Many leaders are managers — they manage the world around them instead of changing or influencing it.
Jay Pathak
Last week I had the pleasure of going to a leadership conference with my church. It was simply amazing. I learned so many things that will help me as I walk the plan that God has for me. One of the most meaningful, however, is that leaders live life with a lean.
Jay Pathak taught us that true leaders are different from everyone else. The only people that change the world are those that appear to be insane. They are tilted. They lean. They look crazy. A true leader has to be tilted.
Are you leaning?
In a culture that is addicted to More, to choose less is to lean. It’s a lean into simplicity. People are cramming their homes full of more crap and cramming their schedules full of more commitments. If you simplify, you will stand out.
To be a minimalist is to be a trailblazer. In a culture that is consumed with accumulating, voluntarily choosing to have only the necessities is never going to be a popular choice. You’re going to get lots of strange looks for choosing to have less when everyone else is doing everything possible to have more.
The pressure to conform can be intense. We are consistently bombarded with messages tell us that what we have isn’t good enough. The commercials tell us that we simply cannot live without that new facial cream. Your family member asks “You’re not going to wear that, are you?” And then there’s the One Day Sale at Macy’s.
But to be a leader is to live with a lean. You look crazy when you choose less. You stand out, and that’s a good thing. Because when you lean, sometimes others lean with you. Others may choose to cut some things out. They follow your lean. Leaders actually create a new normal by leaning. What do you do then? You lean some more.
Lean into simplicity. Lean into having only what you need. Lean into clearing clutter.To be a minimalist is to live with a lean.
Lean. Then lean some more. You will look weird. It might even look like you’re insane. But if you want to change the world, you’ve got to lean.
Minimalist Believer 