24 April 2024| Hagegården, Sweden [David Neal]
There was a time when the Adventist health lecturer would give a presentation about the right way to live, invite the listener to make a response, and hope for behaviour change to take place. It is almost as if there was an unspoken rule, that once the prescription is given about right living, it is up to the individual follow the advice, act on it, and everything will be alright.
The challenge of what we know we ought to do – and what we do is one every individal faces. Perhaps no greater example of this is is that although packets of cigarettes in most European countries carry incredibly powerful in-your-face messages about the dangers of smoking, people continue to smoke.
Lifestle Coaching Skills Workshop
Lifestyle Coaching recognises that behaviour change is not easy. Combine the challenges of everyday life, with the power of long-term habits and lifestyle change becomes near impossible. The answer suggests Katia Garcia Reinert, General Conference Associate Health Ministries director, is to use a coaching approach based on biblical principles. But the clearest way to understand the paradigm shift is in the metaphor Reinert uses.
Travel Agent or Tour Guide?
“Look at it this way”, says Reinert. “There is a major difference between a travel agent and a tour guide. The travel agent plans the trip,” she explains, “but the tour guide is different. Unlike the travel agent whose work ends before the trip begins, a tour guide accompanies the traveller on the journey.” Continuing the metaphor Reinert explained, “Tour guides have a personal knowlegde about the itinerary, they develop a connection with the traveller, but most of all they use their strength and knowledge to ensure the traveler has the best journey possible.”
At the heart of the 23 – 26 February Lifestyle Coaching Skills Workshop which took place on the Swedish campus of LifeStlyleTV, is a deeprooted paradigm shift in how we teach and lead Adventist Health Ministries. “Amen to that”, says this objective reporter – who has been known to eat emotionally, while knowing that such an action is not always wise! As Reinert confirms, “We don’t just want to give information, advise change, or even write a lifestyle prescription, rather, coaching is an approach that allows us to travel with people on their journeys to better health.”
With participants from Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Belgium and Scotland, many of whom are health practitioners, as the video report shows, it is an approach enthusiastically welcomed.
LifeStyleTV and LifeStlyeSTAY
It was in November 2017 that work began to raise a new television studio in Hagegården, Sweden to support the ministry of LifeStyleTV. The 950 square metre studio in 2024 continues to support the continuing output of a wide range of programmes designed to meet the needs of viewers at different stages of their spiritual journey.
In recent times LifeStlyeTV has added LifeStyleSTAY to its ministry portfolio, creating a ‘get away from it all’ hotel experience in response to the stresses and strains of today’s maxed out European lifestyle. Set in an area of outstanding natural beauty in rural Sweden, it offers an open door for those who want a a glimpse into what a holisitic lifestyle looks like, with its healthy living emphasis and warm hospitality led by the LifeStlye founders, Claus and Theresa Nybo.
In this video Claus Nybo gives an introduction to LifeStyleSTAY along with his enthusiasm for Lifestyle coaching.
Read the story about the development of the LifeStyleTV campus.
Read the story of how an opera singer’s mansion became an Adventist TV studio.
The campus of LifeStyleTV and LifeStyleSTAY is located about 110 miles (180 kilometres) east of Norway’s capital, Oslo and is a supporting ministry of the Seventh-day Adventist Church.
Featured image: David Neal – Participants at the Lifestyle Coaching Skills Seminar on the campus of LifeStyleTV
Video editor: Attila Erdeg
