A thought by Henry Cloud, from his book, Integrity (p. 53). HarperCollins e-books. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.)
Trust is such an important thing.
He says, “In the end, trust is about the heart, and someone making an investment in you from his or her heart. And if you gain people’s trust, their heart, then you also have their desire and passion. Heart, desire, and passion all go together. Without one, you don’t have the other. That is why some leaders only get compliance, but can’t capture their people’s best efforts. It is why some parents get obedience in the short term, but not autonomous kids who desire to be the best for them that they can be. These leaders and parents just impose their will on the other people.
“But the good ones capture the other people’s will, their true desire, through connecting with them first. It is the difference in the parent who tells the teenager to ‘get with it and stop hanging out with “‘those kids,’”’ and the one who sits down and tries to find out what the teen is getting from hanging out with ‘those kids.’ What part of the child’s heart are those kids able to capture that the parent and the parent’s values have not? That is the only way that a parent can move a child past compliance to being ‘willing’ to come the parent’s way.”
He goes on, “Will is an interesting term. We usually think of it in terms of volition and choice. ‘Will you do something?’ is asking if you would choose to do a particular thing. But, in another sense, for example in Greek, will means to ‘desire’ or ‘delight’ in something. If you ‘will it,’ then it is what you truly want. Anyone who has ever tried to depend on ‘willpower,’ for example, to stop doing something he or she truly desired has seen which one wins out in the end. ‘Willpower’ and just trying to make good choices cannot compete with the true desire of the heart, for that is where the passion is. You will not lose weight, for example, until your deepest desire is to get healthy. The heart is always stronger than mere ‘willpower.’”
He then says, “How far will a spouse go for someone who makes no attempt to understand and connect with where he or she is and what he or she is experiencing in the relationship? As time goes on, less and less. The love begins to wane, and the passion fails to fuel the commitment as it once did. That is when they get into danger if they do not have a deeper desire to live out their values and commitments, over and above how they feel. . . But, if someone feels understood, and connected with, it is a whole different story.”
And it really is, isn’t it?
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