Coaching to Create Breakthroughs

This week's class is "Coaching to Create Breakthroughs: Defining and Practicing Elements of the Coaching Relationship."  We are receiving feedback and practicing on coaching skills and creating breakthrough actions.

Revealing yourself is required

“Do you not know that there comes a midnight hour when every one has to throw off his mask? Do you believe that life will always let itself be mocked? Do you think you can slip away a little before midnight in order to avoid this? Or are you not terrified by it? I have seen men in real life who so long deceived others that at last their true nature could not reveal itself;... In every man there is something which to a certain degree prevents him from becoming perfectly transparent to himself; and this may be the case in so high a degree, he may be so inexplicably woven into relationships of life which extend far beyond himself that he almost cannot reveal himself. But he who cannot reveal himself cannot love, and he who cannot love is the most unhappy man of all.” Soren Kierkegaard

Coaching is about...

Coaching is about breaking the old coherency and creating a new one. 

Source: Julio Olalla

Do I make clear requests?

It's been 3 weeks since I heard the material around requests and agreements, and for some reason, I keep circling back to it. Most communication breakdowns seem to result from a missing or unclear request.  I spoke to a CEO group on work/life balance yesterday, and again, much of the breakdown they said they experienced was, in essence, due to a missing or unclear request.  Many commented on the complaints they received from spouses who were weary from them being plugged to PDA's 24/7. (What a surprise!) But none has any type of request and agreement with their spouse. Why don't we do this with each other? Wouldn't it seem like common sense? Perhaps. I think it just seems too formal, or business-like to do this. Sort of weird - shouldn't the other person just be able to read your mind? Know what you want? Don't want? Evidently not. 


And that's just one example among many where we fail to make clear requests and get agreement. According to Chalmers Brothers, a request needs to have the following characteristics: 
- Specific and concrete regarding "what"
- Directed at a "who"
- State what will create satisfaction
- Have a time-frame and outcome
- Establish a shared context 


So when I feel like my expectations haven't been met by someone or something, I am starting to ask myself if I made a clear request or not. Did I gain agreement? What was my responsibility in the breakdown?  Was there truly clarity in both parties in what the request meant? 


I suppose since this material has been circling up there in my brain somewhere that my answer is "no," I am not making clear requests.  I'm going to see what might be different when I make them. 

New thinking required

Why is this classic quote taking on new meaning for me right now?


"We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them." 


Albert Einstein

Let go of the Outcome

Can't get this quote out of my head.... 

“Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”

Soren Kierkegaard 

One Big Puzzle

I see it as a puzzle. Some pieces are clearly the corners and edges, and yet others pieces can be recognized, but unsure as to where they go. And then there are those pieces which I don't recognize, and I have no idea where they go.

What makes the coaching process really interesting for me is not having a picture to see - you know, like the picture on the box of a puzzle? Doesn't everyone use that? I heard someone say they never look at the picture because it feels like cheating to them. Well, it doesn't to me. I like the picture. I get some idea of where I am going. But in coaching, you can't look at the box. For some reason, that's what I like about it. 

The Ladder of Inference is pretty powerful for understanding how someone creates their "picture of meaning." It goes something like this....  we take in some kind of data or information, and selectively, we pick what we see. We may think we pick all the facts, but we don't. Just watch other people!  Two people just don't see the same thing twice. Our instructor is a clinical psychologist, and he talked about the role of eye witnesses in the courtroom. Eye witnesses just don't have as much credibility now due to the realization that we take in facts and data selectively. And then we add our own meaning and assumptions to those facts, and make conclusions. And those conclusions form our beliefs and subsequent actions in the world. So naturally, our beliefs then affect what data we see next time. And it keeps reinforcing and repeating itself. 

I wonder what I see without awareness? What do I simply add my own meaning and assumptions, and don't even realize it? What can create a shift or change inside myself? We've talked a lot about authorship, power and choice in class. The ability to rewrite our own stories. And if that's the case, how can I use the ladder to rewrite something that needs a new chapter in my life?