Adventures in Coach Land

So this week I made a breakthrough and I largely owe that to coaching, my co-coach and the way coaching has really allowed me to work through and process stuff I had not been dealing with.

Although coaching is not counselling, it has to be said, that it can almost have a therapeutic affect on those undergoing it.  It has had such an affect on me.  By saying this I have not followed a plan, or been given solutions from my coach.  More it has enabled me to re-frame how I’m looking at stuff and find a way to move past those excuses I have been making for myself.

I have been depressed lately.  Over the death of my dad and more recently, my very old dog and first pet with my now husband, the loss of our first gallery space owing to our Landlord being able to make more money by installing a pizza restaurant, and just other stuff in general which seemed to be mounting up.  Anyway,  through the learning on the course I have really allowed myself to open up to deal with this stuff as it became obvious quite quick into the course that this was the shit that was getting in my way.

This last week I’ve had a breakthrough.  I have been swimming 3 times at the beach and I am going to be taking up wild swimming.  A new member of our board has a kayak which my family are going to borrow, this is fantastic as we were going to rent one out, to have a go as it was our plan to take up kayaking and now we don’t have to and I have almost finished my first piece of work in months…… this is a huge breakthrough for me as I have been unable to work on anything since I lost my studio, but I feel I am now turning a very real corner thanks to coaching!

So last week I did my first completely solo coaching session outside of the course (still for free) and with someone I do not already have a connection.  I have already undertaken hours of coaching, whilst on the course and in between modules with another one of the members, but this was different and far more scary.

Due to circumstances beyond our control, the intake session (30 minutes to talk a little more about the process and what the coachee would like to focus on during our sessions) was done over the phone.  This I find fairly tricky as without all those other cues we get from watching people as they speak and think something through, it is much harder to judge when to interject and when to continue to allow the silence to go on.

Silence is one of those things that is of paramount importance to coaching, your ability as the coach to hold that silent space is so important in allowing your client to process what they’re saying and what they’re thinking.

I digress… so although the situation made me nervous it went well.  At the end of the session we had begun to build up a rapport and I look forward to helping my client reach her goals.