If someone asked you how your heart is, what would you say?
I know, it’s a weird question
But what I told you that the answer to that question would determine:
How long you’ll last in leadership.
How effective you’ll be in leadership.
Your ultimate capacity as a leader.
I believe the condition of your heart determines all that, and much more.
So how is your heart? And how do you make it healthy?
It’s Not Your Competency, It’s Your Character
One of my favourite scripture verses is Proverbs 4:23 which says “Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.” Another translation says “Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life.”
When I was a young leader, I thought skill determined your capacity. Just become competent and the world’s your oyster.
But that’s not really true. No matter how talented you are, your character can sink your ship.
Just ask athletes who aren’t allowed to play anymore.
Politicians who will never get re-elected.
Celebrities whose careers have been marred by constant scandal.
I have come to believe that character, not competency, determines your capacity as a leader (I wrote a full post about that here.)
And the state of your heart determines the shape of your character.
10 Habits That Will Help You Guard Your Heart
So how do you guard your heart as a leader?
If you want to effectively guard your heart:
1. Separate your personal walk from your professional work.
If you’re in ministry, never confuse your work with your walk.
Your work is what you get paid (or volunteer) to do. Your walk is what you do because you are a child of God in a relationship with him through Jesus.
Your walk is life long. Your work is what you do in a season or because you’re called.
A strong walk fuels strong work. The two best ways I know of to fuel a personal walk are to read the bible and pray daily.
And, if you’re in ministry, keep asking yourself this annoying question: If you couldn’t do ministry tomorrow, what would be left of your personal walk with Christ?
That will tell you a ton about the state of your heart.
2. Establish effective guardrails.
They might sound like ‘a bunch of rules’, but leaders who guard their hearts set up healthy guardrails in their lives. A guardrail protects you from danger before you hit danger (that jagged cliff with the 300 foot drop).
Some of my guardrails include not meeting with a member of the opposite sex alone, not riding in a car alone with a member of the opposite sex who isn’t part of my family, and even automating savings and givings.
The best series on guardrails is one by Andy Stanley called (not surprisingly) Guardrails. You can watch it for free here.
3. Acknowledge that you have the capacity for good and evil.
Before you complain that “those guardrails outlined above are for paranoid, legalistic people”, just think it through.
Do you believe you have the capacity for good and evil? I do.
I think when you’re really in touch with your heart, you realize that in it live both good and evil. When you begin to think ‘that could never happen to me’, you are probably closer to having it happen than you realize.
Knowing that the capacity for evil lies in every heart makes us more reliant on God’s grace, more humble, and more aware that we need a strength from God to withstand temptation than we naturally possess.
4. Pursue Quiet
When my heart wasn’t as guarded as it ought to be, I used to hate sitting in silence.
I’ll tell you why. Because as soon as I sat down I would begin to sense things weren’t quite right. Why? Because they weren’t.
Over the last decade I have pursued silence, and even begin almost every day with an hour of silent reading and prayer.
Here’s what I’ve learned. The quiet reveals the quiet, or the disquiet, within.
5. Cultivate a circle of wise counsel
The more I know myself, the more I realize I need wise counsel around me.
Effective leaders surround themselves with wise people who are smarter than they are. If you’re the wisest person in the room, you need a new room.
In this post, I wrote about how to cultivate an inner circle in your life that will help you find health.
6. Assume that you are responsible.
If you’re in leadership, not everything’s your fault, but everything is your responsibility. I am not at fault for everything that goes wrong under my leadership, but I am responsible.
Weak leaders assign blame. Effective leaders accept responsibility. If you’re always thinking a problem is someone else’s fault, you have heart work to do. You’re too defensive. Too insecure. And too sensitive. I wrote about how to overcome defensiveness here.
7. Put your marriage before your parenting and friendships.
People with weak marriages will often prioritize their kids over their spouses. Big mistake. Or they’ll turn to a friend for the kind of emotional support that really only a spouse should give.
Your marriage will suffer, your kids will grow up insecure or co-dependent and your marriage will stay underdeveloped.
Leaders who guard their hearts realize that a healthy marriage will produce healthier relationships all around. They drill down on their issues. They go to counseling. They pursue intimacy with the only legitimate source of romance in their lives. And when they do, they are less tempted to inappropriate emotional satisfaction elsewhere.
And by the way, having an effective circle of wise counsel around you (Point 5) will also take pressure off your marriage because you won’t be relying on your spouse to solve all the problems that hit you at work. You’ll be able to be there for your spouse as well as confide in your spouse.
8. Prioritize Rest.
There is a difference between time off and rest. A lot of time off can easily fill up with mindless distractions, meaningless errands and trivial pursuits.
If you really want to guard your heart, you need to pursue rest. Sleep intentionally. Wake up rested. Take a nap. Be still. Know that God is God.
9. Think.
Socrates put it this way: “The unexamined life is not worth living.”
I agree. If you want to guard your heart, take time to think, reflect and revise. Read some great books. Watch some documentaries. Have actual conversations with friends about issues, not just people and events.
Process life. Think.
10. Get the help you need.
Guarding your heart effectively is something that needs the care and attention of others. Go to a counselor. Hire a coach. Ask someone to mentor you. Seek the counsel of friends. Get help for your problem.
It takes a brave person to do that, but you’re brave, right?
The help you need changes the life you lead.
These are ten habits I see in people who guard their heart.
