A Strategy to Matter and our Ideas about our Self

I was talking with someone, yesterday, about having a strategy to matter. Think about that. Some think it’s enough just to want to matter – that it is noble enough, in itself, to be willing to take opportunities as they come. But it takes a deeper level of intention to say, “I’m going to make opportunities” or “I’m going to structure my life to make opportunities more likely”.

What could make the deepest difference in our world? I think it has something to do with how we think. One of my most insistent prayers as always been, “God: I want to mean it – really, really mean it.” Serving for the sake of serving. Loving for the sake of loving. Actually listening, period.

Take the Jesus foot washing thing, as an example. It can be easy to do it today as an opportunity to say and think to yourself, “Hey, look at me – I’m washing feet.” It “ennobles” you. It can be easy to do it for the sake of what it allows you to think about yourself.

But (and this is speculation) perhaps Jesus didn’t do it because of what it said about Him. Maybe He did it because of what it said about feet and dirt and need (they simply needed to be washed).

Remember Philippians: “He did not consider equality (with God) something to be grasped.” Which means He simply didn’t think in those terms. Wow. I wish (not that I think myself equal with God!)

Maybe the most important part of the leadership journey is when we give up our ideas of our self – maybe we get bored with them - and in their absence, we serve for the sake of serving. We replace our ideas about our self with ideas about need. Maybe, we finally, simply mean it.