But is it really work?

A few years ago I wrote a piece about the weirdness of clergy work. Find it here. It is based on a number of conversations with my friend and previous training colleague, Bob Clucas. The early Apple spell-checker suggested he was Reboot Clichés - I wish that had stuck. As with many of these ideas, which I usually wrote down but he also initiated, neither of us remembers, or cares, who deserves the most credit. So we tend to share it.

I have read a few posts on social media recently from new clergy trying to make sense of activities such as doing the laundry or cleaning on a day off and what to do when the mind wanders, during such activities, to work-related matters.

Firstly, well done for spotting it. And now to the idea. It is the difference between real and apparent work. And this, if my previous experience is anything to go by, will transform the lives of about 20% of the people who read it, whilst the rest will say 'That's crazy.' To the 80% I say, please allow the 20% to be crazy but happy. What follows ain't illegal. Here we go:

There will be things you do that come under the heading 'duties of office' (clergy are office-holders, not employees) which you enjoy and would do anyway, paid or not. For some this will be hanging around in coffee shops or going to parties; for others writing improving articles in the church press and for still others fixing guttering. These are work, apparently, but don't feel like it to you.

Then there will be things you do in your down-time or on your rest-day that you would rather pay someone else to do. For some this will be gardening; for others ironing, washing or shopping. These are leisure, apparently, but don't feel like it to you.

The trick, if trick it can be called, is to recall that clergy do not have to avoid domestic chores every day they are on duty. If ironing is work for you and it has to be done, do it on any day except your rest day. Glebe management is part of your responsibility so it is OK to do gardening whilst on duty. In fact it is required as part of your duties.

If you cram all the leisure activities that feel like work into your day off you won't feel like you've had one. If you trade them for one or two bits of your duties that don't feel like work you will.

To summarise, try and make sure your duty days are a mix of real work and real leisure, or apparent work and apparent leisure. And fill your days off with real leisure and, if necessary, apparent work.

I once shared this with a group of clergy who were what is known as 'training incumbents' (TIs). One guy, who I know for a fact had ruined the lives of several curates, responded, as if it were the last word on the matter. 'Well that wouldn't work for me.' He seemed quite shocked when I suggested that I was not asking it to work for him but that it might be an option he shared with his curate in case it was helpful for them. At this very idea, sharing something he didn't personally find helpful, he gave the room a look which encompassed all the ranges of amazement in the known universe. Teaching the doing of things exactly the way he had done them for thirty years wasn't the only thing that worked? Really?

If you were his curate I doubt he told you this. Sorry if it's late.

Same time next week?

Bring on the Walls

I was having a bit of a chat with my new ministry colleague about what we do when we hit a wall. I'm not really sure that an ample theology of wall exists within the church. The problem is, I reckon, that most people choose the metaphor of hitting it. Which is not the way I deal with walls, by and large. The couple of times I tried, it left scars.

Marathon runners speak of 'the wall'. For them it is a description of something psychological. Your mind tells you to stop but your body isn't finished with it yet. I know a bit about this. Some years ago I was told by a neurosurgeon that my chronic back pain would decrease if I exercised. Trouble was, exercise really hurt. I was slowly and gently introduced to the psychological idea that pain, real as it was, had ceased to be an indication of something wrong. I was causing myself no further damage when I exercised and the pain was unnecessary. I had to retrain my body to keep going even though it hurt. Took about 18 months but it worked. Hardest thing I ever did. No question.

Real walls, without doors, have to be climbed or circumnavigated but remember, you should be able to see them coming. Prepare yourself for any walls with appropriate equipment.

Metaphorical and psychological walls require a whole different set of techniques. You can seek a hidden door. Jump them. Blow them up. Walk though them. Dig under them. Leave them for another day. Give them to somebody else. Attach them to a balloon and float them away. Attach yourself to a balloon and float over. Get a really big ladder out of your shoe. Join with the Roadrunner (beep beep) and draw a hole in it. Jump through and erase the hole as Wily Coyote leaps. Fun, isn't it? As the great Dan Reed said, 'To daydream properly takes immeasurable amounts of imaginary time.' The decision is yours.

The problem with walls is that they aren't walls. They are obstacles which you have deemed insurmountable. It isn't the worst advice to ignore them.

Got too many things in your head? Put some down for a bit. Diary them for next week and forget about them.

Got a thing coming up you don't know how to deal with. Get input. Talk it over. Break it down into smaller bits. If you gotta eat a slug you want that critter thin-sliced.

Got too many actual jobs? Renegotiate some deadlines.

Wondering about your entire sense of self-worth and ability? That kid needs therapy. And probably not from the person who gave you the deadlines or relies on you hitting them.

What sort of mental ability does it take to willingly go to your death by crucifixion? I'm not going to get into theories of atonement or a quest for the historical Jesus - I want this to be useful to more than the faith community. I simply ask if you could go that way knowing you could avoid it and knowing that no-one would ever know that you did, or criticise you for it. From where does that sort of inner strength come?

Walls. Time to come tumblin' down.

Thought for the Day

As delivered at BBC Radio Bristol's Breakfast with Emma Britton and keeping a miraculously straight face during the previous item about a man with an enormous cucumber:

I am happy to be identified as a Christian but often have to make sure that people understand - I am not a Bible-basher, creationist, trendy-vicar or Jesus-freak.

When my sons were young, from time to time a friend or relative would say about one of them 'Hasn't he grown?' It was awkward. Firstly, because the answer was 'of course'. Secondly, as it happened so slowly, we didn't notice it as much as those who visited us twice a year.

Today's stories all have this amazing 'Hasn't he grown' connection.

Any of us who were once used to putting all our clothes in the wash after a night at the pub because they smelled smoky will have noticed our cleaner public air.

Anyone who has had half an eye on technological change will be aware of how much progress we've made over the last twenty years of computer science.

We have such an eye to medical progress today that we can investigate muscle-loss by sending Bristol worms into space.

And we are far more aware of mental health issues than we ever used to be. Plus, we can fix a lot of them.

Things get better.

But there's loads to do. Smoking still kills people. Minorities are under-represented in the tech industries. Mental illness isn't going away any time soon. And Bristol worms-in-space or not, medical research takes time.

Progress is great. It's absence frustrating. The journey essential. So in my theology I am happiest being a seeker-after-truth and sharing occasional clues as to how my understanding has grown. As the late Terry Pratchett once said 'The presence of those seeking the truth is infinitely to be preferred to the presence of those who think they've found it.'

Training News

Those of us who consider it part of our duties to train other people have many stories to tell. TCMT and I have many fine conversations about this because I am married to someone who also has to train. And so to our story for the day. I've tweaked a few details and missed some out. People in the know will know but hey, I've tried.

Some years ago TCMT was a regional manager for a large chain of shops. The organisation was taken over by a holding company who did not, in their guts, believe that being a woman and being a regional manager were compatible. Furthermore, in whatever organisational situation she found herself, being a retail regional manager who did a good job (kept profits up and staff happy) was certainly incompatible with the European Working Time Directives (soon to be RIP'd I guess). So she and I had a bit of a chat, surrendered a bit of our joint income and she took the 'sod-this-for-a-game-of-soldiers' line and resigned.

But. and there is a but, she likes playing shops, helping customers and the retail environment. If there is a finer placater of the hostile and angry in this world then they probably work at ACAS or the UN or summat.

So she went back to a part-time shop-floor job with a different employer and got back her mojo.

Recently the store manager left and there is a gap before the new one arrives. The chain she works for doesn't do 'assistant manager' so they thrive on the sort of chaos you get when no-one is in charge. They also (and this is loving husband speaking) may take just a teensy bit of a liberty with the fact that, although low paid, TCMT could run the store and turn a profit with her eyes shut. She simply doesn't want to any more.

But from time to time she accepts that there is nowhere else for the buck to go and carries it along for a bit.

I expect you're wondering about training. Well spotted.

So yesterday was a day of being accidentally in charge. I think TCMT is an inveterate trainer. That is to say she likes moving people towards the required standard of competence by observation, conversation, direction, advice, correction, review and input. (I made that up. Like it?)

This chat ensued?

TCMT: You know that thing you were going to take upstairs?

Junior: Yes.

TCMT: But you left it at the bottom of the stairs to remind you?

Junior: Yes.

TCMT: (Knowing that it had been left approximately three feet from a sensible place) Did you think about where to leave it?

Junior: Yes.

TCMT: So what is the problem with where you left it?

Junior: Maybe someone carrying a box down stairs might not see it and fall over it?

TCMT: Anything else?

Junior: Well I guess in a fire you might not see it?

TCMT: So why did you leave it there?

Junior: You know, I thought of you as I put it down.

Whilst it must be kinda tough having a co-worker who knows almost everything, someone who knew, intuitively and then actually, as they placed an object in the wrong place, that it was wrong and furthermore dangerous and that an experienced colleague would call them on it, STILL DID IT!

That deserves the rare accolade of an exclamation mark I believe my friends. At least I get to train the trainable.