In recent times, it seems that our lives have been consumed by changes of epic proportions. Personally, 2020 was to be a year of celebrations. My birthday is in March, and this year was a milestone birthday year which required party planning, directly proportional to the milestone. Plans were in place, invitations sent, RSVPs received, food preparation underway, and then COVID struck. With so much uncertainty swirling about, it only made sense to cancel. Little did we know at the time, a global pandemic was looming. Looking back, that birthday, despite it being an important milestone was so insignificant.
One of the primary topics to emerge from my clients during that time was of clarity. Or the lack of clarity, more accurately. There were few details about this new virus invading our world. How is it spread? How infectious is it? How deadly is it? In those early days and weeks, many coaching sessions focused on bringing clarity to an unclear situation.
Our approach to coaching is intended to do just that. I have studied many theoretical approaches to coaching and one of my favorites is brief coaching because it allows the coach and coachee to quick distill the purpose of the engagement and foster clarity to realizing set goals. One of the reasons this process is effective is that it causes exploration of possible and preferred futures as viewed by the client, and recognizes the client as the expert in all aspects of their lives. So our coaching sessions began to evolve to defining or redefining possible futures in a world of uncertainty and bringing into focus that which is certain. From that point of clarity, clients were able to remain agile and stay curious in a safe environment, and then move forward toward the new future. That may sound like looking at the world through rose colored glasses and perhaps there is a tinge of positive thinking involved, but the “future” for some clients was the end of the week. For others, it was the next 30 days. Remember, coaching is client directed and coach supported, so there was no predetermined “future” – that would violate the very tenant of exploring possibilities!
Life coaching meets clients where they are and is intended to be an evolutionary process. We do not live in a stagnant world and as such, successful coaching sessions evolve as the client encounters new challenges or wishes to explore new directions.
What challenges are you experiencing that might benefit from having a trusted partner and safe space to explore a new possible future?
