Video Transcript: Passive Aggressive Leaders

Well, now we get into the passive aggressive leader. We've talked about the narcissist, one of the navel gazers. We've talked about the leader who can't say no, that codependent. We've also talked about the overly controlling leader, who says, yeah, I gotta have it the way I want. I want what I want, when I want it, now, all the time. Well, now we get into the passive aggressive leader, a very different, interesting pattern. Although, as we cited before, a lot of these things go hand in hand, they overlap. But now as we pick it apart, we get to know each category, each topic, as we look at leadership and the dark side. Well, you may remember the hot air balloon story, we'll go over it again. The story goes like this. You're in a hot air balloon, hovering approximately 30 feet above the ground. He was lost he he didn't know where he was going. And he was close enough to the ground that he was able to talk to somebody this woman and she says You're in this hot air balloon.

And he's asking her where am I?

Well, she says you're approximately 30 feet above the ground. You're between 40 and 41 degrees north latitude and between 59 and 60 degrees west longitude. 

You must be an engineer the balloonist said.

I am, replied the woman. How did you know?

Well, answered the balloonist, everything you told me is technically correct, but I have no idea what to make of your information. And the fact is, I'm still lost. Frankly, you've not been much help at all. If anything, you've delayed my trip.

The woman below responded You must be in management. 

I am replied balloonist. And how did you know that?

Well, the woman said, you don't know where you are or where you're going, you've risen to where you are due to a large quantity of hot air that you put out, you made a promise which you've no idea how to keep, and you expect people beneath you to solve your problems. The fact is, you're in exactly the same position you're in before we met. But now somehow, you've managed to make it my fault. 

To make it her fault: that's the passive aggressive pattern. When the person in charge often says to you, well, then manipulates and even guilt trips. It's your fault. Oh, well, let's plan on this. Let's do that. And then if you fall short, or things are just right, yeah, there's some controlling control issues there. But this is where there's some blame shifting. And there's also passive behavior and aggressive behavior, where there's no honesty, there's no transparency. And it's often the case where the other person, terms of you and the other person, where the other person is saying to you. Why aren't you performing? What's wrong with you? Why aren't you perfect? And so on. So that's an interesting story about the man, the hot air balloon management, or being an engineer, these things are roles or identities. Who are we and how can we help each other interdependently while the passive aggressive leader.

Let's take a look at those passive aggressive leaders. They're resistant to goal setting and planning, quite often. Now you may have a leader who is much into goal setting and it seems like they are into planning. But often they'll say, Well, what did you do with the planning? What have you done in terms of goals? And then if you screw up, it's all your fault and they don't take responsibility. Or a pattern of erratic emotional behavior or are pessimistic attitude about the future. And they're trying to have you feel responsible where they will not feel responsible. And as I said, with a story, there's blaming others. It's your fault, not my fault. Can't believe it. Well, why didn’t you check with me, go off and say, Why wasn't I consulted? Now controlling person, again, you can see the overlap, there's control in there. But also, you've got this whole thing of manipulation and blame shifting and blaming. Then there are challenges with the passive aggressive leader. Again, going to planning and goal setting, they don't do well versus receiving criticism, evaluations, and also processing anger and expressing it properly. Now, as I mentioned before, in the other videos, we all have this situation, we all have all five dark sides, compulsivity. Also, with codependency and all different levels, we all deal with them. Passive aggressive, is no different. And so, check in yourself, do you have a challenge with planning, goal setting? Are you dealing with receiving criticism? Do you not do well receiving criticism and evaluations? Is that a challenge for you? I know with myself, because of my love language of needing words of affirmation, that can be a little difficult for me, or processing anger and expressing it properly. How can we get beyond this? That's the challenge. And so passive aggressive also challenges us to look at ourselves as people. There is a poem called What kind of person are you? By the way, this is by Ella Wheeler Wilcox, the poem is which are you? I'll start again,

There are two kinds of people on earth today, 

Just two kinds of people. No more I say

Not the sinner and Saint, for it's well understood, 

That the good are half bad, and that bad, half good,

Not the rich and the poor. For to rate a man's wealth, 

You must first know the state of his conscience and health, 

Not the humble and proud for life's little span. 

Who puts on vain airs is not counted a man

Not the happy and the sad. For the swept flying gears

Bring each man has laughter, each man his tears.

Know the two kinds of people on earth I mean, 

Are the people who lift and the people who lean

Wherever you go, you will find the Earth's masses

Are always divided in just these two classes.

And oddly enough, you will find, too, I ween,

There's only one lifter to 20 who lean

And the question is Which class are you? Which class are you? Do you lean too much on other people, blame them? Also expect them to do all your dirty work while you look good? And that yes, you have control but that passive aggressive pattern or behavior. Or someone else thinks that you're on the same team with them. But you're really not. And you're getting this manipulative pattern. And the challenges when we look at passive aggressiveness is if we're leaning too much, we need to learn how to lift. We need to learn how to lift people up. So, we're servant leaders, we're there to serve. We're not there to put people underneath our thumb. Here's some comparisons as far as descriptors, a list of words. Are you volatile, or steady? Are you deceitful or are you open? Are you selfish, or mature? Are you draining? Or refreshing? insecure or secure? Manipulating or accepting? conditional or unconditional, breaking or bonding

I'll go over it one more time. Are you volatile or steady, deceitful or open, selfish or mature, draining or refreshing, insecure or secular, manipulating or accepting, conditional or unconditional, breaking or bonding. As you think through those comparisons, and you do some self-inventory, as well, the 12 steps step for looking at inventory, we want to look at how passive aggressive needs to be minimized, we need to take ownership of our own things, not pass it off. Passive! Pass it off to someone else. That's what God wants us to do. He wants to look at how we can help others and be lifters. Not to be draining, but be refreshing. Not to be conditional, to be unconditional, yet with accountability between you and God, you and the other person. So, as we look at all the dark sides, in this session, we're going to look at a lifelong plan to kind of cap things off, and look at how the dark side can be conquered. How the profile can be helpful. When you take it, I'll have that copy. Of course, they're online. And please reference it. As you take that inventory that profile often now and again to say, Where am I? How are things going? Where am I at today? Is the passive aggressive level too high? Get help? Or is it narcissism? Is it too much about me lately? I need to humble myself before the Lord. James 4:10: humble yourselves before the Lord. And He will lift you up. God can do that. And we know this.

So, what's the step one on lifelong steps for overcoming the dark side? Step one is acknowledge your dark side. Much like recovery. And you'd, like, acknowledge that we need help, we need to surrender and give over to God.

Step two, examine the past. Look at your family of origin. How did you grow up? What are those dark sides of shadow sides that came up? And look and see how maybe there's there was more abuse? Or there's more teasing, or things that you just blocked out, you forgot about? What could it be, examining the past and looking at what may have been have gotten in the way of you moving forward and truly following God. And truly giving over to God, all of your hurts all your habits, all your hang ups? What are your resentments? Who hurt you? What's getting in the way. And of course, as I've said before, in these videos, I am the problem. I get in the way, when we take responsibility for ourselves.

So, acknowledge your dark side, examine the past, resist the poison of expectations. See, too often we get into this place where we walk into work, or we are involved in volunteer ministry. And someone approaches us with their expectation of what we ought to be doing. And we have our own expectation we ought to be doing. And sometimes the other person is trying to control us unfairly and in the wrong way. Yes, there's control; nothing wrong with control, but done in a godly manner, to people who lead for example. We lead people. If we are placed in a position of leadership, we need to have a level of control, but not we're bossing people around. We need to empower people, rather. And so, resist the poison of expectations

Practice progressive self-knowledge. What does that mean? Progressive Self-knowledge is always be aware of yourself. And that's where the other steps come into play. You need to look at, and I need to look at, we all need to look at what's happening inside.

Step 10. Recovery looks at step four, sort of doing your fearless moral inventory. And step 10 is you're doing a daily inventory of yourself. How am I doing, God? We start out with devotions and prayer and script You're praying throughout our day, checking in with ourselves, having relationships with people say, Hey, I'm concerned about this, concerned about that. What do you think? Getting feedback in a healthy way. And depending on God in everything, so progressive self-knowledge, it's continual, keeps going. It's not a onetime event, it’s a daily event.

The fifth thing is to understand your identity in Christ. We are God's citizens, a holy nation, as Paul says in the New Testament, and we need to, again, go back to that surrender every single morning, every single day surrender to the Lord. What kind of person are we? Are we lifters or leaners? Our identity in Christ is that we are forgiven, we are made new every day. And we surrendered to the Lordship of Jesus Christ, so that his light will drown out the shadow and the dark. And what we have dealt with, with the shadow and the dark, God's already used to continually, progressively make you more and more his servant, his person. So, I encourage you today to make the decision to be God's fearless leader. One who is surrendered to Christ understands his past or her past, who is always looking at how we can become more and more like Jesus and God's help. And with the help of God's people, we can.