I'm bad at details. I hate the excel sheets, the line items, the itty bitty teeny weeny to dos, the nuts, the bolts...the details. I can do this stuff if I have to, and I often do, but I loathe this type of work and I quickly get bored. Now, I have tremendous respect for folks who are gifted in this area and I could not function without these people in my life, but I'm just not that person.
Despite these flaws, as it turns out, I do have a few strengths. And one such strength lies in being a big picture person. I am a dreamer of dreams and I can almost literally see them coming to life in my mind's eye. I see visions, and I know how to talk about them in such a way as to get people excited and interested, passionate and engaged. I'm a hopeless optimist and an endless believer in the human capacity for love, change, and growth. How I actually take the tiny steps to live out these awesome visions that I cast is often inconsequential to me in the moment, but I believe in them so much that it almost doesn't matter. Silly, I know, but true.
One of my dreams is that every person in every country throughout the entire world would experience justice. That food, safe water and basic shelter would be accessible to every individual, that education would be available to all who hope to pursue it, and that every child would have a safe place to lay their heads at night. I'm starting in Mozambique.
As I prepare to board the plane tomorrow to head back to Mozambique with one of the largest congregations in the Missouri Methodist Conference, Morning Star UMC, I am honoring and refining these big-picture-casting-the-net-out-wide type skills. My goal is to literally provide a huge smattering of opportunities and paint a beautiful picture of our work in Mozambique, with the end result of lighting little fires in the hearts of each of the people on the team. In my Meyers-Briggs personality profile it states that, "There are two basic things that ENFPs seek most in the workplace: The chance to explore new ideas, and the chance to conduct that exploration alongside other people who share their excitement." Bingo. This is my hope for this trip. To explore big ideas with people who can motivate thousands to get on board and come alongside us.
I fail and fall all of the time, especially when it comes to details. I drop the ball, I lose track of time, I trip over my shoe laces because I forget to tie them, I get so lost in my dreams. My prayer for this trip is that all of my stumbles and falls while dreaming will somehow pay off by capturing the hearts of those who could play central roles in bringing these dreams to life.