• Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

LDSPMA

Empowering Latter-day Saints to spread light and truth by connecting them at the intersection of faith, creativity, and professional skill

  • Conference
    • 2025 Conference
      • Register
      • Sessions
      • Workshops
      • Awards Gala
      • LDSPMA’s Got (Secret) Talent!
    • FAQs
    • Volunteer
    • Past Conferences
      • 2024 Conference
        • Sessions
        • Workshops
        • ZIFF Networking Dinner
        • Schedule
      • 2023 Conference
        • Sessions
        • Workshops
        • Schedule
        • Sponsors & Vendors
      • 2022 Conference
        • Sessions
        • Workshops
        • Schedule and Maps
        • Photo Gallery
      • 2021 Conference
        • Sessions
        • Workshops
        • Schedule and Maps
      • 2020 Conference
        • Sessions
        • Workshops
        • Schedule
      • 2019 Conference
      • 2018 Conference
      • 2017 Conference
      • 2016 Conference
  • Membership
    • Email Sign Up (Free)
    • Monthly Zoom Discussions (Free)
    • Mentoring Program
    • LDSPMA Next Gen (Youth)
    • University Chapters
    • Facebook Group
  • Podcast
    • Watch
    • Listen
      • Listen on Apple Podcasts
      • Listen on Spotify
      • Listen on Buzzsprout
    • Submit a Creator Highlight
    • Called to Create Conversations
  • Articles
    • All Articles
    • Faith & Mindset
      • Gospel Principles
      • Creativity
      • Productivity
    • Craft Skills
      • Writing
      • Media, Film & Theater
      • Podcasting & Speaking
      • Music
      • Fine Art
    • Professional Skills
      • Editing
      • Publishing
      • Business
      • Cultural Diversity
      • Marketing
  • Awards
    • 2025 Awards Gala
    • Praiseworthy Awards
      • 2024 Winners
      • 2023 Winners
      • 2022 Winners
      • 2021 Winners
      • 2020 Winners
      • 2019 Winners
      • 2018 Winners
      • 2017 Winners
      • 2016 Winners
    • Spark Awards
      • 2024 Winners
      • 2023 Winners
      • 2022 Winners
      • 2021 Winners
      • 2020 Winners
    • Lifetime Achievement Awards
    • Apply to Be an Awards Judge
  • About
    • Mission
      • LDSPMA in the Media
      • Success Stories
      • Viewpoint on LDSPMA
    • Volunteers
      • Volunteer Year-Round
      • Volunteer at the Conference
      • Apply to Be a Presenter
      • Apply to Be an Awards Judge
      • Resources for Current Volunteers
    • Leadership
    • Policies
      • Nurturing a Caring Community
      • Political Neutrality Policy
      • Antiharassment Policy
      • Harassment Reporting Form
      • Children Policy
    • Contact US
  • Support LDSPMA
    • Donate
    • Volunteer

Sharla Goettl

Member Spotlight: Sharla Goettl!

May 22, 2021 By Trina Boice Leave a Comment

Sharla lives in Newberg, Oregon with her husband and three daughters.

What are some names of the books or other media you have created?

Spiritual Resilience: Leading Our Youth to Go and Do, is a Latter-day Saint nonfiction book about how to make a greater impact as parents.

The Goal Maker is a guided questionnaire to help determine the next best step in building your faith.

Am I a Good Enough Leader For My Family? is an article written for the Leading Saints organization.

What inspired you to become a creator of media?

As a stake Young Women president, I have felt inspired to find deeper answers to the questions youth and their parents ask all the time. The youth of today will be the heroes of tomorrow. It will be their ability to give more relevant answers and apply innovative solutions that will bring about future miracles. I feel it is our responsibility as their parents and leaders to support them any way we can.

What has been the highlight of your career so far?

I have been a youth leader almost every year of my adult life. The families I have interacted with frame my testimony with their experiences. There have been moments when youth were not receiving the support they deserved at home, yet they remained resilient anyway. There have been times when the youth have supported me in my own shaky moments. It has been a pleasure to relive some of these treasured memories in the principles I discuss in my writing. But truly, the honor was being welcomed into their lives in the first place.

What was the best advice you’ve ever been given in your creative journey?

My grandmother was a novelist, poet, and long-time teacher. She poured over her words with tender care while living in a tiny tribal outpost surrounded by her five rowdy sons and eager students. She found joy and solace in her writing. In her patriarchal blessing, given when she was a young woman, it reads “spare not in lifting up thy voice to take a full part in every endeavor.” Commitment to the craft of communicating Christ’s gospel and eternal truths is an endeavor I am motivated to “take a full part.” My task will be to spare not my voice.

What advice do you have for someone just starting out in your field?

Pray often. The task of writing this first book has taken many months of writing and many months of editing and many months of publishing and many months of marketing. The task could have gone much more smoothly if I had remembered to consistently pray before starting my work. If I ever forgot, I would consistently come to a point where I would need to start over. The reminder that I was not doing my work alone was constantly in my mind. Regardless of the task before you, prayer will always help the process go more efficiently.

What keeps you inspired in your daily creative work?

I have three teenage daughters who are consistently out-performing me. They are artists, friends, designers, thinkers, and givers of testimony. They will continually do things better than I can do myself. They inspire me every day to support them and their peers. I eagerly seek their guidance and am improved by it. I ask how they would handle a situation and am changed by it. I leverage their creativity and am amazed by it. I try to keep up so they will know their mama tried so hard to teach them in a way they deserved to be taught.

What would you like others to know about you or your creative process?

My answers are not my own. The insights I write about were first written in the scriptures by the men and women who were authorized to speak on behalf of our Savior. My task has been applying their words in a modern context. The concept of eternal truth is always in my mind. Christ is a good enough creative director to not let any words or any experience go to waste. The knowledge is there and always has been. The only difference between now and the end of the Restoration will be our ability to understand what we already have.

In what ways do you feel you have been able to be a voice for good in your creative pursuits?

I hope I have offered a voice of confidence to parents and youth who feel overwhelmed or not quite good enough for the task at hand. I hope I have laid out my arguments well enough to counteract the doubtful words in their heads. I truly believe we have a purpose and every capacity needed to fulfill it. I hope I have provided a connection between daily life and eternal covenants so that more people can benefit from the guarantees they offer.

If you want your spotlight to link to your website or any of your social media platforms, include the URLs here.

http://www.sharlagoettl.com
https://www.facebook.com/authorsharlagoettl
https://www.instagram.com/authorsharlagoettl/

Filed Under: Member Spotlight Tagged With: Book of Mormon, Latter-day Saint, Latter-day Saint Publishing and Media Association, LDS, LDS youth leader, LDSPMA, Mormon, parenting, Sharla Goettl, Writer

Latter-day Profiles

January 3, 2021 By Trina Boice 2 Comments

Latter-day Profiles is a collaborative effort of students, faculty, and staff at Brigham Young University-Idaho. The program features in-depth interviews with noteworthy members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Guests range from leaders in business and industry to educators, to musicians and authors to volunteers. All have stories to tell that are interesting, informative, and thought-provoking.

Latter-day Profiles is produced by students in coordination with faculty and staff advisors. That means the students research the guests, schedule the interviews, run the cameras, and edit the programs.

BYU-Idaho Communication faculty, Brian Howard, hosts the program and works closely with the students in the production process. Currently, Latter-day Profiles airs Sunday afternoons at 2:35 Mountain Time on BYUTV. Twenty-eight new episodes are produced every year.

We thought you might be interested in seeing the schedule for the first quarter of 2021!

LDPRF_39_01 / Carmen Rasmusen Herbert / Speaker, Singer & Author

Airs January 3rd 2021 / February 28th 2021

Carmen Rasmusen Herbert was a Top 6 finalist on the second season of FOX’s “American Idol” in 2003. She has appeared on many talk and entertainment shows including David Letterman, the Today show, MSNBC, and Good Morning America. 

LDPRF_39_02 / Ed Sexton / Dean, College of Business and Communication at BYU-Idaho

Airs January 10th 2021 / March 7th 2021

Ed Sexton is the dean of the College of Business and Communication at BYU-Idaho. He has served in the Sixth Quorum of the Seventy and as a bishop, high councilor, mission president, stake mission president, stake president’s counselor, and stake president.

LDPRF_39_03 / Meg Johnson / Speaker & Author

Airs January 17th 2021 / March 14th 2021

Meg Johnson is a founding partner for Jumping Turtle LLC and Our Turtle House. Her work as an influencer has touched many on a local, national, and international level, and Meg is a recipient of the Athena Leadership Award. Meg was a ballroom dancer and professional party planner. Then a weekend trip changed it all, and Meg was paralyzed on March 6, 2004, when she was hiking in Southern Utah.

LDPRF_39_04 / Joel Bishop / Speaker & Actor

Airs January 24th 2021 / March 21st 2021

Joel Bishop is the president of Rise to Your Challenge, which offers speaking, training, and consulting services. Joel is an accomplished actor, speaker, and presenter.

LDPRF_39_05 / David Christensen / Author

Airs January 31st 2021 / March 28th 2021

David Christensen is a senior advisor to the non-profit organization Mentors International. David is an author and has served as a mission president in Chile and as MTC President in Guatemala.

LDPRF_39_06 / Trina Boice / Author, Podcaster, BYU-I Instructor & Entrepreneur
Airs February 7th 2021 / April 11th 2021

Dr. Trina Boice is a #1 best-selling author of 31 non-fiction books. She is an author coach at FromBooks2Business.com and creates online courses at LifelongLearningEducation.com.  Trina also writes movie reviews at MovieReviewMom.com. A popular international keynote, she has gone on many speaking tours around the world. 

LDPRF_39_07 / Sharla Goettl / Author
Airs February 14th 2021 / April 18th 2021

Sharla Goettl is the author of “Spiritual Resilience: Leading Our Youth to Go and Do.”

LDPRF_39_01 / Charlie Bird / Author

Airs February 21st 2021 / April 25th 2021

Charlie Bird was Cosmo the Cougar at Brigham Young University from 2016 to 2018. He received national acclaim for his multiple dance performances with the BYU Cougarettes. As Cosmo, he performed across the country, including on the ESPN College Football Awards and on America’s Got Talent. 2017 was dubbed “Year of the Mascot” by NBC Sports in honor of Cosmo’s character and performance. Charlie was born and raised in Southwest Missouri and served a two-year mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Redlands, California. He graduated from BYU in 2018. Charlie is an active LBGTQ advocate and is involved with multiple nonprofit LGBTQ organizations nationally and across Utah.

Filed Under: Craft Skills, Media, Film & Theater, Podcasting & Speaking Tagged With: Brian Howard, Brigham Young University Idaho, BYU-I, BYU-I Communication, BYU-I faculty, Carmen Rasmusen Herbert, David Christensen, Ed Sexton, interviews, Joel Bishop, Latter-day Profiles, LDS, media, Meg Johnson, Sharla Goettl, Trina Boice

Primary Sidebar

Recent Articles

Headshot of Cali Black

A Conversation with Cali Black

By Cali Black – “I truly believe that when we stop and we reflect, that allows the Spirit to bring things to our remembrance.”

Sprint Writing for the Win

By Rebecca Talley – “There is no one-size-fits-all for writing a novel – or any book, for that matter. We all must figure out what works for us.”

To Creative Middle-Aged Sisters in the Working World

By JoLynne J. Lyon – “Decide how you’ll measure success. Study your possibilities. Say a prayer. And if it’s what you want to do, get yourself out there.”

Recent Podcast Episodes

Popular Articles

A senior couple walking down a quiet lane

Sometimes Things Do Work Out

By Steve Dunn Hanson – We can choose how any situation or circumstance we find ourselves in will ultimately affect us. We can literally shape the results of all our experiences.

Cussing & Creating: 3 Reasons Why You Shouldn’t (& Should!) Use Profanities in Your Writing

By Lizzy Pingry – Writers must evaluate the way they express themselves: how does our use of language and its profanities build or destroy our stories? 

Portrait of a Painter: The Journey of Latter-day Saint Artist Dan Wilson

By Howard Collett – “God is in the very details of our work. That doesn’t just apply to Christian artists working on temple paintings, but it applies to anyone in any career. God can answer specific questions to help us be better providers, better employees, better employers, better husbands or wives, or wherever we need help.” – Artist, Dan Wilson

More Articles

Trusting Your Teenage Writer: Three Tips to Avoid Overwriting

By LoriAnne Spear – Many of us novice writers overwrite in our insecure attempt to sound like a real writer. We use flowery language or big words so the reader will believe we’re legit. Instead, we produce overwrought writing and get in our own way. 

Announcing the New LDSPMA Podcast!

By Ted Finch – Podcasting is turning into a medium where we can simply and effectively share our light. We can flood the airwaves with hope and positivity. We can model civility and celebrate differences of opinion and diversity of thought.

Aaron Merrell: Working in the Film Industry

By Trina Boice – Check out a recent BYU-Idaho Forum presentation, featuring Aaron Merrell, who is a senior producer for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saint’s Publishing Services Department. In the forum, Aaron gives a behind-the-scenes look into producing the Book of Mormon Videos series. He also shares insights about working in the film industry.

Footer

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • YouTube

Copyright © 2025 LDSPMA. All Rights Reserved. LDSPMA is not endorsed by nor affiliated with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.