Maria Connolly, LPC
We are all coaches. We coach ourselves by correcting or cheering ourselves on toward our dreams. We coach others as we give them advice, support, and encouragement. But most people come to a coaching role without training. That’s why it’s so important to have some go-to resources that help you clarify your WHY, because once you know why you’re doing something it’s easier to see if it’s helpful or not.
Usually, we face January with the resolve to “do better this year”. Yet, that’s starting from a very judgmental and negative space, isn’t it? What if, instead of setting lofty goals this year, we work on cultivating a more robust base on which we can build healthy systems for life? Imagine setting the intention of “nurturing yourself” as your only goal knowing that doing this will bring real improvement to all areas of life.
Making a commitment to deeply care for yourself and to engage in daily practices that come from a place of compassion, love, tenderness, and gratitude is a very unselfish thing to do. A committed practice to uplifting and honoring your own needs makes you better able to honor others. When you embrace the power of nurturing your heart, your world can be transformed at every level.
Every craftsman has a favorite, go-to tool that they always reach for because it reliably gets the job done. Have you thought about what tools you often reach for when you’re in a stressful or difficult situation? For some people, it’s anger. Other people use pouting. Are those the best tools to use? They’re more like using a screwdriver handle to pound a nail. It may do something, but you’re not going to be happy with the results. Plus, you’re more likely to get hurt. So what’s the power tool that you can use to easily shift your mood and choose a more resourceful state of mind, even under trying circumstances?
A practice of mindfulness is priceless. Without it, we can go through life only experiencing things superficially, missing the things that bring lasting enrichment. However, when you become The Observer, taking in information without judgment, you’ll see what you want more of or less of, in your life.
For example… how observant are you? If I asked you to identify the colors in a picture of a forest, no doubt you would say green, brown, and maybe some yellow. But an artist closely inspects each area for color or hue; she also sees the variances of shade (black added to the hue), tone (gray added to the hue), and tint (white added to the hue). Not only that, she detects the differences in intensity and value. Before the painting is done, the artist will have mixed hundreds of different combinations of paint, each one intentionally performing a specific function on the canvas. Why is this so important? Jon Kabat-Zinn explains “The best way to capture moments is to pay attention. This is how we cultivate mindfulness.”
“Change takes time, and when it happens… it feels like magic!” ~ Maria Connolly
Sometimes, when I’m coaching a client, it seems like nothing changes. Or if some change happens it doesn’t seem lasting. Why is change so hard and takes so long? Often this is because there are individual patterns that are in the way of lasting change. They are deeply ingrained and insidious.
There’s a war going on inside…the client’s good faith and best intentions are competing with long-held, adaptive and limiting beliefs and behaviors. This war can be won by systematically developing practices that change who you are at your core. These strong core values provide the support and structure for real change. But this does take time. If someone is promising overnight success, they’re not talking about real change.