Practice what you preach...

Practice what you preach…. As a kid, I was told this phrase over and over by my parents, teachers, coaches and most adults I looked up to during this time. Quite simply, it means to be a person of your word and do what you say you’re going to do.

During the summer, we put an emphasis on building relationships. Not just with our campers, but also with our counselors, counselors to camper, camper to camper and most importantly, everyone building a relationship with God. This is not something we want them to do just while they’re here at camp. Their time at Skyline is spent learning how to develop relationships with the goal of when everyone returns home, they take these skills and continue to foster relationships with their friends, their parents and with God.

Well, we strive hard to “Practice what we Preach” here at Skyline. As a business, we have a lot of companies we deal with to help top make camp the successful place of growth it is. Over the last few months, we’ve be honored to get to build better relationships with not only our insurance company, Morrow Insurance but also our photo company, Waldo Photos (as many of you know and use already). We are not just clients of their companies, but we have great relationships with them. They keep up with what’s happening around Skyline so well that they know and were amazed at what your campers were doing and wanted to try it for themselves.

The owners of these companies stopped by, spent a few days at Skyline and learned how to rappel and cave, just like the campers did in our caving, survival and rappelling class. No matter your age, it’s a sense of bewilderment when you rappel down a 110 ft cliff or spend 5 hours underground with someone. You learn about trust, respect, caring, communication, everything thats required to build a great relationship.

Our relationships with these companies is much more than just a “summer thing”. Just like we try to have the same type of relationship with our campers, counselors and parents throughout the year as well. I hope the campers that have made new friends at Skyline keep up with each other, check in on each other, or just drop an email or heaven forbid, a hand written letter to make their day and just say hi.

Building relationships takes a lot more than clicking a button on a social media page. It’s not about how many “likes” we get or how many followers we have. Its about being someone that is worthy of following and its not something you can do just during your time here at camp, it has to be a way of life 24/7.

Quite simply, talk to one another, support each other, learn about each other, be there for your family and friends, reach out to God.

Build relationships…..practice what you preach.