MAX Mindfulness: Fear or Love

by David Wine, President & CEO

I have shared before that there are really just two emotions in our world – fear or love.  And that impacts everything in our lives in big, big ways!  We perceive our world and our relationships through whatever emotion we are feeling at the time.  Lead with love and we trust others, feel their support, and understand our relationship with them in helpful, healthy ways.  Lead with fear, and we distrust others, feel division and a sense that someone is “out to get us”, and our relationships can easily fall apart.  This is as true of team life in businesses as it is with our families and other relationships.  That is why I write on mindfulness – at MAX we are about personal growth (as one of our values)- but it is also good for MAX when our team is built on trust and supportive relationships.  It leads to a productive and fun environment.  (And, I am so very appreciative of the ways I see this happening so often at MAX!).

I could write a tome on this subject – thankfully for you, I won’t!   So I’ll make this very simple and tie it to our mindfulness theme.  One of the greatest gifts we can give ourselves is to watch our emotions and our feelings.  And through that mindful attention, we can begin to ask ourselves a very important question, “Am I right now leading with love or leading with fear?”  “Am I leading with trust or distrust?”  “Am I accepting responsibility for my own life and results (loving ourselves) or am I blaming outside people and externals (disliking ourselves)?”

The first step, always the hardest one, in leading with love is recognizing all those times when we are not and paying attention to the emotions that are driving perceptions of ourselves, others and our world.  That is why mindfulness is so important to our personal growth and development.  We have to pay attention to our emotions and feelings to get a sense of how responsible we really are for what we are creating in our lives.  If indeed we are our thoughts, we are, indeed, the only ones who can change them.  Leading with love leads to wholeness! Leading with fear fragments!  Hmmm….that sounds like a MAX theme!


Dave WineDavid Wine

David is the President and CEO of the MAX enterprise, having served in that capacity since its formation in 2001.   He has forty plus years of  leadership experience in the business and faith-based worlds, being an ordained minister, having been elected to the highest position in his denomination,  and receiving numerous awards and recognition for his leadership in the insurance industry. He currently serves on numerous boards in the church and insurance sectors.  His hobbies include hiking, biking, skiing and snowshoeing as well as being an avid reader.  David and his wife, Sharon, have three daughters, a son, and four grandchildren.