What Are You Not Noticing?

Spent some time this weekend reading ontological coaching material, particularly around the concept of “the observer that you are”. The observer that we are determines how we are able to respond and react. Our reactions, choices, and decisions are based on what we observe.

If we can expand what we observe and what we are aware of, then we discover new possibilities of action, choice, and decision. Expanding what we’re aware of might include: noticing what is happening in the dynamic between ourselves and another, noticing the needs and wants of another, noticing what the greater good / greater purpose is calling for in the situation, noticing the longer-term impacts, noticing our own physical reactions, noticing options, noticing our own assumptions and mental models.

One of the gifts of coaching is that it strengthens this muscle of noticing. It increases the coachee’s awareness of herself/himself as an observer, of the things she/he is slow to observe, of the mental blinders that are obscuring possible courses of action. And once the noticing muscle is strengthened, whole new ways of responding become available. Observing more of the present simultaneously offers up an expanded observation of the potential next moves. 

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