Inside Out

Two of my daughters have rhino heads tattooed on their ankles. 

Those tattooes are taken from a bigger tattoo of charging rhinos across the back of a beloved friend and mentor. 

Apparently, rhinos can run faster than their vision can process. I've been told they can run like 30 mph, but they can't see 30 feet in front of them. Yet, because they are rhinos, and they can trample anything that gets in their way, they just go.

The idea behind the tatooes comes from a book (the title of which I can never remember) that compares the boldness of rhinos to pursuing after God. For my friend, the tattoo is a symbol of his commitment to pursue God; his faithfulness to that commitment inspired my girls to such a degree that they copied a piece of his tattoo. It is beautiful. 

Though I do not have a rhino tattoo, I can relate to the mindset. My heart is to follow hard after God, even when I can't see what might be just beyond my view. The challenge is, I'm not a rhino. So, when I charge into opportunities and experiences without considering the costs or consequences, it can be... challenging. Like studying leadership, at the doctoral level...

So, why am I comparing my studies to rhinos? Well, because when I embarked on this mission... quest... thing... I wasn't really thinking about leadership. It is a contextual leadership program, and I was focused on the contextual part. 

You'd think that someone who has enthusiastically jumped into a doctoral program on leadership would have considered what studying leadership would mean. But I didn't.  The beauty of the program, though, is that it is coming from an Affective and Trinitarian perspective. And as I learn more about God's character through those lenses, it is allowing me the courage and confidence to step forward into areas where I have been afraid to go. 

Photo by Andrew Liu on Unsplash

That courage and confidence is also allowing me to look deeply at my struggles with leadership, and my fear of embracing who God has called me to be, or even to recognize the leadership roles God has placed me in. Rather than being afraid of failure, I'm seeing how I need to embrace it. Rather than allowing my weaknesses to define me, I am understanding in a whole new way that my weaknesses really are a way for God to demonstrate His strength, and can illustrate on a small scale the way the Body of Christ can work together. It has given me freedom to have different conversations, to ask different questions of myself and others, and to ask for help from people who have in the past intimidated me. 

Though not quite to the level of a rhino, seeing God as Father, understanding that He cares more about my heart than my performance, and recognizing that at the center of the universe is a relationship (the Trinity) I am invited to be part of, it is easier and easier to embrace the title and responsibility of a leader, thus allowing me to fulfill that role more faithfully, which is ultimately what I truly desire.