Tag: grow

You are the driver

Posted on by Adam LiVecchi

This is your life are you who you want be? – Switchfoot

Your life is a gift given to you by God. You didn’t ask to be born, but you are here. You are a unique person with a unique purpose. You have a unique DNA code and unique finger prints. There is only one you. You are the driver of your own life. Are you going in the right direction? In other words who you become is not up to God, it’s up to you. In the first parable where Jesus taught about the kingdom of God he mentioned seed and soil. If you look closely at that parable you will see that there is nothing wrong with the seed, the issue is the soil. We are the soil, our feelings, thoughts, desires and will is the soil. We determine how fruitful we will be. We must remember that problem is not with the seed, it’s with the soil. The thoughts we entertain, what we listen to and watch. Who we permit to influence us. The choices we make help to determine who we are becoming. The relationships we have help form us for better or worse. There are a lot of things in this life that we didn’t choose, but we always choose how we respond. We are not in control of what happens to us but we are in control of our response. Remember we choose to be a victim or an overcomer based on how we respond to what happens to us.

3 keys to being an effective communicator

Posted on by Adam LiVecchi

First let me define what an effective communicator is. An effective communicator is someone who speaks and people listen. An effective communicator maintains the attention of his or her audience and an effective communicator would be able to leave about 75% of his or her audience knowing the main points of what it was that was being communicated. If the communication leaves room for misunderstanding it was not an effective communication.

If we want to become an effective communicator there are 3 things we must do consistently. 

1. We must be slow to speak. Meaning we must think before we speak.

2. We must mean what we say.

3. We must do what we say.

(Since none of us are perfect, when we mess up we should be quick to admit it. It is better to admit it than be accused of it.)

The more we live our message the more influential our message will become. If we don’t know what we are saying, mean what we are saying or do what we are saying we have no right to influence anyone. Our integrity is what gives us the right to influence others. We must remember that our words only have as much authority as we have integrity. We must think before we speak, mean what we say and do what we say consistently if we want to become effective communicators. 

The difference between Leaders and Managers

Posted on by Adam LiVecchi

Leaders and Managers are very similar in some aspects but also very different in other aspects. An effective leader and manager must be both strategic and intentional.

Leaders move things forward.

Managers keep things together.

Leaders are about momentum.

Managers are about morale. 

Leaders are pioneers.

Managers are developers.

Leaders see the big picture.

Managers see the little details that are a part of the big picture.

Leaders are about significance.

Managers are about security.

Leaders are about substance.

Managers are about structure.

Leaders and Managers are both essential for the progress and development of any entity that wants to grow and thrive.

Challenge Yourself

Posted on by Adam LiVecchi

Comfort does not produce change or growth but challenges do. If you are not being challenged you are not growing. We need friends that pick us up when we fall, correct us when we are wrong, challenge us when we are complacent and encourage us when we are weary in well doing. While it is very true that we need others, we also need to learn how to build challenges into our every day life to assure us that we are growing. Setting goals that are just beyond where we are will build a steady flow of challenges into our life if we choose to be accountable. Kris Vallotton says it this way, “accountability means you must give an account for your ability.” Challenges + accountability = Growth. Consistent growth positions you to reach your full potential.

When you intentionally build challenges into your life it helps you better handle the challenges that just seem to find you accidentally. I will share a few of the ways I am challenging myself in hopes of inspiring you. Here are a few challenges that I have worked into my life that are helping me to grow. When I run on the treadmill my last minute is usually my fastest minute. When I go to CrossFit I am working consistently to improve my rope climbing skills. Also often but not always after my CrossFit exercise I do some extra time on the bike just to get some extra cardio in just to push myself a little bit harder. Wednesday is my day off during the day, and Wednesday night is my family night. I am challenging myself to keep my rest, health and family at the top of my priority list because my longevity and legacy depends on it. My only challenge to you is for you to give someone who is trustworthy permission to challenge you and hold you accountable so that you reach your full potential.

First Impressions 

Posted on by Adam LiVecchi

I really don’t believe in first impressions anymore. Unless I sense that someone is dangerous to my children, my wife or myself, I don’t allow my first impression of someone to define how I view them. In all honesty the first impression helps to lay a foundation for how I begin to think about a person but I have learned not to make a strong definitive idea about someone based on my first impression or on my first interaction with someone. You could be catching someone on the worst day of his or her life. They could have just lost a parent, spouse or even a child. They could have just been evicted from where they live; maybe they just got fired from their job. I think it is wise to be patient with our perceptions of other people. We should extend grace to others, and instead of immediately labeling people we should learn to love them. Something even dumber than first impressions is – second hand opinions.

Formulating a second hand opinion of someone is even more stupid than allowing a first impression to define how we see someone. It is unfair and unwise to allow someone to define how we view someone else. We can’t allow someone else’s bad experiences to keep us from good relationships. My encouragement to you is to be slow to formulate opinions of people, and don’t formulate second hand opinions of people because you would not want someone to do that to you.

3 Benefits of Patience

Posted on by Adam LiVecchi
  1. Someone with patience is ruled from the inside out.
  2. Someone with patience is slow to speak.
  3. Someone with patience is slow to get angry.

When someone is patient they have self control. Which means they live according to their values, vision and purpose, not their circumstances. If you can control your emotions, you can control your mouth. If you can’t control your emotions you will not be able to control your mouth. If you don’t control your mouth you will damage your relationships and lose your credibility with people. Someone who is patient does not get angry fast. If you are someone who gets angry fast people will deem you unstable and untrustworthy. If people don’t trust you you cannot serve or influence them because they are skeptical of you. If we love people we will be patient with them. Patience is an expression of both love and wisdom. Love makes people feel secure, wisdom helps people become significant. Be loving and wise to yourself and with others. Embrace the slow process of growing in patience. You will feel better, have better relationships and make better decisions that will benefit you and those you love.

Patience 

Posted on by Adam LiVecchi

When your faith is put on trial and is found guilty as charged for believing God to do what he said he would do, then patience is produced. Remember that it is “the trial of your faith that produces patience.” (James 1:3) Patience is worth waiting for. There are somethings in life that only come by working, there are other things in this life that can only be received by waiting. It is our job to discern if we are to wait or work or work while we are waiting. Patience brings God’s work in us and through us to a place of maturity. Things that are valuable and things that last take longer to make. For example a cheap digital battery operated watch takes minutes to make while a Rolex takes about a year to make. While it is true that God can accelerate time and make something priceless happen in a moment, often costly things happen very slowly. What God is doing in you and what God will do through you is worth waiting for. Give yourself to the slow process of growth. Be more concerned about growth than promotion. If you are patient with yourself and if you keep growing you will actually out grow your circumstances. The process that caused us to learn patience is actually the process that allows us to become the person God called us to be. Jesus said, “in patience you possess your soul.” (Luke 21:19) If you don’t have patience you don’t have self control, if you don’t have self control you will be ruled by someone or something else. Your future depends on you having patience. Your legacy is determined by you having long suffering. Long suffering is when patience starts to hurt. Have patience with yourself and others and be sure to enjoy the process. Don’t let impatience cause you to be impetuous. Keep waiting with joyful anticipation that God will do what he said he would do.

Relationships 

Posted on by Adam LiVecchi

There is a reason why a high percentage of American’s are lonely. The National Science Foundation reported in its General Social Survey that unprecedented numbers of American’s are lonely. One study based on 1500 face to face interviews found that more than a quarter of the respondents had no one with whom they could talk about their personal troubles or triumphs. If family members are not counted, the number doubles to more than half of Americans who have no one outside their immediate family with whom they can share confidences. Why is this so? The answer to that question is no doubt a multi-layered one, one which would by itself occupy many articles and research data. But I want to make a simple observation from my own experience. Relationships are difficult, and generally speaking those relationships which can handle the weight of the deeper discussions of life are the most difficult of all.

Yet it is this very business of relationships to which the follower of Jesus is persuasively called upon to give their most serious attention. Peter speaks to this in 1 Peter 1:22: “Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for each other, love one another deeply, from the heart.” Pay attention to the weightiness of Peter’s words “sincere love for each other, deeply from the heart.” When I read those words I find them staggering because it describes a quality of relationship that seems so rare, and if the Social Survey mentioned in the first paragraph is true it is rare for most of the adult population of the U.S. And I suspect it is also rare among Christian people.It is the challenge of trust, vulnerability and the necessary persistence over time which close friendship requires that makes it a work which many of us simply will not carve out sufficient time to make a reality. Os Guinness notes “Life fired at us point blank becomes the survival of the fastest. As a Kenyan saying goes, “Westerners have watches, Africans have time.” This is one of the great temptations of our era the temptation to yield to the notion that there simply isn’t enough time to build these kinds of relationships. And it is not only the appearance that sufficient time isn’t available to take our relationships deeper  but there are numerous issues which close quarter relationships inevitably bring us face to face with conflict, and the need to communicate about these inevitable frictions that emerge when we seek close friendship with one another. It’s much easier to simply keep your distance. Let things remain superficial and lighthearted.

Yet scripture makes clear that there is something critical to our spiritual growth which is tied to our relationships, “as iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.” (Proverbs 27:17) In the economy of God, the challenges which occur in our relationships are essential to brining about growth in our character and the quality of our love growth which comes only in this way. It is therefore no exaggeration to say from the vantage point of Scripture that the quality of life in which we must grow is precisely in the area of relationships. According to John’s recollections it was among the last things Jesus said before he was arrested and then executed: John 13:34-35 “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

This is one of the reasons why Christianity doesn’t have much appeal to lonely Americans, hungry for friendship. For when Westerners think about depth, Christianity is too often not the place where searching people turn for that substance. Yet, one of the most common images of the church in the New Testament is family, as though God intended for those who might have suffered with poor family life an opportunity to recapitulate the family experience with brothers and sisters who sincerely and from the depths of their hearts love one another. Could this have been what Jesus had in mind when he made love a cornerstone of what was to characterize his movement? A movement of friendships rooted in the Divine friendship?

By : Scott Pursley

Scott Pursley is a Psychologist and the Lead Pastor of Christ Fellowship in Cranford, NJ. Click here to visit the website of Christ Fellowship.

Integrity

Posted on by Adam LiVecchi

The wisest and wealthiest man to ever live said, “the integrity of the upright shall guide them.” Integrity is a guide, it gives us direction. Integrity instructs us with what to do next. Someone who has integrity may not have a blueprint for the rest of their life, but they intuitively know what is the next right decision. C.S. Lewis said, “integrity is doing the right thing even when no one is watching.” When someone has integrity they are honest with God, themselves and others. If you have integrity you do what you say, you mean what you say, and you admit when you are wrong.

Integrity is not about perfection, it’s about authenticity. Hypocrisy is when we project an image of ourselves that is not who we really are. Hypocrisy is the opposite of integrity. Hypocrisy tells others that we are not trustworthy, serious or safe. Our integrity tells others that we are trustworthy. If people don’t see our integrity they won’t want to hear our truth. If we are honest most of us would say that we are recovering hypocrites who are being changed into people of integrity who mean what they say, do what they say, and are what they project. If we want to have real meaningful relationships then we need to keep it real with ourselves and others.

Our integrity will determine both our longevity and our legacy. King Solomon said this, “The just man walks in his integrity: his children are blessed after him.” Again we see that integrity gives us direction and provides our children with blessing. We can protect our children’s future by living with integrity now. Let integrity lead you to do the next right thing, it will effect you, your family, your friends and your future. Remember this, the more integrity you have, the less regrets you will have. 

How Powerful People Think.

Posted on by Adam LiVecchi

Powerful people don’t think I can’t, they think how can I? They don’t think this won’t work, they think how can we make this work? Powerful people don’t focus on the problem they focus on solutions and strategies. Let me share with you a private conversation I had with a powerful person who is happy, humble and really down to earth. This man is an inventor, an investor, a philanthropist and an evangelist. He is a good husband to one woman for many years and a good father to his children. He feeds orphans daily and sends young people to college that are not even his children. God has blessed him and he has made some right decisions over the course of his life and now he lives to give. I have leaned a lot from him. His life has taught me that the purpose of prosperity is generosity. 

One day while in another country with my good friend I asked him, what does it feel like to be powerful? I said to him, you can buy a Mercedes or a house in the Caribbean or go on vacation for a few months. You can do virtually whatever you want. What does that feel like? When you get up in the morning what do you feel like? At first he really didn’t have an answer. In fact he said that it was a good question and that no one had ever asked him that before. From my question I learned that a good question is a question that has never been asked before. Not only will the asker grow from the answer, but the one answering the question will grow also because now he is thinking about something he never thought about before. The next day he answered me in a more clear and definitive way. He said, “to be honest it feels good to know that I can buy my wife a Lexus cash, but honestly I really don’t think about it until we need a car.” When he said that a thought hit me like a ton of bricks. Powerful people don’t allow useless thoughts to occupy precious head space. In other words my friend doesn’t wake up thinking about what he can buy or where he can go, he only thinks about what is pertinent to now. Because he planned for tomorrow he doesn’t have to worry about it. Powerful people live in now. They may plan for tomorrow, but they refuse to worry about it. Remember this if you are worrying about tomorrow you are probably not planning for it wisely, because fear and worry shut down the logical part of your brain. So worrying about tomorrow will mess up both today and tomorrow, making yesterday rather appealing. Powerful people don’t live in yesterday or tomorrow they live in now. You can’t be powerful living in the past or the future, because you live in now. If you are attentive to now, tomorrow will be better than if you focused on yesterday or worried about tomorrow. Whether you are day dreaming about the house or the car of your dreams, or worrying about how you are going to pay your bills. Dreaming and worrying are not how powerful think. Powerful think about what is the next right decision based on who I am, where I am, where I am going and what I value. Powerful people practice self control, which helps them to stay focused on what is most important. The more self control you have the more powerful you are. Powerful people don’t control others they control themselves.

3 things powerful people don’t think about.

  1. Powerful people don’t worry about what is out of their control.
  2. Powerful people don’t allow useless things to occupy precious head space.
  3. Powerful people don’t live in the past, they are focused on the next right decision.