Posts Tagged ‘coaching’

Newer Entries »

The Thigh Bone’s Connected to the Knee Bone: Part 2

Written by on 14th October 2010

Check out my experience with chronic health concerns in  part 1 of this story…

As I wrote yesterday, it seemed unconscionable that I would give a presentation on having a solid relationship with health and wellness while experiencing deep dissatisfaction in my own relationship. I felt out of integrity and if giving a brief presentation on the topic was making me feel this uneasy, I’d better pay attention.

So I did. I allowed this opportunity to be the driving force of a wake-up call and decided I wanted to show up for this October 28th event having taken some creative steps in the re-writing process. I wanted a new story about health.

First, I took a cue from all wise, romantic plotlines, where the protagonist experiences heartbreak: I sat down and had a good cry. Where did we go wrong? How did it get to this? If you leave your sneakers where I’m inevitably going to trip over them, I’m inevitably going to throw them away, mister! Oh, wait, that’s a different story…

Then I took a page from my standard coaching playbook. I wrote. I answered my own questions, such as:

  • What are my symptoms telling me?
  • What is the deeper longing here?
  • What’s the benefit of not feeling healthy?
  • What would it look like to be in relationship with my body?

The most insightful piece of information this process provided was, unsurprisingly, around responsibility. I realized that I’ve kept looking externally for answers. I’ve been operating under the assumption that if only I found the right doctor who would be the perfect synthesis of Eastern and Western medicine, the epitome of heart-centered care and connected to top-notch specialists, I would quickly find my way. In this one part of my life, I longed to be puppet, I kept looking for someone else would tell me what to do at every turn. I realized I needed to begin viewing myself as the primary care physician. I needed to be the person I kept hoping someone else would be for me.

So it all comes back to me? Sigh. But then I realized I have experience in this area! After all, while this problem might feel overwhelming, I have tremendous experience solving troubling problems. We all do. I also know that my head can only make so much headway, so to speak. When solving troubling problems, it is better to access the heart. And in my perspective, the heart is that special point of connection to the Divine, to Source, to God, to the Light. It’s where I get intuitive hits. It’s where I feel less afraid.

To access the heart, I followed the lead of the Sufis. Sufism has this super cool practice of prayer called Remembrance, wherein you are essentially remembering God, that you come from Source, from Love and that everything is a part of Love. Even my crappy relationship with health is enveloped in love. Sweet, huh? (Note that I’m not actually a Sufi, so if I’m misrepresenting Sufis here, consider it plain ignorance. Mostly, I’m just a little in love with this spiritual practice.) My experience with Remembrance – and occasionally some other forms of prayer and meditation – is that it leads me to paths I wouldn’t have otherwise noticed. I come away with a measure of clarity about the next step to take.

Which is exactly what happened.

Tune in tomorrow for part 3 to this story…

Tags: , , , ,
Posted in health | No Comments »

Are you a Possibilian?

Written by on 22nd September 2010

The drive back to Philly from Baltimore was less than two hours, but my husband had been up since 6am and, after a very filling dinner with friends, he quickly fell asleep in the passenger’s seat. This left the night to just me, cruise control and NPR.

Which is when I encountered Studio 360, a program that had never before crossed my radar. On this week’s episode, they were exploring David Eagleman’s newish book, Sum: Tales from the Afterlives. Eagleman is a neuroscientist-turned-fiction writer. Here’s how he described himself for Studio 360:

“I call myself a Possibilian and the idea of Possibilianism is it’s trying to understand the possibility space and it’s not interested in committing to a particular story over others in the absence of good evidence to do so.”

Eagleman, and his application of  Possibilianism is particularly tied to an understanding of religion and the big questions we typically relegate to that realm. He has this to say on the Possibilian website:

“It is not difficult to recognize that if you’re born in Saudi Arabia, your nervous system is likely to absorb a belief in Islam; if you’re in India, you love Hinduism; most Americans soak up Christianity, and so on. Brains in different locations are exposed to different contexts, and they come to believe the local stories with equal passion and fervor. After childhood indoctrination people will vigorously defend their story against all the other stories, which seem to them fundamentally ridiculous.”

As a coach, I very often witness how the defense of one’s personal narrative shuts a client off to the possibilities that might otherwise exist. This sometimes has to do with religious narratives. It also has to do with cultural indoctrination and family history (that’s a story, you see).  I watch my clients “vigorously defend their story.” I do it sometimes too, of course. Eagleman seems to be stating in the first quote that the problem is that we commit to particular stories “in the absence of good evidence to do so.”

I agree with this. I also believe, however, that reality is a pretty fluid proposition. (A favorite quote by Nietzsche: “There are no facts, only interpretations.”) Committing to a particular story, then, is not just a matter of identifying the good evidence, it’s also a matter of interpretation. For me, that becomes an issue of usefulness.

Consider a story you feel particularly attached to – be it about the world in general, your significant other, your own character – and ask yourself:

  • What good evidence do I have that supports this story?
  • How is this story useful to me? Or isn’t it?

Maybe, just maybe, there’s another possibility for you!

Tags: , ,
Posted in story | 2 Comments »

Put It Up, Tear It Down

Written by on 15th September 2010

Nearly a year ago I designed a series of posters to advertise my coaching business around town. If you live in a city, you’re used to seeing such business and event posters on telephone poles, light posts and in every coffee shop’s designated advertising area. I decided I wanted to experiment with this method of promotion. So I created a series of four clever posters to get the word out. They rocked. They were fun, smart and playful. They became known to me as “my poster campaign.”

The only problem was, I never went campaigning.

It was four months, post-design, before I actually got them printed. And then they sat. They sat on my dining room table. They sat in my office. They sat in my husband’s office. It wasn’t until last week that I stuffed them in a shoulder bag along with a roll of packing tape, a staple gun and a box of tacks and hit the streets. Last week, people! Last week.

There are lots of “reasons” for this delay, many of which I’ve been vaguely present to during these 12 months of avoidance. But the heart of my resistance didn’t become clear to me until after I’d hung the posters. After all, my experience with marketing online – via email, facebook, my website, whatever – has generally been a positive one. Even when there’s no active support for what I’m doing, there is hardly active rejection. Rejection tends to show up as passivity. Additionally, I’ve been doing this long enough and have enough ego strength that even if I put something out there and no one bites, I don’t find myself insecure or troubled and anxious.

But here’s the difference between online marketing and said poster campaign: what I put online, no one can take down or deface; what I hang on a telephone poll, anyone can take down. Or tear in half. Or doodle on. People encounter my business online either because they’ve knowingly entered my space or because I’ve been given permission to enter theirs. Hanging posters around my neighborhood was an act of invasion, a way of showing up uninvited.

Photo © Scott Gleeson Blue

I didn’t seen this coming, oddly enough. I knew I was dragging my heels, but couldn’t fully see why this kind of marketing would be all that different than my other forms of marketing.  I hadn’t anticipated that I would cringe every time I saw a poster missing or defaced. Or that I’d have to coach myself through morning strolls in the neighborhood, knowing that I’d be getting a more public kind of feedback than I’m accustomed to.

This experience reminds my of an earlier post wherein I mentioned that owning a business is like creating your own personal and spiritual development incubator. It’s like a fast-track to growth. (Or a slow track, depending on how long you avoid your own ideas!) I’m pleased to report that my skin feels a little thicker this week and that I’m no longer compulsively keeping tabs on my own posters.

I do what I do because it helps people get to the stuff that matters to them. If showing up uninvited and having to sit in my own discomfort means that someone who needs my support actually gets what they need, it’s totally worth it. And if showing up uninvited and having to sit in my own discomfort means that no one responds to the poster campaign but that I learn to give myself the emotional support I need, it’s totally worth it.

Self-reflection aside, I’d like to offer one tidbit for those of you looking to spread the word in this manner. Leave your phone number off the poster unless you want to be drunk-dialed at 11pm on a Friday night, with the request to attend a dance party. Just sayin’.

Tags: , , , ,
Posted in fear | 2 Comments »

Transitions

Written by on 11th September 2010

Transitions is the theme for the first ever free Open Mic Coach Night coming this Monday, 9/13 at 7pm ET.

Our lives are always in flux. It’s part of the big picture, like birth and death, as well as part of the everyday small pictures, like breathing or changing jobs. Sometimes we “manage” transitions well and sometimes we resist, struggle or get lost in the upset.

I was thinking of this yesterday while visiting a friend and her two young sons. The older lad went out to play with a friend while the younger one was relegated to being watched by the adults. Inside. Not quite able to talk, you could hear him get antsy at his brother’s impending departure and then start to whine and breathe rapidly as the door closed in front of him.

My friend watched her youngest process this transition, knowing he might quickly adapt or he might resist, struggle, get lost in the upset.

At just that moment, a ball was sighted, and all apparent thought of the older brother was gone. Adaptation had occurred.

© Scott Gleeson Blue

As adults, we’re aware of transitions in a new way. It’s not just older brothers going outside to play. It’s roles, careers, beliefs and identities that are changing. It’s big stuff.

If you  find yourself struggling through a transition, or just want some outside feedback, I hope you’ll join Monday’s Open Mic Coach Night. Three to four people will receive on-the-spot coaching and, importantly, we’ll be learning from one another, expanding the possibilities and deepening the collective awareness.

I hope to see you there!

Tags: , , ,
Posted in coaching | No Comments »

Occupational Hazards

Written by on 6th August 2010

I listen. A lot. But professionally, it’s more than listening. It’s about creating a space that’s all about the other person and being present to their needs and wants.

Recently, I’ve begun to notice that I’m doing this personally. It can be hard for me to assert myself in a conversation the way other people do. I often wait to be asked what’s going on as opposed to launching into the story of what’s going on for me. I hold back. It’s like I reflexively keep the focus on the other person.

So when I was out for a walk with one of my best girlfriends last night, I found myself continually asking questions, listening, empathizing and offering feedback. I wasn’t being a coach, per say, but I also wasn’t being a friend: I wasn’t giving her the chance to ask follow-up questions, to listen, to empathize, to offer me feedback.

As the evening wore on, I began to notice that I was feeling distant and uncared for. Which is precisely when I remembered that few people care about me more than this friend and that I had the ability to ask (implicitly or explicitly) for what I wanted! So at the first opening, I took a deep breath and launched into a long story about my week. And then I launched into another about a personal problem I was facing.

By the end of the night, I had experienced all the intimacy and care that I had wanted. It was available to me the whole time. I just had to reach out and take it!

Tags: , , , ,
Posted in inspiration | No Comments »

Your True Story: A Pilot Coaching Program

Written by on 26th July 2010

Stories are everywhere.

There is the story of your day, your week, your first love, your career, your professional development, your body. Since the beginning of time, we have been making sense of our world through story and we use stories every day to inspire us, hinder us, explain ourselves, understand difficult concepts and more.

At this very moment, you are in the process of writing your own story.

Because your story is integral to how you experience yourself and your world, I am SO excited to be launching a pilot coaching program to help you create your most powerful and authentic story!

Click here for pilot program details.

After you read the program details, my guess is that you’ll quickly have an inkling if this is the right program for you. The following list of reasons might also help you decide:

  • You’re feeling stuck
  • You keep experiencing the same problem over and over again
  • You have similar symptoms in many areas of your life
  • You’re ready to take a truthful look at your situation and take action based on what you discover
  • You have the time and energy to devote to a powerful, life-changing process
  • You want structure and end dates
  • You always wanted to experience coaching
  • You like significant cost-savings without a decrease in service
Keep in mind that this pilot program launches in August and that I’ll only be signing up participants (who are getting a deep discount!) through the end of this week. If you are ready to craft your own true story, schedule a time with me to talk. I would LOVE to support you in this process!

Tags: , , , , ,
Posted in coaching | 2 Comments »

Career Seeking = Research

Written by on 6th July 2010

Every once in a while you encounter someone with a whole lotta gumption. You know the type. Someone who really takes the bull by the horns and gets after what she wants.

Olivia Lindquist is one such person. In the midst of a career search while teaching English in Korea, she dropped me this note:

As I’ve been working on my grad school applications due this fall, something was keeping me from being fully invested. Finally I realized that going to grad school for English literature, even though it’s absolutely something I want to do, feels like closing a door on the possibility of pursuing a career in holistic health.

So Olivia decided to figure out how teaching English and a career in holistic health might work together. She’s in the midst of an interview series, bringing to her blog readers the responses from several women in different, related fields. I – representing coaches worldwide (okay, maybe I’m just representing me) – recently responded to Olivia’s questions which she posted last week. If you’re interested in learning more about coaching as a career from my perspective, click the image below to read the full interview.

Additionally, tool around Green Junkie Living. There are other careers highlighted and you just may find some answers you’re looking for. If nothing else, I think we can all learn from Olivia and her gumption. She wants something. She’s not exactly sure what it is. And instead of sitting back and hoping it magically appears, she’s taking an active, holistic approach. She’s asking herself the hard questions. And she’s asking others, too.

For Olivia and all you other career seekers out there: may you uncover what you already know.

Tags: ,
Posted in career, coaching | 4 Comments »

The Joy Equation: An Interview

Written by on 18th May 2010

I know a lot of amazing, inspiring people. People who live openly, honestly and with passion. People who are making a significant contribution to the world.

In this post, I’m sharing with you a recent interview with one such person – a Ms. Molly Hoyne – who happens to run a super cool organization in Seattle called Stratejoy. If I lived there, I’d do my best to spend a lot of time with Molly, where we’d undoubtedly drink margaritas and talk about the crazy gift it is to be helping others live life on their own terms.  I’m choosing to share Molly with you here for two reasons:

  1. She’s bound to inspire you. Seriously.
  2. She’s offering something amazing right now.

This offering is called The Joy Equation: A 30 Day Guide to Living Life on Purpose. Especially if you’re experiencing a quarterlife crisis and you’re a woman, I think you might be interested in hopping on over to this page for some more info.

For now, let’s get on with the interview. Friends, meet Molly. Molly, meet Friends.

Jennifer: First of all, could you share a bit about yourself?

Molly: I’m Molly. I live in Seattle. I love to travel and take baths and wear costumes and and partake in naked adventures and have wicked smart conversations about the meaning of life/business/saving the world. I’m getting married in August even though I refuse to plan my wedding. I’m taking off in an RV for a year in September. Here’s my life list.   Here’s a 7 minute video of my story. Here’s my business.  That is all.

JGB: Your new guide, The Joy Equation, is all about living life on purpose. Can you say a little bit more about what that means?

MH: Living on purpose means making deliberate choices about our personal resources – our time, money, energy and love. I think it’s fairly easy to get stuck living on autopilot, doing something today just because we did it yesterday.  Sometimes autopilot is useful- it helps take the guesswork out of making every little decision. Wake up = brush teeth.  Or drink coffee in my case!  But living a life? I think we need to stop and take stock on a fairly regular basis.  What am I doing with my time?  My money?  Why? Am I loving it?  Suffering it?  Am I making conscious choices or just taking the easy road?

JGB: So is there an actual equation for joy?

MH: There is in fact!  I’m sure there are bunches of personal “equations for joy” but I operate with this one: Connect with Yourself  +  Define Success + Cultivate Powerful Habits + Commit to Your Happiness  = Authentic Joy.

Connecting with Yourself is really about clarity around your values and all the little things that make you feel alive.  Defining success comes down to declaring your own version of “making it” or what it’s going to take to rock your world. Cultivating Powerful Habits is the goal setting portion of the equation! We can dream and envision and set intentions all we like, but there is execution that needs to happen as well. And finally, Committing to Your Happiness means recognizing the importance of your own fulfillment and self-realization. We need to create and commit to our own happiness in order to be fully alive and present for everyone else in our life.

JGB: I know that this course evolved out of your own experience conquering your quarterlife crisis (QLC). What do you think brought you to the point of crisis?

MH: I think I ignored the little niggling feeling that “something feels off” for quite awhile before it hit “crisis” mode! After all, I was doing what I had studied in college, getting the proper promotions, kicking butt, making my bonuses…  But when I was really honest with myself, I recognized that I wasn’t fulfilled whatsoever and I had no idea what do to about it. I felt stuck. I was totally self-medicating with wine and constantly bitching about my job without doing anything about it. I was turning into someone I didn’t recognize!

I think I hit crisis when I realized that I was the only one who could change the direction of my life, but I felt totally clueless on how to start.  What direction did I even want to go?  How was I going to “start over”?  What if I failed?    

JGB: And now? How would you describe your life now?

MH: Busy!  And so full of the right things that I frequently find myself telling people I love my life. Which is ridiculously corny, but totally true. It’s been four years since I hit the worst of my QLC and in that time I quit the corporate world, spent 10 months backpacking around the world with my boyfriend, started Stratejoy, cultivated a meditation practice, got engaged, and dove headfirst into coaching/teaching/speaking about success on your own terms.

My life is a lovely reflection of my authentic self.  It’s a mishmash of ALL my interests. This year alone I will have performed in a burlesque show, attended a 7-day silent meditation retreat, bought a cabin in the woods on a river, partied in Vegas with a bunch of 20-something bloggers, taught workshops on both coasts, and made out with James Franco. (If anyone knows James, can you pretty please help me arrange that last bit?  Thanks.)

JGB: And now that you’ve discovered so many wonderful things about yourself and about life, if you could stand on a rooftop shouting one message, what would it be?

MH: This is Life!  Jump in!  Make it Count!

JGB: Thanks, Molly! I couldn’t agree more!

Don’t forget to find your way to Stratejoy’s website and check out Molly’s pay-what-you-can promotion on her guide, The Joy Equation.

Tags: , , , ,
Posted in purpose | 5 Comments »

Day 29: Get There From Here (30th Birthday Countdown)

Written by on 16th March 2010

As a countdown to my 30th birthday on March 18, I’ve committed to offering 30 people, things and experiences I want to celebrate from the last 30 years. Grab a piece of cake and enjoy reading!

Like most 20-somethings, I’ve spent a lot of this last decade figuring out what the heck I’m good at, what interests me and what I find to be meaningful. Also like most 20-somethings, I’ve done a lot of that exploration in the realm of career. I couldn’t be happier with where this exploration has led me.

Get There From Here – the name of my business (which I hope you’ve noticed, ahem) -is comprised of two integrated realms: coaching and entrepreneurship. I want to celebrate them separately in this post.

Coaching

In 2006 – days before I was scheduled to depart for Toronto to begin my coach training – I shot my own coach an email:

“Patt – Even if I decide I do not want to set up my own coaching practice after I get through the training, you really think the training itself will be worth it?”

Here answer was an unequivocal YES and she was right.

Not only did I not encounter a bunch of flaky, new-aged, very not-funny people, but I embarked on a process that has redefined the way I experience the world. Being a coach has enabled me to drop the judgment; I am attuned to what is said and unsaid; I know how to take good care of myself; I ask for what I want.

Then, of course, there are my clients. These days, with a flourishing coaching practice, I am particularly aware of the tremendous gift it is to partner with individuals to fulfill creative endeavors, identify new careers, enhance their effectiveness as leaders or build their own ventures. Some evenings after a long day of calls I will sit and stare at the wall, my eyes welling up, as I wonder how it has come to pass that I am possibly this fortunate to help others craft their own powerful life stories.

(My class at Coach University.)

Entrepreneurship

And then there is the business.

I became convinced in my early 20s that I must not like to work. What other reason could possibly explain my extreme dissatisfaction with every job I held? Turns out, there were myriad reasons, not the least of which was that I had a really hard time working hard for someone else on what it was they thought I should to in order that they might be successful. I didn’t like being a cog in a business I didn’t care about.

So after years of job hopping, I discovered coaching and decided to hang my shingle.

Being an entrepreneur isn’t for everyone. It is however, one of the shortest of short-cuts to personal and spiritual development that I have yet to experience or witness. Seriously. Like marriage (and like parenting, I imagine), it’s like this constant mirror hanging in front of my face affirming what is whole and highlighting what is broken. It’s painfully uncanny in it’s constant need to truth-tell.

Then there is just the fun part: The fact that this is something I created. That I can take my work in whatever direction suits me. That I don’t have to call a boss when I am sick.

At the end of the day, I am working harder than I ever have in ways that bring tremendous amounts of meaning to my life and apparent good to the world. Get There From Here provides an perfect umbrella under which I get to experience these amazing, amazing gifts!

Tags: , , , , , ,
Posted in celebration, change, story | 2 Comments »

Newer Entries »

    Get There Now


  • Schedule a consultation

  • Attend the next event

  • Comment on the blog

  • Sign up for the email newsletter and receive a free story-changing tool:
    Email:
____________________

“I can't thank you enough for just pushing what I knew I had inside of me to the forefront everyday!”– T.C., Philadelphia, PA