Force Multipliers & Leadership

In military science, force multiplication refers to a combination of factors that, when present, gives personnel, strategies, or weapons the ability to do more of whatever they’re already doing. For instance, refueling planes while they are still in the air (air-to-air refueling) is a force multiplier. One plane comes alongside the other like a flying gas station to fill its tank mid-flight so that the other plane can continue on its mission and not lose time by having to land to refuel. The second re-fueling plane saves time and increases the effectiveness of the first. The force of the first is enhanced by the second. A helicopter is another example of force multiplication. By flying low, it can do what other flight vehicles cannot. When ground troops need reinforcements or extractions that are too hard to get to, the helicopter is a go-to force multiplier.

FRIENDS

When I was sick, as in, we-don’t-know-what’s-wrong-with-you sick, and it went on for months, I needed as many force multipliers as possible. During our ordeal, force multipliers were those people who stepped in to help when tragedy struck and stayed around even after the initial blows. We could see force multiplication at work when our friends and family brought meals, helped us with childcare, cleaned our house, contributed financially, and otherwise acted as a safety net for us through our suffering. One time, I even recall our small group from church quietly compiling the exact amount we needed to pay a $1,000 copay for my radiation treatments. The money we just didn’t have as a young family facing a major illness. With Darin in a new job, me sick, and three kids under six years old, things were tight. I remember one of our group members just slipping it into our hands after group one night as we sat stunned by their generosity. It made all the difference. Darin and I went home and wept while we laid in bed, so grateful for people who could see us and come alongside us to help. Force multipliers became game-changers for us.

LEADERS

We also considered our faith leaders to be force multipliers for us. One year I was in five different hospitals over three different states as doctors tried to crack the code on my illness. Leaders from our faith community visited me both in and out of the hospital to care for our family and help us through those dark days. When I look back on those times I can still CLEARLY REMEMBER the leaders who were the most helpful, and then one who really missed the mark. I know that the poor guy was doing the best he could at the time, but sadly his lack of skill is still remembered to this day as to how NOT to be when you visit someone in the hospital. But first, let’s start with the good stuff.

 VALIDATE

I was just a young mom when I was ill. My husband and I attended a church led by Joe Boyd. One evening Joe came to our house to visit when things were especially bad. After spending time sitting on the floor of our living room and talking deeply to us about our struggles, Joe and his wife Debbie stood up to leave and then he said this magical sentence: “My heart goes out to you guys but no matter what happens," he said, as he turned to look at Darin, "She'll be OK. She has the gift of faith.” – the gift of faith – wait, what? What the heck does that mean?

 Joe wasn’t referring to me being lucky to be in a faith community; instead, he was talking about the actual gift of being willing to trust God with the big matters of my life. The most important thing Joe did that night (other than suit up and show up to the tough job of being a pastor), was to really SEE ME at a deep level and then speak up to validate who I was.

 I had never noticed that my ease of believing in God during difficult times was any different than other people's. It just came naturally to me. I thought my way of being was the typical experience of most people in matters of faith and spirituality. But Joe saw more, and he helped me see it, too. His validation of who I was as a person of faith gave wings to my hope and helped me step more fully into expressing my trust in God through those very dark times. Joe, as a great leader, saw it in me, spoke it out, and helped me to see myself through a lens of courage and strength. And he did it in a genuine way, too. “No matter what happens, she’s anchored by her faith, she’ll be alright.”

He didn’t make false claims like “God’s gonna heal her,” or skirt the issue, by quoting a few scriptures at us, or offer spiritual platitudes that miss the mark and make people feel dismissed like, “All things happen for a reason,” or “just trust God.” Instead, he just told it as he saw it and it caused me to trust even more that Something Bigger and stronger than me was holding me through my suffering. In fact, it also eventually helped me to make the difficult transition to acceptance when the tide tuned badly for me and my condition appeared to be fatal. When I could no longer affect an outcome with all of my prayers, doctors, and medicine, the anchor of Joe’s words rose beneath me, “No matter what happens she has the gift of faith.”

By finally being able to release my fate and not cling to a particular outcome, I was free to say what Mary said when she heard the life-splitting news that she was about to bear the Savior of the world - “May it be done unto me according to your will.” When it felt like fear was stalking me at every turn, I was able to say to God over and over, “You choose for me, Lord. All of the outcomes are up to you. May it be done to me according to your will.” Radical acceptance was at work in me because of Joe.

Many things in life are beyond our control. Things like pandemics, mass violence, politicians, protests-turned to-riots, freak accidents, natural disasters, test results, whether someone will love us back or not are all out of our hands at times. Good leaders help those in the midst of unpredictable and troubling circumstances to find their strength and move forward. Thanks, Joe!

 TRUST IN THOSE YOU LEAD

When I landed in the hospital, once for weeks on end, our senior pastor visited us and changed the way I interact with people forever. Ron Vietti, a cool dude with a wild man’s heart, came into my room and spared no time in asking me this pivotal question: “So, what are you hearing from God? Is it your time to die or not? Because if so, I will help you die with pizzazz. If not, then let’s beat this thing.” 

And this sentence should also read: “What he DIDN’T say: ‘Here’s why you’re sick (sinner), here’s what you should do now (dummy), here’s what our church believes about illness (oversimplify). Thankfully, he didn’t say any of those things, and what a relief, because lots of people before him had already said ALL of that to me and none of it (read: none of it) had helped.

 As he stood looking at me in his black leather jacket, daring me to hear God for myself, with all sorts of questions marks hanging in the air and dozens of tubes and lines hanging from every part of me I said, 

“it is not my time yet.” 

“Great!” he said, “Then let’s get on with living!” 

Then after ten minutes and a fiery prayer asking God to have His way in my life, he was gone and I was all the better for it. He trusted my sense of the situation, even when the odds were stacked against me. That same day I had been visited by six different specialists who had all scratched their heads and said “We don’t know what’s wrong with you,” but Ron wanted to know what I thought.

 The reason Ron did a Good-Leader-thing here is that he was curious about my experience and my sense of things. He trusted me. He didn’t jump in and tell me what I should be thinking and doing. Leaders can lead effectively when they let a person’s story unfold without having to control the outcome. When Ron asked me about my own take on what was happening and what I was sensing from God, he believed in me. We are breathing rare air when we can communicate to those we lead that we believe in them.

 HELP THE HELPERS

When a young family is entrenched in a life-threatening illness, there are bullseyes on everyone in their circle. Not only did my entire family rally behind us for weeks and months on end, but so did my husband’s family, our friends, and my church, and we were all exhausted. Kevin Odor, a now-retired Pastor, was not only encouraging to my husband and me, but he also watched over our parents. Kevin, probably one of the most relatable leaders I have ever known, took his gifts of wisdom and shepherding directly to our parents and helped refill their tanks so they could go the distance with us, especially when the chips were down.

 During one particular hospitalization, there was a crowd of helpers gathered in the hospital lobby praying for us, literally too many to get into my hospital room. What a wonderful gift! Later that night I got a call from Kevin saying he was also praying for us and had seen my parents that day and spent time encouraging and praying with them. Fear, anxiety, and a litany of “what-if's” had been plaguing my mom and dad, and Kevin stepped in to help the helpers. Great leadership is often done in secret. My parents were probably able to run that wicked gauntlet for us as they did because of Kevin’s willingness to support my supporters.

 BE PRACTICAL

A smart guy named Maslow once said that until people can focus on the most basics of life they can’t focus on anything else. Good faith leaders remember to minister to both a person’s soul and to their everyday needs. One story stands out to me and my family that we still remember years after it happened. 

It went like this: We were in the sewer of sickness (oxygen tank, wheelchair, multiple organs had failed). One night we made it to church and just sat in the back. After the service, Doug Loman, one of the pastors at the church, walked up to us and REVERSE TITHED by handing Darin and me a check for thousands of dollars to help us in our time of need.

No lie.

Doug handed us a check for a large sum of money and said, “I’m not sure why I’m giving this to you other than that’s what God told us to do.” The Board of the church had gathered in prayer and felt a sense of desire to help our family financially during one of our greatest times of need. Never before and not since have I EVER had a church meet me in this way. I have been to many churches and lived 35 years in my faith, and this event, by far, was the most encouraging action I have ever been a part of. (What church gives money back?) We had not expressed our financial needs to them or specifically asked for help. We were just very overwhelmed and they were just good observers and supporters of their flock.

But that is not all. Under Jim Crews’ leadership, that church cared for and shared with our family in so many ways that I could write an article just about them. Jim and his wife Tara stayed in regular contact with us when my care took us outside the state, they sent flowers, visited us, talked to us by phone, and prayed regularly for us as we moved through this terrible time of our lives. Essentially, they kept us in their community even when we were far away.

 These two leaders had no idea how downcast our souls were or how chewed up our money was. They saw and helped us at just the right time. Without their care, we may have lost our home, as Darin was the only one working to support us. Strong leaders remember that their followers need the basics like food, clothing, shelter, safety, and security before they can focus on growth, development, and service.

 TELL THE STORY

While our family was still recovering from one of the many episodes of illnesses I had, there was a very special couple in our lives. Pastor Andy Cass and his wife, Christy, leaned into our story of struggle and transformed our children in the middle of it. Literally. 

From the first time we met Andy and Christy, they sought to know us at a deep level, and even more, they got to know our kids. Through time spent, long talks, shared activities, and living life together they folded us into their fold. Years later, we still refer to Andy and Christy as the co-parents who helped us raise our family. Both of these pastors became a haven for our older kids as we mended from my illness In fact, one of our kids, in the midst of heartache and conflict, actually ran away and over to Andy and Christy’s home! They sheltered us through those hard times without judging us or our kids, and we are all the better for it. 

A few years later, after experiencing our family’s story of loss and struggle, Andy captured the narrative of my suffering in a video. While the video might have been a typical one for him, it was transformative for me. The power of seeing my story and hearing the struggle helped me get through my suffering and heal from it. My kids would even bring the video and show it to their friends as a way to say, “See this is what we’ve been going through? Life has been hard at our house.” It helped them to have a voice and move through their losses, too.

Andy’s willingness to be with us through our raw struggle, and then capture the story, was so helpful. He didn’t show up and tell me about other people’s war stories. He saw me as a person and, in a sense, said, “Cindy, you and your family are important to me, let’s capture your story together.” Good leaders who are walking through hard times with people know how to honor the stories of those who suffer.

WATCH THE PROGRESS

A leader in my life, Psychologist Dr. Janice Swanson, led me well when she identified a new stage of my recovery for me. Hunkered down and recovering, after months of bracing for the worst, I felt like I had turned a corner and so I scheduled an appointment with her to talk. I asked her to help sort through the pros and cons of returning to school to get my credentials to become a therapist. I was kicking around other career options and next steps, too. At one point in the conversation, she leaned back in her chair and said, “So, you’ve decided to live? Your husband will be so glad.”

Stop. Wait. What?

Dr. Swanson had been caring for me for several months and had listened well as I barfed up all the struggle of my surgeries, cross-country move, disappointments, all my fears, and how I would automatically brace for the worst now when even the smallest symptom would show its face. Rapid heartbeat? Must be heart failure again. Some light sweating at night? Probably Lymphoma. Read: I’m going to die! She helped me understand PTSD in great detail. She had been watching over my re-awakening process as I moved out of the bomb shelter of catastrophic illness and back into the real world.

DECIDING TO LIVE

My husband had tried to get me to look at and make plans with him for our future, but for months I just couldn’t. Wouldn’t. I was always bracing for the next tragedy to strike. How could I think about six months from now, let alone five years? My subconscious mind, because of the several traumatic experiences I had undergone, was locked into the belief that I could, literally, die at any minute. With the fear-center of my brain in overdrive from my past experiences, I believed that I would probably be overtaken by some terrible calamity in the next few hours so why plan for the future if there was none likely to be had?

I walked around in a constant state of hyper-vigilance, startling at every loud noise and bracing for the worst at every turn. How could I think about the future or make plans for us as a family? I’d probably be dead by morning so what was the point? When Dr. Swanson looked at me and said, “So you’ve decided to live? Your husband will be so relieved.” I tilted my head and shrugged my shoulders as if it was no big deal. “Well, I guess so,” I said. I had no idea what a big deal it actually was.

THRILLED

That night when I went home and told Darin about the session and the part about Dr. Swanson congratulating me on my decision to live, he burst into tears, and then into sobs. Apparently, in all my angst and self-preoccupied fear, I had missed that my husband had been living with a girl who still braced for the worst every day and it had been very, very hard on him. Apparently, I needed to tell the “You-could-die-any-day” girl that she was safe so I could re-enter my life, and so Darin could re-enter his as well. Dr. Swanson did a Good-Leader-thing by watching me closely and naming the new stage I was in. She spoke the truth about what was happening and it had a ripple effect on my marriage. We made a plan, I went back to school, got my Master’s degree, and since then continue to make plans to be alive. Darin is still thrilled!

SAY THE HARD THINGS

A very special leader in my life has told me things I did not want to hear. But she did it anyway. Once, after a series of very unfortunate events in my life, I found myself at the end of my ability to cope. Life had piled up and I felt thrown under a wave by it. Under the care of Lori Jean Glass (or “LJ” as we call her), I found my way back and was even able to blaze a new trail for myself, better than the one before. But along the way she called me out on a pattern of behavior that was evident to her , and hurtful to my marriage, but was not very evident to me.

After meeting with me over several days to help me straighten out the situation I found myself in, LJ named it. She said, “You keep taking all the pain of your trailer out on your husband.”

I looked at her and said, “Shut up. Literally, just quit it right now. What you’re saying is impossible. I am upset because he does this…this…and…that. Not about the crappy trailer I grew up in. He does things that are completely under his control and that he knows still bothers me, but he does them anyway. Clearly, this is about him, Lori Jean, and not about the home I grew up in.”

And then she made her case.

Over her time working with me Lori Jean discovered that I had grown up in a highly chaotic family where we all lived together in an old trailer, miles out of town, and with little to no adult supervision other than us four siblings. As kids, we grew up like weeds in a ditch that no one ever saw. And when it was over, we were all like feral cats darting out of the barn when the doors swung open. We left childhood just glad to be out and absolutely no idea what had happened to us or how to talk about it. My two sisters and I eventually “talked about it” when all three of us got married and then rapidly and haphazardly divorced from men who were poor matches for us, all at early ages. Our pain and neglect had been left unprocessed and only came to light in our sequential relational failures. The only words that come to mind for how much I failed my way through that time of life would be: EPIC FAIL. The angst and pain of a child so unchecked and unsafe were a storm inside of me.

She noted: “When you get angry at Darin, sure enough, he needs to take responsibility for his part of things but you need to talk to him from reality rather than from your pain. Your reactions to his choices don’t fit his crimes, it’s over the top and it shuts him down and he moves away from you because he feels like a failure. You're not talking to him like a healthy adult, but like that kid who was abandoned, neglected, and put in harm’s way and he can’t partner with you. He’s wrong before he ever gets started, so what choice does he have other than duck and cover to protect himself?

Oh shit. She was right.

Lori Jean had gotten to know me, listened deeply to my story, and then made the connections about how I was relating (rather poorly) to my husband. For more than 20 years we had had the “same fight” over and over and it always turned out the same way. Until the year Lori Jean saw my flaws, called them out, and walked me through them. Once she helped me unwind the spirals inside of me I was able to take responsibility for my part of our marital problems rather than blame and shame him and point out all his faults. (Side note: good marriage means we have to make peace with our past before we point any fingers at our spouse).

HERE’S WHAT NOT TO DO

At one point, I got “stuck” in a hospital that did not know what to do with me. In fact, one attending doctor actually walked in and said, “We can’t figure this thing out. Simultaneous heart, liver, and lung failure that doesn’t match up with any of the usual causes. We’re stumped. What do you think is wrong with you?” While I liked his willingness to be vulnerable with me and say he didn’t have an answer, it vexed me to learn that, after weeks of inpatient tests and procedures, my medical team had no clue what was wrong. And I was getting worse.

To top things off, earlier that day a local pastor came to visit me and offer his “support.” But he sat down and spent the whole time telling me what it was like for him to go through his son’s ruptured appendix a few months back.

Major fumble.

Let’s just call this whole conversation a “Never-say” when it comes to visiting folks in the hospital. Under no circumstances should you ever talk about your experience unless it is pretty darn close to that of the patient. And only do this after you have “Leaned In” for a while, and offered a warm, empathetic ear to their story of pain.

And the “Appendix Pastor” mistake can only be topped by a visit from a gal I now call “Shame Lady.” One day, while my body carried 25 lbs. of runaway, extra fluid that bulged out of my stomach and down my legs from heart failure, as I lay in a hospital bed on oxygen while getting a blood transfusion, a woman I had never met walked into my hospital room and proclaimed that she knew exactly what sin I had committed that had got me so sick! When she whipped out a Bible coded with a “this sin = that sickness” table of contents, I just froze. Trust me when I tell you that most anyone who has been struck down by a major illness is regularly searching for ANY reason they may have caused their own problems, and also trying to remedy (aka: repent, make amends, etc.) for those things as quickly as possible.

While it may or may not have been accurate, (Who knows? Can we actually measure the sin = sickness ratio?) it was just in poor taste. Shame Lady...keep that stuff to yourself, and instead, stay home and pray for me, or send a hot meal to my family, OK?

Over-simplification of the problem and the solution

Another thing to try and avoid as a leader is “over-simplifying” a person’s problems. One time I sat in a Sunday church service and listened to the preacher bang the pulpit and talk about a scripture related to what husbands and wives should be doing in order to be more Biblical. He seemed frustrated. And I can only imagine that he was exhausted from the relentless demands of being a faith leader, counseling parishioners, the never-ending needs of the churchgoers, and everyone’s feedback on his sermon that day. Pastors have a very tough job.

What made me cringe the most that morning was not his pounding the pulpit. Sometimes there’s no better way to communicate than to physically push and hit a solid object to get a point across. That’s what anger does in us, it fuels our rage and gets us in motion. His intensity about the scriptural command that husbands and wives shape up and prioritize each other more than themselves was pretty spot-on. Instead, what made me roll my eyes was him yelling this conclusion to his speech: SO, ALL OF YOU, STOP GETTING DIVORCED!

Why was this a problem? Because it’s not that simple. Just because we know what to do doesn’t mean we know how to do it. Be careful to not over-simplify the problems or solutions of those you lead. For instance, I’ve heard people tell their alcoholic family members, just don’t drink anymore. I’ve listened while well-meaning parents plead with their depressed and cutting teenager to, please, just be happy. Oversimplification is the buzz-kill of problem-solving, effective leadership, and healthy trusting relationships.

I’m sure the pastor that pounded the pulpit and shamed every divorced or unhappily married person in the room was just really frustrated with having to manage so many failing marriages, and that’s why he yelled at us like a fed-up parent. He wanted us to please STOP burdening his already burdened job. I get it. However, he missed the most essential part of the equation that day: Show us how to stay married.

To have a good marriage is probably the hardest job there is, takes hundreds of hours of work, is not possible for every couple, and takes so much technical knowledge and self-discipline, that it really is not for the faint of heart or for those who just don’t want to work at it. It is truly a learned set of skills that take hundreds of hours of cultivation and practice.

Please, dear pulpit pounding leader, tell us HOW to do what you’re commanding of us, don’t just expect us to know how to play a game we’ve never been taught. Give us the rule book, show us the moves, hand us a map, and then cheer us on while you hand us water and snacks. Long-term relationships are a level of difficulty akin to hiking Mt. Everest. Maybe we need a Sherpa and not an angry, burned-out leader.

WHAT TO DO AND SAY FOR THOSE WHO ARE SUFFERING - RIGHT NOW

When people are facing hard times they need to hear these things:

• We all love (or at least “like”) you and your family

• We can’t imagine what this must be like for you

• We haven’t forgotten about you

• We would like to handle some specific needs for your family 

• Here are some soft jammies, a warm blanket, and pretty flowers as a way to say we care

• Ask: What has this been like for you? Please tell me more. And then what?

• Can I share some funny jokes or a silly movie with you so you can have the good medicine of laughter while you suffer?

• What do you need from us around you?

Here is one last idea:

WEAR A GOWN

if you do go to the hospital to visit someone, do what a good friend of mine once did - she grabbed a clean hospital gown from the laundry cart and put it on over her clothes before she came into my room. I got a huge kick out of this! Given that I was the “sick one” who had to wear a frumpy gown which only added to my discouragement in the hospital, seeing one of my Tribe in a blue gown instantly made me feel so loved and so “seen” by her. I had a HUGE smile in my heart the rest of that day as I felt the love of my friends.

Thanks to all the courageous and effective leaders in my life for validating my struggle, believing in my faith, helping the ones who were helping me, offering practical help, and telling our story. Keep wearing your blue gowns, and never talk to anyone who is sick about an appendix or their sins!

Cheers,

Cindy