In my late teens, burnout described an adrenaline-fueled moment in a car. You floored the accelerator, redlined the motor, dropped the clutch, the wheels would spin, scream and smoke. The vehicle would have no momentum. Eventually though, the tires would grab and the vehicle launch forward. Often the vehicle was then out of control. This was dangerous driving.   Burnout

I didn’t see it coming Something was wrong, and I thought I was sick physically. I didn’t wake up one morning and say, “I’m burnt out”. It was a process of realising something was not right and my GP saying, “Don, I think you are heading to burnout”. Thank you, Dr Don, for your diagnosis. Feeling tired and flat. At

Our vision at Verve Lead is to create thriving Christian leaders and flourishing communities. But why is the vitality of a leader so important? If the community itself is strong, it may thrive or at least survive even with a struggling leader. However in the long term, a community will only be as strong as its leader.  In the book

Most of our blogs are dedicated to helping practitioners in three specific lines of work: coaching, mentoring and professional supervision. If you have been following Verve Lead, you will see that I often group these practitioners together. You might ask; aren’t these unique professions with important differences, so is it appropriate to group these together? While understanding the differences is

Verve Lead has some very exciting news!  In early February, I had the privilege of joining the dissertation committee of Alyssa Serpa, with Biola’s Rosemead School of Psychology, alongside Professor Chris Adams (Director of Flourishing in Ministry and consultant and researcher with the Duke Clergy Health Initiative) and Professor Todd Hall (Faculty Affiliate in the Harvard Human Flourishing Program). I’m

We have spent months looking at the competencies that are essential for an effective leader, almost completing our series last week with a blog on self-awareness. Growing these competencies (specifically self-awareness) leads to the growth of another important, overarching necessity in leaders: emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence is the ability to see, understand and manage emotions in yourself and others, and to have the humility and wisdom to rely on others when you are struggling to do so…

Improving the Lives of Clergy A team of researchers from Rosemead School of Psychology at Biola University invites you to participate in their research to improve the lives of clergy. Their study is testing a new measure of health for Christian leaders, and they hope that this tool will become a faster and more effective way of identifying warning signs of poor health to empower clergy to intervene before disaster strikes…

Just wanted to let you know that I’m going to be presenting at the Church Mental Health Summit on October 10 along with 50+ other presenters…

Reminder: The Church Mental Health Summit is on October 10. If you’ve been on the fence about registering, I highly encourage you to be a part of this one-day virtual event for Church ministry leaders!