{"id":481,"date":"2012-04-26T08:11:36","date_gmt":"2012-04-26T15:11:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/gc2012\/?p=481"},"modified":"2012-04-26T08:11:36","modified_gmt":"2012-04-26T15:11:36","slug":"a-lesson-in-giving-up-control","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/a-lesson-in-giving-up-control\/","title":{"rendered":"A Lesson in Giving Up Control"},"content":{"rendered":"

If you don’t know me yet, let me introduce myself.<\/strong><\/p>\n

My name is Dana Lede, and I am a busy person. \u00a0I work on average 10 hours a day at my day job as a music teacher. \u00a0I am the lead for a Professional Learning Community at work. \u00a0I am also the chair of the Site-Centered Decision Making team, one of the main leadership teams at my school. \u00a0I am the president-elect for the Puget Sound Youth Wind Ensemble. \u00a0I am in charge of our regional Solo\/Ensemble competition for middle school and high school students. \u00a0I am on the Board of Higher Education and Campus Ministries. \u00a0And I am on the Conference Council for Young Adult Ministries.<\/p>\n

And I am a control freak.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Wow, I don’t think I realized just how much need I have for control until I put all that down to paper (so-to-speak). \u00a0I like being in control. \u00a0I mean come on, if I didn’t do it all, it wouldn’t get done…right? \u00a0I don’t like asking for help, and I don’t like receiving it when it’s offered. \u00a0And I really, really, really don’t like people making decisions thousands of miles away that will affect my community.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, that’s exactly what is going on right now in Florida. \u00a0People are making decisions…important decisions…that will affect all of us. \u00a0Now some of the legislation may not seem that important, but there are definitely some big issues this year. \u00a0Structural changes might not seem like they will affect us on a local church level, but I believe they will. \u00a0Sexuality and other Social Principle issues are huge. \u00a0These are both issues I feel very strongly about. \u00a0And yet it’s not me there debating and letting my voice be heard, it’s someone else.<\/p>\n

Breathe, Dana. \u00a0Just breathe. \u00a0“Be still and know that I am God.” \u00a0Breathe.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Seriously. \u00a0It is really hard for me to give things like this up to God. \u00a0Does God really have a plan, and is this it? \u00a0For us to debate endlessly issues that cover the spectrum of our denomination? \u00a0I don’t know the answer to any of those questions. \u00a0But I do know there’s a reason I am drawn to the ‘methods’ of Methodism. \u00a0I can’t always make the decisions for everyone. \u00a0And really, that would be scary. \u00a0Imagine if a 29 year old like me, who can’t even balance a checkbook, was in charge of all our finances? \u00a0Or what if I could make all the decisions for music for the whole denomination? \u00a0Would we all be singing hymns, or contemporary music? \u00a0Bluegrass? \u00a0Jazz? (ooh that sounds exciting) Alternative? Though this is fun for me to fantasize, I’m sure I would not please everyone, or even a small portion.<\/p>\n

Luckily, I don’t get to make decisions that affect everyone, and neither does any one person. \u00a0We make them as a group. \u00a0And I need to be okay with the decisions of our Pacific Northwest delegates. \u00a0Many I know, but some I do not. \u00a0Many may be the stereotypical ‘red-headed step-child’ others see our conference as, many may not. \u00a0I don’t know. \u00a0But I do have faith that the right people were prayerfully chosen to represent all of us. \u00a0And I have to believe that the decisions made, whether I agree with them or not, are made with care and prayer. \u00a0Because I know they will take as much care in their job as delegate as I would.<\/p>\n

So now I sit back, check Twitter and Facebook, and learn the wonderful art of patience. \u00a0And each day that goes by during General Conference I learn to be less and less of a control freak.<\/p>\n

Photo Credit: Control Freak by Flickr User dmdzine, Creative Commons\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you don’t know me yet, let me introduce myself. My name is Dana Lede, and I am a busy person. \u00a0I work on average 10 hours a day at my day job as a music teacher. \u00a0I am the lead for a Professional Learning Community at work. \u00a0I am also the chair of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":498,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[6],"tags":[10,18,46],"class_list":{"0":"post-481","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-conversation","8":"tag-gc2012","9":"tag-holy-conversation","10":"tag-trust"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/controls.jpg?fit=640%2C423&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2l75j-7L","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=481"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":499,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481\/revisions\/499"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=481"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=481"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=481"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}