Awesome Permission
One of the things we’ve noticed while mentoring is that some people suddenly take off like a rocket – they accept responsibility for more than they previously took on, and then they seek out more. They also handle this increase in responsibility very well, and they impress people who previously were at best neutral – along with people who were previously disappointed.
We’ve seen it happen, and we’ve been trying to figure out how to describe what the pieces are, because if a cool thing happens, you should explain how to reproduce it.
So, we began to think of it in terms of the process, the ingredients, and the result.
If a cool thing happens, you should try to figure out how to reproduce it.
The Process
There are two versions of what happens:
Struggling
- An employee is struggling with their job.
- Someone they respect has a real, honest conversation with them. “You have the capability to be more than this. I love you. Believe in yourself, and go surprise yourself.“
- The person decides to trust both the person having the conversation with them and themselves enough to try, and they go out and do amazing, unexpected things.
Instinct of Potential
- An employee is good. Maybe even really good. Someone with previous experience with awesome permission becomes aware of them.
- The person with awesome permission experience…extends awesome permission. “You are actually awesome. Did you know that? You should unleash that some more.”
- The person decides to trust both the person having the conversation with them and themselves enough to try, and they go out and do amazing, unexpected things.
So really…
There’s only one process. TADA!
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- Person A (giver of awesome permission) becomes aware of Person B (in need of awesome permission).
- Person A extends awesome permission to Person B. (note how honest “get your act together” conversations are actually awesome permission?)
- Person B decides to trust Person A and themselves enough to try, and they go out and do amazing, unexpected things.
Ingredients
Probably you can spot these in the process, but the list is something like this:
- a relationship between the two people, real enough for there to be trust and respect
- timing
- This one is frustrating. Awesome permission doesn’t always work on the first try. It may not even work on the…tenth try. It might require a different giver of awesome permission entirely. That’s okay though, God does stuff, and God is very much involved in awesome permission. Sometimes it takes time.
- the giver of awesome permission needs…
- the ability to see people in need of awesome permission
- willingness and soul space to extend awesome permission – it’s not an easy thing to do, and being rejected after offering it hurts
- a willingness to have honest (unpleasant) conversations
- the receiver of awesome permission needs…
- a willingness to accept the awesome permission and act on it
Result
A lot of people are capable of being awesome (whatever that means for them!), but they’ve been told somewhere along the way that they shouldn’t be. Society is actually super great at this, making square pegs more or less round-ish. People typically make themselves round-ish by making themselves smaller – which, as far as we can tell, is not at all what God wants from people. Since it isn’t what he wants, it tends to not go very well and to be mostly painful for the person trying to make themselves less.
However, when some of these people simply get permission to be the awesome, real version of themselves, at the right time from the right person, something clicks in their brains and they realize that awesome is exactly what they’ve always wanted to be.
The fact is, people are meant to be awesome, and they’re meant to rely on each other to get there.
P.S. from Laine
Lest you think this is entirely theory…I was on the receiving end of awesome permission around the time I was given a title change to Architect. I was very good at my job, but I was also very shy, mostly quiet (until I got angry, anyway…), and extremely hesitant to be who I really was.
Josh and I have known each other for a long time (…like 12 years. #old #PegaLandFTW), and he basically told me to knock it off and be myself – because I was awesome. (Thanks, Josh. :-D) It was the start of many, many good things for me, including a friendship I value deeply.