Alone At The Top
And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching. ––Hebrews 10:24-25
The really great man is the man who makes every man feel great.
––G.K. Chesterton
Being in command at work makes the transition to the home front difficult for many men, because wives and kids don’t care about their achievements, titles, expertise, or productivity, or that Daddy landed a huge contract. They just want a husband or dad who gives them his time, love, and attention.
I also know leaders who are at war to keep their job, career, or professional demands from killing their precious and private sources of intimacy and connection (that is, their marriage and their family). They may lose this battle in the end, more than half to be exact.
The media has a field day with how men relieve their stress. Ask the marketing team that comes up with the “What Happens in Vegas Stays in Vegas” ad campaign. It’s the model for how the world says to deal with the isolating pressures of leadership. The offer is direct: escape it, medicate it with some other feeling, and then go back to your life, business as usual. Press “Repeat” as often as needed.
It doesn’t matter if you are a married father of three, a coach, a facilities manager, a sheriff, a pastor, a sales manager, or the CEO of a Fortune 100 company; this is what leadership feels like, whether you understand the dynamics or not. These are the bricks in our back-packs, the stresses and strains of being a man, the weights we alone shoulder and the forces in play that make waking up a pleasure and a pain. This pressure of life gets built up and gets relieved some way.
Every man needs encouragement, if you are not getting it from others, can you think of another source?
Father, You are that source—help me to not be stupid at life.