The Herd.

     Your "herd" is powerful, its the people that we allow closest to us and we surround ourselves with regularly.  We have all heard something along the lines of "you are like the 5 closest people around you" and I find that to be incredibly powerful.  Your herd has an impact on you and that can help empower you towards your goals and becoming the person you want to grow into or pull you far, far away from that. 

    When I think of my herd, I think of the community that I surround myself with.  What are those people like? What are they doing? Are they doing things with character? Are they encouraging and acting positively in their lives? Or I can ask myself the opposite of all those questions, but when you answer those questions for yourself, I find that it allows me to "check-in" to make sure that my herd is aligned with my values.  One thing that I struggle with immensely is people pleasing and saying "yes" to almost anyone.  It takes such a difficult level of discipline for me to intentionally say "no." I enjoy providing acts of service and helping people, but saying "yes" to everyone sometimes plays detriment to my priorities and values.  Over the last few years this has been something that I have been working on every single day to become more aware of and be more intentional with.  Over the course of becoming more aware and intentional there has been a shift of who I am surrounded with.  There have been people who have been slowly made distant because they just do not align with mine and my family's values, but on the flip side there has been new people brought into my "herd" that have been so impactful.  That is a blessing.  I believe in the power of community and our "herd" because I have been shown time and time again that when we put ourselves with people who do not align with our values it can be so emotionally and mentally draining - I struggled with that for YEARS.  

    One of the best things that my wife, Katie, and I ever done was create family values.  We did this prior to getting married and we came up with a list a things we valued that would help guide us in making decisions, choices and building a life that helped us prioritize the things that mattered most to us.  You can do this yourself or with a spouse, but I highly encourage the challenge.  Ours is: 

F - Family

A - Accountability 

I - Intentional 

T - Trust 

 H - Health 

    We allow these to be our guiding priorities in our marriage and personal endeavors.  They have evolved and slightly changed over the years, which I think should naturally happen.  I have found that when we prioritize these things that matter most to us our herd often naturally adjusts.  The ones who do not align slowly fade and the ones who do align become closer.  

    I recently had a cup of Yogi Tea and on each tea bag tag, there is a little proverb.  On this one, it said "let every single person you meet be your teacher."  I took that as we can learn from every person that plays a role in our life.  I am not one for burning bridges and relationships so how does this play a role in the impact our herd can have? If we keep those who do not align with the person we want to be, closest to us, we are going to be fighting against this resistance to get the growth we desire.  We should not throw those relationships away, but just be intentional with how close we allow those to get.  I guess what I am trying to get at in this post is that our herd needs to be the people who are most aligned with our values and priorities, and when we adjust that we find an incredibly fulfilling journey towards becoming the person, the teacher, parent, and spouse that we want to be.  It is not easy to do and takes a lot of intentional work, but if it is done correctly, it is so worth it.  As teachers, bosses, employees, spouses, parents, and insert any role you may hold, to be the best at that our cup needs to be filled.  Our herd can help in filling our cups (as long as we are intentional with it) so that we can impact others around us.