I have never been a mother. I have never been a teacher. I have done a lot of self help work on myself. I have witnessed the Law of Attraction happen in my own life. (By which I mean, I have intended for things to happen. I have needed things to happen and I have had them happen as if everything were simply falling into place through very little effort of my own.) I have learned first hand the benefits of being patient and maintaining a positive attitude. Things work out for themselves and when I am positive and patient, they seem to unfold in the manner which gives me the best personal outcome.
I decided to become a coach because: 1. By nature I seem to like to share my good fortune with others. If I have learned something that has really worked for me, I naturally want to tell others, and 2. I am a writer, I enjoy writing, and my writing seemed to be shifting to a "coaching" direction.
None of that prepared me for the lessons and challenges of actually coaching.
First, did you know, that no matter how much or how little money a client may have paid, they may not do any of the assignments you give them?
I know! My ego had no idea what to make of that. In my mind, I had found something that works for me. So metaphorically, it's like I've found a shortcut to get from Epcot to the World Showcase but while I'm waiving people to that special door, they're telling me, "No thanks I want to walk past 'O Canada'" or "If I walk past Mexico, I can buy a churro."
It feels like I am almost constantly thinking, "What?" "What did you say?" "How should I respond to that? What do I say?"
Not to mention nearly constantly dis-identifying with the situation and clearing on any feelings that may come up.
At the end of my own coaching program (where I was first being coached,) I went to a retreat and met other people who had been in the same program. We talked, as people do, and the subject of "good" coaches and "bad" coaches came up. I am firm believer in the Law of Attraction. I have had horrible moments where hideous words came out of someone I loved and, although there seemed to be no stimulus to cause those exact words, the words were speaking directly to my own negative or limiting beliefs. I've heard the psychological explanation for why they may have been said, but I need no explanation as to why they hit my target so well. I attracted them. I needed to hear them to begin the work to pop the swollen ugly pimple of pain the belief was causing in my life. I have experienced both the good and the bad of the Law of Attraction. I have witnessed it. So when it comes to the question of a "good" coach or a "bad" coach, I know there is no such thing. There is only the coach you attracted into your life. It's up to you to harvest everything there is to be had from the relationship.
The same is true with my clients. I am dedicated and enthusiastic about doing the best job I can do, both for them, and for me. I knew all along that becoming a coach would also support my own efforts and I would learn new things. I have already encountered materials I have never seen before as well as clearing methods to which I had never before been exposed. Honestly, it's a great thing.
I have always worn several hats, though, and one of my other jobs is that of a media technician. One of the things I do is transfer VHS tapes to DVD. It's so simple. You put the VHS tape in the VCR. Take the outgoing cords and feed them into a DVD deck with a burner. Start everything up and 9 times out of 10, it just happens. The tape plays. The DVD deck receives and a couple of hours later, I burn and finalize a DVD. Clockwork.
People don't work like that. I mean, I knew that. Yet here I am saying it. So I must have needed a lesson about it as well. When you drop into someone's life once a week, have a conversation, give them some information and some suggestions; there are a lot of different outcomes that can manifest one week later. You probably could build a mathematic equation around it, but it contains at least two unpredictable variables. Me and the client. As human beings, we are mobile biospheres affected by even more variables: physical wellbeing, emotional mood, blood sugar, hunger, whatever has happened during our individual days .... A lot more than simply, this VHS tape won't play in this machine, I'll have to try another.
The other day I was talking to my "accountability partner" (aka a friend who is also going through the coaching certification program.) He mentions one of the "outcomes" with his client that I would never have foreseen or predicted. As I ask him questions and ask him what he's going to do, at one point he says "I'll have fun with it."
Fun with it? At this point, I feel like a juggler who never sees all three balls in action at once. One has always just hit the floor. At the same time, I am constantly forced to remind myself I am not in control of the balls. I am not supposed to be in control of the balls nor should I want to be. These balls are actually human beings and can decide whether they want to fly and where they want that flight to take them. I'm just the travel agent handing out information and any special tips I can give when they head somewhere I've already been.
Fun with it.
I've been so busy trying to be a good life coach, I forgot the most essential thing.
To just be.
Joe Vitale says to dare something worthy and I've done that. I suppose I hadn't considered how often I'd be holding my feelings of inadequacy back as if with a lion tamer's whip and chair while guiding audience members to a door.
"I decided I don't want to walk through that door."
"Wait a minute. What?"
"Let me set this down for a second."
"What did you say?"
Fun with it.
I'm not having fun with it yet, but I think maybe I can get there from here.
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