UNITY. Nothing unites the world better than the Olympics. I watched the opening ceremony with all its pageantry and excitement the Tokyo Olympics 2020 offered the athletes and the world. The technology was amazing with the hundreds of drones above the stadium, the fireworks, the cauldron opening up, and the lighted visuals telling the story of the culture of Japan. Beautiful. Masterful. Serene.
What stood out the most to me was the lone figure that occasionally stood on the stage that made us focus on that one person whether it was an athlete, musician, dancer, performer, or torchbearer. That one lone figure was as impactful as the collective body gathered to celebrate the best of athletes. Powerful.
When I first thought of this week's blog title CHAMPIONS came to mind. We need champions in the world. Those that forge a cause or support our cause. Those that will work hard to achieve their goals, but also celebrate ours. The more I thought about that in comparison to the Olympics it wasn't so much a focus on the individual, but on the collective.
Unity means "the state of being united or joined as a whole" (googlesearch.com)
After a year of pandemic, we need to be united again. I realized the Tokyo Olympics paid homage to this past year by naming it "2020" instead of "2021." It wasn't until I started writing this that I realized we haven't lost a year nor have we forgot it, but we are celebrating it in a long-awaited manner resonate of the human spirit.
As a woman of faith, I found a wonderful online magazine called Influence Magazine that melds leadership development with biblical principles when discussing unity (www.influencemagazine.com)
In an article called Building Unity, Not Uniformity it states, "Being on the same page as a team does not mean being the same. You can have unity without uniformity. Each person on your team has different styles and preferences. Not everyone will eat the same exact food as you, wear the same clothes or like the same sports team. Some of them won’t even like sports! But that doesn’t mean you can’t foster unity. A team is made up of individuals all headed in the same direction. As the leader of that team, there are two important things to understand. First, unity means that everyone has the same goal (1 Corinthians 12: 4-7) and everyone has her or his own role (verses 8-11).
While unity is not identified as a leadership skill, it takes skill to master. When working in a team it takes unity to bring individual ideas, desires, opinions, and even conflicts together. Building a team isn't for wimps. It takes compassion, understanding, and lots of grace for yourself and others. We all make mistakes, but it's in learning, adapting, changing, questioning, and comprehending that we turn mistakes into learning opportunities.
Someone once said, "Mistakes have the power to turn you into something better than you were before."
Growing up, mistakes became criticisms by those closest to me. It bothered me, so I chose to have a different approach when parenting my children. I decided that their mistakes were only such if they learned nothing from them or repeated again. I decided on giving grace instead of criticism. It's the same way I choose to lead at work as its the reciprocal experience I want from my colleagues when I fail. Grace.
So as you watch this final week of the Olympics, keep in mind the unity that team sports has on individual goals. When you celebrate the successes, think about the failures too. You know the athletes who experience them are. Let your heart break for them (empathy), but also celebrate those who succeed (joy). You see unity is more about others and less of ourselves.
What She Said ~ Beverly
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