Video Transcript: Life Coach Tips from Rich DeVos - Part Three

All right, we're back. We're looking again at tips that we've learned over the years in our  relationship with Rich DeVos. incredible mentor that that God, incredibly put into our lives  made a huge difference in our lives. And we didn't of course know it at the time that he was a  master coach. Yeah. And so here we are talking about coaching. And as we reflect on our  relationship, it's like, the whole thing was about coaching. We didn't even know it at the time,  right? And that really is what coaching is, right? I mean, we didn't know all the things that he  was actually doing for us, because he made it seem like we were the one. Yeah. Now  reflecting on it was like, he was just a real subtle coach, who, who made you feel like you are  the ones accomplishing things, changing things, making things happen. But he was behind  the scenes, sort of propping us up and pushing us and gently directing us in a way that we  didn't even know. Right. So and that's what coaching is, coaching is coming alongside, it's not, you know, directing and Rich. Didn't tell us what to do. Right? He didn't, he didn't sit down  and go okay, guys, you guys are you know, I've done this business situation, but this applies  to discipleship. And let me show you how he let us figure that out. Right. If he sat there like a  student? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Really? Oh, yeah. That's good. So I mean, he knows all this  stuff. But he is like, letting us have that sense that we are the pioneers. And we're the ones  discovering all these things. And we're the ones figuring out how to apply his things to our  situation. And so that's really what a coach does. Yeah. And then, and he genuinely then felt  proud of us. Yeah, like, we took the bull by the horns and tried to make something. So we're  on number 14. Number 14 is speak the truth in love. Because that's words from Paul in  Ephesians, 4:15. Sometimes we have this notion that love is like protecting people, we don't  want people hurt, right? And so we want to sugarcoat things. And, and what happens in  coaching situations is, you don't want to say something directly, because you don't want the  person hurt. So what you do is you hint at it, right? And it becomes more of a passive  aggressive thing, where it is stuff like this, the coach will say, well, don't you think you  should? And then what follows is something that you think they're not doing right? And but it's a subtle way of saying you're doing it wrong. It's a little criticism, and it's a criticism, but  you're not going to do it directly. If you're going to criticize, you might as well do it directly,  like, just be clear, say, and so there are times in a coaching situation where you may have to  say something, right? They're gonna hurt themselves. They're hurting their kids, they're  hurting their spouse, they're, there's some destructive thing going on. And the best way Rich  would do this. He would just, you know, he didn't literally do it. But like, he puts on his hat,  boys, we get to talk about this. And he would just let us he would tell the truth without  sugarcoating. He's just saying it how I see it, right. But he would let us kind of know he's in  that mode. Yeah. So I'm not in the coaching mode right now. I'm in my concern, I put it on the  table. And then he would step back and be in the coaching mode again. Yeah. Okay. And I'm  giving you the truth, as I see it, and I'm gonna let you deal with it. And you can take or leave  it, it's up to you. It's your life. It's not my life, so he never tried to control the ministry. I mean,  he was helping support it. But he never tried to control our ministry or what we did. I  remember one note, notable time I remember being walking outside, I was near my garage in  New Lenox, Illinois. And we were talking about how to monetize generations of ministers because,  you know, a lot of ministry, we didn't have it figured out. And today, I like so much about how  to volunteer bi-vocational and career but in those days, we couldn't figure it out. So I had this  idea and I don't even know if you're a part of this idea. I have no idea. But I remember sharing it well what if we did this? And he just like, you know, I just want to stop you, what you guys  are doing is not Amway in part of me just wanted to Like, learn from how they do things I  want you to know, okay, now I felt sort of whoa, right? You thought you were honoring him by  making it more like Amway and a cost structure. And this is not Amway what you are doing is  raising up leaders and making this reproducible and finding out ways from movement. You  know, and it was very okay. Then the very next moment, like you said, because it's close back at so. Anyway, I thought that was interesting. All right, number 15. Take an interest in the  other person's interests. Philippians, two, do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit,  rather, in humility, value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests, but each  of you to the interests of others. But that would be every time we met him, we saw him be a  model that and I'm even people that I mentioned earlier, different political views than 

themselves. But I'll even say even people that have other approaches to Christianity, he  would take interest in them. And say that, you know, God has a plan for everybody. And what  I learned is when you take an interest in someone, and you genuinely take an interest, you're  enthusiastic, you're curious to see what's going on in their life. And you're not satisfied with  one simple answer, you dig deeper. And when that happens, people sort of get excited about  their own story. Yeah. And it allows people to put their story on the table. And then I could see him, Okay, now we have a bigger story on the table. And now it can go somewhere else it  can, you know, like, my opportunity to witness for example, is has many handholds, because  your whole life is sitting there on the table. Whereas before, I am just throwing my view of  what you need. I don't have any handholds at all, because I've not taken an interest in you.  And now the person gets the sense that I'm just a sales object. But if you listened long  enough, if you taken a genuine interest, and I think part of what we saw in him is it wasn't a  put on your wasn't to sell anything it was. I have just genuinely interested in people and what  they do and why they do what they do. Right? And everything that's going around me. And  that was very contagious. Yeah. So if you can capture some of that, in your coaching  experience, if you're taking a genuine interest is that okay? Now y'all listen to this guy,  because we hopefully listen long enough that we can fix the problem. This is fascinating. Your  life is fascinating, the way you think, or your struggles or your issues or what's going on in  your marriage. It's just fascinating stuff, the human condition, our desire to make things  happen or to solve problems. It's all extremely interesting. You can cultivate that kind of  sense. You're going to do a world of good for the person. And I think the person who you're  helping knows in the heart, whether that's your attitude. So maybe you're going well, that's  just not me. You know what? Maybe it isn't you now because you haven't done it. It's like, you  know, the old fashioned pump, you could pump it forever, but no water comes back. You got  to pour water down the thing artificially, yeah. And then all of a sudden, the water starts  coming. So my encouragement to you is to just start doing it. And maybe you're, you know,  forcing yourself. But over time, you'll learn to see you know, my wife is reading this book  where this guy is taking notice of everything. He says, Just go out and sit on your lawn and sit  there for 20 minutes, right and look, and listen and see if you can see things you've never  seen or heard things that you've never heard. Now at first. You're like sitting there going.  Yeah, the grass. The sky, the clouds. Yeah, got it. That to me is a venue. I've done this. This is  stupid. Yeah. Okay. But if you force yourself to sit there for 20 minutes, all of a sudden, you  see this little snail in the grass and you start watching them, and then he's gliding a lot. Oh,  yeah, they glide along. They don't have little feet. They glide along on their slide. I forgot  about that, you know, and all of a sudden you're you're opening yourself up to shades of  green. Look at that tree is that green? is how many shades of green are there let's start  looking at how many I could count and That's what it is use it even with people they know, as  you're seeing their beauty. They're seeing their own nuances, their possibilities, right. And  now they're, it becomes contagious. They start taking an interest in their own life, and the  potential of their own life. that's powerful. Number 16. Success comes through helping people achieve their goals. Right. So again, that was the whole business model was I'm going to  motivate you to work hard by you understanding and seeing clearly your own goals. Right,  what you want. If it's, if you're working somewhere, and you're doing it for the boss, or you're  doing it for the company, are you trying to make your family happy? The energy that you  have for this endeavor is slight right. When it's something you want to do. Like, for example,  how motivated are you President Reyenga in this endeavor called Christian Leaders Institute?  I'm like, All right. I think about it when I go to bed at night. I think about it in the morning,  when I wake up, I pray that I am constantly praying about things. Yeah. Yeah. Because,  because it's something that you see that you're trying to achieve that God placed in your  heart. And there's a million things that you haven't done that you want to do. And I believe  and everyone that comes here, I think that they are changing the world. Right? They're the  people I know, I do I get emails of stories that are submitted. And I recently have students,  these are these are us some of these, these are posts, this obstacle, many actually submit  and you think, Well, no, we haven't published that one when we publish when we don't. I  mean, I get them sent to my email. And I read, and I read, I read most of them, just because I 

want to see your stories and your success and how you're reaching your goals. It's like  intoxicating, and like, almost like a drug to me. Right? It keeps you focused on what you need  to do, but it's helping other people achieve their goals. And really, you will achieve any of  your goals if they weren't doing this now. Now that wouldn't be working in this right. So that  meant that we have to give the sense your coaching motivation comes not from you. But from the person that you're trying to help. Yes. All right, one more. Number 17 help people on their  own life. Joshua says Joshua was a leader after Moses. It was interesting that Moses had a lot  of trouble leading the people. And Joshua didn't have as much trouble. And I think the reason  is because Moses came out of nowhere, he had no one to honor. And so he was the king of  the hill, and people want to take him down. Whereas Joshua modeled servanthood, for 40  years, right, serving Moses, right. And when he took over, people knew how to treat him.  Yeah, treat me like I treated Moses over those years. But still, they finally come into the  promised land, and Moses, and Joshua sorta puts it to the people. He says, If serving the Lord  seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourself in this day, whom you will serve, whether  the gods your ancestors served beyond the Euphrates, or the gods of the Amorites, and  whose land you're living. But as for me, in my household, we will serve the Lord. So a lot of  people use that last part. As for me, in my household, we will serve the Lord. And they often  they don't look at that first part. In the first part, Joshua was just saying, hey, it's up to you.  Right? I'm not controlling who you're going to serve. Right? If you're not going to serve God,  then choose these gods, the ones in Egypt or the ones here, whatever, yeah. You have to  make the decision. I'm not making this decision for you. Right. And that is fundamentally a  coaching kind of thing. Where we're not deciding for people what they should do or not do.  We're helping them think through things. We're helping them look at all the options. And we  may challenge them to find other options and consider other options, maybe talk to some  people, but ultimately, we're not going to and people will want you to do it. You know, what do you think I should do? Right, So as a coach, you want to resist that. I don't want to tell you  what you should do. If you still don't know we should keep talking. Alright, let's keep talking  and researching and looking. Maybe you got to look things up. Maybe you got to study  something, maybe you got to go talk to some people, but ultimately you have to make the  decision. A lot of ways, it would be like you light a match, and there wood has to be dried to  burn. And it was not good, like make it burn, if at all not, which is it as, as pastors, we have  such a heart for people, we want that wood to burn Even though it's sopping wet, right, we  see the pain, we see the hurt, we want it to go away for them. And so we want to take control. And as parents, often we want to do that we don't see eye it gets hurt no. So we want to get  in there and relieve the situation as quick as we can. But then we rob people of their own  potential to deal with things for themselves. Ultimately, in coaching, we want them to learn  how to coach themselves, right? It's like that old sign only takes a spark fire, right, and in  coaching is just been that spark. And that would be Rich DeVos, you know, he was always  careful to not get out the blowtorch to try to burn it and try to make his he felt it was not  sustainable, to force someone to give the illusion of change. He saw that when somebody  really wanted something for it. All he had to do was be there as the little spark to get them to  be self aware of that, to own their own life, as you have mentioned. And the potential of what  happened was amazing. Right? So those are the 17 things that we came up with there,  probably many more, but they greatly affected our lives. And so we thought, let's take some  time to share some of these principles that we learned that greatly affected our lives. Or  maybe it will affect your life. And you'll see them all through this life coach. Yes, Minister  program, often, these principles keep coming up over and over again. So keep at it. And we  believe in you. We believe in your potential. We think this whole coaching thing is a way for  ordinary average people to really do extraordinary things by helping people. This is where  people are hurting all over the place. We've seen all the different ways, you know, counseling  all these different ways that they have their place. But I think this we really see it. I guess we  see it because it affected Yes. changed who we were give us gave us hope and enthusiasm  and the belief that people actually can change the world. The glass is not half empty. It's half  full in. Revival is bubbling up everywhere in you are part of it.