Words matter.

The way I use language is a crucial indicator of how I am relating to my feelings.

By saying this statement using an “I-statement”, I am taking ownership for my beliefs and my feelings.

The way you use language is a crucial indicator of how you are relating to your feelings.

By writing this in the second person, I am labelling you with something that is true for me. It may or may not be true for you. And I am distancing myself from owning my own beliefs and feelings.

My example above is innocuous, so let’s play with one let’s a little more spicy.

When I disagree with someone, I feel tense, anxious, and uncomfortable.

I am taking ownership of my actions (disagreeing) and my reactions (feeling tense, anxious, and uncomfortable).

When you disagree with someone, you feel tense, anxious, and uncomfortable.

I hear people speak in the second person frequently. I imagine they mean “when one disagrees with someone”, but instead they say it in the second person, “when you disagree with someone.” And I imagine that the actual truth is not about their belief about what “one” does, but the truth for themselves. The person saying this is conveying that when he/she disagrees with someone, he/she feels tense, anxious, and uncomfortable. But instead they say “you”, when a quick poll would tell you that for many “you”s, this is not the truth – other people may get excited and energized by disagreement, may feel intrigued and curious, may feel ready to fight… a myriad of reactions.

When I describe my feelings in the second person (“you”), not only am I distancing myself from my own feelings and refusing to own them, but I am also assuming that what is true for me is true for others. I’ve been trying for a long time to be more aware of how I speak about my feelings. To not say, “You know when you get tired and you feel overwhelmed?” and instead say, “When I get tired, I feel overwhelmed.” To not say, “It hurts”, or “It makes me sad”, but to say, “I hurt”, and “I feel sad.” These small changes in language are making me more aware of what I believe and feel, more aware of what I assume without questioning, and bringing me into more direct relationship with what I am experiencing.

If you’d like to read more on language, I recommend:

-Pretty much everything from The Center for Nonviolent Communication, and particularly the book Non-Violent Communication: A Language of Life (I found it at my local library, and eventually bought my own copy)

-On “I-statements”: here and here and here

-Gestalt Processes and Language

During this two-part workshop, you will:
-explore the perspectives you hold about time
-consider and evaluate your values and priorities and relate these to your time
-get a quick overview of some fun time management tools and systems and a chance to play with them
-set goals and make a plan to put into practice what you’ve learned and befriend your calendar

The details:
Two Saturday afternoons: April 3rd and 10th, from 2pm-4pm
Limited to 10 people
$50 (payable at the first session)
Bloor-Bathurst area (details provided upon registration)

To register:
Email me at laurajoanne@gmail.com.

February Dreamboard

Yes, I make dreamboards. Yes, I make them on the full moon.

While making my dreamboard for February, I was thinking ahead to my three weeks on the West Coast. I’m taking off to visit my parents and to hide out in their spare room to crank through the final chapters of the EWB book. In my dreamboard, I see the coast in winter – green, grey, smokey blue. I see the space, orderliness, quiet, and stillness I’m longing for – the silence and concentration I need to give this project its final push, and the mental and emotional clarity I’ll need so that three weeks with my parents will be full of love. I see that during this month, my birthday month, I am feeling clear, focused, and that the important elements can be distilled… almost a simplicity to the clarity.

If you think full moon dreamboards might be your thing, check out Jamie Ridler’s online dreamboard circle. After a year of making these collages, I feel that they capture something about where I’m at and what I’m hoping for in ways that words never do.

Acknowledgment is a particular skill we use in co-active coaching. It’s about noticing and articulating the qualities of a person. Not about the person’s performance, not about giving the person feedback, but about witnessing his or her qualities.

I would love to invite you, for the next week, to give one acknowledgment a day to someone in your life.

The leader in the Fundamentals course instructed us in how to acknowledge:

“You say, ‘You are…’ and then you let a word tumble out of your heart.”

It takes three words, and that is all. Acknowledgments are not about the person giving the acknowledgment, so leave yourself out of it. Don’t say “I really appreciated this about you,” or “I liked it when…”, or “I think you are…”, or “You inspire me”.

Just say, “You are…” and then let a word from your heart tumble out of your mouth.

And if you want a little more information on how acknowledgment is different:

Imagine someone has submitted a report with incredible research behind it. Here are different reactions you might give, depending on whether you were attending to his/her performance, aiming to give feedback, or making an acknowledgment.

A performance-related comment might be: “Your research is comprehensive.”

A feedback comment might be: “The extent of your research and the number of sources you consulted makes your report trustworthy and your conclusions reliable.”

Some acknowledgments might be: “You are thorough.” “You are committed to excellence.” “You are dedicated.”

Notice the difference. The acknowledgments notice the quality in the person that allowed them to do what they did. A coach’s job is to notice the qualities in their clients, and to name them – sometimes to see those qualities and point them out even when the client can’t see the qualities within him/herself.

Now, who are you ready to acknowledge? And what would you like to acknowledge in yourself?

This weekend, I’m going back to the Coaches Training Institute Co-Active Fundamentals course to serve as an assistant. I’m looking back over my notes from when I first took this course, in July 2008. The three days were thrilling – my first taste of co-active coaching and the amazing impact it can have. I fell in love with coaching, and I haven’t looked back.

Rereading my notebook, I find these gems:

Your client is naturally creative, resourceful, and whole… and so are you.

A cornerstone of co-active coaching: the belief that all people are naturally creative, resourceful, and whole. And a coach needs to remember that in order to truly believe that about our clients, we need to believe it about ourselves too.

The evolution of getting better at something is the willingness to stay in the painful place of knowing what you don’t know.

See the (un)conscious (in)competence ladder for details.

Coaching is not about getting the client to have an insight you have about her/him.

Coaching is NOT about getting your client to think what you think! It IS about reflecting, mirroring, and asking questions, so that your client can be clearer on what she/he believes, values, and desires.

Curiosity is the antidote to judgment.

Whenever you feel judgment or opinion coming on, get curious.

As the coach brings more of him/herself to the coaching (e.g. more of his/her humour, warmth, willingness to fail, willingness to risk, boldness, dreams, heart), there is more room for the client to bring more of her/himself too.

I can’t wait for this weekend, and for that heart-racing moment when a roomful of participants sees co-active coaching for the first time. It’s stunningly beautiful.

If you want a little taste of what co-active coaching could be, check out these tools from the Co-Active Coaching Fundamentals course:

Personal Wheel of Life

Professional Wheel of Life

I spent the weekend at a workshop focused on “opening the heart”. Two days meditating on my heart, loving-kindness, and forgiveness; drawing pictures representing my heart space; doing expressive dance to Chopin nocturnes to enact heart feelings; and feeling the warmth of sending and receiving love, silently, with the people around me. This morning, all of that love and heart is still shining on me and through me, making the whole world shimmer in shiny new love.

A much better way for me to set intentions

Few things make me want to rebel the way SMART goals do. Specificity and Measurability frustrate me. Achievable mocks me: “Can you ACTUALLY do that?” Realistic bores me. And if there’s one thing I’ve learned in three decades, it’s that Time operates on its own schedule, not mine.

I’ve discovered that setting intentions does work for me, so I’ve turned my energy there. If I pick a few words or images to guide me, I tend to accomplish far more than I thought I could, and do more than I would have gauged as “achievable”.

The only measurable thing I’m planning on committing to in 2010 is sitting down for 10 minutes everyday with my list of intentions. I’m going to trust that spending 10 minutes everyday with my intentions will shake its way out into actions and goals and accomplishments, in new and surprising ways, in natural ways, even in energizing ways.

I share here the intentions I’ve been sitting down with for the past four days, and which I’ll continue for the year:

I honour my body and my health.
I am confident that I am on track to eliminate debt and generate wealth. I am responsible.
I am open to possibilities, and I am grounded in my own focus.
I am successful and I am making valuable change in people’s lives.
I am open to friendships and I nourish my friendships. I am learning to practice generosity.
I show my family, through my actions and my words, that I love them.
I recognize my habits and patterns and actively experiment with new ways of being.
I stand, speak, and act with confidence.
I laugh everyday.
I make time to create.
I value peace and beauty.
I can love and be loved.

December has been busy, and December has been lazy, and I have not been writing blog posts. Today I have two things to say, plus a poem.

First, this week I’m hosting Two Hours of Perspective, Dec. 30, from 2pm-4pm. Any and all are welcome, just contact me.

Second, I’m putting together a 2010 visioning package for coaching clients (or anyone else interested). The visioning package gives you a chance to focus completely on the big picture instead of the day-to-day. It consists of reflection and planning exercises, plus an hour-long coaching session designed to set you up for the year to come. Drop me a line if you’re interested in taking advantage of this, or watch here for more details.

Finally, I stumbled across this poem in a book from a friend, and I loved it:

The Church says: The body is a sin.
Science says: The body is a machine.
Advertising says: The body is a business.
The body says: I am a fiesta.

-Eduardo Galeano

May your 2009 end with a fiesta. Your body’s already partying.

It’s the end of the year and the end of the decade!

I, for one, am feeling a serious need for reflection. Between holiday parties, friends and families, and the onslaught of year-in-review lists, where’s the time for us to think about what our last year meant to us and where we are in the bigger story of our lives?

I’m a sucker for this sort of thing, and am hereby inviting anyone interested to come to my house on Wednesday, Dec. 30th, from 2pm-4pm, for a two hour reflection gathering.

I promise to provide thought-provoking questions, good conversation, and quiet time for contemplation and journalling. I’ll arrange the questions and conversation-starters, chart out the flow of the two hours so that you get personal and private reflection, and the chance to reflect with others, and I’ll have some art supplies and wine/eggnog/something on hand. You bring a journal or notebook, or anything else that will help you look back on the year (decade) past and look forward to the year to come.

Send me an email if you want to join the reflection party.

Take two hours of perspective. Hope to see you here.

“I am committed to advocating for your best self,” I said. “I champion the person you want to be, and who you want to become.”

I’m the one who says, “I know you really value family, but your actions aren’t showing that right now. What’s going on?”

The one who says, “When you had that hard conversation with your boss, your commitment to yourself, your learning, and your authenticity all showed through.”

The one who says, “I can see that your to-do list is overflowing. What is truly important to you this week?”

If you were advocating for your best self today, what might you ask yourself? What would you remind yourself of?