Senior leaders long to be effective leaders, but we may not be as good as we hope to be.

Leadership in a church context has become much much more complex, with increasing demands on the senior pastor to be excellent in leadership, managerial, and administrative on top of preaching, teaching and pastoral care..

Under stress we might suffer cyclical patterns of burnout, unhealthy coping modes, or psychological patterns we are unaware of.

There’s a temptation in chronic stress to pursue unhealthy coping modes, including detaching by excessive use of screens, alcohol, drugs, pornography, where we don’t experince the full sense of distress.

Or there’s running to control, highly or micromanaging a situation, overwork, reassurance seeking or over-researching.

Valerie Ling and Sarah Hindle, from Sydney’s Center for Effective Serving, say among leaders self awareness an emotional awareness is critical (https://effectiveserving.com.au/) http://www.thepastorsheart.net/podcast/effective-serving"