SIX MAGNIFICENT WOMEN

‘Life is what happens when you are busy making plans’

So we all thought we had everything perfectly planned out.  We had six women who felt ready to make a significant change in their life; we had our book ‘Your Life Your Way’ as a tool; we were offering six hours’ free individual coaching plus three teleclasses; we were starting in September and it would be all over, done and dusted by December.

Well, we forgot that life has this tendency to take its own course regardless of plans.  So working with these six magnificent women has proven to be an interesting journey and for some of them the journey continues.

We were reminded very early on that people who have never had the benefit of coaching before need time to learn how to be a client.  That is the case for everyone—including us.  When we each hired our own coach for the first time, we too had to learn how to be a client.  And each of the six magnificent women did their very best in their own way with this completely new experience. 

We realized once more that despite what any one of us might say or write in preparation, until the experience happens the words are meaningless.  We all only have the old gestalt to cling on to.  Therefore, ‘coaching’ means different things to different people according to their previous life experiences.  For instance, if a person has experienced therapy or counseling, then the assumption may be that coaching is going to be ‘something like therapy or counseling’.  If they’ve only ever had advice from friends and family, then they may assume that the coach has a vested interest in their choices and a definite view on what they should do.  Neither of these is true.

Then there was the whole idea of ‘change’ and what that might mean.   These women were not living in fantasy land by any means – they wanted change and wanted it badly.  The challenge was to determine exactly what the change was they wanted to see.  Coaching by its very nature opens clients up to who they truly are, what they truly want in the rest of their life . . . and very often this leads to some big surprises.  These new thoughts, ideas and possibilities have to be processed – they put clients in a different starting place from where they thought they were.

One of the ‘characters’ clients inevitably meet along the way is their Inner Critic (sometimes called The Gremlin, or The Saboteur).  Whatever name is given to it, it’s the habitual negative mind chatter that goes on in everyone’s head.  Being introduced to this new character and learning that it is the client’s job to manage ‘it’ – and not the other way around, which has often been the case for many years -  takes time.  It starts with the client becoming aware that the negative mind chatter is separate from who he or she truly is and then noticing when it is taking over and stopping any forward movement..  This practice takes time to be assimilated.

And so the process slowed way down – down to a pace that was right for each individual to gain the greatest benefits.  One woman had the added difficulty of breaking a leg . . . and yet she is working with the positives that this ‘opportunity’ has given her.

Huge reminders for us that

o       great coaching comes when the client is ready

o       it takes time for new clients to be fully ready

o       individual pacing is essential

and we are extremely grateful to our six magnificent women for that!

Lynn and Julie