The Emotionally Healthy Leader by Peter Scazzero

Week 2: Chapter 1 — Face Your Shadow

Read Chapter 1 of The Emotionally Healthy Leader. Key passages: Genesis 37-50 (Joseph's story); Psalm 139:23-24.

The shadow is the part of ourselves we don't want to see — and Scazzero argues it is precisely there that the most transformative leadership work begins.

Discussion Questions

8 questions

1.Scazzero borrows the term "shadow" from depth psychology to describe the parts of ourselves that are hidden, denied, or unexamined. In your own words, how would you define what a leader's shadow is?

2.He argues that our shadows don't disappear when we become Christians or enter ministry — they go underground and find new, religious-looking expressions. What are some examples he gives of how a leader's shadow can wear spiritual clothing?

3.Scazzero traces the origins of our shadow to our family of origin — the messages, wounds, coping mechanisms, and unspoken rules we absorbed growing up.

a.What are one or two "rules" or patterns from your family of origin that you have carried (often unconsciously) into your leadership?

b.How have those patterns shaped the culture of the team or community you lead?

4.The author uses Joseph's story as a case study in shadow work — Joseph had real gifts but also real blind spots around favoritism, pride, and rivalry that had to be broken through suffering before he could lead well. What shadow elements do you see in the young Joseph, and how were they addressed through his journey?

5.Scazzero suggests that a leader's shadow tends to express itself most powerfully under pressure — in conflict, in seasons of failure, or when someone challenges our authority. When have you seen your own shadow surface most clearly in a high-pressure moment?

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Closing Prayer

Full guide

Searching God, you know us completely — the parts we display and the parts we bury. We confess that we have led out of wounds we have not named, out of fears we have not faced, out of patterns we learned long before we ever stood at the front of a room. Forgive us for the ways our unexamined shadow has shaped our communities without us knowing it. Give us the courage to stop running from what is inside us and to stand still long enough to be known. Thank you that in Christ, there is no condemnation — only the grace to see clearly and be made new. Search us. Know us. Lead us in the everlasting way. Amen.

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