Leadership Tips
Dear LWML Leaders,
Welcome back to Tips for Leading with Confidence. We pray this leadership tip will be beneficial as you serve our Lord through the LWML. We welcome your feedback and suggestions.
Setting Healthy Boundaries
If you struggle with overextending yourself when responding to the needs of others, you may have problems setting healthy boundaries.
Weak boundaries leave leaders defenseless against “users” who feel entitled to manipulate them and who expect to be taken care of at their expense.
Rigid boundaries cause leaders to shut other people out. They live unprepared and ill-equipped for the give-and-take that healthy relationships require.
Flexible boundary leaders are competent in living their own life, yet with a balanced and healthy interest in others. They can be generous in sharing their time, compassion, and resources, without becoming overly responsible, or betraying their God-given duty to be the unique person He made them, just to please others.
Unlike rigid leaders, they bend and adjust as circumstances require, without becoming overwhelmed, defensive, resentful, blaming, or reactive. In tough situations, they roll with the punches, stay focused, and draw on a well of inner strength which God provides. People and circumstances don’t control them; they flex, and let God take charge. They are helpful, but they don’t feel guilty because they can’t “fix” everyone. Their boundaries enable them to adjust to circumstances. They work toward Bear one another’s burdens (Galatians 6:2), without doing too much or being responsible for others.
For tips on setting healthy boundaries, Edna Ellison and Tricia Scribner have a chapter in their book, Woman to Woman: Preparing Yourself to Mentor, New Hope Publishers, Birmingham, Alabama, First Printing 1999 (subsequent publishing date: April 20, 2011).
Ideas adapted from Daily Devotions, Lutheran Church Charities: Tim Hetzner, author; used by permission; giving glory to God!
God's Blessings,
Lois Teinert, Chairman
Leadership Development Committee
LWML 2019–2021 Leadership Development Committee
Marie McNary
Sherrie Smith
Lois Teinert, Chairman
Marie Chow, Vice President of Organizational Resources, Advisory
