Coaching Wizardry

I don’t know about you but I have mixed feelings about the term ‘personal development’.  I know it’s a significant motivator for many people, and I know many great writers, teachers and coaches who work under the banner of personal development.  But at the same time the words carry a lingering sense of ’shoulds’ and ‘expectations’  - or at least that’s how they resonate in my particular map of the world.

I am more attracted to the idea that human beings are already complete, already perfect.  And that we do not need to develop so much as unfurl, or blossom.  Nick Smith at Life 2.0 had some interesting perspectives on this in the context of psychotherapy.  He compares the work of the therapist to the creative power of an artist like Michelangelo, sculpting not to create something new but rather

    removing the chippings to what is already there and perfectly formed.

He quotes Michelangelo: "the sculptor’s hand can only break the spell to free the figures slumbering in the stone."  I love this thought - it makes me wonder about the figures that are slumbering within us, and what happens when we start to wake up…

Anyway all of those thoughts went through my head when Priscilla Palmer told me about her compilation of top personal development blogs.  It’s a list that’s growing fast - she had the good idea of starting with five, and asking each nominee to identify another five so it’s evolving by the minute - and it looks like an amazing list of resources: learners, teachers, goal-setters, coaches, thinkers…check it out.  You’re sure to find something of value there.

I’m delighted that Coaching Wizardry has been included in such a powerful list - even if personal development isn’t a phrase I’d normally use to describe what I do.  (Maybe I just get over some of my reservations about the word: a label is just a label after all)

But thinking about the blogs that I want to nominate for inclusion in the list - well I think I’d want to go for those writers who help to remove the chippings.  Who write in a way that allows me to see things more clearly.  Things that are already true, things that - somehow - I already know.  Things about myself that are already there - but have been slumbering in the stone.

Without further ado here are the four great ‘chippers’ I’d add to the list:

Rosa Say at Managing with Aloha Coaching
Nick Smith at Life 2.0
Robyn McMaster at Brain Based Biz
Hilda Carroll at Living out Loud
Karen Wallace at The Clearing Space

Thanks Priscilla for your efforts to compile the list - I hope you’ll forgive my meanderings at the beginning about the meaning of personal development

It’s been a long, grey, cool summer in Edinburgh… so thank heavens for songs that make our heart sing.  We need all the inner sunshine that we can get…

So it’s a big thanks to Hilda Carroll for her amazing effort to compile the ultimate "feel good" playlist.  With uplifting songs from some great blog writers and positive thinking experts this list is guaranteed to blast through the gloom.

She hasn’t done a top 10 but I’m pretty sure the first song on the list, and Hilda’s own first choice, would be on it.  The song is Shine by Take That - and while I’d normally shy away from calling myself a Take That fan this is an amazing song to lift your spirits, and chase away the blues.

Enjoy!

I read a great quote the other day - one of Hilda Carroll’s regular offerings of thoughts for the week.

The words were from Douglas Adams and this is what he said:

I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I intended to be.

It reminded me that we often find ourselves places that we didn’t mean to go - and that’s okay.  It doesn’t mean we need to head back again - perhaps we just need to stop and enjoy the view, explore the paths that head off from here, or just accept that this is where we were ‘meant’ to get to in the first place.

I’ve been reflecting since my holiday on where I was going with my writing, coaching, and blogging.  The conclusion I’ve reached is that I want to focus on my work as a writing coach, and writing (and blogging) about writing with confidence.  I don’t think it’s possible (or sensible) to put equal effort into two different ways of writing (and coaching, learning, teaching and blogging).  You end up splitting your focus and attention, and reducing the quality of - and your enjoyment in - both.

So from here on I’m going to make the main focus of my work the Confident Writing blog.  It’s going from strength to strength (I think!) and I’d love to see you over there if you haven’t visited before.  Just click the link…

This shift in focus means writing less here, but continuing to develop it as a site:

Where I share some of my own more reflective writing. It’s a place to explore what happens when we start playing with language, and possibilities. A place to daydream. A place to share words and ideas inspired by stories, metaphors, pictures, films, music, nature, each other. The
best learning comes when we share our stories together so please feel free to read, to explore, to add a comment, to explore new possibilities and conjure up new realities…

Thanks for all your support so far - I’ve learned so much from the connections that have already flowed from our exchanges here.  Although I’ll be posting less you should expect to see many of the same themes and aims as before, so I hope you’ll carry on visiting, and reading, and sharing your own thoughts, words, learning and stories.

“The first problem for all of us, men and women, is not to learn, but to unlear (Gloria Steinem)

I don’t know about you but the idea of unlearning is a less familiar one than learning, or relearning.  I’ve been learning about the power of unlearning this month over at Joyful Jubilant Learning, in a theme introduced and hosted by Dean Boyer.

This is the challenge that he presented us with:

Let’s not only share what we have learned but also anything we have unlearned! We all have a tendency to complicate our lives through our learning; perhaps August will be a month where we start to simplify our lives by unlearning things. As living and learning go together (Adrian Savage), unlearning and freeing go together, in my opinion. The most accomplished piano student must not only learn properly, but unlearn any limiting habit (posture, hand positioning, etc.) to fully develop into an accomplished musician.

You can see how unlearning might start to open things up.  How we can simplify our world, getting rid of things (ideas, beliefs, habits) that are no longer serving us.  How unlearning goes hand in hand with living more freely.

I decided to take up the (un)learning challenge with my first piece as a contributing author with Joyful Jubilant Learning.  It’s about unlearning the power of “shoulds” and replacing them with the language of possibility, the language of perhaps.  It begins:

“Sometimes I wonder if the word “should” is one of the most powerful barriers to learning, acceptance and growth.  Sometimes it can feel like tangleweed, wrapping itself around hopes, dreams and possibilities, stifling the life out of us with requirements and instructions and obligations.

These are powerful constraints, powerful strangleholds, and part, I think, of what we need to unlearn if we’re to flourish and thrive.”

You can check out the rest of the piece here.  There’s a wealth of other articles and thought pieces on the unlearning challenge that you might enjoy, including

Things I had to unlearn before I could get let go of my clutter, by Ariane Benefit and

Unlearning Mediocrity by April Grove

On the unlearning theme I just have to flag up some fascinating insights from Robyn McMaster at Brain Based Biz on how our minds work, challenging us to unlearn and relearn the difference between grey and white matter, and to unlearn unhelpful strategies for those of us (like me!) who are prone to over-thinking.

Well (as Robyn might say) that little  lot should really have stirred your noodle…

Coming back to Dean’s question, what could you unlearn in August to simplify your life, and life more freely?

I don’t know if you’ve ever felt like you’ve been sleep-walking your way through life?  I think most of us have, some time.

Times when we’ve been so caught up in our busyness we’ve forgotten what we were trying to do or where we were trying to get to.  When we’ve given so much time and energy to other people that we’ve lost sight of ourselves. Our selves.  When life starts to lose its colour, its detail, its wondrous beauty.  When we we just drift along, as if asleep.

Some people stay like this.  I was gifted some words the other day (thank you Rosa) that captured this state perfectly.

“Most people, even though they don’t know it, are asleep… They never understand the loveliness and the beauty of this thing that we call human existence.” ~ Father Anthony de Mello

These words reminded me of times when I’d been asleep, reminded me how amazing it is to feel awake - but also got me thinking about how you know when it’s time to wake up.

Which took me back to this scene from The Matrix, when Neo is lying asleep, in front of his computer screen.  A message appears on the screen.  It’s simple, short, powerful, perplexing.  Explains nothing but says everything.  A classic note to self.

“Wake up Neo”.

And he does.

We don’t always know where the message has come from.  We don’t always know what it means or where it will take us.  But we can read the words on the screen, and recognise their meaning.

Wake up.