I am just coming home from a golf trip to Scotland. (This was a year ago, but posting now.)   Wow, what a trip!  12 great men, 4 great golf courses, one great castle, one SUPER GREAT Young Life camp, and a top notch place to get the best fish and chips anywhere!  Here are my simple take-a-ways from this EPIC trip… as well as observations.

Laughter — and lots of it, is so, so good.

I can remember for years taking kids to camp, and on night two, we would have an Entertainment Night.  Young Life leaders would come out and be in crazy and silly skits.  “Bowling skit,” “Movie skit,” or the “Doctor’s office” skit… cannot really explain them other than to say there was deep, deep belly laughter.  As we would walk back to the cabin kids would be rehashing the skits, and laughing.  It was so good…

This week we laughed.  11 men who generally didn’t know each other, coming together, and in the end – laughing!  Last night, thankful for Spotify, we went around and gave “awards” to each guy from the week. You had to name the award with a song… so they would say the name — “Another One Bites the Dust,” and as they would describe why this person was getting this award we would play that song in the background.  Let’s just say, if laughter is good for the soul, we were real good to peoples souls on the last night.

“What’s the game today?” (They want to play!)

You cannot take the kid out of the man!  One of the best pieces of advice I ever received in working with adults was that they are really just grown up teenagers.  I think what was meant by that was that if a kid likes it, generally, an adult will too!  They are just grown kids. The worst mistake we can make is to think that because they are “older” they now have “grown out of” adventure, fun, surprise, humor, competition, etc.

The element of surprise – it still works.

At Young Life Camp we focus on surprise… and on this trip I did the same.  It might have been what the “Tee Prize” was for the day, or the game, or where we were going to dinner.  It is amazing how much people like to be surprised.  Just like in a marriage or relationship, people like to be surprised… flowers, candy, a note in the suitcase.  I will keep this in all of my trips — people love and feel valued by surprises.

Sharing questions – people want to be known.

Each meal we had “table questions.”  It was everything … but a few were, “If you were to toast your dad, right now, what would your toast be?”  “What was your favorite birthday growing up?”  “A car, a relationship, and a song from when you were 16 – go!’  People want to share, and they want to remember!

Quality Trip + Significant Mission = SUCCESS.

This particular trip, and the Scotland Trip 2018 — let me know if you want info, are built around some bucket list items, some adventure, as well as mission!  We spend the day at the Young Life Camp in Scotland.  It was great to see these guys talk to kids, share a meal, and sit in Young Life club.  We also had coffee with some of the staff, and heard the visions of what they are trying to do.  This deeply meaningful… and at the end, the depth of the trip is why I think guys will come back.  It was not just a trip with banter, and excess, and competition.

People want significance!