What if your life could be different? Free and whole? What if you could be present to people, to yourself, and to God despite the circumstances around you?
What if you could let go of control without losing yourself? What if you could be free of resignation because you knew you had something unique to offer?
Author Pablo Giacopelli shares his life–changing journey to living with a secure identity and a quiet mind, regardless of opinions and situations. Holding On Loosely will challenge your perceptions about the power of control and the desire of God in a way that will awaken new life in a soul weary from constant performance.
This book has the potential of sweeping you away into a journey of walking with the confident certainty that you are never alone and God is always within you. Find life. Find love. Find the Person within that has always been looking for you, and the God that perfectly made that person.
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"Holding On Loosely grips you tightly. You can't help but catch the scent of personal familiarity in this deeply honest and intimately revealing story of Pablo's pursuit of acceptance and ultimate freedom to be who he was created to be––truly beloved"" Michael L. Simpson Executive Coach with Trove, Inc., and Best–Selling Author of Permission Evangelism and I Believe, Now What?
"There are stories that entertain and stories that inspire...but then there are a few stories that awaken something deep inside our heart that is good and noble. This is one of those stories. A true story about a man who is not unlike you and me. You won't have to commit to finishing Holding On Loosely–it will engage you till the end." Gary Barkalow Founder, The Noble Heart, Colorado Springs, CO Author, It's Your Call: What Are You Doing Here?
About the Author
Pablo Giacopelli is a professional tennis coach and has worked successfully with some of the best female tennis players in the world. He was chosen as the Estonian Tennis Team Captain at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Pablo is also a certified personal and professional performance coach through his business UXL. He is married to Madeleine and lives in Tel Aviv, Israel. Pablo is the father of four children: Vanessa, Jake, Mia and Gisella.
Product Details
Paperback: 208 pages
Publisher: Heart & Life Publishers (December 9, 2011)
I have always been known as a man who goes against the flow of what others consider normal. This approach to work and life explains why I have often succeeded where others have failed. Born to Argentinean parents working in Lima, Peru, I was the only child until my sister showed up. She ruined a pretty good gig for a kid who had all of his parents' attention all of the time!
During my boyhood years in Peru, I began to play tennis through the encouragement of my parents. I didn't like tennis. I loved soccer and moto-crossing on the small bike my grandfather purchased for me for my tenth Christmas. Still, I had to do what my parents said, and everyone assumed that I loved tennis because I became good at it very quickly. Soon I was the best player of my age in my country, and at 11 years old I began to travel to international tournaments, where I also excelled.
My father, wishing to cultivate my athletic potential, began to plan my life according to his vision for my success. When I was 13, my parents sent me to attend a tennis academy in America. From there, I began to travel the world playing junior events. My life focused on making it as a professional tennis player. It became one big show, and I felt that I had to excel at everything I did.
As often happens when a person is forced to do something he doesn't enjoy, I rebelled when I got to college. There, I got involved with the wrong crowds--or maybe the normal ones--and began to party as hard as I possibly could. I experienced much of life, not all of it pleasant. I found myself stranded in a foreign airport. I slept for several days in the back seat of a car, too broke to buy food. So it went. All the while, my overactive instinct for survival kept me pushing myself to the limit.
Not surprisingly, I eventually burned myself out. My life was at a crisis point when I finally stepped into a church and for the first time approached God. But it still took two more weeks before I made the decision to become a Christian. It would take many more years before I understood--and began to truly experience--the transformation that occurred in my heart that sunny, warm morning in church.
After that first, defining point in my faith, my life took all kinds of twists and turns: marriage, the births of three precious children, a string of jobs and business ventures, a go at driving race cars, a divorce, and a growing religiosity that, far from freeing me, led me into bondage. Focused on keeping the rules rather than understanding God's heart, I became the prime example of a modern Pharisee.
My career as a professional world tour tennis coach started at a conference at the 2004 Wimbledon tournament. My job took me all over the world. I became familiar with a multitude of cultures. I experienced some amazing highs, but also some painful lows. There is no describing the thrill of marching into the inaugural ceremony at the Beijing Olympics and watching my players perform at the very pinnacle of their sport. Yet I longed to wake up next to my kids each day. I missed watching them grow up into the wonderful people they are today. After too many lonely nights in hotel rooms, I began asking some deep, long-overdue questions.What was life really about? Was this as good as it got?
Finally, in a jet flying 35,000 feet above the Earth, I began to break down. That is when God opened the curtains on a new, far more wonderful way of living--one in which I have come to know firsthand the depths of His love and the life-changing power of His grace. Join me on my journey in Holding On Loosely. My hope is that you, too, will gain insights that can transform your life. This is a story of learning how to live in the moment. It is my personal chronicle of discovering daily, little by little, how to relinquish control of life and experience the power and freedom of trusting God.
Since this new, second phase of my life began, I have remarried a wonderful Jewish girl who loves Jesus. We have a cute little girl, and we live today in Tel Aviv. Under the banner of my business, UXL, I coach people all over the world on how to maximize their personal and professional performance.
My life is not perfect. However, every day I discover more and more the wonderful reality of how much God loves me and how He really sees me. My relationship with Him is no longer based on my performance, but on His love and grace for me. I am well on my way to recovering from Pharisaism as I learn how to live from the new heart Jesus gave me long ago, the day I first asked Him to come into my life.
Pablo
Official Bio:
Born in Lima, Peru, Pablo Giacopelli learned to play tennis at an early age. In his eleventh year, rated the top young player in his country, he entered the international circuit; and at age 13, he attended a tennis academy in America. In his adult life, Pablo coached world-class players who reached further than they had before. His client's successes included: quarter-final showings at a Grand Slam; several titles on the tour; top-ten yearly race rankings; year-end masters championships as well as many victories over the ten best players in the world.
Today, as the founder of UXL, Pablo serves as a Personal and Professional Performance Coach, helping athletes, creative artists, business leaders, and men and women from all walks of life define and attain their dreams. Drawing on biblical principles fleshed out in his own remarkable journey, he points people on a proven path to success that unites vision and energy with God's grace. Pablo lives in Tel Aviv, Israel, and is married to Madeleine. He is the father of four children: Vanessa, Jake, Mia and Gisella.
Pablo Giacopelli is well qualified to speak about many dimensions of life as a successful tennis coach and a trusted life counselor and coach. His book, Holding on Loosely, however doesn't particularly draw upon those credentials in the manner that might be expected. This is not the typical "10 Ways to Get Your Act Together and Succeed in Everything You Do" type book that comes out repeatedly from different authors each of whom have a unique take on what is basically the same information. Rather, Pablo does something that is rare. He drops his mask and gives the reader insight into who he is as a person, how he's mismanaged things in his life, and what now has changed around him because of changes that have taken place first within him.
As a man who understands better than most what the demands of high performance expectations can do to a person, and who understands this from both sides of the equation, Pablo engages in stepping through a series of life changing events that are more of a narrative or an internal dialog within himself, with God (or a higher power) and with others around him as well. He shares most importantly what has changed in his thinking and expectations (or the diminishing of them) and the peaceful place within himself now from which he lives and takes on life as it comes to him.
Moving through a narrative story that flows well, the book holds the reader's attention and illustrates by example rather than just conceptually the life's lessons the Pablo is offering to those vicariously along for the ride with him. Highlights of the book for this reviewer included a differentiation between those things that are religious in nature that drive us in certain directions, verses those things that are spiritual and relational and guide us rather than driving us. At the conclusion of the book is also a very personal look at his relationship with his father. Details of the past wounds or grievances are not given and are unnecessary but obviously there are wounds and deep hurts involved. The lack of detail actually makes it easier for the reader to enter in and apply or personify what is being spoken of to their own situation.
While the book is clearly written from a spiritual perspective that element of the book is not pushed upon the reader with great detail. Just as in places within the book, Pablo is checked in his spirit from aggressively "witnessing" to others in favor of a more careful and sensitive approach which relies upon prompting from God or the Holy Spirit, he practices the same thing in his writing. Subsequently this becomes an excellent book for a broad audience. There is available a study guide for those who want to think about and explore more of those types of issues. Information is given within the book on how to obtaid the guide. In addition, because of this quality it would in this reviewer's opinion make an excellent book for anyone in a 12 step program who is looking for an encouraging read that provides things in a "caught but not taught" manner.
Overall I found this to be an excellent and encouraging read. I can recommend it without reservation.
5 stars
bart breen
The review written above is based on reading a book directly provided by the author in the hopes of eliciting a review. No promise of a review was offered and in the event that a review was provided no promise of it being a positive one was offered. The review above represents the opinion of this reviewer based upon a full reading of the book and has not been influenced in any other way. bb
I am a ITTF and USATT Certified Table Tennis coach, who has struggled with my own game when it comes to the "mental" side of the sport. This was timely, helpful and a joy to read. I believe God is working in my own life and game, through this book, other life lessons and my own spiritual growth. - Brian Fowler, [...]
Frederick Buechner says, "The story of any one of us is the story of us all". This is what you find with Pablo's book, Holding on Loosley. From the first page, this story captured me and I wanted to sink into a big soft chair by the fire read it from cover to cover, not only because it is a great story but also because through reading it, I was invited into a better story, too. I highly recommend this book to anyone who is spiritually thirsty and to those who like me, sometimes need to "loosen our grip" and in the process enter into the wonderful liberty of surrender!
