THE TIME HAD COME for me to lead my first board meeting. My most trusted advisor was seated next to me and as I surveyed the members of the board staring back at me, seemingly awaiting inspiration or at least direction, I wasn’t quite sure where to begin. I didn’t have an agenda. Come to think of it, I didn’t even know what an agenda was. I didn’t call the meeting to order and I had no gavel. I sat there realizing I didn’t actually know what was supposed to take place at this meeting.

That’s probably not a bad thing. After all, I was only five years old. That trusted advisor seated next to me was George, my teddy bear whose nose had been re-attached more times than I could count. (Literally, I probably couldn’t count that high—I was five.) My board members were all rather stuffy, and the only tools I’d brought to the meeting were a sheet of stickers and a 12-inch wooden ruler. I had no idea what to do with either one.

In preparing for my board meeting, I followed all the rules, based on my understanding of my father’s regular board meetings at the church where he was the pastor. The board members would gather and they were not to be disturbed for any reason. That’s the extent of what I knew. So, given the lack of door between the parsonage kitchen where my mother was working and the living room where I had assembled the board, before I took my seat in the open concept dining room and living room, with its plush pink carpet and mix-and-match furnishings, I made a point to tell her she was not to enter the room until I was done. I was not to be disturbed.

I’m glad she headed my request and kept to herself in the kitchen. After all, had she walked in on my meeting, she would have witnessed what a horrible failure I was in the role of chairman of the board.

This was a true story, taken from the unfinished book I began to write several years ago on the topic of multipotentiality. I’m going to pull several chapters or sections thereof and post them as weekly blog posts over the next little while. Good luck trying to make sense of it all!