When we talk to our young adult children about the defining moments of their growing-up years "Where were you on 9-11" is always at the top of the list. Like all of you, I remember that day well: where I was, what I was doing, where my collective family members were, what time I turned on the TV to watch the second plane fly into the second tower.

And, because I was preparing to lead a recovery group that night, I remember spending hours praying about and agonizing over how to address this with a population of people who were going to be triggered by the collective national grief, pain, horror, and panic in the aftermath of 9-11.

As a pastor and leader I knew I needed to address and make space for everyone's feelings, fears, and frailties. I had to hold a lot of tensions and be prepared to extend a lot of grace as people stumbled and relapsed in the wake of 9-11. I needed to create space for all of this without exploiting the panic, and I needed to provide calm without minimizing the real anxiety most everyone was feeling that night and the months to come.

We are currently in one of those defining moments. We will all remember where we were, what we were doing, what changes we had to make, and how this pandemic impacted our lives.

In a slightly different way, this is all the things I am feeling as I craft the post for the leaddership brief. I want to make space for all the things: the feelings, the fears, the frailties, as well as the hope, courage, and innovation that I know this group of readers possess!

I don't want to exploit the situation and yet I want to be real and provide help, tools, and resources that I think will meet your needs.

I shared that my superpower is the ability to organize any space and this opened up a floodgate of private messages and questions about how I organize and could I help them.