LEADERSHIP AND A GROWTH MINDSET

bag. And getting to bed on time is a journey I am still on! A growth mindset says it’s OK if I have these weaknesses; I can improve even if it’s small daily steps of focus and a commitment to continuous learning.

Continuous learning and progress are key, and being able to turn mistakes, challenges and failures to your advantage is all part of adopting a growth mindset. Self-awareness will help you prepare for failure and a growth mindset will make you celebrate it. If you, like me, are fully aware that your mouth has got you into trouble before…then you prepare for mistakes in that area. How? Well, sometimes you can determine to not always have an opinion. You can enter a meeting, having gone for a walk beforehand so you’re completely at peace, and decide that to live a more peaceful life, you will just refuse to respond to negativity.

Self-awareness also helps us to set boundaries and to forgive others for their shortcomings because we are fully aware that none of us are the full package. It also promotes unity. When we are fully aware we don’t know it all, it makes us more likely to draw on the expertise of a wider team. We listen to others and value their opinions; we ask the right questions with growth in mind; and we work more collaboratively. Insecurities, division and toxicity will be scarce in work environments, home and church spaces where selfawareness, emotional intelligence and a growth mindset are front and centre.

That’s a strategy embedded in emotional intelligence - managing your emotions, instead of them managing you and being fully aware that you could get it wrong BUT at least you have a plan! AND you’re developing the psychological tools to do better - and you will. Of course, in our success equation, prayer is the biggest factor of all.

1 Thessalonians 5:16 says: ‘Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.’

Thanksgiving and gratitude are central to all of this - as is the revelation that we are so blessed to be able to empower and help to shape the lives of others. Self-awareness should cause us to check ourselves regularly: am I complaining too much, becoming critical or ungrateful? Sometimes when we’ve been doing something for a long time, we can forget how passionate we were at the start. Gratitude goes out the window and we take the favour and grace of God on our lives for granted. The art of the possible is to daily give thanks for the position of leadership we find ourselves in - whether that’s in the home, workplace or church setting.

If you’re reading this and have grown weary in the leadership seat you occupy, command a grateful heart into existence, go before God and ask Him to relight that fire. Leadership is such a privilege; do all you can to do it well.

Esther Kuku

Director of Communications and Engagement for Resuscitation Council UK @mew36

Approximately one month before the global pandemic, on 20th February 2020, I was the host of an event highlighting and honouring men. The event was revolutionary. There were approximately 100 men in the room and something very special took place that couldn’t be denied. Fast forward two years to 1st March 2022, which saw the launch of my very first radio show called Naked Conversations - a safe place for conversations with men, for men and about men. The experience has been life changing.

As a single mother of four boys, it has been exciting and exhausting, scary and supernatural. Raising boys is not for cowards! Prior to having sons, I wrestled with the concept of living in “a man’s world”; my past experiences with men had left a very bitter and hateful taste in my mouth. It took years of mind renewal to see men from God’s perspective and to love them authentically, but that’s another story for another time…

It was the event in 2020 that made me realise how unappreciated and undervalued many men were feeling. The responses after the event left me in tears for days. I didn’t consider that there were men within my circle who felt the world would be a better place without them in it. That revelation was devastating. That was when I made a personal commitment to honour and highlight men as part of my mission. I realised that many men are hurting and broken, many are hiding, many are running, many are dying, and what they need is for someone to love them back to life.

But there is a missing link…

1 Corinthians 13:4-8 (NIV) says:

‘Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonour others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.’

My conviction is that women are the missing link We are the link that was purposely designed and designated to help and heal our men. Women were crafted by God to help men. Women were created for this very reason.

*** I realise this statement is controversial, having had many conversations with women over the years, because the realisation is that many women themselves are in pain and that pain has often been at the hands of men.***

Hurting people, hurt people. I know this first hand, but what if? What if we, as women,