Friday, December 4, 2009

Introverted Leaders and a Personal Lesson

After a week off from blogging due to the holidays, I am back at it and excited about an article I read this past week as I continue to grow into the Christ follower and leader God wants me to be.

One of my struggles in life has always been my belief that God has given me the spiritual gift of leadership and the personality of an introvert. Over the years, I have had a very tough time reconciling these two traits as a pastor/leader because many of the leaders I have hung around with are the strong type A persons who on the outside appear to be strong extroverts. I am learning that this isn't necessarily true either but that's another blog post at some point in my life... BUT, the article I read this week confirmed what many people have been telling me over the years that brought me great encouragement to be grateful and content with the giftings and personality God has given me. Even thought I don't always believe it, I can be used powerfully for His glory (with the right heart attitude of course) with what He has given me.

So for all my fellow introverts out there who strive to lead, here are the five characteristics from that article that help us as introverted leaders lead with a quiet strength very successfully...

1) We think first and talk later.
2) We tend to focus on depth.
3) We exude calm.
4) We often let our fingers do the talking.
5) We embrace solitude.

I am not foolish enough to think that there aren't weaknesses associated with each of the above mentioned as well, but it does encourage me to know that the very traits that come so naturally to me can be used to lead others to succeed for the cause of Christ. I have become more convinced that I need to keep building upon these strengths and improving in my areas of weaknesses so as to become my very best for Jesus.

LEAD ON MY FELLOW INTROVERTS!

No comments: