76 - Pitfalls of Leadership: #5 Secrets Sap Passion and Purpose
The "Living with Heart" Podcast is brought to you by Chip Dodd Resources (www.chipdodd.com) and The Voice of the Heart Center (vothcenter.com). You can connect with Dr. Chip Dodd at chip@chipdodd.com. Contact Bryan Barley for coaching at bryan@vothcenter.com.
Remember that the Pitfalls are descending steps; one connects to the other with predictable effects.
Some leaders have referred to the descent as a “chain reaction.”
The descent can be stopped at any time, with an intervention from others whom the leader listens and healthily responds to, or a cry out from the leader in descent who is heard and responded to by others.
The Five Pitfalls:
Work becomes confused with one’s worth.
Performance begins to be valued more than one’s presence.
People become things.
To be an example to others, the true self is isolated.
Secrets sap one’s passion and purpose.
These pitfalls can destroy careers, friendships, reputations, marriages and families—unless one is freed from them.
# 5 Secrets sap the leader’s passion and purpose
Once the leader’s true self is isolated, the “getaway” or “cure” is usually a closely held secret.
A secret is anything one withholds from appropriate people because they fear rejection, judgment, censuring, or being controlled.
Secrets:
require a person to withhold emotional and spiritual struggles from the people who hunger to know them and care about them.
block the intimacy, or “into-me-see,” that is an essential part of human encouragement and fulfillment.
make a person sick because they are not connected to relationship with others.
At this point, a leader begins to survive in a cycle of work, performance, isolation, and secrets that increase toxic shame and guilt.
To dissipate the shame and guilt, the leader tries to work harder, perform better, which cycles into a repetition of isolation and secrets.
As the cycle continues, a leader will begin to experience symptoms of burnout, depression, excessive anxiety, addiction, and other forms of impairment.
Jesus says in John 10:10, “I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. (NIV)
To many leaders who are caught up in the swirl of Pitfall #5, this scripture reference seems like a long-lost illusion.
By Pitfall #5, the leader is far away from everything they had once hoped and believed.
Jesus also says in John 10:10, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy.” (NIV)
This reference is a living, breathing experience for the leader. He or she is being robbed of every blessing they were created to experience in the passion, struggle, and joy of getting to do what they were created to do.
When caught up in Secrets, relief becomes bondage:
Bondage is a very simplified definition of addiction. The leader is addicted.
The addictive processes “eat up” the human being, who is running from the vulnerability and struggle of being human.
Secrets block a person from being emotionally and spiritually available and vulnerable, because secrets require hypervigilance and focus on control.
Genuine encouragement and replenishment never occur because the heart has become hidden or untouchable.
Legitimate needs are being met in illegitimate ways.
Through secrets the leader becomes a pretender and loses the strength of truly being a contender.
Liberation from bondage is available:
If there is breath, there is hope. Addiction recovery begins with:
Confession: the recognition of and “fessing up” to being human, which means that I feel and I need more than I can manufacture without relational help.
Admission: the acknowledgment of powerlessness over life, and the more I have attempted to do it alone, the more unmanageable my life has become.
In these two beginning steps, the leader must admit specifically what he/she has gotten involved with in order to get relief—which is the exact nature of the secrets, relief-seeking.
The leader starts the process of returning to being human:
1. Dissociation and detachment from the true self (slowly) becomes re-association with one’s true self and re-attachment to how I am unavoidably created.
2. We are created as emotional and spiritual creatures. We are created to do one thing in life, and that is to live fully. But we cannot live fully without doing so in relationship with ourselves, others and God. Please read The Voice of the Heart: A Call to Full Living by Chip Dodd.
3. The DNA of the human being is created to find nourishment and strength in relationship.
Denial is pierced:
The leader can begin (it is only a beginning, not a quick fix) to see the harm they have done to themselves, and as a consequence, the harm they have done to others.
Impairments can begin to be recognized:
The practice of hopelessness 🡢 leads to despair.
Lowered expectations 🡢 leads to reducing passion.
Toxic shame about one’s internal makeup of feelings, needs, desire, longings, and hope 🡢 leads to distancing from others and denial of one’s own needs.
Relief seeking 🡢 becomes seeking alternatives to needing genuine relationship.
Counterfeit fulfillments 🡢 leads to addictive processes that trap the leader in secrecy and self-destructive options.
The Voice of the Heart: A Call to Full Living by Chip Dodd
Keeping Heart by Chip Dodd
The leader sees that he or she has a problem, but how God created them and who God called them to become is not the problem. Running from the true self, for whatever reason, is the problem.
The sin of “over-dependence on will power” has led to the sickness of addiction, which leads to multiple harms for which amends will be needed.
The leader begins to see the power of toxic shame, as related to one’s upbringing; it began the process in which work was associated with work and performance mattered more than personal presence.
Recovery of heart and living how God created us to live does not diminish future achievements.
It sets the leader free to accomplish even more because one’s whole self is present to perform with head, hands, and especially heart!
We are feeling creatures who long for fulfillment; we are not thinking creatures who are faulty because we feel.
Dr. Chip Dodd
Voice of the Heart Center