21/10/2023
When i was a child, I learned that my needs and wishes are less important than those of the social system i am part of. This meant that i became really good at pleasing, at performing and doing well within the system I was part of, and it equally meant that a lot of my energy was directed at figuring out the system and then working my way up.
But where was I in all this? And where am I today?
Recently i had a very significant insight from the rich sharing in a call i attended, namely that for coaching to be effective I need to feel congruent with the client, there needs to be a partnership that also considers my needs and whether i feel comfortable with coaching a particular client. In essence i need to be able to be there for the client from within, not at the cost of myself!
So, not at the cost of myself. But what does this really mean?
As I reach deep to try and give this some meaning and reshape my life so that I don’t continue to live at the cost of myself I come to the following. Living from within means upholding my integrity and being authentic, which immediately reminds me of Brene Brown’s book “Braving the wilderness”. She talks in it about this concept of belonging so fully to yourself that you are willing to stand alone and she goes on to describe this as a place untamed, unpredictable, one of solitude and being dangerous and breathtaking, and sought after and feared at the same time.
I can definitely connect to and feel the feared part and the solitude and through my journey over the last few years through both therapy and now somatic coaching I have also come to experience and see and smell the breathtaking part of it.
The insights from this call took the conversation a step further, in that I understand now that for me to be able to coach well and authentically I need to coach from within and not at the cost of myself. As I say this, and having Brene Brown’s description alive within me, I can still feel very strongly how I don’t know yet what it really means to live and coach from within. Something in me wants to dance and rejoice and live and feels the urge to get going and laugh and on the other side there is the 30 past years of my life that have just lived a different life. I know for sure I don’t want to continue the same way as I have for the past 30 years, but it is not easy to start treading new paths when the known path seems easy and comfortable. As I say this, and rather then following up with a but, I want to acknowledge these feelings and yes and them, and then add that I also understand fully that the known path misses the breathtaking landscape that I so long for and that gives purpose to my life. We have been created noble, rich and unique and we each have a contribution to make to this world, and that contribution is from within and not at the cost of ourselves.
So where now?
So where now? The answer is the wilderness. Will it work just like that? No, I believe it will take time to reconnect and belong so fully to myself that I am willing to stand alone. It still feels scary, and maybe it always will, but I know for sure that I cannot truly belong to anyone else save myself. Yes, we have been created from dust and return to dust and similarly we have been created by God and will return to the realms of God, but we are each unique and have a responsibility to live our uniqueness and bring our gift to the world.
It is our responsibility to live from within, not at the cost of ourselves.
Having said this, this is in no way a judgment of anyone that does not live from within, it is more a reminder to myself, and a truth that I consider worth saying out loud.
So as I continue developing as a coach with such tools as contacting, focusing, sourcing an beaming and many more, I hope to be able to grow day by day to become more authentic, more congruent, more intuitive, always remembering that I want to live from within not at the cost of myself and belonging so wholeheartedly to this conviction that I am willing to stand alone.
