God Is My Coach
How do I know I’m doing the right thing when there are no clear answers?
How can I be confident I’m moving in the right direction?
I’m not satisfied with where I am, yet I’m not sure what to do next.
Do these questions sound familiar? If so, you’re in the gray zone. Business leadership coach and bestselling author Larry Julian helps readers navigate “the gray zone,” those defining moments where we’re faced with dilemmas and decisions that don’t have black and white solutions while our circumstances are filled with unanswered questions, ambiguity and uncertainty.
If you feel stuck in the gray zone, take heart. Julian emphatically states, “Our true greatness lies within the gray. Uncertainty is the very catalyst to living a significant life and successfully leading others.”
Larry Julian has created a practical eight step coaching process that will teach you how to live and lead in the context of uncertainty rather than becoming paralyzed by it. He teaches that life isn’t about what happens to us, but what happens to what happens to us. You cannot change the circumstances that challenge you; you can only change your internal response. God has provided each of us with the gifts to overcome the gray and be successful in work and life. Larry’s passion is to help you find these gifts and develop them to transform your grayness into greatness.
The result of Julian’s coaching process is guidance in the gray, clarity in the chaos, and wise, impactful decisions that shape one’s destiny.
Chapter Summaries
Chapter 1 Purpose – The Gift of Your Unique Calling
Discover your unique giftedness and integrate your career with your calling
God created you to serve a purpose. When you discover your gifts and put them to work in service to others, your work will come alive with a renewed sense of purpose and passion. In this chapter, you’ll learn a practical five-step process to help you discern your unique giftedness. You’ll discover:
- The natural abilities you love to use
- The things you love to work with
- The ideal environment – the one that triggers your motivation
- The kind of relationships that bring out the best in you
- The reward that provides you the greatest sense of satisfaction
Chapter 2 Potential – The Gift of Creativity
Learn how to maximize your creative potential to grow your business in challenging times
In today’s economy where financial resources are limited, your personal creativity is your greatest free resource. More often than not, our own fears, ego, and self-limiting thoughts get in the way of our creativity. This chapter offers a practical seven-step process to maximize your creative potential in the midst of challenging times. You’ll learn:
- How to overcome the self-limiting thoughts that block your creativity
- How to become successful by solving someone else’s problems
- How to transform marketplace needs into a successful business venture
- How to get other people to buy into your ideas
- How to transform daily setbacks and discouragement into opportunities
Chapter 3 Perspective – The Gift of Appreciation
Discerning the truth of your circumstances will help you lead with the right perspective
Challenging circumstances can easily cloud your judgment and send you down the wrong path. Appreciation is a powerful tool to help you cut through the clutter and see your circumstances from the right perspective. Clarifying your perspective enables you to identify and stay focused on what’s right – the right task and the right direction. In this chapter, you’ll find out:
- The definitions of appreciation and perspective from God’s value system
- How appreciation can transform your grayness into greatness
- How appreciation changes your focus
- How appreciation increases your value as a professional, business owner, and leader
- How appreciation can improve your profitability
- How appreciation improves our personal health and well being
Chapter 4 Platform – The Gift of Your Foundation
A platform built on a solid foundation helps you rise above the noise to communicate your personal brand
How can you be heard? Building your personal brand is critical in today’s noise-filled, short-attention-span world. Your personal brand must communicate who you are (your character) and how you solve your customer’s problems (your competencies). Bottom line, the customer needs to trust who you are before they’ll buy what you sell. So many struggle with the question, “How can I communicate my faith and values in a diverse workplace?” The answer is simple. Stand on your platform and let who you are speak for what you believe. In this chapter, you’ll grasp the Four Principles of an Effective Platform:
- Reflect – How your outward actions, decisions, and behaviors reflect your inner beliefs and values
- Respect – How to respect the dignity and worth of all people in a diverse workplace
- Reconcile – How to reconcile your professional self with your spiritual core
- Raise – How to raise your standards of excellence above the noise of mediocrity
Chapter 5 Power – The Gift of Pressure
Transform your pressure into power
Pressure is a double-edged sword: It’s the single most powerful stimulus for growth, but it can also cause negative stress that will threaten to derail you from your potential. There are really only two choices. Pressure can be transformed into power or it will render you powerless. Our success lies in how we harness it. In this chapter, you’ll learn the four steps to transforming pressure into power.
- Awareness – How to avoid being blindsided by the outside demands of your circumstances and how to detect and overcome erroneous beliefs that ignite negative stress
- Alignment – Learn how to align your will with God’s will
- Adaptability – Learn how to develop resiliency
- Action – Learn how to put God’s wisdom into action
Chapter 6 Pace – The Gift of Grace to Run Your Race
God designed you to run your race at your God-given pace
The business world lives by a sprint mentality. Quarterly goals and urgent deadlines demand you sprint to win the race. The spiritual world, however, is based on a long-distance mentality. The Apostle Paul counsels us to “run with perseverance the race uniquely marked out for us.” How are you to reconcile these opposing viewpoints? How can you win the short-term prize in business while focused on the long term race of life? How do you know you’re running the right race? The answer is based on your response to three simple questions:
- Whose race are you running?
- What’s your pace?
- What’s the prize
In this chapter, we’ll use examples, thought provoking questions and exercises to help you determine your right race and your ideal pace.
Chapter 7 Place – The Gift of Your Environment
Discover whether your environment has you in the right place at the right time
While finding a good environment is important, that doesn’t make it the right environment. Rather than asking yourself, “Is this a good or bad environment?” ask yourself “Am I in the right place at the right time?”
Place has three definitions. It can be defined as an external environment, an internal state of mind and an appropriate moment in time. Each of these dimensions, while important, is insufficient on its own. Combine them together, however, and they interact to create a powerful “right place at the right time” opportunity. In this chapter, you’ll learn how the right environment can bring out the best in you so you can bring out the best in others. You’ll discover:
- The Engagement Equation and why it’s crucial
- The case studies of three leaders who used unconventional environments to be significant in others’ lives
- How to impact your own environment by applying The Engagement Equation
Chapter 8 Prosperity – The Gift of Relationships as Your Legacy
Focusing on the one impacts the many
Significance is often defined by great achievement, great wealth or great philanthropy. In God’s economy, however, true significance is measured in terms of “the one.” Larry’s mentor, Monty Sholund, taught that true significance and prosperity can be as simple as nourishing the one person in need of God’s grace. Monty would ask, “Who would you rather be, Billy Graham or the one who mentored Billy Graham?” Monty’s life purpose was to teach and mentor the one. He believed that if you loved the one and encouraged the one to grow in Christ, the one can impact the world. In this chapter, you’ll study how your legacy will be left through “the one.” You’ll learn:
- What genuine prosperity is – The gift of relationships
- The 5 E’s of Effective Mentorship
- Encounter – How to discern the hidden potential of others
- Engage – How to unleash the potential of another through love and truth
- Enlighten – How to help another find their call
- Encourage – The importance of believing in others when they don’t believe in themselves
- Enjoy – Experience the joy of seeing others grow
- How to apply the 5 E’s mentorship process at work and at home
- How impacting one person will make a difference in your life
The God is My Coach Life Plan
In this special section, you’ll develop and summarize your own Life Plan. The practical exercises will help you discern how the gifts of uncertainty apply to you. Using what you’ve learned, you’ll identify and develop each of your eight gifts.
The God is My Coach Discussion Guide
The questions in this section will guide your discussions, helping you apply faith to real life issues.
Excerpt
Please click here to read a complimentary excerpt from God Is My Coach.
