Careering...in control?

At the turn of the year I found myself in an unfamiliar place.

After a long career working with one of the Japanese giants of the Musical Instrument Industry, my employment came to an end just before Christmas 2009, due to a merger within the corporate group I have been a part of for many years.

When I heard the news it was a huge shock. We’d been performing pretty well in difficult economic times, holding our heads above water when some others were struggling. The brand for which we were responsible was something of a success story and we sat in an exciting and growing area in our market.

Yet, at the beginning of 2010 I become a free agent, accepting the voluntary redundancy package I had been offered.

“Doing” or “being”?

Like most people though the whole of my life was larger than just my career.

I had my faith, my family, my friends, my local community... I also had a growing and increasingly significant set of Social Media communities; new tribes that I had been connecting with, sharing life in the digital domain.

During all of the time I had been blogging, using Facebook and Twitter etc I’d been very careful with my online presence to say very little about my previous day to day working life in the electronic music, audio & video product industry…concentrating rather on my life as a follower of Jesus trying to live as authentically as I can.

This was not some secular/sacred issue. I made that online separation simply because I wanted to be defined not by what I “do” in my career, but rather by what I “am”. In fact over the years I became ever more convicted that it is this attempt at walking the way of Jesus that defined me; weak, faltering and broken as I am.

Now I had to apply that maxim – to be more about the “be” than the “do” - more than ever.

Together with my family – and with a lot of prayer – we’ve been trying to discern where we go from here.

Despite the initial shock of an unexpected career shift, my wife and I felt this sudden change of circumstances was a gift of God (perhaps more accurately a hefty kick) to make me more available to Jesus stuff in whatever form that takes. Expecting that there would perhaps be more time than before, I had already stepped out and started to take the initiative to get involved in a few things that I have a passion for, and were close to my heart.

 I made the time to take some of my online relationships offline...meeting over coffee, taking myself along to conferences and training days and putting faces to names...generally networking like crazy. Not for any Machiavellian desire to meet useful career contacts, but rather because I like people. It’s also so enriching to share time and space with folks who inspire and encourage you.

I had arrived at the point where parts of a quote from Henri Nouwen were becoming a reality for me.

“More and more, the desire grows in me simply to walk around, greet people, enter their homes, sit on their doorsteps, play ball, throw water, and be known as someone who wants to live with them. It is a privilege to have the time to practice this simple ministry of presence.

... I wonder more and more if the first thing shouldn’t be to know people by name, to eat and drink with them, to listen to their stories and tell your own, and to let them know with words, handshakes, and hugs that you do not simply like them, but truly love them.”

Time to recalibrate

I’d really been taken by how many of my buddies have just gotten off their butts, and taken leaps of faith…

I suppose now was the time I was taking mine.

Early signs for my new reinvented life seemed to be focussed towards authentic missional discipleship, connection and some kind of increased & enhanced online activity – influenced in part because I was inspired by many who by their living, writing, sharing, creativity, entrepreneurial spirit, grace and love had impacted me more than they will ever realize.

Their efforts to connect and create enthused me then and still motivate me now.

I’d watched with admiration and a degree of awe as my Texas based online buddy Jonathan D Blundell develop a number of websites related to various initiatives including a self published novel and the weekly Something Beautiful Podcast which he co-hosts with Scots Thomas Mathie AKA Headphonaught  and Stewart Cutler. The guys consistently put together a great selection of faith journey stories mostly from guests at the fuzzy outer edges of the Church, growing community as they went along.

 So, it was humbling, wonderfully surprising and massively affirming when JD flagged me up at the beginning of the year as a “Kingdom Blogger to watch in 2010”.  I have tried to live up to the hype, but probably fallen some way short! However, I am continually grateful for the tools we have at our disposal to connect with others and to cultivate community...and the gift of time when I could really explore what “Being Social” is all about

I was also inspired by occasional online contributor to WIRED UK and blogger Chris Hinton of Geek-Speak who also happens to be a Salvation Army pastor on the quiet. Chris has fostered wonderful relationships with some of the big guns in the blogosphere, yet is not on some heavy duty evangelism trip.  He simply connects...no agenda...no surreptitious schema.

Also, I guess I’d been energized too by former pastor and Problogger Darren Rowse in Melbourne, Australia, who is regarded as THE global authority on making a decent living from blogging and although I didn’t expect to be earning 6 figures anytime soon like Darren does, I was interested to explore just a little of what might be achieved.

I’d never been much of a bread head, so it would be my passion that drove this thing. In many ways I wanted it to be a vehicle to help others, as much as help myself.

Now I blog to connect. My blog is the hub for all of my Social Networking tools and a point for others to connect to me.

I blog because I enjoy writing. I’ve always enjoyed it, and now there’s a place to share that enjoyment.

Local as well as global

Another major sea change in my life was the time I had available to get under the skin of my local community. I walk my kids to school daily, spend time talking to other parents by the school gates. It’s exhilarating to be able to walk into my small town and recognise so many familiar and friendly faces of people I do life with.  It’s a special privilege to stop in the street to share highs and lows; the mundane and profound.

 What is more, there’s also an active “digerati” right here where my family and I live. A small band of local yet disparate and previously unconnected Tweeters has organically grown together, maintaining a fairly constant dialog and meeting in the local pub for the occasional face to face “Tweet-up”.

I can remember one Sunday after a particularly fractious morning at Church (don’t tell me you’ve never experienced one of those) I managed squeezed in a mere 40 minutes local Tweet –up between the morning and evening services, and was struck by the beautiful sense of friendship and togetherness there in the pub.  The contrast between this, and what I had experienced in the morning was palpable and completely refreshing.

Relationships are forming and becoming deep.

Following the “Missio Dei”

By “Being Social “ – online and off - I have found myself sharing in community with a ragtag bunch of Jesus Followers, heretics, geeks, questioners and partners in prayer across the web.

There’s a phrase that I picked up from renowned missiologist Mike Frost that continues to have real resonance for me and my family at the moment. “We are“Following the Missio Dei into Strange Places”

Where to?

So, if I’m “Following the Missio Dei”, where am I going, and what am I doing?

When I meet new people the inevitable question “What do you do?” usually arises, and rarely is my response the same as it was the last time someone asked me.

I once told a film maker I had met that evening that “I hustle for Jesus”

For the moment I’m still deep in the trenches of transition, working towards finding a role that will allow me to live in this reinvented space using my passions for communicating, connecting and the new digital tools for doing that...whilst also paying the mortgage!

 It’s about mostly about sharing stories, affirming others and trying to walk the Way of Jesus.

 After years in the business and commercial world I’ve fallen in love with words ...and The Word...all over again.

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Johnny Laird is a “connector, communicator, change agent & social activist… friend of the geek & radical”

 He blogs at johnnylaird.net and Tweets at @johnnylaird

 If you make contact he WILL reply!

 Parts of this piece have already appeared in one form or another at  johnnylaird.net