People-Pleasing Pastors
BOOK SNAPSHOT: "Unhealthy people pleasing is a common leadership problem among today's pastors, affecting more than 70 percent to some degree. Since it acts much like a virus, a strong leadership 'immune system' is needed to counter it. By incorporating insight from the Bible, family systems and neuroscience, a pastor can develop a healthy immune system. Because of the immature ways many of us handle ongoing negative emotions (chronic anxiety), people pleasing is mostly driven by the emotional parts of our brains rather than the thinking parts. When we grow in our emotional maturity (differentiation of self) in both our inner world (thinking and feeling) and our out world (individuality and connectedness), we are less apt to people please. We mature by developing others and ourselves into PRESENT leaders instead of pleaser leaders." (Charles Stone, People-Pleasing Pastors: Avoiding the Pitfalls of Approval Motivated Leadership, p.25). This book has become on...