Ready for Change

People who choose to work with a coach are yearning for more self-awareness. One of my favourite things about working with these clients is being able to design individual, customized exercises for self-awareness for each client.

Although the exercises/quizzes below aren’t individualized, here are some of my favourite self-awareness exercises or quizzes around the internet.

The Enneagram

The Enneagram is a psychological-spiritual personality system. What I like most about it is that it doesn’t just describe your personality, but also gives you clues about where your type often gets tripped up, what your areas of growth are, and tips for growing in that direction. I’ll often ask my clients to complete the Enneagram test and then we’ll use the description of their type to help understand how they are reacting to what’s going on in their life, and how they can choose a direction of growth.

Here’s a link where you can complete a few sampler Enneagram quizzes, and learn so much more about your Enneagram type.

Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI)

I use the MBTI less often — my sense is that it provides a helpful description of one’s personality preferences, but provides less in the way of understanding how to grow. Still, it’s a neat introduction to thinking about how you might show up in the world, and what that might mean for how you interact with others.

A quick MBTI google will turn up a number of free versions of the MBTI assessment, although – as always – those freebies come with the caveat that the most accurate results will come from taking the official MBTI assessment and reviewing the results with a certified MBTI practitioner.

(And if you’d like to go the official route, I know a most talented woman, Sandy McMullen, who literally “painted the book” on the MBTI, and who offers MBTI assessments and coaching).

The Via Survey of Signature Strengths

Particularly when I’m working with a client who struggles to see his or her own strengths, and who is blinded by, perhaps, an overly acute awareness of his/her weaknesses, I like to invite the client to complete the Via Survey of signature strengths. The survey helps you identify your strongest character strengths, building an appreciation for what you bring, rather than a focus on what you may believe you lack.

In a future post, I’ll describe a few other self-awareness exercises that I believe are particularly helpful. Enjoy exploring what you discover!

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Laura McGrath is an Ottawa-based life coach and therapist who works with clients all over the world. She’s an Enneagram Type 5 (with a 4 wing), has trouble deciding if she’s an INTJ or an INFJ, and her top five signature strengths are judgment/critical thinking/open-mindedness, caution/prudence/discretion, honesty/authenticity/genuineness, leadership, and modesty/humility.

If you’d like to talk more about self-awareness exercises designed just for you, Laura is more than happy to pick up the phone and have a conversation. Get in touch.

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The Wheel of Life is a tool often used by life coaches. For the first year or so that I used it, I loved it. After that, I got a little restless and decided to mix it up. I created my own Wheel of Life, which is more individual and more fun.

Wheels of Life: What’s Already Out There

If you’ve never seen or used a wheel of life before, a quick google search can show you a number of different versions. I’m partial to the ones provided by The Coaches Training Institute (personal wheel and professional wheel). There’s even a cute little Wheel of Life app.

Creating Your Own Wheel of Life

If the categories provided on the standard wheels of life don’t speak to you, then I encourage you to create your own wheel.

• What are the important areas in your life? What matters to you?
• What areas do you want to track and check in on?
• Pick ten adjectives to describe the life you dream of: perhaps each of those adjectives can become an area on your wheel of life.
• Pick ten images that capture how you want your life to be. Each image becomes a section of your wheel of life.
• Pick ten songs that express the different energies you want in your life. Each song can hint at a wheel of life area.

Using inspiration from what’s really important to you, music, images, etc., you have the tools to create your own wheel of life.

My Wheel of Life

My wheel changes over time. I check in on it once a month and journal a bit about each of the areas, where they’re at, and what I’d like to see change.

Right now, my wheel of life categories are:

• Joy and Doing Good in the World – to what extent is my life’s work bringing me joy and filling me with a sense of purpose, contribution, and service?
• Debt vs. Savings – what’s the financial picture my partner and I are seeing this month? In which direction is it moving?
• Sense of Possibility – do I feel like things are bubbling? Am I sensing opportunity? Is there enough space in my life for new ideas to arise?
• What’s My Part in this Partnership? – how well am I engaging with this ongoing inquiry of what it means to me to be a wife and a partner?
• Future Self – the future me, the woman I am becoming — where in my life am I sensing her presence? Am I continuing to move towards her essence?
• Here and Present, Being – am I showing up to my life? Or am I caught up in my thoughts, or caught up in the internet, or otherwise distracted in a way that keeps me from being alive and present to myself and those around me?
• Energy and Initiating – how are my energy levels? Do I have it in me to be the one who suggests and initiates activities? Am I active, or just reactive?
• Open, Honest, Loving, Caring Relationship – are my partner and I continuing to create and maintain this gorgeous love of ours?
• Mystery – am I willing to be surprised? Am I open to the synchronicities, beauty, and mystery around me? Am I engaging with the sacred and the unknown?

For me, the beauty of creating my own wheel of life is that this wheel inspires me and lights me up. It connects me again and again to what truly matters to me right now, and reminds me of what I am creating in the world.

What do you use to remind yourself of what matters to you? How do you engage, and re-engage, with the questions of how you want to live?

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Laura McGrath is an Ottawa-based life coach and therapist who works with clients all over the world. If you’d like to have a chat about how working with a coach can help you reconnect to what’s most important to you, Laura is more than happy to pick up the phone and have a conversation. Get in touch.

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On Being “Stubborn” and How to Challenge It

So, if you DO think coaching is for you, but you’re still finding you’re resistant, then that’s where the coaching starts–with your resistance. A coach can prompt you to look at what your resistance is about, where it comes from, and why it’s important to you.

Some coach-like questions you might want to ask yourself:

• What do I believe will happen if I don’t do it myself?
• What do I believe it says about me if I ask for support from someone else?
• Is there a pattern here? Does this do-it-myself / stubborn theme only apply to coaching, or is it a theme in my life? If it is a theme: how has it helped me, and how has it held me back?

What Is It That You Want?

Finally, I offer you the classic coach question: What is it that you want?

And: Are you getting what you want with what you’re doing now?

And: If not, are you willing to try something new in order to get what you want?

If you are willing, then perhaps it’s time to contact a coach and see what might happen. And if you’re not, then I trust you to find something else that better supports you in reaching your goals.

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Laura McGrath is an Ottawa-based life coach and therapist who works with clients all over the world. If you’re considering how working with a coach might be useful for you, she is more than happy to pick up the phone and have a conversation. Get in touch.

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Things around the interweb that I’d like to share with you. This week, I went with ones that have been personally meaningful to me over the last month. I hope you find something here for you.

• From the June 6 Religion Outside the Box newsletter: “After decades of trying to improve myself one would think I would be getting more things right than I do. … Instead, I find myself simply repeating the same old foolish things I had done for a long time… Practice has not made me more perfect. It has, instead, made me more discouraged and weary.”
• Fleur Hanlon McGregor of Kai Balance posted on how we can use the body to shift out of a mental feedback loop of stress and depression.
• On the same day, guest writer Stuart Watkins posted at Crazy Sexy Life about how addictive brain chemicals are, even the ones that get produced in states of stress and anxiety. “Just like a drug, the feelings of stress and anxiety are extremely addictive, and the transition between being super wound up on stress and worry, to becoming calm and present may be a foreign feeling and withdrawal symptoms may come along with it.”
• Richard Moss’ When Thoughts Attack! – Tips on Taming Your Ego. “The ego simply does not know how to deal with challenging feelings like vulnerability and feeling out of control. When the ego is running the show, you can notice a dynamic: One thought generates an emotion that leads to another thought that generates another emotion. Round and round you go like a dog chasing its tail—well, in this case tale—becoming increasingly agitated and upset, even if in that moment you are otherwise actually fine, safe, and secure in your bed.”

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At the beginning of 2011, I asked myself what I wanted to accomplish this year, and one of my answers was “coach my ass off”.

I want as many folks as possible to tap into how amazing their growth and learning can be when they have the support of a coach.

I want YOU to tap into that.

Here’s what I believe my clients get from working with me:

• a clearer and more resilient sense of self
• stronger relationships
• thoughtful, loving attention to their unique version of a meaningful life.

Wouldn’t you love a taste of that?

In my quest to “coach my ass off”, I’m offering a special coaching package through June and July to new clients:

Join me for four 30-minute coaching sessions on a purely pay-what-you-can basis.

No strings attached. No obligation to continue beyond the four sessions. No heavy financial commitment. Just an opportunity to get yourself some of this.

Won’t you join me?

Send me a quick email (readyforchangecoaching -at- gmail -dot- com) to sign yourself up for some super — and super affordable — coaching sessions. I’m looking forward to hearing from you!

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The fine print:

• this offer is available to new clients only
• all four coaching sessions must be completed between June 10 – July 25th
• coaching sessions are 30 minutes each and are conducted by phone or Skype

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With my clients’ permission, I occasionally share stories from our coaching sessions (names and identifying information have been changed).

D. has spent much of the last year exploring a space of mindful presence. Even while her job throws challenge after challenge at her, D. takes time to meditate, reflect, and do yoga. She knows that doing these things helps her maintain balance, openness, and calm in the midst of a hectic life.

In a recent coaching conversation, D. observed that although she was still going through the motions (taking time away from work to spend with friends, spending time on her yoga mat), her sense of peace was getting interrupted by a nagging, worrying voice in her head. I’ll call the voice Mr. Judge.

“What if you’re missing something?” Mr. Judge said. “What if you’ve forgotten something important? You don’t have time to take an evening off; you should be working!”

What I noticed in our conversation was how much energy and power Mr. Judge’s voice had. When D. talked about what Mr. Judge said in her head, D.’s voice got louder and stronger. I could tell that Mr. Judge was the one calling the shots right now.

“Here’s what I’m noticing,” I said to D. “Mr. Judge has all the power. He’s keeping you from enjoying your time off. Even when you take some time for yourself, for self-care, Mr. Judge gets in there and keeps you from really relaxing.”

“That’s true,” D. said.

“So,” I asked, “what would satisfy Mr. Judge enough that you could quiet him down, send him out for a cigarette, and get him to leave you alone for awhile?”

D. and I explored the different strategies she has for dealing with her self-judgment. As we talked about what had worked in the past, and what wasn’t working now, D. discovered that she was engaging in mental warfare with Mr. Judge. Every time he showed up, she fought back and tried to shut him up. So this week, she’s going to experiment with a new strategy: when Mr. Judge shows up, she’s going to let him say his piece. She’s not going to fight. She’s going to listen, observe, and then let him go. Rather than making inner war, she’s going to try making inner peace, knowing that if she gives mindful attention to her thoughts, they tend to lose their power over her.

P.S. For all you coach geeks out there, some of the coaching skills I was using in this conversation were:

• Working with the “saboteur” or “Gremlin” (similarly, from a Gestalt perspective, we were working with a top dog/ underdog situation): Of the many ways there are to work with the saboteur, I chose in this call to ask D. what her saboteur needed to satisfy him, but I made sure that D. got to exercise her own power over her saboteur by choosing what she would offer him.
• Big-A Agenda: the client’s Big-A Agenda is what brings her fulfillment, what she values, what’s important to her in the longterm. I know D.’s Big-A Agenda includes bringing peace and mindfulness into all aspects of her life. Meeting Mr. Judge with peace, rather than with war, is one way for her to continue to embody her Big-A Agenda.

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Every Thursday, Ask Laura answers a question from readers. Got a question? You can submit it here.

Dear Laura,

I keep losing sight of what’s important to me. I’m struggling to set personal goals and hold myself accountable to them. For whatever reason I’m not satisfied with where I’m at right now (mainly in my working world) but having a hard time setting the boundaries of what I want to go after. When I seem to be making progress I always get distracted by things right in front of me, such as personal relationships and adventure. Any advice for how I can approach this differently?

-Distracted and Dissatisfied

Dear Distracted,

I hear the frustration in your words! You know you don’t want to be where you’re at, but you also don’t know where it is you want to head. It’s my hunch that you’ll need to get clear not just on “what you want to go after”, as you put it, but also how you want to be as you go after it.

With that in mind, here are the exploration questions I’ve cooked up for you…

How do you want it to be? 

Laura

Every Thursday, Ask Laura answers a question from readers. Got a question? You can submit it here. 

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With my clients’ permission, I occasionally share stories from our coaching sessions (names and identifying information have been changed).

Image: Sam Ely and Lynn Harris, Unrealised Potential stamp, 2010

E. said he wanted coaching on procrastination. First, I got curious and asked what procrastination looks like for him. He talked about what he does and doesn’t do when he procrastinates.

I wondered what it would be like for E. if he didn’t procrastinate. He started describing what he would do, and how he would get it done, and how he would meet deadlines.

E. was starting to paint the picture of what he wanted in his life, but I didn’t have a sense yet of what made this important. So I asked, “What’s important to you about this?”

As E. answered, I heard one of those big, lightbulb, heart-stopping phrases come out of his mouth:

“I could actualize my potential.”

Wowzer, I thought! We’re not just talking about getting things done. We’re talking about this beautiful human being’s ability to realize his potential!

I echoed that back to him, telling E. that I was really appreciating the bigness of what he was speaking about. I had a sense that he was feeling the bigness too, so I checked that out: “How does it feel for you when you start talking about actualizing your potential?”

E. answered that indeed, he was feeling the bigness of it. I imagined he could feel it even more, though, and what I wanted for him was to get a taste of what he was describing, the person he would be without procrastination.

I invited him to choose a spot in the room that would represent “the land of realizing potential”. He chose the spot, and then together we moved there. We stood there, sinking into the feeling of “realizing my potential.” When I thought he was really feeling it, I asked, “What’s possible here?”

A huge smile broke out on E.’s face as he said, “What’s possible? Well. . . anything! What couldn’t I do from here?”

I could see he was experiencing the possibility, and I wanted him to get even more tangible and specific. “What might you do?” I asked.

E. started naming things he would do in his land of realizing potential. He named the things he would have time to do once he got over his procrastination tendency. He pointed out that he would have more time for his personal projects, the things he really wanted to do.

When I could see his excitement at what he could accomplish, I knew we had tapped into the vision – we had touched on what was really important to him about being able to address his procrastination. So it was time to turn back to where we had started.

From where we were standing, I asked him to look back at the chair he had left. “Over there,” I said, “sits E., a great guy who’s struggling with procrastination. As you stand here, realizing your potential, and look back at E., what’s your advice for him?”

“I guess what he doesn’t get is that just because he doesn’t want to do something doesn’t mean he should put it off, because it’s not just about doing that one thing. . . doing that one thing affects so many other things he’ll be able to do.”

“Almost like he’s not looking at the big picture?” I asked.

“Yeah! E., see the big picture!” E. said.

From there, E. and I started drafting what it would tangibly look like to take a “big picture” approach, and how he could start putting it into place, starting with spending time later that day taking on something he’d been putting off.

P.S. For all you coach geeks out there, some of the coaching skills I was using in this conversation were:

• Curiosity: Exploring what “procrastination” looked like for E.
• The Big-A Agenda: The little-a agenda – the topic-of-the-moment, as it were – was procrastination. But procrastination was a piece of something much bigger for E. – his Big-A Agenda was self-realization, or actualizing his potential.
• Fulfillment coaching: In Fulfillment coaching (one of three coaching principles taught in the Co-Active coaching approach), we spend a majority of the time painting the picture of What-It-Would-Be-Like if the client achieved his/her goal. From this place of fulfillment, identifying, choosing, and committing to an action comes easily.
• Articulating what’s going on: I took time to articulate to E. that I was appreciating the “bigness” of what he was talking about, and took time to get him to articulate what he was experiencing as he spoke about it too.
• Geography: I used physical movement to get E. to explore a different “geography”. When he physically stepped into “the land of realizing potential”, he got a visceral sense of what it could be like, and what it was he was aiming for.

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With my clients’ permission, I occasionally share stories from our coaching sessions (names and identifying information have been changed).

A. sent me an email before our coaching session and listed a number of things that she’d done during the week, including an amazing race she’d run, a successful team meeting at work, and taking time out from a busy day to spend some time recharging with friends on a patio.

All of these fantastic celebrations were overshadowed, however, by a difficult situation she was facing with a supervisor. As our call began, A. was about to skip over all the good stuff and dive into the challenging stuff, but I interrupted.

“Hang on! Look at all these things you have to celebrate!” I said.

“Hmmm, I guess so. . .” A. replied. “Actually, it was a pretty great week.”

“What I’m seeing,” I said, “is that even in the midst of a stressful situation at work, a situation that’s taking up a lot of your energy and causing you pain, you were still able to accomplish so much and enjoy so much in your week. That’s really something to celebrate.”

After we’d celebrated, we delved into the work situation to do some coaching around that.

Later the same day, I received this email from A.:

“Thank you for reminding me that it is okay to celebrate. . . I really didn’t take the time to consider what I’ve done recently, or to look at it as anything more than regular. It felt really good to have that validation. I’ve really been in need of that. I didn’t realize how much I needed it until you stopped this morning and acknowledged it.”

P.S. For all you coach geeks out there, some of the coaching skills I was using in this conversation were:

• intruding – yes, I cut my client off to make a point.
• acknowledging – I acknowledged her ability to accomplish a lot and enjoy herself even in the midst of a sticky situation.
• celebrating – I was inviting my client to take some time to celebrate herself and what she’d done, and I was celebrating with her.

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Every Thursday, Ask Laura answers a question from readers. Got a question? You can submit it here.

Dear Laura,

Sometimes I feel like the whole world’s against me and no one’s on my side. How can I get some support?

-Looking for Somebody to Lean On

Dear Looking,

Ah, I know the feeling. For me, it’s like being crammed into a dark corner, and I raise my fists up in defensiveness. What is it like for you?

I love that you’ve recognized your need for support. Once you’ve reached out and received some support, the feeling that no one is on your side will start fading. Before exploring support, though, I want to ask a bit about “the whole world” being against you.

Is it true?

That’s one of my favourite Byron Katie questions. Whenever we notice ourselves framing things in absolutes (“the whole world’s against me”, “no one’s on my side”), it’s a clue that our thinking has taken a field trip into a world of fixed, unchangeable, absolutist beliefs. So I invite you to slow down and ask yourself, “Is it true?”

Perhaps you can think of someone who isn’t against you: maybe it’s the grocery cashier who helped pack your bags, or the bus driver who stopped to let you off, or someone who gave you a hug when you got home. In any way, little or big, can you find examples from this week of people who weren’t against you?

I know you can. And as you find those examples, your mind will start loosening its grip on the belief that it’s you against the world. And once that belief has been loosened up just a little, you can open up to exploring support.

What does support look like to you?

Support looks different to different people. What’s the type of support you need?

Some people, I’ve learned, feel supported when someone checks in with them regularly to ask how they are. Some people feel supported when they take “me-time” and go to a yoga class, or listen to music, or take a walk. Some people feel supported when they have a list of four great people on their babysitting roster.

What’s the type of support you’re yearning for?

Jot down (or doodle!) what support looks like for you.

• How does it feel when you’re supported?
• What do you notice around you?
• What do you believe when you’re supported?
• What can you count on when you’re supported?
• What changes for you when you get support?

Get Specific

I invite you to list five to ten things that would help you feel supported.

• Try to make these things tangible (e.g. “Jane takes out the garbage”) rather than abstract (“Jane helps out more around the house”).
• And try to make these things statements of what you want to have happen (e.g. “Joe makes dinner on Monday”) rather than naming what you want to stop/change (e.g. “Joe stops eating all the leftovers I was going to use for my lunches this week” — that explains what you want to have stop, but not what you want to have happen instead).

Ask

I think it’s a tragedy that sometimes the people closest to us miss out on supporting us, because they don’t understand what support looks like for us. Often, they don’t understand because we’re unclear on it ourselves, or we’ve never taken the time to tell them what we need.

Do the people close to you know about your personal definition of support? Do they know you’re needing support right now?

I invite you to make the ask. I invite you to step forward, knowing what it is you need and want, and to make a specific request from someone near you for their support.

If this idea feels too daunting right now, start with something that doesn’t feel intimidating or overwhelming for you. For example, get the physical sensation of support by sitting with your back leaning against a wall, or feel supported lying in a hot bath or floating in a swimming pool. Ask someone to give you a call this week just to ask how you are. Tell someone, “I know I need support, but I’m scared / uncomfortable / reluctant / worried about asking for it.” As you make yourself vulnerable in this way, the people you’re reaching out to will see your sincere need for support, and see that you are inviting them in to help you.

It’s beautiful that you’re asking for their help. It’s beautiful that you are opening up to your honest, human, moving need: to feel supported. It’s my wish that as you learn what support you need, and how to reach out for it, that you become a role model to others around you who feel the same way.

Warmly,

Laura

Every Thursday, Ask Laura answers a question from readers. Got a question? You can submit it here. 

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