Henriet's Blog

You Are Just Like Snow!

Forgive us Western Washingtonians...we've got snow on the brain. It is melting today but we have had a lot of it. I have not left my house for days, just like everyone else around here. Maybe that's why I'm comparing everything to... snow.

We are just like snow!

Snow is intriguing and fascinating. It is mesmerizing when it comes down in all its forms. Sometimes it falls in big flakes swirlingly floating to the ground. Sometimes it resembles a fine mist. It can even come down in mini snowballs that look hail but are a type of snow. 

Gathered snow looks like a big white, beautiful blanket. Lots of snow looks great but the individual snowflake is truly amazing. We have all heard it before...each one is unique! All snowflakes may look alike but they are orginals, every one of them.

That's how we are like snow

We are just like that! We are each unique. One-of-a-kind. God made us original, according to his image. He did not make batches of Bobs or piles of Paulas. He made individuals! I love that. It's why I love coaching using StrengthsFinder and Myers-Briggs. Every person is so interesting! And, every person is one tiny aspect of God's entire Person. Just like the snowflake. Mind boggling!

Often we look at people as a group, clan or race. We see them from afar and totally miss the wonderful individuality. Just like when we only look at the blanket of snow. It's looks great but we miss the true beauty.

Let's not miss the wonder of what God created in the people around us. Let's all choose to look closer and truly see and hear each other! Pass it on...

Hybels at WC Leadership Summit: "Don't Quit"

This year's Global Leadership Summit 2010 started with three sessions, including Bill Hybels' kick-off talk, with a variant of "don't quit" and "never give up."

"Thanks, Bill, I needed that!"

One of my favorite conferences each year is the Willow Creek Global Leadership Summit. Why? Because it's all about leaders. I love leaders and leadership. Bill Hybels always inspires and the Summit usually lines up great speakers that provide nuggets of truth and inspiration to improve each leader's effectiveness.

This year, as I arrived at the Westminster Chapel satellite site, I lacked enthusiasm. Not because of the Summit, but because of life and leadership circumstances. Can you relate? Have you experienced times of discouragement in your life or leadership?

Bill Hybels kicked off the Summit with an opening session - as he always does. He reviewed some basics of leadership, including that leaders:

• Move people from here to there - there being the envisioned future
• Recruit fantastic people to the team
• Need to establish mile markers and celebrations

Whispers from God

Then he spoke about The Power of a Whisper - also the title of his new book. He told us how over the years God has spoken to him (not audibly) through thoughts in his head, which he called "whispers." Then he gave us a list of "whispers" and invited each leader to listen for the whisper God intended for them.

Now, listening to God is not new for me, but lately I've had a harder time due to this current funk. As Bill read his list, "Don't Quit" jumped out at me. It was clearly the whisper for me. I wasn't really planning to quit, but this word from God helps me to be more determined to keep following his leading in my life.

Interestingly, the next two speakers, Jim Collins and Christine Caine, also gave variants of "don't quit": "never, ever, give up" and "don't lose hope or give up." It's just what I needed today.

"OK, God. I heard you loud and clear. I won't quit. I will go wherever you lead. Please give me the courage and strength to follow."

"Jesus Knows You" - My Topic at Life At The Ridge this Sunday

"He even counts every hair on your head." Matthew 10:30, NIRV

It's been a few years since I've had the opportunity to speak at a church. Pastor Josh Hebert of Life at the Ridge, one of our Semper Vita partners, asked me to teach this Sunday and start the series. Wow. That's an honor. "Thanks for trusting me, Josh!" Both the series and my sermon are entitled, "Jesus Knows You." He does! And, that's good.

Jesus knows you - really knows you

He knew you before the world was made (Ephesians 1:4) and he knows every hair on your head. That's easier for Jesus with some people than for others but regardless - he knows! He knows your name. He knows my name. Wow. The God of the universe knows us personally. We're not only in his address book we're written on the palm of God's hand. (And we're not talking about a handheld computer!) Besides your name, Jesus knows your heart, your dreams and your wiring.

One of the things that I just love is helping people discover their God-given wiring. It's just awesome. That's part of the "Grow" element of Semper Vita. (I wrote about discovering your wiring and doing your part recently - because I believe it allows us to maximize our potential.) When we understand how we're wired we can be so much more effective in our relationships, at work and in God's Kingdom. The key here though is that God hand-designed each of us - for our good and to his glory. Amazing stuff.

Knowing our wiring isn't enough if we go it alone...

If we're just plugging in our wiring based on our own best thinking we might still fall short of what could be. With understanding our wiring comes following Jesus. He knows each one of us and ask each one of us to follow. He told Peter, "Follow me." He tells all of us, "Follow me." And the way he asks us to follow and what he has for us to do varies based on who we are. Our relationship with Jesus is personal.

Do you know you? Do you know your wiring? Do you really grasp that Jesus knows you - the real you? Are you following?

Get Busy Doing Just Your Part

"Love should always make us tell the truth. Then we will grow in every way and be more like Christ, the head of the body. Christ holds it together and makes all of its parts work perfectly,  as it grows and becomes strong because of love."   Ephesians 4:15-16, CEV

In the last post I discussed that all of us who claim faith in Jesus need to get busy. "Busy," you might say, "I'm already too busy. You've got to be kidding me." Well, hold on. I don't mean busy just doing any and everything but busy doing what God intends for us to do. You see, God has "Designer tasks" planned for each of us. How do I know? It's clearly spelled out in Ephesians, one of my favorite books in the Bible. It tells us about who God is and how he has created us, chosen us and uniquely designed each one of us. It also tells us that he has prepared good things for us to do. In fact, he has hand selected good tasks for us. God is the designer. He made us and he made the good things for us to do. Here's how Ephesians 2:10 puts it:

"God has made us what we are. In Christ Jesus, God made us to do good works, which God planned in advance for us to live our lives doing" (New Century Version).

Know yourself

So, how do we know what God has for us? Well, I believe that one important first step is to know our wiring. Who did God make us to be? In fact, at Semper Vita we believe in this so strongly that we advocate for everyone to discover their God-given wiring. To do that we use the Clifton StrengthsFinder, Myers-Briggs and Spiritual gifts assessments. I know that for me, discovering how God made me really helped me to focus on what God intends for me to do.

Know your part

The good news for all of us is that God only asks us to do our part. He's already at work in us and around us. He invites each one of us to join him in the work that he is already doing. And, he only asks each one of us to do the works that he prepared in advance for us to do. So, what is our part? How can we discover that? One key step is to ask God what he wants us to do. Part of that is looking around to see where he is already at work. Another key step is to understand who he made us to be so that we can better know what it is he asks us to do. It helps us to discover our purpose and to focus on the tasks designed for us.

Do your part

The next step is simple: Get busy and do your part. Once you know what God is asking you to do, just do it! If you're not sure, try out some different things and see where you sense God's pleasure. The results of getting busy in the right direction are obvious. It results in joy, peace, a sense of fulfillment, and lasting impact.  This impact is what the Bible calls fruit.

So, how are you doing? Do you know your wiring? (If not, contact us to get started.) Do you know your part? Are you producing fruit? Please share your story of how God has designed you and how he has invited you to join him.

Celebrating the Launch of Semper Vita Institute

We love to see missional endeavors at work.

A new chapter begins

Two days ago, I announced that we've been working hard behind the scenes on two endeavors.

• The first was the NW Ministry Conference. I'll be presenting a workshop on Missional Volunteering today. (More on that soon.)
• The second big project entailed creating a sister company, called Semper Vita Institute, to handle the training. 

Today we celebrate the launch of this new company.

What does this mean for Semper Vita?

By helping to start Semper Vita Institute, we are now able to outsource our training. SVI, as its called internally, provides quality training to both non-profits and for profit corporations to help people discover their unique wiring. The training includes Gallup's Clifton StrengthsFinder, Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and one-on-one coaching.

By partnering with Semper Vita Institute we are doing a couple of things:

• We are able to focus on our core purpose of connecting people to meaningful volunteer opportunities in their local community.
• We can provide quality training to non-profits now.
• We can go missional faster.

Through this new resource, we can immediately partner with non-profits and help them discover how to work more efficiently and maximize their team efforts. We can serve churches and allow them to help their people understand their unique wiring for volunteering and beyond. Semper Vita Institute has several trained coaches that can work with individuals, teams, departments and organizations.

Check it out for yourself

Semper Vita Institute launches its new website today. Check it out at www.sempervitainstitute.com. Congratulations Semper Vita Institute. Go get 'em.

StrengthsFinder For A Better Life

Living out of our Strengths: a possible solution to stress and dissatisfaction?

Yesterday's post discussed Oprah's self-confessed struggles with her weight. She's currently focusing on how to live our "Best Life" on her shows, bringing in experts to address the things we all deal with.

Use your Strengths Buckingham style

In the past, she's had Marcus Buckingham on her show. He is a Strengths coach and advocates Taking Control of Your Career and Your Life. That includes living in our strengths. In his book, Go Put Your Strengths To Work, he discusses the need to put together a strong week plan. This plan leads to living more and more in our strengths. One of the things he encourages is to figure out what we love and what we hate. Do more of what we love and stop doing what we hate. Makes sense, right?

When we do more of what we love and are naturally good at, it should reduce stress and increase joy. Less stress and more joy...a recipe for contentment and maybe even weight loss?

Semper Vita trains using StrengthsFinder

One of the core convictions of Semper Vita's approach is that we believe that each person is designed uniquely by God. As such, living in our strengths leads to contentment, joy and greater success. One of our services is personal StrengthsFinder coaching, using Now Discover Your Strengths, co-authored by Marcus Buckingham.

We desire for everyong to "experience life through service in community." We believe that by understanding ourselves, and loving ourselves, God and others, we will live a meaningful and fulfilled life. We also believe that when we live a God-honoring, other-focused life, we will find contentment and reduce stress. Doesn't that sound like the best life?

Contact us if you're interested in finding out more about living in your Strenghts.

Happy New Year - Let's Dream Big

Here's to a great new year, full of promises, hopes and dreams; let's together commit to making a difference by serving in community.

It's a New Year

As I reflected on the first lines of this post, the words "I love starting over" came to mind. And I do. It's exciting to begin again. Clean pages in a journal, new goals, a whole year full of promises. Last year's post on my personal blog, the predecessor to this one, I wrote that "I love to celebrate the start of a new year. The idea of starting over." Everyone can start over at any time during the year but New Year's seems just the perfect time.

For me it starts with the countdown and ringing in the New Year. Then on January 1, I spend time praying, reading my Bible and thinking about the year ahead. After my time with God, I write in my journal - the brand new one with clean pages - and write down my hopes, dreams and goals.

Hopes rather than resolutions

This year I established personal plans but also wrote my goals and dreams for Semper Vita. What do I hope to achieve personally? It includes spiritual growth, living each day to the full, staying organized, vacation, and of course...weight loss and exercise. No New Year's goals are complete without diet and exercise, right?

What about Semper Vita?

 Here are some of my goals for this brand new non-profit:

• invite hundreds of people to join the Semper Vita volunteer force
• helpdf people to discover their wiring and find their best self through training
• release version 1 of the software
• officially launch Semper Vita as a missional entity
• raise $200,000
• partner with churches and non-profits to collaborate for a better community

I believe that together we can make a difference in our communities and in the world. Together we can begin a new year, starting with the best resolution: to love much, live well, and give back this coming year.

Invest In Someone Today

When we focus beyond ourselves everyone involved benefits.

Potential needs to be nurtured   

When I started Kindergarten in the Netherlands, my teacher believed in my potential. With a November birthday I had a late start. However, that did not stop her. She thought that with a little help from my mom I could catch up and skip ahead a grade. I benefited greatly because mom spent the time to teach me to read and do basic math. Consequently, I skipped first grade making me the youngest in my grade from then on out. Being the youngest was fun but being appropriately challenged and not bored was priceless. Thanks mom!

In college, while attending Santa Clara University, a math professor invested in me. He saw that I could do well enough with a little extra attention. So, Professor Dave Logothetti challenged me to dig deeper and I passed Calculus I and Trigonometry - prerequisites for my business degree. Thanks Dave!

When I was a public relations coordinator, my boss John Tsantes recognized my potential and urged me to grow in my profession. As a vice president in our high-tech agency, he spent hours explaining PC boards, semiconductors, and CAD so that I could write white papers and press releases for my clients. He coached me so that I could represent my clients well in conversations with editors of EDN and such magazines. Thanks John!

When I started pursuing writing, David Kopp challenged me to work to develop the craft. The list goes on. There are many others who decided to invest in me. Thanks everyone!

My turn to pass it on

A key component of Semper Vita's mission involves investing in people. Our training entails bringing out the best in people. We focus on investing in strengths, releasing potential and maximizing personality types.

Today, I get to put that training to work. I'm investing in a group of people who want to grow their  potential and maximize how they function as a team. It will be great fun.

How can you invest in someone else? How can you encourage, inspire or challenge someone to be all that they can be? It's just one more way that we can volunteer our gifts and skills to extend Christmas. Who will you invest in today?

I'm Trained, Put Me To Work!

How Semper Vita helped three people discover their design and find greater joy in volunteering, work and life...

Nicki Contacted Us

One of our first responses to the new Semper Vita website was a request for training. Nicki responded by using the Contact Us form and asking for some help. She was in the middle of a shift from running her own business to volunteering. However, she wanted to find more significant opportunities . Like most people, she had been doing "odd jobs" but hadn't found her volunteering "niche" yet. So, we sat down. She brought her Myers-Briggs and StrengthsFinder results. She also knew some of her Spiritual Gifts. After a discussion we discovered that her type preferences perfectly lined up with her strengths and gifts. What she needed was greater understanding of her wiring, permission to be herself, and a reframing of what volunteering means - for her. We discussed how her interior design business tied in with her strength of harmony and her Spiritual Gift of hospitality. Instead of leading a scattered and separated life, she needed a way to make all the pieces work together. Now Nicki knows that by using her home to lend hospitality and her design expertise to help others create peaceful homes she can live integrated. She desires to use her gifts and offer her talents to bring harmony and beauty to others. Thanks for contacting us Nicki. You're trained and now are ready to volunteer!

Dave Tells His World

Dave knew himself but had no words to explain it to others. Now he's an evangelist! He'll tell anyone who will listen that he's an ENFP but not just a typical extrovert who's the life of the party. No, Dave likes to get to know people a little before he jumps in. He is intuitive, creative and likes options. He completed the Myers-Briggs and StrengthsFinder assessments as part of his job. He liked the idea of learning about his wiring to improve work performance but did not realize how it would help him in every area of his life. His strengths line up with his personality. Now he's telling everyone who'll hear how learning about your preferences and strengths helps you live life to the full.

Susie Achieves Contentment

Susie just completed the StrengthsFinder assessment. She contacted Semper Vita and wanted to understand her wiring better. Her strength of achiever means that she needs to accomplish things. Her strength of learner means that she thrives on studying and increasing her knowledge. As a stay-at-home mom, she is committed to her kids, knowing that this is her most important job. Yet she felt a little under challenged. She felt a little guilty but also sensed there was more. Susie desires to use her strengths to give back to the community too.  Now she understands that her need to accomplish and her need to learn are not because she's dissatisfied but is part of her strengths. Now she plans to complete the Myers-Briggs to learn more. Even before understanding the rest of her wiring, she's already found a way to apply her strengths and contribute in a way that suits her. She now volunteers her time to help a local non-profit by researching and using her computer at home. She feels content.

What About You?

Nicki, Dave and Susie are trained and ready to be put to work. Do you understand your wiring? Are you trained? If not, Contact Us and we'll help you discover your personality, strengths and gifts so that you can join Nicki, Dave and Susie and say, "I'm trained, put me to work!"

Semper Vita Trained: Find Your Fit

Learning more about who you are, what you're best at and what you're meant to do helps you discover true joy in volunteering.

We're all unique. Each of us is created for this time and place with one-of-a-kind wiring. This wiring can be uncovered and then honed so that we can enjoy greater success in life. What do those benefits look like? Understanding ourselves can help us be more successful in our relationships, in volunteering, in our work - as well as in every other aspect of life.

We've all been made by God with a specific purpose in mind. Most people want to know what their purpose is in life. People ask, “Why am I here?” As Christians, we want to know what God’s purpose is for our lives. Yet, is that the right approach? In What's So Spiritual About Your Gifts, Henry Blackaby advocates asking “what does God want to do through me?” rather than “what can I do for God?” We might wonder what kind of tasks God has intended for us when the right question for us to ask is “what kind of me” does God want for His mission? 

The Apostle Paul discusses the fact that all God's people have a specific assignment. In 1 Corinthians 12:12-31, he explains that the church is a body and, just like in a human body, each part has a role. The roles are different but every part is needed. Paul encourages us to volunteer as we are wired—to do our part as part of the body. If a hand attempts the do the work of the foot, two people are displaced. The foot does not have its task and the hand is poorly equipped for footwork. 

God values each person and has given people unique callings. Personal discovery for the purpose of finding our fit as part of the body is biblical and useful for effective volunteering. What better way than to know the gifts, personalities and strengths of the people of in order to bring God's hope and love as the whole church to the whole hurting world? 

How then shall we volunteer? According to the Bible, each one of us should serve according to the Master’s design and intention. How do we know what that is? There are a variety of ways to discover our design. Fortunately, several personal discovery tools exist that can be used to help people discover their unique design for use in God’s Kingdom. These tools can be used to assist people to discover God’s unique wiring and their specific part in the body of Christ. As such, these inventories and assessments are not prescriptive, but merely a means to aid in the discovery of God’s unique design.