Recovery for Codependent Relationships
Do you feel caught in a trap of constantly trying to please everyone, and yet you still feel guilty at the end of the day? Do you feel as if you and a loved one are in a never-ending battle for control and have no idea who is winning or losing? Do you feel as if something is missing in your life? In codependent relationships, deceitful games are played, and important Christian principles are often taken out of context and abused. God wants us to have healthy relationships with a balance between being dependent and independent. This course describes how the most effective means of overcoming codependent relationships is to establish or deepen a relationship with Christ Himself. Allow this course to help you break the cycle of codependency and free you to make new choices...free to choose love. Cost: $15/book
Anger Management
Learn how you can free yourself from the frustrations that sabotage your life and relationships and find freedom and victory in Christ Jesus. You can be free from the anger trap. It is for freedom that Christ has set us free!
Practical Evangelism
Practical Evangelism
Evangelism Ministry Team – Do you have a fear of sharing your faith with others? Do you hear people talk about “Go ye therefore…” and feel a mixed combination of desire and hesitation? In this class we will examine the what, why, and how of evangelism in classroom study and learn how to share the gospel biblically, naturally, and effectively as we get outside of the church walls to reach those God loves. Evangelism is the overflow of knowing and loving God.
Starting October 2nd (Wednesdays) - Upstairs by Fellowship Hall
7:00pm - 8:30pm
Evangelism Ministry Team
D2L-O (Sunday)
D2L-O Class
What is D2L-O? Is it just another variation of Designed to Lead? Is it just another leadership course? The answer to those 2 questions is NO. One key aspect that answers the why…to align with the current culture of the church.
Beyond that, answer the following questions: Are you uncertain of your life’s purpose? Do you question your identity? Do you feel that perhaps there is something more for you, but you are uncertain as to what that is? If these questions resonate with you, then you are not alone. Here are a few comments we have heard about D2L-O:
- This course has completely changed my mindset about why I’m here and what my mission is.
- Personally, it caused me to reflect deeper on many of the key elements to my faith.
- This course has had a huge impact on my spiritual walk in the way that it really highlights where I’ve fallen short and reminds me of the point and purpose in all of this.
- This course has started me on a clearer path in understanding who God says I am.
Course Outline:
We are the church collectively and individually.
God’s plan to redeem mankind includes us. From the beginning, He designed us to live in community and gave us stewardship responsibilities over the earth and everything in it, including one another; and Jesus has restored us to that rightful place.
When we reach out to God to care for our souls only, we miss this connection to His master plan. Our helping Him to meet the needs of others is directly connected to us having our own needs met. The church of God is sent on the mission of God.
But for the world to encounter God as He works in and through us, we must be mature believers. A mature believer is accustomed to dying to self and willingly does so daily. A mature believer knows who they are and whose they are. A mature believer reflects the image and likeness of God in their daily interactions and, in so doing, causes flourishing to take place in their sphere of influence. In this environment, the Holy Spirit can make the invisible Kingdom of God visible, and to call other sons and daughter’s home.
Sunday D2L-O Class will start February 9th, 2025
Online Registration will close January 26th.
The Next D2L-O Class with start Sunday, March 16th, 2025.
Online Registration will close March 2nd.
D2L-O (Wednesday)
This class focuses specifically on understanding your true calling and identity as a Christ follower. As stated in the book, the Church should be the greatest place for producing leaders. The reason is because Jesus, the Head of the Church, was the greatest leader to ever walk the earth. If we are engaged in discipleship, and becoming like him, we should be growing as leaders who bless the world. NOTE: This course started on October 6th, runs weekly on Tuesday evening from 7 – 8:30pm for 20 weeks and will end on March 9th. All sessions will be via Zoom. There is a book purchase ($20) required with this course. Email larry@wcf.ca to sign up
Song of Solomon
We all have passion and a yearning for intimacy and romance. God did not create these desires in us without also giving us the owner's manual for relationships. The biblical book Song of Solomon is devoted to all the aspects of love. The topics covered will be: The art of attraction, dating, intimacy & sex, conflict, romance, and commitment.
My tech travel setup
MacBook Pro
Robert Capa, a famous photojournalist once said, “If your pictures aren’t good enough, you’re not close enough.” It’s not just about zooming in with your lens, either. It’s about getting physically closer to people and getting to know them better. It’s also about spending a little time with a stranger before taking their photo. That helps build the trust and comfort that’ll come through in your pictures. Walk up to your subject with a simple wave and a smile to help communicate that you mean no harm.
Ask permission to take a photo if they speak the same language as you. If you don’t share a language, try learning some basic phrases ahead of time, gesture at your camera and ask through expression. Of course if someone doesn’t want their picture taken, it’s imperative to respect their wishes and move on — people are always more important than photographs. National Geographic writes that “making great pictures is primarily a mental process.” What makes you want to photograph the person or place? How might you describe it to a friend, and what adjectives would you use? Are there details you can focus on that tell a story?
iPad/iPhone
Maybe it’s a dry, arid desert, captured by focusing on the patterns of cracked earth. Or a prairie that’s photographed with the horizon at the bottom of the frame, to help create a sense of the open sky and tranquility. Or maybe it’s the story of a deft artisan, fingernails covered in wet clay as she molds a pot. When you’re on the road it can be tough to eat right and make sure you get all the right nutrients. I started taking daily supplements of Multi-Vitamin, Fish Oil capsules and Vitamin D and it helps a lot. Especially the Vitamin D since I don’t get to see the sun a lot during the winter in Sweden.
Sennheiser HD-25 Headphones
It’s difficult to recreate the grandeur of a vast landscape in the confines of a picture frame. But one way to add a sense of depth to your photos is to compose them with objects in the foreground that support the scene. It can be as simple as a winding road through a national park, or some rocks to show off the local geology.
If you’re taking photos of people during normal daylight hours, a quick way to get more flattering light is to move the person out of direct sunlight. The light is much “softer” and doesn’t cast stark, unflattering shadows across their facial features. Even better, have someone stand next to an open door or window as the single source of light.
Lighting
I stumbled upon the concept of margin while reading a post by Michael Hyatt, which led me to design my ideal week. Richard Swenson, M.D. (who wrote the book: Margin: Restoring Emotional, Physical, Financial, and Time Reserves to Overloaded Lives) describes margin like this:
Margin is the space between our load and our limits. It is the amount allowed beyond that which is needed. It is something held in reserve for contingencies or unanticipated situations. Margin is the gap between rest and exhaustion, the space between breathing freely and suffocating.
Last year I wrote about why booking too far in advance can be dangerous for your business, and this concept of margin so eloquently captures what I had recognized had been my problem: I was so booked up with clients that I wasn’t leaving any margin for error, growth, planning, or reflection. I wasn’t really growing my business in a sustainable way; I was just booking one client after the next. At the time this seemed like a good thing: doesn’t growing my business mean getting more clients?
A long redesign.
What if instead of booking up to 100% capacity (which more often than not ends up being closer to 120%), we only booked up to an 80% capacity?
What if we left more room for growth (personal or professional) and stopped being one with “busy-ness”?
I spent nearly a year turning down every new project (and even getting rid of old ones) so that I could reduce my workload, build in more margin, and create what is now Digital Strategy School. It takes time to build margin into your schedule.Write a book. Create a program. Update your contracts and proposals (which has been on your to-do list for how long..?) Spend more time with your family. Go above and beyond for a client. Learn something new. Actually follow through on the things that have been nagging at you for a long time.
When you design your ideal week, you start to see that the time you think you have is often not in alignment with how much time you actually have.
After designing my ideal week, I had a much clearer idea of how to create a framework for my week that would empower me to feel more focused by theming days of the week, and even parts of the day. SO simple, I know. Some of you have been doing this for ages and you’re already a pro, and some of you who saw my schedule said “woah, that’s so rigid, I need more flexibility!”
Structure enables flexibility.
If you’re not sure how much time you are actually spending on various tasks, use a tool like Rescue Time (their free version is excellent!) which runs in the background and tracks where your time is being spent. It can even send you weekly reports so you know exactly how much time you wasted on Facebook, or spent in your email inbox! You can assign different websites or programs/applications on a scale of very distracting to very productive, so you can see at a glance things like: which days of the week you’re most productive, which times of the day you’re most productive, and the sites on which you’re spending the most distracting time. Turns out I’m consistently “in the zone” around 3pm in the afternoon; so instead of trying to tackle highly creative work first thing in the morning (when my brain is barely functioning), I handle it in the afternoon, when I know I’m at my peak!
Creating more margin has been game-changing for my business.
What would be possible for yours?
Audio
Many years ago, I worked for my parents who own a video production company. Because it is a family business, you inevitably end up wearing many hats and being the czar of many different jobs. I mainly managed projects and worked as a video editor. On production, there were times that I was called on to work as an audio tech and was made to wear headphones on long production days. In those days, having a really good set of headphones that picked up every nuance of sound was essential to making sure the client got what they needed.
It’s safe to say that because of my unique professional experiences, I’ve tested out a lot of headphones.
First impressions.
Naturally, my first impression of these headphones is based off of the look of them. They have a classic over-the-ear style that is highlighted by a blue LED light that indicates the power for the noise canceling. The padding on the ear pieces seems adequate for extended usage periods.
They are wired headphones, but the 3.5mm stereo mini-plug cable is detachable. Something else I noticed right of the bat was the very nice carrying case that comes with them. It has a hard plastic exterior with a soft cloth interior that helps to protect the surface of the headphones from scratches. I never truly appreciated cases for headphones until I started carrying them from place-to-place. Now I can’t imagine not having a case.
A perfect fit.
Once I gave the headphones a thorough once-over exam, I tried them on. As I mentioned, they have a classic over-the-ear style and just looking at them, the padding on the ear pieces seem adequate and the peak of the headband seemed to be a bit lacking, but you don’t really know comfort unless you try on the product. So, I slipped the headphones on and found them to be exquisitely comfortable.
Quality.
Now that I had the headphones on my head, I was finally ready to plug and play some music. I plugged the provided cable into the jack on the headphones and then the one on my iPhone 6. Then I called up Pandora. I tend to have a very eclectic music purview and have many stations set up for different moods. From John Williams to Fallout Boy, the sound quality of these headphones was remarkable. There is an amazing depth of sound and incredible highs and lows that make listening to music a truly breathtaking experience.
In order to test how voices sounded, and the overall art of sound mixing, I pulled up Netflix on my iPad Air 2 and watched a few minutes of a movie to hear all the nuances of the film. None of them were lost. In fact, I ended up hearing sounds that I hadn’t heard before. Echoes…birds chirping…wind blowing through trees…breathing of the characters…it was very impressive what the headphones ended up bringing out for me.
I would highly recommend these to any sound mixing specialist.