Welcome to the Bahner Blemen Leadership Podcast. I'm your host, Kristen Heidegg, Manager of Marketing and Business Development here at Bahnhof Women. In today's podcast, I can talk with Santa and Erin Barnett. Erin is a research specialist at Exponential and the Director of Strategy and Partnerships at Generation State. Hannah is the founder and CEO of Generation State, as well as a speaker and author. Together, they work to serve and inspire the next generation, promoting justice and encouraging others to make a difference. In this conversation, Aaron and Hannah share about their mission to help young leaders discover their purpose and emphasize the significance of experienced leaders and investing in Generation Z. They discuss practical strategies for reaching this upcoming generation and share stories of how young leaders from around the world are linking arms to build a better world. We hope you enjoy this conversation. Well, hey everyone. Thanks so much for tuning in. Today I'm so excited because I get to talk to my friends Hannah and Erin, the Barnettes. Welcome, guys.
SPEAKER_04Hey, we are so excited to be here.
SPEAKER_01We are. Thank you so much for inviting us on.
SPEAKER_00Oh, of course. Well, I just over the little bit of time I've gotten to know you two and hear more of your story and just see your love for the next generation. I knew that we had to have this conversation and talk all about your two organizations and what you're doing and what's next, but also just your heart for the next generation and how we as church leaders can support and love Gin Z.
SPEAKER_04I love it. This is yeah, helpful.
SPEAKER_01Thanks so much for being willing to have that conversation. I think that's something that we so appreciate about everything that you all are doing as an organization is that you recognize the importance of reaching the next generation, speaking the language of the next generation, adjusting to reach them in whatever way is possible. And I really respect that.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I second that. That's something I was gonna say.
SPEAKER_00Well, y'all are sweet. Um, well, Hanna and Eric, why don't you both kind of give a little intro to listeners who may not have heard of you or your work and what all you're doing?
SPEAKER_04You want to start?
SPEAKER_01Sure. My name is Hannah Grunowski Barnett, and I'm the CEO and founder of a nonprofit organization called Generation the Saints. And our mission is we are trying to use the conversations the next generation is already having around passion, purpose, and justice to bring them into conversations about Jesus, the gospel, and the Great Commission. And we do that through six-month cohorts of young leaders from around the world who come in and really understand how they can be an innovative missionary sent out into every sphere of society. So that's my main heart, my main work. I'm also a speaker, author, I'm also a wife to this amazing leader next to me, named Erin. And I'm a friend. And I just really do believe that my unique calling in the world is to unleash the calling of other leaders. I believe that every single person has a wrong they were born to make right. And I is my joy and my honor to be able to walk alongside of leaders as they discover what that is and step into that calling.
SPEAKER_04I love it. I love it. Yeah, I'm Aaron Barnett. I work for Exponential. If you're not familiar, we are all about multiplication and movements. And so we want to see multiplying healthy disciples uh through our organization. We also have a huge emphasis on church planning. And so I'm the next gen catalyst at Exponential, and we believe that the future of the church is bright and the future church planners are beautiful and inspiring and empowering. And so my job uh is to create a space for young leaders to belong, but also build the future of the church together.
SPEAKER_00That's right. That's so great. Um, Hannah, I want to hear all about the start of your organization because you started from a young age. I love when you anytime you share about your organization, you just light up. It's the coolest thing to see. It's so evident how this is your passion and what the Lord's using you for right now. Um, and so I want to give you a second to share or a little time to share your story and how you got here, even from a young age.
SPEAKER_01Sure. It's really fun to reflect back because I think so often as leaders, we can focus so much on the future. And I know I, for one, absolutely live most of my life in the future, both of us do. And so it is a really good reminder, even for me, to reflect back on and where this all started. And really where this started for me was a 16-year-old girl with a really big dream. And when I was 16 years old, I had already said yes to following Jesus. I had already started to give my life to him. I started reading scripture. I was passionately following him, but I felt like there was still something missing because I had seen stories in scripture of these people who truly gave their entire lives towards the cause of the mission of Jesus. And I wanted to know what is my unique role in the mission of Jesus. And so when I was 16 years old, I remember praying this prayer. I journaled it. I still have the journal where I said, All right, Jesus, whatever you want me to do with my life, it's yours. Here, here it is. I want to go all in on your mission. And as I did that, I thought there was gonna be this flash of revelation or this really clear mandate that God just gave me. And it wasn't that way. There was a few months of what felt like silence where I just continued to ask and pray and and seek. And four months for a 16-year-old feels like a really time. And so it really tested my movement. But after about four months, I was sitting on my parents' couch and I was reading this book about a lot of the major injustice in the world. And as I read through it, my heart broke for injustice after injustice. And at the end of the book, I wondered, God, what does this mean for me? What are you inviting me into? God, I want to know what is my unique role in your mission? What do you want me to do on this earth? And it was in that moment where I felt that God gave me a really clear impression. I felt He was saying, Hannah, you're not called to solve all of the injustice in the world. You don't have to make all the wrong things right on your own. Instead, I want to use you to empower a generation to make wrong things right in the world. And in so doing, you'll have a greater impact. And so I ran up to my bedroom at the time and I had a whiteboard. And at 16, I started drawing out all these ideas and dreams and plans for what it would look like to empower and equip my generation to actually discover the wrong they were born to make right, but not to stop there, but to build a strategy to accomplish it. And then from there, it continued to grow. When I was around 20, working at a local church, I noticed that the next generation was walking away. We've heard the 71st statistic and I was seeing it in real time, my own peers. And as I started to inquire and ask, man, where are you going? What is better than Jesus? A lot of what I heard was they wanted to go away because they wanted to change the world and fight for justice and chase after their passions and dreams. And there was this disconnect I was noticing between a generation that desperately wanted to change the world and a God who ultimately, I believe, created them for that. And for some reason, they were not understanding. The only reason they even want to do that is because they're made in the image of restorative, redemptive God. And so we said, man, what if I could actually use that desire to help bring them back to Jesus and then in subduing, launch them into the mission of Jesus in a way that actually creates radical, lasting change in the world. And so at 20 years old, that was kind of the birth of the strategy. Over the next two and a half years, our team that I grew that was all volunteers, 20, 21-year-olds, that we kind of developed this six-month training program. We collaborated with over 50 leaders from around the world who are way smarter and more experienced than we were. And then in 20 early 2021, we launched our first cohort through our program. And now we've had over 130 young leaders from nine different countries come through this six-month program. And we're seeing them unleash as innovative missionaries into every sphere of society. And there's so much more that's ahead, but that's really the core of where we've come from.
SPEAKER_00It's so exciting. I love hearing it every time she shares it. I also love how Aaron's just the most supportive. He's like, she's doing it. Yeah, she's doing great. And I also love how well I just love how the two of you both have this huge heart for the next generation, and the Lord just gave you a place for that. Um, I think I love how you can see into the next generation so well of this desire for a purpose and a drive and something they can work for. I think we were looking in the studies the other day, and it was like one of the top things that people want in a workplace is to know that their work matters and that they have purposeful work. Um, and I think that really is something core to this next generation that we're seeing.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And you're doing such a great job of equipping these young leaders with this.
SPEAKER_03Thank you.
SPEAKER_01Thank you. It is one of our biggest heartbeats. And Erin talks about this a lot that we have an opportunity, you know, we're both young leaders in a sense, but there's a generation even after us. I'm 28 years old. And so some people are looking at me as the next generation, and I'll I'm honored and I'm I'm working to do the best I can with my 20s. And yet there's also 18, 19, 20-year-olds who have capacity to lead. And Aaron and I have a huge passion around unleashing even then.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. So, what does it look like to take this moment in our lives to steward it really well, be faithful with what God placed in our hands to lead down, but then also lead up as well. So, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Erin, you in Exponential got to launch this thing called the Next Gen two-day event this year. I was so honored to attend and get to see it in person. Tell our audience all about it and everything that it was, because it was great.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it was so cool to have you guys. Um, honestly, just wowed by what God did there. Uh, super special to come alongside of the work at Exponential to build something that the next generation can attach themselves to and say, Yeah, I do believe that the future of the church is brilliant and beautiful and inspiring and compelling and empowering. And I want to be a part of that. And so at Exponential, I came on as a like a um a researcher and was there for around six months. And I was like, hey, what would it look like to actually start some next gen in this initiatives at Exponential? And so we actually had our two-day event in March that y'all got to attend, and it was incredible. We had around 212 young leaders come out for it. And the vision behind it was um, my wife was actually being interviewed just like this on a podcast, and she actually brought up that statistic of the 70%. And I was shaving in the bathroom, and I was thinking to myself, man, death and life are in the power of the tongue. And what if we are speaking death over a whole generation, walking away from the church by talking about statistics, that they are the statistic?
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_04And so um, Hannah and I have really told ourselves, like privately, hey, what does it look like to really debunk that narrative as uh as a unit, as a team, as next gen leaders, to say, hey, we believe that the next generation is the future of the church and we want to build it with you. And so uh I pushed that to our executive team and said, Hey, I want to create an event where the next generation find a place to truly belong, where they say, Hey, we are so better together. When we are on mission together, when we say yes to a God-sized dream of even to become church planners, what could it look like in five, 10, 20 years from now? Uh, what started at exponential blooms out of that from a multiplication aspect. And so we launched it. We had next gen speakers, next gen worship leaders. This year we're innovating. We're excited to uh partner with people like yourself, where it's hey, how do we actually have great minds at the table to mentor, to invest, to bring the why behind the what of what you guys are building and see what God could actually birth uh through the lens of authenticity, passion, and purpose. And so we're excited to see what the next generation wants to do with the next uh with the future of the church. And so that's a little bit about what we're building at exponential, and we can't wait to see what God has next.
SPEAKER_00So it's gonna be great. I'm excited to see it. I'm glad that we happen to have a great seat to watch, a little glimpse of it. And I know it's gonna continue to grow into great places. Aaron, one of the one of my favorite moments of the whole conference, um, you probably won't even remember this because you were doing everything that week, but you came up to me and you were like, okay, I want you to take notes. Like if there's anything that feedback, like I'm open to all the feedback, I'm open to like I just want to make this better and better. And that really stuck with me from a leader standpoint of imagine if every leader just wanted to make it better for God and continue to ask those questions. I just thought it was so great that really stood out to me.
SPEAKER_04Thanks. Yeah, I believe that curiosity is a marker of a great leader. A lot of my mentors have taught me that. So I think when curiosity exists, hungry is on the other side. And um, and so I'm honored that you would call that out in me because I too try to be a curious leader. So thank you.
SPEAKER_03Of course.
SPEAKER_00When your team isn't whole, it disrupts your mission. We have staffed over 2,500 missions of faith. Build your best team through our customized executive search. Go to Vanderblumen.com slash get started to talk with our team today. Okay, I want to talk a little bit about the next generation. I know we've talked about some great resources so far for it, but for a lot of our listeners that aren't in that next generation, they might be older. We have a lot of people that are asking us questions about what they can know about Gen Z. What are the markers of Gen Z? What are the trends? What are the things we need to know? How can we reach Gen Z? We get these questions a lot, and it's a really big topic, especially when we see them, how much of the population they're about to make up and how it's important as church leaders to reach them. Yes, absolutely.
SPEAKER_03Absolutely.
SPEAKER_01Go ahead. I I actually think that one of the biggest concepts that Aaron and I are seeing is this idea of positional influence versus personal influence.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And Aaron is really going to talk about this. You want to share a little bit about that?
SPEAKER_04Yeah. So, you know, when you, you know, when you paint a canvas, like you have the canvas and then you have the frame typically. And I would say I see a canvas that has a word called margin on it. And the frame around that is positional influence versus uh personal influence. Uh previous generations, a lot of organizational development, business development, church structure, the list goes on, is through the lens of positional power, positional influence. And so it's a top-down approach where the next generation is very deep and wide. So they look at their peers, they look at uh their friends, and they grew up on social media, they grew up on secular platforms like TikTok, Instagram, Twitter, the list goes on. And what a lot of these platforms actually do for the next generation is they empower this personal influence. And so what I see with the next generation and the future of the church, where we have such a beautiful opportunity to innovate, is how do we take a generation that grew up on a co-creating uh relational connection or positional connection and bring it into a place of uh positional power. And so uh what I have felt with the next generation is there's a big gap between personal influence and positional influence. And I think as we as senior level leaders, we have such a great opportunity to baton pass, to invite the next generation to use their voice, to sit at the table, sit in executive meetings, to co-create with the organizations that we get to be a part of. Why? Because they are they have grown up in a world that is surrounding them with personal influence. And so I feel like if we could actually tap into their heartbeat, their their lifeblood of, hey, I want to not, I don't want to just come in and serve and hold the doors and be a small group leader and the list goes on, or be a youth pastor or young adult pastor, but I want to be a part of the the mission of our church, the the co-creation of our future of where it could go. And you know, I heard a great leader, I think Craig Rochelle mentioned this is people really care about what you care about. And I feel like the next generation deeply cares about our organizational development, but they want to know that you care about their voice. You know, as a younger leader myself, and we've both been young, we also know, even as yourself, we sat in rooms that most of the time we didn't have positional influence. We actually didn't have money backing us. Uh, we only had sometimes our ideas and our voice. And so, what if we could actually capitalize on the ideation of the next generation and their voice of how they see the world to say, hey, if you were me, what would you do? Right. And so when we actually give take a posture of Jesus and humble ourselves to say, Hey, I want to learn from you and be curious, I want to see how you see our church or the future of it, I think that's where our beautiful innovation starts. So Hannah, if you want to share anything else, you can't.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely. No, I I have seen that too. And in the work that Medial Generation is stints, we're really trying to unleash every single young leader in their unique passion, but directing it towards the mission of Jesus. And one of the reasons that we're trying to do that so intentionally is because the next generation will lead with or without us.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_01And this is the opportunity, but also the danger. I mean, there's some real danger in the next generation leading without a covering, leading without mentors, leading without individuals who can sharpen them, who can provide perspective for them. And so if the next generation is going to lead with or without us, the exciting thing is that they're going to lead. And Gen Z and millennials, I have found are somewhat different in that. I'm right in between. I'm either the youngest millennial or the oldest Gen Z, somewhat of a zillennial. So I kind of understand both perspectives. Uh, but millennials were were known, you know, Time Magazine came out with an article about the me, me, me generation, and but at the same time, they were considered the most social justice conscious generation of all time. There was this weird paradox to them. Millennials were famous for saying they cared, but really doing very little that inconvenienced their own life to make any lasting change. Gen Z is different in that they grew up seeing the millennials talk really big game and do very little. And so Gen Z has almost had this reaction to that, and therefore they're leading at greater speeds, they're going at different paces, and they're going with or without leaders who are covering them. So, senior leaders, we can either see that as a threat to our organizations, to our infrastructures, to our businesses and ministries, or we can see it as an opportunity to partner with them and to see their impact multiplied because we're willing to maybe even take a back seat and empower them and share them on because we're the one discipling them in the background, right? There's there's a young woman that I've been able to invest and mentor in uh for about eight years now. And when she was 13, I think I was 18 or 19, and I just started investing in her because I saw that she didn't really know where she was going in life and she had a lot of potential. And now, about eight years later, you know, I'm 28, she's 19, and she has built a lot of leadership for herself. She just a couple of days ago was out speaking at an event. She's an athlete and she's on her way to the Olympics. And so she has now this little platform that has grown that she can reach all these athletes that I would never be able to reach. And so there have even been some events that have brought me in to speak about how I invest in her life, not even what I've built. And I could either see that as, oh, well, they should be asking me about what I've built. And all I've accomplished, or I could say, no, the best thing I can do with my life as a leader is to try and invest in other young leaders so much so that they outpace me, that they do more than me. If we can have this abundance mindset when it comes to investing in the next generation of leaders, I think we'll find ourselves leaving even deeper, more robust legacies than if we were to just focus on our own leadership.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. And I think to that point, is when I see the canvas of you know positional influence and personal influence surrounding this canvas of margin, a lot of like what we see in the life of Jesus, even, he created margin for the things that matter.
SPEAKER_03Absolutely.
SPEAKER_04And I think we would do a disservice to ourselves if we didn't prioritize margin in our own calendars to actually reach the next generation. And so, you know, culture is what you create or what you allow. We've heard this multiple, multiple times. And so what Hannah and I have really like even tried to adopt and change in our own life when it comes down to the next generation is how are we creating margin in our own organizational calendar, our personal calendar for the next generation? And so when we prioritize that and we prioritize the life of Jesus of creating margin for the things that matter, what are we actually doing then? What Hannah was talking about? We're actually being about discipleship and mentorship. And I think the next generation is craving leaders, senior level leaders, leaders like myself, leaders like you that are saying, Hey, I'm gonna carve out time in my own calendar to see you, to believe in you, and find ways to even empower you. Absolutely. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00I wanted to ask on that like what are some of those keys to discipleship and mentoring this younger generation? Like, what do you think some markers of that would be?
SPEAKER_03Go ahead.
SPEAKER_01I think one of the most impactful things in my life, if I look at the leaders who have created space for me, and there are so many of them. One of the biggest pieces is not so much that they sat down with me and gave me all the perfect advice. They didn't go through a million books with me. They didn't, you know, fix all of my issues. The biggest thing they did was they invited me into their own life and leadership. And by understanding how to how to do it because I saw it, it has equipped me to lead in real spaces. Sometimes when we learn about leadership through a book or on a stage, those things are all great, but it can feel very disconnected from what it actually feels like to lead a normal life. But some of the memories that I have that are most impactful to me is when one of my mentors, Aubrey, who is a pastor and a phenomenal communicator and author of multiple books and very gifted, she would just invite me over to her house. She lives in Chicagoland, and I would get to see how she's working on a sermon while cleaning up her kitchen and telling her kids to behave and then going and leaving and hosting a radio show. And I got to just be in her atmosphere while she was doing that. Or I got to see the way my pastor, when I was on SAP at a church when I was about 18, 19, even though I wasn't on high-level teams who'd invite me into those meetings just so I could see how it worked and see what they were talking about. It was leaders who created space for me to just be a part of their life and leadership. And so that has impacted how I lead. And even now, most of the time when I'm traveling for a speaking engagement or for a conference, I'll often have a young woman with me, an 18, 19, 20-year-old woman who also feels called to speak or lead in some capacity. And I'll say, Hey, you know, I might not have all this time to have a weekly meeting with you, but come with me and I'll show you what it looks like when I do sound check. I'll I'll show you what my notes look like on my iPad, I'll talk you through what I do before sermons prepare, and I'll give them a glimpse, I'll give them access to my life. And I don't even have that much wisdom yet to share, I know, compared to so many leaders. And so I've just thought though, if I can start that now in my 20s, then how many more decades will I have of leadership inviting young people with me? And I think every senior leader can do that. Whether you are a full-time parent and you're a leader, you can invite them in your life. Or if you're a full-time in ministry, you can invite them into meetings with you. You can have them follow along with you as your sermon prepping. If you are a full-time business leader, invite them into the executive team meeting, have them sit on the side and take notes and unpack it afterwards. Find the leaders in your circle who are just looking for access and invite them into what you're already doing.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. And I would add to that is two things. I was gonna say three, but you covered one of them. Uh, but two things is in my own personal leadership and development growth, I've grown exponentially when leaders said, Hey, I'm gonna toss you into the deep end, hope you can swim. And when leaders have done that, I have found a uh my capacity to grow. Right. But then I've also found that not every leader wants to toss you in the deep end and watch you fail, but actually provide coaching. And I think that our uh is a true marker of what we can do for the next generation is how do we give them um personal influence or positional influence to actually say, hey, I'm gonna toss you into something that is gonna challenge you, that is gonna scare you, that is gonna probably bring a lot of fear or even anxiety in your own life. But I'm gonna sit back and be so pleased as a senior level leader because I get to sit on the back end and watch you flourish and walk out like in real time, work out your calling and what God has anointed you for.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And so that would be one. And then two, I would just say is uh, yeah, just to touch on this topic again, is how are you creating margin in your calendar for the next generation? Um I've also seen um just inviting, like if you're an invitational leader, uh, we can grow so much as young people. I'm sure in your own life, when you've been invited, um, or when a senior level leader has been so curious to say, Hey, what do you see? What do you think you we should change here? I think that adds so much value to not only you as a senior level leader, but then also it creates this like it factor in your organization or in your church when people know that they are extremely valued. Absolutely. And I don't know about you, but in my personal experience as a young person, I go where I feel valued.
SPEAKER_03Absolutely.
SPEAKER_04And so when people value your mind or your heart or your emotions or the way that you see the world or how the way that you see the local church, I think we're gonna see great expansion or great beauty just kind of uh flourish from that point. So those are the things I would add.
SPEAKER_00I love it. I think it's so sweet. Hannah, the way you talked about the wonderful mentors and people who disciple you and took it. And I like, as you were talking, couldn't help but think of the people that did that for me and just the mark that leaves. And then also as you talked about church leaders, I was thinking of one example. Um, my senior pastor at my church growing up, every year he would have summer interns at the church, and he always would take the interns um to hospital visits with him and go like pray over people in the church that were sick, or he would take them along to um like pray over newborn babies or like do these things that it's like this is the ministry that we get to do. I remember hearing stories and stories of interns that would share, like, oh, I got to go with Pastor Steve to do this, oh, I got to pray over this newborn child. And it's just so beautiful that like how subtle an opportunity. He's like, Hey, I'll bring you to lunch and then we're gonna run by the hospital and do this. And you get to come along and ask as many questions as you want on driveway. And I just love it's that was how he created that margin and that space. He's he knew he had to drive there anyway, so why not bring the intern along so they can learn what ministry really looks like.
SPEAKER_03Absolutely. Yeah, I love it.
SPEAKER_00Powerful. I need to keep an eye on the time over here because I know we're getting close to the end, but I have so many questions, of course, because I just love the way that your hearts um adore this next generation and the things they're gonna do. I want to talk before we end, I just want to ask some questions to you as leaders and some things that other leaders and young leaders can learn about kind of taking care of yourself as a leader and how you can be a good. I think you mentioned earlier the next generation is gonna lead with or without us. And we want to provide them some guidelines. So, what are some things that you would tell young leaders to think about and take care of themselves so they can lead well?
SPEAKER_04Oh, such a great question.
SPEAKER_01It's so important. And one of the things that super important I believe has been a really big deal for my leadership are the people that I have in place who keep me grounded. And there's a few different groups. I'll mention three different groups. There's the people who are investing in me, the people who are mutually investing in each other, and then the people that I'm investing in. Those are kind of my three levels of people in my life that I have said I will always have these three categories. Uh first, those investing in me. I have a woman who's more of a mentor spiritually. She's that person I can call with the random question of am I being a good wife? Am I totally missing it here? Am I crazy? Am I making a wrong leadership decision? She's kind of an overall spiritual mentor to me. And then also I have an emotional health coach who I meet with every other week. We both meet with him individually, and he's that person that will take me deep who will say, Hey, where are you personally at spiritually? Where are you emotionally? Are you mentally healthy? And will also help me recognize when I'm not and how to overcome that. And he's my really healthy check-in there. So I have that going, as well as a lot of other business mentors and entrepreneurial mentors, and there's so many individuals who I've intentionally placed in my life to invest in a meeting. Then I have individuals we're mutually investing in. And I have a few different groups of friends. I have two of my closest girlfriends who've known me for a long time. And our group text uh is called core team. And that was an intentional conversation we had within with all three of us. We said, hey, we're going to be each other's core team, which means when I'm feeling when I wake up with a lot of anxiety over leadership, I don't just have to keep that to myself or just tell my husband. I have girls that I will text and say, Hey, you all, I need you to know I have a lot of anxiety right now. I'm not okay. I need you to remind me who I am. I need to remind me I'm more than leadership. And they're the people that will show up when I really need people. That's my core team. We also have a group of couples who intentionally are in each other's lives and have said our marriages are going to be stronger because we have these other couples in our lives that we intentionally get away with once a year. We all take a trip. And then also throughout the year, we are checking on each other, we're keeping each other accountable. The men are saying, Hey, how can I be better husbands? The women are saying, How can I be better wives? There's that accountability. And then there's the people I'm investing in. And actually, those people will keep you healthy as a leader because when young people see you up close, they're they're not that impressed by you, right? So if I go speak at a conference to a room of a thousand young people, I might start to feel that I'm kind of cool because all the young people are trying to take pictures with me and they think I'm something. But when I get home to Chicago and I take out the young girl I'm discipling or mentoring at for coffee, she does not think it's funny that I'm five minutes late and she will tell me and she does not think I'm that important and cool. And that's good. We need to be surrounded by people who are not impressed by us. Something that I have said often, and I I continue to believe it. All three of those categories, none of those people are impressed by me. None of those people think I'm anything that special outside of my own identity as a daughter of the king. And I'm grateful for that. And that is, I think, a really important element for every young leader to have a place.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's so good. A lot of uh what Hannah touched on is uh my own personal rhythms. But one thing I would just add for if you're a young leader listening to this podcast, is health is on the other side of your ass. Um what I mean by that is when Jesus looked at Peter, when Peter was he was toiling all night, trying to cast his net into the, you know, in the water to catch all this fish, you know, he was like, Jesus, we toiled all night, we toiled all night, we didn't catch anything. And he cast his net on the other side of the boat and he posed up so much fish that his nets were breaking, his boat was sinking, and he needed a community and an army of people to pull up the amount of fish that he caught in that moment. And I don't know about you when, but when my boat is breaking or my nets are breaking, or uh, you know, I need the community around me, um, I am thankful for friends that just that have the heart of Jesus and provide everything I need. And so I would just say, if you're listening to this, find people that when you are in a crushing season, emotionally, physically, spiritually, mentally, whatever it is, that when you are in need of something just like Peter was, that you have people in your life that says there is a source and his name is Jesus, and have you gone to him first? And um, so I would just add that is out of that place, that secret place of just going to Jesus first, you really find everything you need: peace, abundance, hope, faith, and the list goes on. And so that's great. That's one thing I would add as well.
SPEAKER_00Well, thank you, thank you, thank you so much for hopping on here and having this conversation with me. I know it's gonna be so fruitful for so many. Um, real quick, where can listeners hear more about your ministries that you get to be a part of? And we'll make sure to add links and everything to show notes so they can find that.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, you can find me on Instagram. That's typically where I post the most, even though I'm not huge on social, is Aaron Rbarnett underscore. You can also check out our website. Uh, we have our big conference in Orlando every year in March. And then we have different regional events throughout the country. And you can check those out at exponential.org.
SPEAKER_01That's right. And you can find out more about me at hanna.g.barnett on all socials, and then as well at generationistinct.com. And that is where you can find out more about our cohorts, our partnership with churches, and other ways that you all can get involved. Wonderful. Well, thank you guys again so much. Thank you. You're welcome.
SPEAKER_04Thanks for having us.
SPEAKER_01We're so grateful and honored to be a part of it.
SPEAKER_00Thanks for listening to the Vanderblumen Leadership Podcast. At Vanderblumen, we help Christian organizations build their best teams through hiring, succession, compensation, and diversity consulting services. Visit our website, Vanderblumen.com to learn more and subscribe to our Vanderblumen Leadership Podcast wherever you listen to podcasts to keep up with our newest episodes. Thanks for listening.