A while back, I heard a missionary give a talk about his travels to remote villages in Africa that illustrated an intriguing good teammate trait.
Hosting a guest was a tremendous honor in many of the places the missionary visited, so the villagers would often celebrate his presence by preparing a special meal.
What they served, however, tested the limits of the missionary’s palate. The meal was usually made with ingredients that were foreign to his body and prepared in a manner that was contrary to the western sanitary standards to which he was accustomed.
But the missionary always graciously consumed whatever food he was offered, despite its lack of appeal and the fact that he knew it would inevitably disagree with his digestive system.
The missionary described how scarce food was in these regions and how sacred meals were to the villagers. To not have eaten what he was served would have been a tremendous insult.
He ate the villagers’ food and accepted the inevitable unpleasantness that followed for one reason: He didn’t want to offend them.
Not everyone is willing to embrace this mindset. To many, the notion of enduring discomfort for the sake of others is incomprehensible.
The missionary knew how sacred food was to the villagers. Rejecting it would likely cause them to reject him and the message he hoped to deliver—the purpose of his mission. To him, getting the villagers to be receptive to that message was more important than his ego or any personal comfort.
His sacrifice was fueled by a purpose beyond self.
I find it interesting, if not ironic, how often individuals who refuse to sacrifice their comfort to keep from offending others are the same individuals whose egos cause them to surrender to the discomfort of peer pressure.
They will drink excessively, do drugs, perpetuate untruths, or engage in behaviors that are unethical or immoral to avoid feeling like a prude or killjoy. They’ll disregard what they know to be right to keep themselves from experiencing the discomfort that could come from rejecting what they know to be wrong.
Good teammates don’t operate that way. They’ll sacrifice their comfort to keep from offending others. But they’ll never sacrifice their integrity to avoid the discomfort of offending others.
Their commitment to their team and perpetuating their teams’ missions prevents them from making that mistake.
As always…Good teammates care. Good teammates share. Good teammates listen. Go be a good teammate.
