Lives Transformed. Period.

When I hear people question the truth of scripture, my first thought is to point them to someone who reflects the joy and confidence and presence of having Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.  To me, nothing speaks stronger to the truth of our Holy Bible than a life that has been transformed by what God offers.  One of those people who exemplified this in his life in beautiful fashion was Roger Williams, the former President and CEO of Mount Hermon.  Roger walked through life here on earth with the exhilaration of his salvation as if he were walking on the precipice of heaven.  He truly glowed and was a living example of how the truth of scripture can transform you.

Roger went home to be with our Lord in September of 2014 after succumbing to a long battle with cancer.  While I was very sad to lose Roger as a friend and mentor here on earth, I feel closer to him than ever, and rejoice in the thought of joining him in heaven one day.  Roger was one of the first people to get me really excited about heaven.  He spoke of it as if he had been there, and that he just knew it would be more wonderful than anything we could possibly imagine here on earth.

Our family would usually just see Roger once a year at the Mount Hermon family camp at Lake Tahoe, but the love he showed us throughout the week exemplified the true Christian Spirit.  It was a huge inspiration for me personally in my walk with the Lord.

Those summer evenings we spent singing worship music and taking communion on the south shore of Lake Tahoe, as the sun set on the mountains to the west, were truly magical for our entire family.  In fact, I can still hear Roger’s voice telling us that in spite of the remarkable beauty we were surrounded by on Lake Tahoe, we could count on God’s promise that heaven would far surpass it:

“If you think the colors are good now – wait till you see them in heaven.

If you think the sunsets are good now – wait till you see them in heaven.

IF YOU THINK this is a beautiful place to live now – wait until you see it REDEEMED [in heaven].”

As the Mount Hermon tagline, which Roger helped to create, would say,
“it’s all about Lives Transformed.  Period. “

Is That God Calling?

Fast-forward to October of 2013, over a year after Roger had begun an arduous struggle with cancer, during which he continued to teach, preach and provide visionary leadership at Mount Hermon.  In spite of all that he was going through at that time, he agreed to meet with me in his office to address specific questions I had regarding my future.  I had been sensing that God was calling me to a ministry around work/life balance and figured Roger could help guide me in knowing if that was actually the case.  In spite of it being a very difficult time for him with his declining health, he spent over two and a half hours with me that evening in his office with intensity and delight that I can’t quite do justice with words. My direct question to him was,

“Roger, how had you known that it was God calling when you gave up your successful career and beautiful home to go into ministry?”

Roger’s response was crystal clear.  He told me hat God had quite simply hit him over the head with a 2×4 when his calling arrived.  It was obvious.  There was no mistaking it.  I would know for sure when it happened to me.

And after hearing the specifics of his story, I had to agree!

As for my yearning to think that God was calling me to leave my high tech marketing job in Silicon Valley to help others in the way of work/life balance, it seemed pretty clear that I had not been hit by that 2X4 [yet].  I left that evening with a great sense of relief and drove over back over the hill on Highway 17 thanking God for such clear advice from such a dear friend.

Roger went to his heavenly home on September 14, 2014, succumbing to cancer that he called “his insidious dance partner”.  His death came just a few days after his 21st anniversary at Mount Hermon. Praise God for the gift I was given that day to be with Roger and to drink from the deep well of wisdom he offered.

Life Coaching

Well, Roger was right.  There was no mistaking the 2×4 when it hits you.

Through a series of very personal incidents over these past two years, God has made it crystal clear to me that it is time to get started.  I will talk to a couple of those incidents in future blogs, but my layoff from Oracle in January of 2017 (see: New Beginnings) was one of those that turned into just the opening I needed to re-set my sights on how I was moving forward in life.

As soon as I realized I would be losing my job, I enrolled in an extensive 1-year certification program to become a New Ventures West Integral Coach®, or in more common terms, a Professional Life Coach.   Life Coaching has turned out to be an ideal way for me to make a long-term transition in my career from high-tech marketing to a full-time role of helping others navigate work/life balance challenges in Silicon Valley.

From my research, it was clear that New Ventures West had the most comprehensive training program around, and I knew that to effectively lead people in a discussion about balancing priorities about their work in this area, I needed top-notch credentials and comprehensive training.  I am already through almost half of the program and definitely see that this is where God wants me to be.  It is a wonderful thing to feel that you are following His plan for your life.

Just ten years ago I had never heard of a “Life Coach” and no idea what they did.  Now many of the more innovative corporations in Silicon Valley offer Life Coaching services as a human resources benefit to help their employees better manage the many complexities of life.  The thinking behind that is that by becoming a healthier individual you are going to end up being a more productive employee.

Living Without Margins

We all agree life has become quite complex and very challenging on a daily basis, regardless of what you do for a living.  People are getting stuck on even the seemingly easy things in life.  Life coaches can enter a person’s world not only to free them but also help them develop into more complete individuals, better equipped to handle the many curveballs life is throwing at them.  There are many books on this subject, but my favorite is Richard Swenson’s “Margin”.  We are simply living life today without margins.  Try reading a book without margins – you won’t get very far.  It’s stressful!

A quote from the opening paragraph of the book:  “The Way We’re Working Isn’t Working” also speaks to this dilemma the average worker is facing today:

“The defining ethic in the modern workplace is more, bigger, faster.  More information than ever is available to us, and the speed of every transaction has increased exponentially, prompting a sense of permanent urgency and endless distraction.  We have more customers and clients to please, more e-mails to answer, more phone calls to return, more tasks to juggle, more meetings to attend, more places to go, and more hours we feel we must work to avoid falling further behind.”

The simple things in life are not so simple anymore.  Expectations exceed our human capabilities.

So, I am learning to become a life coach to help people develop into more complete human beings, as well as to help them through the many “speed bumps” (as Kona Jack would call them) that come their way.  The many classes, books, videos, and other resources I am now consuming to gain my coaching certification (in December 2017) are helping me learn the fundamentals of integral coaching.

There is another important side to this story.  In addition to my course work, I am getting coached myself.  That is a big part of my training.  I can’t learn how to help people develop themselves if I can’t do it myself, is the prevailing thought, which I tend to agree with.  So I am now learning [from my coach] how I can personally develop to become more complete while developing to be a better coach!

Through this training, I am learning a great deal about myself.

My current narrative (as we call it in class), is that I have been riding a Silicon Valley EXPRESS train for the past 25 years, and you might just say that in order for me to become an effective life coach, I need to
S – L – O – W    D – O – W – N.

In fact, my coach is even telling me to stop the EXPRESS train and get off.

He wants me to commence on a trek of self-exploration to better understand my true self.  In the past, I have definitely not been one to demonstrate much patience, especially at the DMV.

This is life-changing stuff!

To put it in surfing terms (as one of my classmates describes it), I am learning to “HANG 11”.  Things like speaking more thoughtfully and slowly, listening with my heart (not just with my ears), and sitting for 30 minutes every morning while doing (and thinking) absolutely nothing.  Are you kidding me!

It is quite exciting and feels really good.  But it is also quite uncomfortable for someone who has been flying along at warp speed for 25 years solving an endless flow of high-technology challenges.

Why a Christian perspective?
While my passion for helping people in the work/life balance struggle in Silicon Valley has led me to the coaching profession, I do look at the world through the eyes of a Christian who believes the Holy Bible is the true word of God.  I want to be very upfront about that.  However, I do not believe my clients need to hold Christian beliefs to receive value from my coaching. It is simply the lens through which I view the world.

Next post: Begin with the end in mind

**RESOURCES**

The Way We’re Working Isn’t Working: The Four Forgotten Needs That Energize Great Performance by Tony Schwartz and Jean Gomes

I happened to run across this book as part of my required reading for the New Ventures West training program, and I loved it!  It aligns beautifully with promoting work/life balance.

Schwartz offers a plethora of very practical information for those who are too busy working to attend to their core human needs.  One example was his discussion about the value exchange between employers and employees being the one-dimensional concept of “time for money”.  He suggests having employers invest more in the multidimensional needs of their employees in order to gain more sustainable high performance.  Schwartz talks about focusing on the value we produce during the hours we work, and provides some very good examples of how this can pay off for both sides (employers AND employees).   His analogy is that human beings are not meant to operate like machines (high speeds for long times), but that we produce the most value when we are able to pulse between the expenditure and the intermittent renewal of our energy.

Amen to that!

Measuring Up by Charles P. Lloyd

Charles P. Lloyd is my mom’s twin brother.  Uncle Charles was an incredible man who impacted my life in so many wonderful ways.  He played the role of a second father to me, and I definitely believe my mom passed on some of Charles’ genes to me.  This book is an excellent demonstration of that.  Somehow, Uncle Charles was writing on work/life balance before I had even entered the work force.  We crossed paths on this topic over 15 years ago when he pulled out this book to show me what he had written.  I was quite shocked when I saw it, as I had been writing on the same topic for several years by then without ever knowing he even had an interest in it.  If you take a look at the Circle of Life quiz (in this blog under Circle of Life), you will see an amazing resemblance between the two separate writings.    

In Measuring Up Charles asks a simple question:

“What are some of the essential attributes that must be learned and developed in men and in women to be well-rounded, happy and self-actuated?”

Take 30 minutes and read this book if you would like to learn more about “the real you” and “where you are going” in this life.

Uncle Charles went home to be with our Lord on May 18, 2017. Here is a link to his obituary if you would like to learn more about him.