple they had more happiness playing soccer with a plastic bottle than we have buying the latest macbook. Observing this i couldn’t help but admit that despite all they lacked physically they had something we did not. I left with more questions than answers: “What is more important wealth or tranquility?” “Are they mutually exclusive?” and “how is it that in their poverty they have tranquility?”.

I was confronted with the question, would i rather if i had to choose be rich and lack tranquility or poor with complete peace? It was for some reason hard to answer even though it was clear which answer was right. Returning home you’re bombarded with who want’s to be a millionaire and deal or no deal style tv shows that promote the proverbial high known as “happiness” through wealth. The high is immediate and temporary, society are constantly searching for this high, the over night success. I started to see it like a drug, except 90% o the population were addicted. It was frightening and i knew that was not what i was looking for.

So let’s answer some questions and ask ourselves the hard questions regarding peace, and maybe we’ll learn something about defeating stress and anxiety in the first world.

In this mini series i’ll address 3 simple questions:

What is peace? What is not Peace?
Why do we need peace?
How do we attain peace?

February 21, 2014

The Entrepreneur with the Omnipotent Dad

So i’m observing a child at the shops the other day. Helpless, small but yet so innocent. Reaching out to it’s father it wants shiny object in his hand unbeknownst to it that the shiny silver set of car keys could be a danger to the child. Instead the father reaches into his bag and brings out a rattle toy which he passes to him. The child is much happier and managed to avoid a potentially dangerous situation due to the child’s ignorance.

Timothy Keller senior pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian in New York City says that the root of Christian peace is complete trust in God, Jesus calls it “child like”. He goes onto say that the Christian knows that their father will give them what they ask or what they should have asked for if they knew what he knew.

I have found this particularly true in my life. I’ve found entrepreneurialism with an omnipotent father one of the most powerful tools available to me. For a number of reasons

Risk: Knowing God is all powerful and is my dad means i can take risk. Most people are scared of risk because they fear rejection (God never rejects those he has accepted in Christ) or they fear failure (in God there is no failure because he works all things for our good and his glory).
Peace: Knowing your identity is secure, that there is nothing you can do to disappoint your father and also knowing there is nothing you can do that he can’t help with provides a sense of inner calm. It means that even in my risk taking i’m not overcome with worry.
Humility: Knowing that anything i have achieved or will achieve was therefore a result of his grace working through my mistakes has completely changed my worldview of myself. One cannot boast when one has received a gift, but simply boasts on the giver.
Generousity: My constant awareness that i didn’t achieve anything by my own efforts has allowed me to understand anything i’ve been lucky enough to have is not my own and therefore giving it away to help others is sometimes not my decision.

We sometimes forget that when you enter into sonship with Christ you aren’t simply saved from something but rather you are saved toward something. The quality of life for which we are afforded is not circumstantial, but rather a constant ability to take action and live the life you feel called to (faith), whilst in constant peace knowing that you’ll never lose your position in Christ and no failure is bigger than his ability to work it for your good and his glory (hope).

It is truly a beautiful thing to be an entrepreneur and call God your father.

February 11, 2014

Just a Thought: Art and Life

Art is a collaboration between God and the artist, and the less the artist does the better.

– Andrew Gide

Have you ever seen art? What makes it beautiful? Recently my wife and I were lucky enough to spend a few days admiring fine art at the MET and MOMA in New York City. However as we looked and listened to our audio guides a question cycled in my mind, what makes these pieces beautiful? It wasn’t uniformity because throughout history and across cultures they were different yet equally beautiful. It wasn’t the mood or tone – some were light and some were dark, granted some people are more drawn to certain styles but the idea that some master pieces are considered objectively and undeniably beautiful means something in it must transcend individual opinion.

Two words kept recurring in our audio guide in both museums as a kind of common thread “intent” and “time”. Used in the context of “the artists intent is to… and over time did…”. Suddenly it struck me that it wasn’t the colours, the tones, the opinion, or the size but rather both the intent and time that makes art beautiful, let me explain.

Intention: I was observing a classic piece from ancient rome in the MET. At least 12 metres tall, it looked good but i wasn’t amazingly impressed. But as the tour took us closer it began to break down every nuance. The red on the right with the intent of symbolising death and the glowing gold around the king symbolising victory. The king’s size exaggerated to demonstrate the emotion in the moment, one of power and victory yet at a cost. The more the piece was broken down the more the image gained beauty as i realised that every stroke was intended to convey something. It was beautiful because someone planned it and crafted it with a purpose. Without thought or planning it would be worthless.

Time: The same piece I later discovered took somewhere in the vicinity of 7 years. This was remarkable to me because the artist had an image in his mind that he kept for 7 years, he kept the raw emotion, he kept his idea and evolved it over such an extended period. Some dark patches, some light patches individually worthless but when combined to convey a uniform message it is given purpose and therefore beauty.

Intention without time isn’t valuable because it was too easy that anyone could do it, Time without intention is just a meaningless piece that took a long time but has no purpose and is therefore worthless both are mutual in relationship to each other.

Isn’t life much the same…

The beauty of people’s lives isn’t in success or failure, in wealth or poverty, in the colour of their skin or status of their family. In my trip to the USA i was confronted by the beauty of people. Some were wealthy, some were homeless but all were people, and all had a story. Crafted with intent over time by a creator (you and God), yes there were some who were in the middle of a dark patch and some were in a bright patch, but beauty is not uniformity. Your life can’t be all light or all dark, it is beautiful because it is intentional, unique and done over time.

Just a thought what if we changed our perspective? What if we saw that every single moment, light and dark in our life was part of a larger picture being painted. That our legacy is our picture painted and finished. It is beautiful not because it is simple or uniform, it is beautiful because it is unique, crafted and intentional.

The Christian life is one of surrender. Simply defined Christians believe our picture becomes more beautiful if we aren’t the ones painting it. If we let God paint our picture and use our lives to convey his message and not our own.

Life is a canvas and you are painting it. But as Christians Romans 8:28 says that all things work out for your Good and his Glory. Perhaps the best thing i’ve ever done is realise i could never paint something as beautiful as God could, and realising i’d rather surrender it to him to make my life stand for something bigger than my own personal gain. That my life may be used to convey his message of forgiveness and grace, this is truly the most beautiful piece of art one could hope to see, a life fully surrendered to the most talented artist in the world God.

January 30, 2014

Perspective and Leadership

“We do not believe because of what we see, we see and interpret the world through the lens of what we believe”

This post is a bit of a splatter on a page of my thoughts.

I have always thought the believe what we see, i embarked to the USA to do just that. To see more. We’ve attained some level of success as a company over that last few years and with investors now buying in and a seasonal shift in both my personal life (as Linda and I embark to work with this new church plant) and also my company I was hoping to meet some people in the USA, see how they conducted themselves in business and come back inspired. What resulted was not quite what I expected.

The more I saw, the longer i was here, the more people I met i did not leave with answers but simply questions. I’ve realised that we do not believe because we see as i initially thought, but rather we see and interpret the world through the lens of what we believe.

Seeing is the result of an internal work, however most people presume their perspectives are objective, that vision is fact therefore measurable. For example – “That hotel is enormous” – can sound factual and the person making the statement believes it to be so, but they are interpreting it based on an internal schema of what “enormous” is.

What does this have to do with leadership? Well the bible and christianity is not just about an external change and worldview, but this is what we are known for – what we do, how we behave – and though these things are essential i was reminded they are only important because of what they represent – an internal change. It starts with an internal change in identity, a new schema of viewing the world.

As a Christian the bible states that God changes our hearts and subsequently the rest of our life is learning how to see the world differently and from our new perspective change our character. But what is this new perspective? If i were to put it into one sentence: That God is big, much bigger than you – but he is also good, much too good to you than you deserve.

Standing atop the New York City Skyline – on top of the free world, overlooking the greatest city that man has built my awe was not turned to man, in fact in a moment , my awareness of how small we in fact are was incredibly confronting. I saw 10 million people, worrying, scurrying to work. I saw buildings built by men in an attempt to attain immortality, some torn down for renovation, some still standing with 99% of onlookers unaware of who the man even was. I see people who are worth billions and those worth $1. But what I don’t see is any one man. No man no matter how powerful or influential has ever attained eternity and out lived time. As I explore the MET i see artifacts of every culture and every dynasty or king who once ruled the world and I see “history”. None of them out lasting time itself. As i listened to the “deep space” documentary at the Museum of Natural History basically recounting 200 years of man’s best efforts to understand our universe to simply conclude it is endless and beyond complete understanding, my perspective was shifting.

It was in this moment that i truly saw God, not just the God who saved me, but the God who is truly intentional, the God who architects the world not for everyone’s good and everyone’s glory/ ambitions, but simply for his own his Good and his own Glory. This is perhaps the human condition, believing the universe should be for our Good, hence the stupid question “why does God allow bad things to happen” – what we are in fact saying is “why doesn’t God do everything for the good of every human being…” – forgetting simply that we are not that important. Seeing that time, the universe, this World are not for our best interest but are simply part of God’s painting, as he creates a work of art on a blank canvas to try and communicate his glory.

He is intentional with every stroke, every event. On a piece of art there are shades of dark and light, vivid colours and soft palates, it is the inter-mingling of these different things that alter the image and make it a masterpiece. If it was simply light it would be nothing. The same is true of life and history. It is the unique nature of everyone’s story in the canvas that is the universe that displays God’s mighty nature.

I soon realised that my shift in perspective was actually a change in the state of my heart, – humility.

I leave not inspired because of what i’ve seen people do, i leave inspired because i am reminded of how small I am, how big he is, and truly he is intentional in every stroke of his brush to create a a beautiful piece of art that will give him so much glory.

My father i am truly honoured to be part of your story, The key elements of this realising it is your story not my own, it is for your glory not my own, and it is in your complete sovereign control not my own. My only Job is to be myself and simply be available to follow your direction and pace. That hope is perspective manifest in an internal realisation that God is big and in control.