This is a guest post from media executive, actor, and author Kathleen Cooke. In episode 32 of the BoldIdea podcast, Kathleen talked about the influence of relationships.
Creative people are always looking to start something new, or something revolutionary that’s never been done before. Sometimes we make it too difficult, when often, it’s as simple as bringing practical wisdom and truth to everyday issues.
I recently met a couple, Ron and Linda, who had a couple of young college-aged sons. Their boys would bring their friends home from school on weekends and one weekend Ron overheard them talking about how hard it was to find girlfriends because relationships always centered around sex.
Ron suggested, “Before you find a girlfriend you have to learn how to be a gentleman.” Since those kinds of classes weren’t taught anymore they asked if Ron would teach them. So Ron and Linda started having classes in their home on how to treat and talk to a woman with the final class ending on the subject of how to cook a meal. Soon, what started out to be a small group of college guys turned into a full time ministry. It now even includes a young married couples class on how to be a better husband and wife.
Linda even began her own group for young women on how to be a woman of grace and how to honor men. Through that effort, Ron and Linda have been able to share the truth of Jesus to hundreds of young men and women.
No one is going to get to the top doing it like everyone else, because someone is already there. Successful people know they are problem solvers. Then they have to get creative and work hard to make the solution work. Many people miss that last step—the work hard step. It’s easy to see problems but providing the solutions requires time, energy, and tenacity. Sometimes it may mean providing what people need before they know they need it. That’s what Ron and Linda did. An out of the box ministry and now their life’s work evolved from talk on sex with a bunch of college guys to teaching young men and women how to be thoughtful and caring in their relationships with one another.
Kathleen Cooke is a media executive, Hollywood Screen Actor’s Guild actor, speaker, writer, and a founding partner and Vice President of Cooke Pictures, a media production company based in Burbank, California. She also co-founded the nonprofit organization The Influence Lab where she leads and mentors Christian professionals in the entertainment industry. Follow Kathleen at her blog KathleenCooke.com and on Twitter and Facebook.