Life & Leadership Thrival Plan

By Ann Katherine Gilcrease

Seattle Pacific University

EDU 6525
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Introduction

When considering which career and life path to take, I have had a tendency to go in the

direction I was turned as long as there was an external force pushing me forward. Never thinking

about whether or not I was at the right trailhead, I often wandered down paths that were

uninteresting in their content, provided they gave me some form of positive affirmation. There

were often internal struggles that ended in compromise, but I kept erring on the side of what I

knew to be “in my wheelhouse” rather than branching off into the unknown that captured my

passion. Now that I’ve reached a point in my career where I no longer wish to compromise, I

have struggled with the internal reorganization of triggers, facts vs. fiction, goals and purpose. In

order to create a personal path that adheres somewhat to the road less taken, but one that has

been trod nonetheless, I have utilized an outline borrowed from Rachel Dexheimer that was

based on Chapter 23 of “Adaptive Leadership” to create structure for my personal Life and

Leadership Thrival Plan.

In this framework, there are four sections. The first focuses on creating a personal

‘holding environment’ for renewal. As a leader, the trials of the everyday need a place to go in

order to not have them follow me home. To help with that, the second section had me explore

growing my personal support network to anchor myself when I am in need of guidance,

empathy, and a listening ear. This will help construct a strong foundation that will be recognized

in the third part of this essay where I will discuss my plan for building a strong understanding of

‘self’ in order to solidify my inward tolerance for outward stressors. These three are incomplete

without a sincere connection to my purpose, something that has been no easy feat to uncover.

I have often turned to poetry for inspiration, and it has been said that poems strike you

different ways at different points in your life. Although I read it a few years ago, “A Standing
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Ground” by Wendell Berry houses a line that did not resonate with me until recently. It says, “I

have been furious without an aim. I am not bound for any public place, but for ground of my

own where I have planted vines and orchard trees, and in the heat of the day climbed up into the

healing shadow of the woods.” There have been few people who have struck an ongoing chord in

my life as Mr. Berry, and this speaks to the flurry of activity that has been my life for the past

three decades, and the very real need to slow down and take stock in my personal goals before

moving forward. I hope to reorient myself to this thrival plan over the next few months, and to

engage in finding a future that fits my purpose so that I leave more behind me than dust.

Personal Holding Environment

With that said, the place to start is by creating a space that is a sanctuary for my physical,

emotional, mental, and spiritual renewal; by creating what Heifetz, Grashow, and Linsky call a

personal holding environment. In framing a safe space that is outside the purview of my job, my

resilience to the stress of a job, and the influence of opponents, can find limitation. In order to

cultivate my personal support network outside of the system (Heifetz, et. al., p. 289), I need to

focus on how I engage with the world around me and find authentic ways to shift from survival

to thrival.

Physical activity has never been my strong suit, but I enjoy walking and jogging as it is a

family affair. My siblings and I have signed up to run our family’s annual half-marathon in

Louisville, Kentucky, and it is an opportunity for us to reconnect. From this start, I plan on

creating an ongoing practice of signing up for events to stay focused on my health and physical

resilience. A daily exercise routine has often supported me emotionally and has helped to

stabilize my mind in times of extreme stress. It provides a quiet space for me to be reflective.

Running gives me a sense of belonging and accomplishment that is invaluable.

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Growing in friendships outside of work as an educator was never easy. It wasn’t until I

took time away from the classroom that I was able to begin cultivating friendships through

regular attendance at church, taking stained glass classes, and fully immersing myself in my

passion for music and performing arts. I plan on continuing these when I return to my regular

employment hours, but I will be much more diligent in keeping work at work so that I can focus

on what is important to me outside of that sphere.

Growing a Personal Support Network

Over the past few years, there has been a great deal of change in my family which has

cracked the foundation of my support network. When my mother passed in 2017, all of her

children were in the process of leaving their support networks behind and moving to a new place.

I had just moved from Texas to Washington. My older sister was moving to Washington D.C.

from Washington and my younger sister just left her closest medical school friends behind in

Kentucky to move to Charleston, South Carolina. Our brother was also moving houses, albeit in

town.

We grew up in a small town with a close-knit community who all felt the bull-in-a-china-

shop, solution-creating, and community emboldening effect that was the Reverend Gretchen

Sterrett. She chose not to tell her parishioners, or even her family, that she was dying of lung

cancer. We found out by one sibling finding the medications, and it slowly trickling through the

others. Two weeks before she passed, she could not longer preach and my father told the church.

She was already too far gone mentally to hear much of the love that was showered on her or

provide the uplifting words the town, her congregation, and her family needed to hear. It truly

was a tragedy for my hometown, my family, and the larger community she served.
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Why does my mother play such a large role in this section? As you can see, her presence was

as close to omniscient as you can get and if you were in town, there was no way to avoid her.

“Come with me…I have a job for you.” was written on her memorial bench, and it fit her

perfectly. Growing up, I never had much choice in how my time was spent – she always had it

planned out for me. My foundation was initially strong because of her, and in spite of her. When

she passed, it not only broke my heart, but it set off a string of unintended consequences in my

professional life that I am still recovering from. Intimacy issues, internal motivation, and

professional goals based on personal interests have all come under the microscope as of late.

In addition to those items, building trust in others takes faith and courage on my part and I

am often not willing to trust others. Before we moved to Washington, I lost my friend group

because I no longer taught at the school where we met. It is easy to get close with other educators

when you are all in the foxhole together, but I found it more difficult to garner close friendships

when I changed jobs as often as I do. One of the most important goals I have for the future is to

find a school and stay at it for more than one year. The stability that will come with cultivating

relationships over a longer period of time than a year, and not having to have a first year, every

year, will help calm my mind and build upon my resiliency.

From those past experiences, I knew that I could never again put all of my friendships in one

place. So, upon arriving to Washington, I knew I needed to spread my confidants out. I have

been attending a UCC church nearby on and off for the past three years. With intimacy being a

real issue, as well as church bringing up emotions that are sometimes uncontrollable, it has been

a struggle to attend regularly. Church has always been an essential part of my survival, and in

order to thrive, I plan to work on my regularity so that I have a community outside of my job that
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can not only feed my social and spiritual needs. That, combined with a stable teaching job that I

stay in for more than a year, should work wonders for my mental state.

A Community of Self

With all of that said, how do I then create a tolerance for the ‘heat’ that rears its head in

the everyday experience that is leadership? As an extrovert, it is important for me to stay

connected with my community and my goals by partnering up with like-minded, and not so like-

minded individuals, towards creating a healthier place for us to all live. Being a school leader, it

is nearly impossible to distance myself from the people I am serving and the larger community

that provides the necessary resources for me to thrive. This means that I have to create clear

boundaries for myself and have a strong internal dialogue.

Through regular exercise I can relieve stress and build the physical stamina necessary to

power through tough situations. By volunteering in my church community I can work to avoid

the pitfalls of privilege that come when you least have time for first-world problems. By growing

friendships outside of my profession through my hobbies and church I can create safe spaces in

which to vent, reflect, and create. Through meditation and awareness I can work through mental

and emotional trials that negatively affect my daily routine and sense of contentment. By

building sustainable patterns throughout the week I can prepare for the inevitable crisis in either

my personal or professional life. Throughout all of this, I will work on, and stick with, my goals

by placing them in places I cannot help but see. This will build confidence, and assist me in

keeping my focus on what is truly important in life.

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Staying Connected to Purpose

“I learned this, at least, by my experiment: that if one advances confidently in the direction of his

dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success

unexpected in common hours.”

― Henry David Thoreau, Walden: Or, Life in the Woods

As Thoreau alluded to, the most important way to live your life is to focus on your

dreams. Family, Creativity, and Community are the three things that provide me with the surest

sense of purpose. My research for this essay took me to an article by Mark Manson that provided

seven questions that help you find your purpose in life. Although it was not peer-reviewed, the

questions were adept at helping me look at my goals to see if they aligned with what I both

needed and wanted out of a vocation.

Dexheimer’s thrival framework asked how we would know if we are on track and on

purpose. It was the question regarding what made me forget to eat that helped me to narrow

down the field. Performing music and teaching have, by far, the most impact on the passage of

time. I could do those two things for hours and never know a minute has passed. Performance

has always provided me with a major mental escape coupled with physical exertion. I lose

myself in the music, and always have. By blending both music and teaching, I believe I could

find an outlet for my creativity with enough stimulating projects that connect community with

the arts.

Self-confidence has often taken its toll on my ability to perform, both as an educator and

a musician. Meditation, exercise, healthy eating, excelling in hobbies, conversations with like-

minded people, and volunteering have all brought me back to center. It is the unevenness of

choosing to stay with these positive activities that has led me down a path of self-destruction. By
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bringing awareness to the patterns that lead to the negative behavior, and focusing on setting up

daily structures in place to enhance the positive ones, I believe I will better be able to create a

stable space in my life that will allow me to thrive both personally and professionally. As a

leader in life and education, I had to take a step away from the rush of an impossible schedule to

see what was important. Now that I have a better “balcony view” (Heifetz, p. 291), I feel as

though my compass is finally pointing north.

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References

Heifetz, R. A., Grashow, A., & Linsky, M. (2009). The practice of adaptive leadership:

tools and tactics for changing your organization and the world. Boston, MA: Harvard Business

Press.

Mark Manson. (2020, March 5). 7 Strange Questions That Help You Find Your Life

Purpose. Retrieved from https://markmanson.net/life-purpose.