Better Practices - Decompression

This is a series of posts that outline our better practices - tactical things that you could do right now that The Ember Cast has found highly profitable for growing global leaders. Feel free to use these ideas with attribution, meaning just say, "I got this from The Ember Cast."

Decompression and debriefing is one of the most difficult things to execute as a leader and the research is clear: if you do not decompress the experience with your team, your cross cultural trip will have zero impact. It will be as if your team never left their house. It is that important.

It's difficult because it comes at a time in the lifecycle of a trip when everything is winding down. Your team has just completed most of their tasks. You are probably traveling on your way home. The team has been away for more than a few days. Everyone is looking forward to being home. It is precisely at this moment in the trip when decompression requires you to stop imagining what it will be like to sleep in your bed and instead ramp your energy up for a few more days to properly engage your team for finishing well.

Here are a few suggestions for making this work well when your trip is winding down and you are sick of your team, salivating for some good Dim Sum and ready to sleep in your own bed.
+ The theme of good decompression is 'change.' You put this experience together for your students so that they would be different from it. They would be more joyous, more giving, more selfless. Do not be afraid of asking significant questions that will lead to change.
+ Resources for decompression are very scarce. Seth Barnes has given the world gold with his series of posts on the subject. Save off a subset of his great questions to use with your team.
+ If you can plan for one or two days at a neutral location, on the way home, where you can relax as well as have time to process what you have experienced. Granted it is difficult and expensive to add this to your trip. At times we have done this without other locations too, in airport terminals and restaurants, on public transport, on flights home. The key is not locale, the key is to do it.
+ I like to do this over a whole day, meaning I plan 5-10 questions, and we give the team free time at the beach or pool or whatever and we have a mini session for each question, time to journal and share, all spread over a whole day, one question every hour.
+ One of the questions I always use is asking the students to write a 20 second summary, 2 minute summary and a 20 minute outline of the trip. This is a fundamental one that helps them process the trip for themselves as well as for people who ask them about it. Most people will only listen for 20 seconds. A few will listen for 2 minutes. One day, they may get asked to write a report or give a talk for a missions agency.
+ We have a two page 'toolkit' for Decompression. It's ready to be printed out and delivered to your team. You should have one too - if you prep it now, it will be much easier to execute when you are only hours from home.

London, 2015.

Friday Burn

::: Considering the Vacancy Tax

It could be something like: For any storefront that’s empty, after two months of vacancy, the landlord has to pay a tax of 20% of the average rent they’d be receiving. All the money would go to neighborhood improvements and policing.

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::: City Street Orientations from Around the World
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::: Mike Frost on NYC

What's happening here is your future, even if you don't live in Gotham City. Wake up and recognize the old, tired ways of doing and being church are changing. Cities like New York don’t have all the answers, but they're being forced to confront the questions more quickly than the rest of us.

This is why Ember almost exclusively serves in cities.
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Photo: Decompression.

For 2029

This is a team I helped lead in 2008, ten years ago, which seems both like yesterday and centuries ago. The old town, Sopron, Hungary. And look at my kids.

Most people that lead these kinds of things come home from something like this and declare success, almost before even landing. Team members do this too - I've never heard a student land at the airport and tell me that they are never doing that again. Instead, and I'm guilty of this too, we all proclaim this was 'the best team ever!'

Instead, let me suggest that you temper your proclamations. Influencing students is a long game, played best with patience, intention and modeling. 10 years out might be a good marker in time to make some of these declarations. Ask yourself: Are you still in touch with these students? Do you know what kind of influence they have in the world? Are they more kind, more in tune with their lives and the world around them, do they embody being a sent person even more than while on this trip? Maybe that helps you gauge the success or failure of your experience. Keep in mind - you are not the only reason they are doing great or doing awful.

Dig deeper though. What is it that you want from your students 10 years after they have this experience with you? You can't declare success or failure if you don't have goals. We have one major measurement for The Ember Cast summer teams.
How many are in intentional ministry/leadership? [Note - vocational, bivocational, volunteer, lots of variety in this]
I'll play too. On this team - about 70% that I know of.

Plan for the long term. Execute with the end in mind. Don't scream how great your trip was at baggage claim.

Ember October Dinner

Our guest this past weekend was RM, who is in the midst of starting an agricultural training center to provide tactical farming skills for people interested in this kind of thing. The applications are broad, including being a grower state-side as well as in another culture. This starts this coming summer, based in PA to start with, and would be a summer long training and mentoring experience. Ping if you need a lead.

Some highlights from our time:
+ RM always had an interest in growing things, from the time he was very young. Gardens, farm animals, etc. Your past shapes your dream [Dream Year.]
+ A pivotal experience was being overseas and seeing this kind of thing in it's context in SE Asia.
+ Original plans included a global export business but that fell through.
+ The ability to grow things is fascinating to everyone. Neighbors always want to see you if you are growing something.
+ Lots of agricultural concepts are redemptive analogies - mustard seed, sheep, death to life.
+ There was a good discussion between the adults about scale and multiplication. I appreciated that because students don't hear that kind of conversation very much - scale or bail.
+ Advice for a young person: take every opportunity that comes your way and find a mentor.

Lots of students tonight. Special thanks to RM for being our guest.

Friday Burn

::: Half of the World is Now Middle Class or Wealthier
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::: 5 Month Old Baby Youngest to Visit All 50 States
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::: Crossfit as Church
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Ember Monthly Dinners

Last year, in an effort to invest in our Ember staff a bit more, we started hosting a monthly dinner where we invited some of the most innovative people we knew serving in the global nonprofit space to interact with our leaders. The conversation was always lively, centered around calling and missional imagination, as well as hearing the latest on the super interesting projects of our guests. As the year went on, the guest list blossomed into fabulous dinners with people involved in what the Lord was doing around the world.

These dinners start again this year and our first one is this coming weekend. We are pivoting slightly this year by including more focus on 'executing your dream.' If you are a local high school student and consider yourself an emerging global student leader, ping for invite details.

10GDC

Ember facilitated a culture service learning experience with a group of 10th grade ladies this past weekend - we had a great time getting to know them and were super impressed at their passion for the world, their grit to getting things done and their posture of learning. We are better for working with them. Here are some of the elements:
+ A Friday evening session introducing the weekend and some of our Ember mantras and concepts.
+ Sat morning - serving with A Wider Circle
+ Sat lunch - cultural navigation in the Shaw neighborhood of DC
+ Sat aft - church at The Miracle Theater gathering of National Community Church
+ Sat eve - dinner and decompress near Eastern Market

Really appreciate A Wider Circle and their approach to poverty alleviation and they have a huge reach. I love their best reminder: that items should be in 'dignity-condition'. This summer one of our partners received a box of donated food and it was all expired. Many of us believe that it is totally acceptable to give our trash to those less fortunate.

Modeling cultural navigation continues to be a central theme for Ember and the students we work with and I'm thrilled at how we have grown in this skill. Shaw is a great place to do something like this - very safe, lots of opportunities for this kind of observation because its a big mixing bowl, a good place to walk slow and concentrate on learning.

Pastor Heather Zempel preached at NCC and in light of the past few weeks, it wasn't planned out that way. She did however preach a fantastic message from Rev 2 about the church at Thyatira. A standing goal for Ember is to expose students to different expressions of Church when we can and NCC is one of the most futuristic churches I know.

Special thanks to ProtoGuides Hailey and Audrey for serving with this team.

Friday Burn

::: When Church is My Idol
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::: Goalkeepers
The Gates Foundation on the Global Goals
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::: The Neighborhoods That Offer a ‘Bargain’ on Upward Mobility
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::: "Are we sure what Jesus is looking for is well-attended church services?" - Francis Chan

Photo: Mosaic Hollywood, Sept 2018.

Thank You, Board of Director, Leslie Brettschneider

A million years ago, this high school girl named Leslie joined some of our fun when we wanted to engage students to serve local and distant communities, see the world and to call them to stop just existing and start living. She stuck around too, making the transformation from a student to a leader, helping us lead teams for four summers, including teams to Brasil, Cameroon, and Hungary twice. Leslie was also pivotal to some behind the scenes leadership development with SPACE. When I started The Ember Cast, she was on my short list of people that I wanted to lead with.

The rhythm of people's involvement with Ember is driven by seasons - we know I'm the only one who is sticking with this for the long haul. So Leslie's time on the Ember board of directors has come to an end after being here from before the beginning. I am immensely grateful for her time on the board. She has given wisdom and insight to our organization and has always given input with a bias towards action.

Leslie remains one of our bright spots and a model - see the world clearly as a student and you can intentionally carve out a life that serves others. From one of our favorite students to a leader powerhouse, she's working in the nonprofit sector in DC and making moves with some leadership initiatives with a church in the city. And she is the only one that has seen a rock concert with me on a missions trip.

Thank you Leslie. A future that has not even been created is in debt to you.

Leslie, 2nd from left, Nov 2017.

SAN/LAX

Been in San Diego and LA the past few days, part has been visiting family and part looking at a few colleges for Em. By my count, she has less than 40 weekends at home. Parents, don't waste your time or your attention.

Friday Burn

::: Crispr Edited Mosquitoes
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::: Welcoming Homeless as Property Managers
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::: How to Run a Better Meeting
Seth Godin's advice on meetings and conferences - pure gold.
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Post Sabbatical 2018

Ember things:
Provide a daily devotional for summer teams while on the experience.
Include a Code of Conduct within the team application so that this is understood at the inception of the project.
Dig into the possibilities of partnering with the Greece ministry from this summer in a deeper way.
2019 will probably look different because of a Sheng family trip.
Small pivot for yearly operations to run September - August.
I wrote a small report about the Ember IG team. Request access by clicking this.
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I have felt a bit uninformed about the general LGBT issue and specifically the implications for church and nonprofit organizational culture so I spent time in some books and listening to some messages on the topic. Ping if you have something interesting or want to know my resources.
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If you are in ministry today, you have likely been impacted by Willow Creek Church and the way they have innovated for decades. In case you missed it, they were/are in the midst of a leadership crisis and decided to continue on with the Global Leadership Summit anyway. Erwin McManus' talk at the Summit, within the context of this crisis, was profound and powerful. Although I didn't attend the Summit, I listened to it multiple times after buying the audio messages. Unfortunately, they are no longer selling audio downloads of the messages.
"I had the genetic makeup of a coward. What you fear has mastery of your life. If you are afraid of heights, you stay low. If you are afraid of crowds, you stay alone. What you fear establishes the boundaries of your freedom. And that is the beautiful thing. It is only in relationship to God, where the Scripture says, "Perfect love casts out all fear," when God is the only one that you live in relationship to in fear, it is only God that sets you free and sets you free in His love. Every other master that controls you by fear is a cruel master and will steal your life away."
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Mark Batterson spoke a 3 part series on a theology of the city and how National Community Church will impact Washington DC for the next 70 years. Inspiring and challenging - would we all learn to dream like they do.
"If we get this right, we create a prototype for the urban church. Church as usual is not going to get us where we need to go. We cannot build spaces that get used one or two times a week. There are ways to do Church that no one has thought of yet."
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I gave up Coca Cola and french fries except for once a week. I started playing a little bit of racquetball but it's only been a week. My cholesterol was out the roof.
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Katie finished a 6 week internship in Dehli at end of August and flew directly back to school. Her internship was focused on analyzing whether giving preschoolers some advance education tips help them do better when they get to school. We are spending some time in SoCal in the next few days looking at colleges with Emily. In 11 months, Dea and I will be empty nesters. We have a Southwest Companion pass that will last through the end of 2019 and are looking to capitalize on it.

ProtoGuide 18-19 Fall Reading

StrengthsFinder - One of the best personal leadership and influence assessments. We take every ProtoGuide through this because knowing yourself well is foundational for leading others.
The Circle Maker - Part memoir about a church down the street that is one of the most innovative organizations in America. Not many churches and lead pastors have a vision that gives people chills. Every semester has one book that is on the list for just fun to read, this is that one.
Movements That Change the World - Addison breaks down social structures that are ingredients for every movement and catalytic leaders think in movements.
Western Christians in Global Mission - A good primer to put an end to thinking that we in the West know the best, have the most and are the only ones that can get the job done.
Multiplying Missional Leaders - On the ground, tactical leadership behaviors.

If you know someone else reading books like these with high school students, I'd love to meet them.

8th Grade Culture Learning

The Ember Cast facilitated one of our culture service learning experiences this past weekend with a group of 8th grade girls - we loved every moment working with them. This came about from a request from one of their small group leaders and they desired an exposure to global issues, an opportunity for this group to serve in a community and hearing from someone doing some pretty neat things. Elements included:
+ team building.
+ serving at The Well in Curtis Bay, which included some organizing and cleaning in both the Hope Chest [their clothing closet] and the CEO's office, strategy with a social enterprise they are launching in September, and being in the neighborhood making friends.
+ a culture navigation walk.
+ dinner in Fells Point.
+ In every apple, there is an orchard.

The Well in Curtis Bay is one of our best partners and we are constantly inspired by them. Curtis Bay has the whole package of urban fun and the environment was maybe a tad edgy for these girls but we wholly trust the team at The Well and knew it would work out fine. Middle school kids are not too young to learn about big global systemic issues and Curtis Bay was the perfect context for this weekend. Special thanks to 3 Ember ProtoGuides for helping guide most of these activities for a successful weekend.

Last big project for the 2017-2018 school year. My sabbatical starts as soon as you read this - see you in September.

Friday Burn

::: The Table of Disruptive Technologies
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::: Decades in Which Each Country Reaches Peak Population
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::: The Power Law of Dunbar's Number
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::: If you don't go, you don't grow. - Greg St Cyr