Author: livingwholecoaching

My ministry is to inspire and equip hearts through teaching, writing, and encouragement, leading others into a deeper relationship with God. I seek to awaken faith, nurture spiritual growth, and empower individuals to know God intimately, walk in His purpose, and reflect His love in every area of their lives.
all or nothing, change, destiny, Faith, God, mission, women's conference

Its All or Nothing

livingwholecoaching

When God gave me another chance to change my life to something extraordinary, I took the challenge.  I am all in.  I never knew that some days would be so challenging that I would want to turn back.  As I was reading the Bible the other night about the story of Abraham, I started to think do I have what it takes to please God no matter what?

A few months ago God woke me up to give me specific details of the things that He expected of me to accomplish through Him.  While it was very exciting to be chosen and spoken directly to by God, as the words unfolded on the paper, my mind began to think “I can’t do this”.  And no I can’t, not in my own might or strength or wisdom, but God said to trust Him.  So I am.

As I immediately began to set out on total faith to begin the plans of what the Lord wanted me to do, He opened doors for me that I can’t even begin to explain.  One of the major things God asked me to do was hold a conference for women to introduce the ministry that He asked me to coordinate – The Butterfly Journey Ministry.  But wait not only shall I host a conference, but it was to be in Seattle, WA (somewhere I have never been) for 1000 women.  I decided not to tell anyone but a few close spiritual friends that would be praying for me and coming along side me to help me see this mission through.  My bank account doesn’t show any signs of opening up with huge amount of seed money to pull this off, so by faith we shall do this.

I connected with an event planner in the Seattle area who has been a true God-send.  I told her up front that this was being planned on faith alone and she never thought I was crazy or anything.  As a matter of fact she embraced the idea and said even if I didn’t use their services to get this event together that she personally wanted to attend because she was so drawn with my testimony.  A few days past as she went to consult with her boss about taking on my event and came back to me to say that her and her boss would be not only helping me to plan this event, but they would be praying on that end of the country for the success of the event.  They have taken hold of the vision for the ministry that God has given to me!  Wow, I am way past amazed!

Needless to say that they have found a wonderful venue to hold the conference and the facility personnel is all in to help me make this vision come to life.  Now I need the women, I don’t know where they will come from but I know that they will come if God ordained this conference.  He wants to give them something that they need, that they seek, He wants to change their lives forever!

Because the outcome is going to so great and far beyond anything I can imagine, I can’t turn back.  I have to fulfill the promise that I made to God that I would lead this ministry for the women of this world.  I want to be the catalyst that will help women heal, find their purpose and move into their destiny.  The mission is more important than anything that I have done in my life and I don’t take it lightly.  It’s all or nothing.

Can you help me find the women that God wants to move in their lives, to change from the inside out, to fill that void that nothing else can fill but Him?  I need your help on this one, to stand in agreement with me that we can do this and lives will be changed and God will get the glory!

It’s all or nothing!

The Butterfly Journey – Lisa

 

Faith, God, hope, The BAMs of Life, the butterfly journey, tragedy

The BAMS of Life

livingwholecoaching

Life is so unexpected.  Just when you feel your on the verge of getting started with your purpose and you’re feeling great about all the possibilities and BAM, something comes along to smack you in the face.  There is a trick to being able to stand against the BAMs of life and that is God.

Unfortunately, there is no “real” silver lining in life, but from my experiences with God, I can stand firm that “this too shall pass.”  Nothing lasts forever and tomorrow will come.

Sometimes things come to rattle our whole world.  I just read a Facebook post that a man lost his wife and newborn baby in a tragic situation.  I am assuming it was through child-birth, but the post didn’t really say and they didn’t really have to, after all it was a tragic loss no matter how it happened.  It is in those times that you ask yourself; “how in the world will he get through that?”  We ask ourselves all kinds of questions trying to figure out the reason.  How will he cope with the loss and raise his 2-year-old son in the midst of his grieving?  There is an old hymn that says: “we’ll understand it better by and by” and sometimes this hymn gives me hope that one day we can find out just what happened.  God can explain the full picture of what we can’t see.

Nevertheless, the BAMs of life can leave us numb and full of pain.  What do we do, how will we survive?  For me it is by the faith in God that He has my heart in His hand and  that He will be the one to come along side of me and comfort me.  Sure sometimes  you doubt, sometimes we even question God, that is a part of our human nature.  I find if I don’t have hope in God, then I don’t have any hope at all and that my friends is an awful life to live.

So as I ponder my own BAMs, I can remember that God says that “I will not be utterly cast down.”  I may trip and fall, I may even be laid out prostrate under the weight of the BAMs that come to kill me, but I remember the word of God tells me that “no weapon formed against me shall prosper!”  And to that I hold on to in the midst of the BAMs that come my way.

What gets you through the BAMs of your life?

The Butterfly Journey – Lisa

 

 

book, God, love, relationships, the butterfly journey

Relationships: You Still Have Time

livingwholecoaching

I was super bummed when I finished writing a lovely post about relationships this morning and clicked on the publish button and to my surprise or perhaps my demise half of the post was missing.  I had to trash what was left and decided to walk away until this evening.

But in the efforts to post something of wisdom, something positive, something motivating everyday I am re-doing my earlier post in hopes that I capture the essence that I wanted to.

Relationships are a huge part of life that shapes who we are, who we become, and how we handle all the other aspects of our lives.  I was not at all great at relationships.  Not that I didn’t have any but I didn’t have healthy ones, at least not for me. I called myself a chameleon.  I would change myself into whatever type of person that relationship wanted.  I hid my heart, my dreams, my desires and wants deep inside.  It really didn’t matter, no one seemed to want to know the “real” Lisa anyway.  But just like any other woman I wanted a relationship where I could be me; the real me.

It didn’t come until after the healing process started during my depression that I began to understand the why’s of my unhealthy relationships.  God had to show me that I was worthy.  Me, Lisa, was worth something more than what I had experienced in these unhealthy relationships.  But I didn’t know that then and that was my problem.  I equated my worth with how pleased the other person was with me.  And since I wasn’t even sharing the real me I didn’t realize that what they were giving me in return was not equal to my worth.  Whatever they offered I thought that was all that I was worth!  But God said no!  That is not who you are, you are beautiful, lovely, and unique because He made me that way.  I was worthy of great things because God said so.

When God gave me the man of my dreams, I didn’t know if I could pass the test and use my new-found wisdom to cultivate the relationship in a healthy way.  And sure enough the old me came slipping back into play, but God stopped me every time I tried to revert back to my old ways.  Craig, (my fiance) is a wonderful man of God and he was very patient with me in my learning stage.  He has taught me a lot about love, patience and friendship and today he is my best friend!

I explain more about my experience with relationships in my upcoming book: The Butterfly’s Journey coming soon!

The Butterfly Journey – Lisa

 

be all you can be, change, life, seeking God, start living

Got Life?

livingwholecoaching

Life is not a spectator sport.  On the contrary, you need to get out there and take the bull by the horns and shake things up!  If you don’t do it for yourself, who is going to do it?

I have seen people live their lives with no enthusiasm, no zeal, no dreams, no aspiration and die unfulfilled.  Why would you to do that?  Often times it’s because no one took the time to inspire or motivate them to become their “greatest” selves.  Me, myself I am my greatest motivator!  I desire to have something better than what my life was yesterday.  I knew in my knower that there must be something more to life than just living.  It has to be more than walking around like a robot, being humdrum and just surviving.

But guess what it takes some effort on your part.  Amazing discovery I know, but seriously how is your life going to change if you don’t participate in the change process.  If you never pursue filling that void, how are you going to know if you ever reach it or not.

Back to what I know best; God is a rewarder of those that diligently seek Him.  Okay, so you don’t believe in God, now what?  But why don’t you believe?  Do you have any proof that He is not real?  What would it cost you to seek Him?  A better life, a sense of peace, joy when you need it, the experiencing of a love that is so profound that it amazes you?  These are the things, the experiences that you can have with God.

Many have passed away never really experiencing life the way that it should be experienced.  Sad but it’s true.  You know we all have our moments of reflection when we see how fragile this life we have is and it is at those moments that I want to run and jump and be fully embraced in my life.  I had such a moment last night sitting in the ICU waiting room, while my nephew was lying in the hospital bed breathing with the help of a machine and tubes coming from everywhere on his body.  He is only 18 years old!  Fragile!  As I prayed over him, I asked God to not only heal his body but also his soul.  I asked God to give him a zeal for life that he would never take it for granted, but live it to the fullest potential in God.

You have to be a participant in your life.  We can’t all walk around victims of our circumstances or the world would be in a worse state than it is right now.  If you have a life, start living it to its fullest potential.

The Butterfly Journey – Lisa

depression, destiny, dreams, purpose, seeking God

Where Are You?

livingwholecoaching

One of my favorite phrases was; “I don’t know what I want to be when I grow up.”  And I used that phrase up until a few years ago!  I have been grown for quite some time, but I never really knew what it was I was supposed to do, or that I was good at.  I used to envy those who said they have known since they were kids that they wanted to be a certain profession or accomplish a certain thing in their life.

I figured out that if I had stopped and reflected on my life and my experiences I may have understood what my role in life was far before now.  However, I was too busy doing life, working, taking care of my family, and just being.  I had dreams and aspirations, but I still didn’t know exactly what they were.  But I knew it was more than what I was experiencing.

I had to find out where I was in order to understand where I was going.  And God helped me with that, but it was after a terrible, long, bout with depression that He showed me my purpose.  Seems ironic I know, but until I knew where I was or had been and understood all the experiences that I had suffered I couldn’t grasp the purpose that God had for my life.

The first thing that God had to show me was me.  Like the caterpillar’s journey to becoming a butterfly, my life had to be broken down (literally it was during the depression) just like when the caterpillar goes into the cocoon.  When the caterpillar goes into the cocoon (chrysalis), its safe place, it is broken down and liquified and it begins its change.  There in the midst of the depression I began my change.  The caterpillar knows their purpose and destiny is to become a butterfly.  But for me I didn’t know what my life would become after that.  I didn’t even know if I would make it out of that stage of my change.  But you know what, I only could depend on God that He would see me through and that my friends was my life-changing lesson.  God was the only one that I could depend on from that point forward.

So you see, knowing where you are right now is very important to your process of transforming.  This is your opportunity to seek God for what it is that He has for your life and start living an extraordinary life with purpose!  I wouldn’t have chosen the path of depression as my lesson to find out my purpose and my worth, but today I wouldn’t change my experience for the world.  It was there that I learned to cling to God and our relationship has become one I would never want to lose.

Where are you today, do you know?

The Butterfly Journey – Lisa

 

 

facebook, God, peace, satisfied, the butterfly journey

Are You Satisfied?

livingwholecoaching

This was the burning question that I posed to our Facebook fans this morning.  Are you satisfied with you life where you are?  If I had asked myself this question a few years ago, I would have answered a resounding NO!

I have been a Christian since I was 15 years old and though I believed in God, it wasn’t until I was well into my life that I really understood how much knowing Him and having a relationship with Him could make me feel so satisfied.  Being satisfied with my life doesn’t mean that I have everything in control or all the answers to life.  It simply means that with God in my life I can depend on Him.  He is there for me when I need Him.  I am not worried about  people, things, or situations that I may have to face, because God gives me the feeling of peace.

The experience of God is so amazing and although I can write about it and share, it’s something that you have to experience for yourself.  I can’t really put the words together eloquently enough to give Him the due credit that He deserves.

Let me tell you, like most people I have tried to feel satisfied with my life without God, but there was nothing that could fill that void.  I was like most people searching for that something to make my life seem worth living.  I searched for it in the clubs, looking for a husband.  I looked for it in drinks, drugs, and sex.  I looked for it in work, in friends, in things.  I couldn’t find it anywhere, all that stuff was temporal and didn’t last but for a specific time period.   But with God, He is steady, faithful, He encompasses the very essence of “real” love.  I didn’t have to perform for Him, I didn’t need to make a certain amount of money, I didn’t need to be perfect. . . He loves me regardless of my past.

I understand why people end up in way that they do, because they have not come to the realization that God is the one and only solution to a satisfied life.  Until we get tired of being on the wheel of life, just getting by and the feeling of the void growing stronger within us, then we will turn to God.  I feel  sad to think that over the years I put Him last, but I am glad that I did finally come to Him and He was still there waiting for me!

I am so satisfied with my Savior and nothing can take His place in my life!

The Butterfly Journey – Lisa

God, Joy, love, overcome, past hurt

I Can Overcome!

livingwholecoaching

You don’t have to allow your past to define who you are today.  Past hurts from people you loved or people you didn’t even know can leave a deep wound upon your heart that you may feel can never heal.  But I am here to tell you it can and it will if you open yourself to the healing process of God’s love.

Most people I know have suffered some sort of pain, loss, or brokeness that have left them in a place of deadness.  It is easy to just stay in a place of mourning than to seek healing and work towards moving past that place.  It takes effort and work and sometimes reliving the very thing that caused so much hurt.

For me it wasn’t a good feeling to have to go back over my life and examine the things that had happened to me by others and also realize that some of those things I caused myself.  But if I wanted to become everything that God wanted me to be I had to go back and bury the feelings, bury my past hurts.  At first I had to acknowledge the pain and the cause.  Then I had to forgive the person(s) and then myself.  Sometimes I experienced as much pain as I did when it first occurred, that was the hard part.  Some things were burned into me so deep that I had forgotten that it even happened to me.  My mind had placed it in a box so tightly closed that I was afraid to even open the memory.

Through it all God was there to help me sort through the toughest parts and together we buried each one.  Today, I have overcome!  I don’t have to worry about those things coming back to hurt me again.  I learned from my own mistakes and I can truly say that I am a new person.  My life changed because of the greatest love that I ever known – God!

I want to encourage you today that you do not have to be defined by your past any longer.  I don’t care what it was that happened or what parts you may have played in your own past mistakes.  I am here to share with you and encourage you that no matter where you are in life things can change.  You don’t have to be in the church building, you don’t have to know all the scriptures in the Bible, you just need to ask God to enter into your life and take control.  It’s not easy!  I will be the first to tell you that your life is not instantly going to be wonderful, but what I can say is that God can turn your ashes into beauty.  He can exchange your tears for His joy.  He will help you bury those terrible things in your life that have caused you so much pain.  I have overcome of my past!

The Butterfly Journey – Lisa

 
affirmations, book, love, The Help

You’re Important!

livingwholecoaching

When I read the book The Help one of the things that stayed in my mind was not the horrible way they were treated, but the way in which they carried themselves in the midst of so many injustices.  The one “help” named Abigail was raising the daughter of her employer and I was so happy that the little girl had “Abbie” as she called her in her life.  The little girl’s mother didn’t even want to be bothered with the child because she was a little chubby and not the most pretty little girl of the bunch.  But what Abbie did everyday was told her  positive affirmations about herself.

Abbie having lived in a time when she was treated differently and sometimes unjustly because of the color of her skin she knew all too well the negative affects it can have on a person.  She wanted to make sure that if there was something that she could do to change someone elses self-worth that she would, just by saying those same little affirmations to a little girl in hopes that she would continue to believe them as she grew up with a mother that didn’t seem to love her.

Those little words of confirmation, uplifting phrases that we can deposit into someone elses spirit can mean a whole difference in that person’s life.  Hopefully, that little child grew up remembering those words that Abbie spoke into her and she believed them no matter what life threw her way.  I hope that deep inside those words would reverberate back to her remembrance in those times when she didn’t feel so beautiful or loved.

The same concept holds true for most of us today and that is why I believe it is so important for us to tell our children, grandchildren, and even someone elses child that they are wonderful, smart, and important.  You just never know how important those words can be for them in life.  We can still deposit positive affirmations to one another in our adult life.  It holds the same strength to an adult as to a child.  Just like the effects of negative verbage that comes to us through life experiences whether true or not we begin to believe what people say to us and about us.

That is why I love the Lord so much because His love is so perfect and He affirms us with it everyday.  He doesn’t change His mind about us even when He should.

The Butterfly Journey – Lisa

depression, God, Joy, people pleaser, purpose, women

Women It’s Your Time!

livingwholecoaching

When I began my “butterfly journey”, I didn’t realize how many women in the world were suffering with the same issues that I myself had dealt with for so long.  But I am noticing that it is a common theme for most of us to lose ourselves, our worth, our purpose, and our faith while doing life.

You know when I think about life it is so much more than just working, cleaning, taking care of others etc.  God created it to be a time to understand who He is, understand of ourselves, our worth, our purpose and each other.  One of His greatest commandments is to love thy neighbor as thyself.  But we fall short on this because we lose the ability to love ourselves.  Our society is full of the message that it is selfish to do things for yourself, especially women.  But we must if we are ever going to reach the full potential of our lives as God has planned.

We are expected to have a career, raise a family, be competitive, have a great shape, complete our education, do the laundry, clean the house, serve in the church, take care of our extended family and whole host of other things!  Whew, that made me tired just typing it out!  And nothing is wrong with any of this, we do have responsibilities, but then where do we fit God in all of this?  That’s the missing link!  We end up doing all this and more and we lose our relationship with the one who can give us everything we need.  That’s what happened to me and I am not proud to admit it but it’s the truth.

My personality is one of “people pleaser” or so it was.  I had to fit in and make people pleased with me and my abilities.  What happened was I could finally take no more and I shut down; emotionally, spiritually, intellectually, and physically.  I was a wreck!  I suffered a deep depression for over 2 years and tried desperately to figure out what happened to me.  That’s when my “butterfly journey” began. When I could suffer no more, God showed me my life using the analogy of a caterpillar’s journey to becoming a butterfly, to illustrate where I had gone all wrong. (The Butterfly’s Journey book to be released April 2012)!

The main thing (a relationship with God) had become a secondary, or really even third or fourth place in my life.  I was literally in a place of hell (separated from God) and it was horrific to say the least!  I didn’t understand my “true” worth in Him; I only knew what my worth was to others and to them I was disposable, even to some I was garbage.

I let the God of my creation heal me from the inside out and my life has never been the same.  Through my pain He gave me my purpose, through my tears He gave me joy, and through my newly established relationship, He showed me my worth!

It’s time ladies to take your rightful places in life and live a transformed life with purpose in God!

The Butterfly Journey – Lisa

encouragement, God

Encourage My Soul

livingwholecoaching

Often times we go along in life with expectations of what we would like to do or see happen in our lives. Sometimes things don’t turn out quite the way we had planned.  Or little set-backs come along to steer us off course.  Things happen to get us down and out and disturb our souls.  Every time something happens that I didn’t plan for (and that is often) I  start to feel discouraged.  Like it is just another thing to hold me back from accomplishing the things that I set out to do.

We must have the wisdom to understand that life is not always good and things do come along to knock you down.  But we must have the resolve to encourage ourselves and others.  Did you realize that when you encourage someone else your own troubles start to feel less intense?  I mean you walk away feeling great about helping someone see the possibilities in themselves.  You actually begin to see the possibilities in yourself!

It amazes me that little words of encouragement can go such a long way.  Just think if we all paid it forward the encouragement that someone has given to you!  What kind of world would we live in?  Where people all over would be affirming one another, coming along helping you to see the endless abilities that you possess.  This would be a wonderful place!  And it can start with you.

If you know God and the wonderful promises that  He has stored up for you, then you can even encourage your own soul!  You can speak to yourself about all the good things that God has given you, has placed in you, has stored up for you and get yourself in a place of expectation!

Please take the time to look outside of yourself and encourage someone along life’s way.  You will be amazed at how it makes you feel.  Encourage your soul today, the world needs what you have!

The Butterfly Journey – Lisa