Coaching, according to me, is a meditative therapy to help us get absolute clarity and reach our highest potential. The process involves travelling within using effective questions and reaching out to all levels of our consciousness – from the unconscious to the subconscious and the super conscious self. When done with the truest intentions of seeking answers to some pertinent questions that life often puts across to us, the process brings out amazing results. Asking powerful questions and deep active listening without being judgmental is the key to effectiveness and to finding the answers.
Essential steps to coaching include the following-
Clarifying the goal or the key issue to be addressed
- Try to be as specific as possible here. Have a broader goal and a specific goal for the session
- Goals could be wanting to make some decision(s), understand your emotions, get feedback, hear yourself think, close a gap, improve relationship with someone, get clarity about life, find your life purpose, discover your values and so on.
- Questions to ask here could be as follows-
- What is the issue I want to deal with today?
- What do I need to accomplish through this session today?
- How will I know that I have found what I was seeking?
Acknowledge and accept your current reality
- Take a realistic view of where you are and what you are feeling at this point in time.
- Acknowledge it to yourself and be in complete acceptance of it. (We often deny our emotional state of mind and that further blocks our thinking)
- Questions to ask here could be as follows-
- What is my current reality?
- What impact is the current situation creating on me and others in my life?
- Who else is impacted by my current state of mind and my current reality?
- How will this impact my future and the future of those around me?
Ask yourself why is this important to you
- This stage helps us to go deeper to understand what is it that we really want?
- Confront and acknowledge your truest emotions and feelings about the issue in hand.
- Check if you are being too hard or too soft on yourself.
- What will you get by resolving this issue?
- Will it take you closer to your goals and help fulfilling your life purpose
- Questions to ask here could be as follows-
- What am I not present to or what am I denying in this whole thought process
- What will be my most certain future if this continues
- Am I being completely true to myself? What is stopping me from expressing my innermost feelings
- What am I achieving/getting by accepting this reality
- Is this the truth or just my perception? What can I do to analyze my situation objectively?
- What do I need to learn from this situation to move forward
- Is there more to it? What is it and why does it matter to me
Understand your barriers
- Barriers can be of various kinds – spiritual, emotional, physical, intellectual or plain attitudinal.
- Knowing exactly what stops us can effectively lead us to actions for overcoming these obstacles
- Questions to ask here could be as follows-
- What is stopping me from achieving my goal
- How can I bridge the gaps in my knowledge/skills/awareness levels that can help me take a leap?
- What are my deep rooted beliefs that are blocking my thought clarity?
- What is it that I fear that is stopping me from taking action?
Exploring possibilities
- Having understood the barriers, the next step is to explore possibilities for the way forward
- Finding solutions becomes easier once you have thoroughly looked through the issue as well as your blocks (mental/physical)
- Questions to ask here could be as follows-
- What best is possible for me?
- What can be the some of the best solutions to address the present issue/situation?
- What am I willing to contribute to myself and my world with the clarity I have now?
- What am I open to receiving for myself and my world?
Action Planning
- Once you have listed all possible solutions/way forward to deal with the current situation, the most important task is prioritizing them and zeroing in on few solutions that can be moved to an action plan immediately.
- Questions to ask here could be as follows-
- What actions am I ready to commit to today?
- What specific will I do to ensure this happens?
- What are my timelines for reviewing my actions? Are these realistic?
- What can I do to ensure my accountability towards my goals
- What steps will I take in case I fail to stick to my plan.
- What is my plan B?
Following the above process, one can sail through any crossroad/situation/ hurdle in life. At times, we often avoid asking some very pertinent questions to ourselves and even if we do, we do not answer them honestly. We mislead our thoughts by not being honest with ourselves or by denying our innermost thoughts. It is pretty easy for us to convince and fool ourselves into believing that we are being true to self. It is best to discard the initial answers we give ourselves as they usually come from our conscious mind. If we need real solutions that will work for us, we need to dig deeper and bring out answers from our subconscious and possibly our super conscious mind states. We can always self-coach. Often a trained coach can facilitate the process much more effectively as they navigate through the sea of emotions and feelings without being involved emotionally and can provide the strength and support we need to maneuver inwards into our deepest corners.
*** does reside inside of each of us; however we most often cannot sense Him or His presence within us as we have covered ourselves with so many layers and sheaths of pretense. Dusting these layers can do wonders for us to be in touch with our Highest and Purest Self and the process of coaching achieves exactly that. Regular coaching can lead us to our highest potential and live a fuller life.
Some coaching tips-
- Seclude yourself to be just with your thoughts for at least 30-40 min.
- No calls, interruptions, messaging during the session.
- Keep sipping water to enable the thinking process
- Be patient and kind with yourself.
- Be neutral to the whole process as if it is a third person
- The tone of questioning should not imply any kind of judgment ever.
- Be honest and do not avoid confronting your truest feelings/emotions.
- Believe that nothing and no one is perfect. Everything is situational.
- There are no absolute rights and wrongs only difference in perceptions.
Article By: Vishakha Bhagnani