– A J Cronin (1896-1981)

My wonderful mother, Roma, an amazing woman, coach, businesswoman and all round great human (yes well I do love her!) sent me this poem to underline the coaching practice we are in the midst of seeding and developing. It echoes our thoughts on how as coaches we can be helpful in supporting others in thinking new thoughts and finding new doors.

Turning Walls into Doors? How can that be?

Look beyond the problem, beyond the block, beyond "the wall" - ask: what are you really trying to do?

Afterall, a door is just a wall, with some space in it too. 

Action(s) to Start when Walls Suddenly Appear:

- When way closes around you, sometimes a good start is taking a quiet space and writing / drawing /mapping down whatever comes out

- Letting others around you know so that they may also be a support and also allowing them to know that you are looking for new things to come up! It is amazing what the universe will come back with!

- Have a conversation about it with someone you are energised to speak about it too, and someone who you are fearing speaking about it too. Trust me, both are valuable.

- Just start -  what space do you need to make? if you have to clear the room start with a corner…whatever is going on choose a TINY piece of it and do that and see how it feels…in time you’ll have done a lot of little things that made a space wide enough to walk through!

- Laugh, dance, move and breath!

- Do something you love! Even if only for 5mins.

Personal Flow and Ebb…

I am not often overly personal on my blog though today I thought it important: this poem comes also at a time when certain walls and signposts have jumped up for me! While I am listening and responding to them (and sometimes reacting) I am also finding it hard and I too am ready for some new doors and windows, new ways of thinking and living and also, learning to get used to and live with life’s inevitable flows AND ebbs…and as such I am going to post one such of my own flows below.

Feel free to read on or enjoy the above.

Again, I find myself am in transition

Professionally, I am so often in transition conversations, supporting others: teams, communities, organizations…at best creating a space for reflection and deeper conversation that allow them to move from what seems an impossible block –> towards a new thinking/head-space where new things are possible…or to connect for the first time to define and clarify what they are coming together to do

…and yet I too am needing that new space myself, personally.

One of the benefits of working internationally and across disciplines industries and ages, I am able, even though transition can ’suck!’ to know that transition is a natural and ever coming ever crucial state for being alive and living. And yet, even knowing this, I feel the need to be human enough to say so, "I am not finding it easy!" And there is pain too.

Though I acknowledge the health in this transition - if I have experienced it my insight is likely to be more sound for clients going through their own situations, and also for my own growth - I must admit, I am not yet comfortable here!

Life is Messy

I was at a dialogue a few months ago where mid-dialogue we were called on to say what we were bringing to the world after the dialogue and what came out of me was "my voice, voice, and life - with all its messes". I may chuckle and say I should be careful with what I speak and yet it is true what I said…

And I have learned that life does, afterall, have a tendency to organize around mess and chaos rather than a neat plan…and a plan, no matter how well thought through and chosen, is always going to be subject to the infinite plan of life around it…

And I am learning that there is nothing to really fear…not truely.

That said, it can be hard at times to really appreciate this, to use one’s voice and trust one’s gut and fully trust that everything will be ok, that there is nothing to fear…and that somehow in all the mess everything is ok and good and right now too. And that there is joy in this space as well!! 

Doors WILL Open

And I am learning that it is in these moments that the belief  "faith" that "a door will open" seems more critical in the ebb then in moments when things are flowing. As a good friend commented, I have become reasonably well practised at making things happen…and yet I need to also learn to let them happen. What about the ebb - which is it about rest? And release and ??? And what about the timelag?

What would Spring & Summer be like if it doesn’t have Autumn & Winter?

So I wonder: what is the flow without the ebb? And how can I acknowledge and live joyfully in the ebb too? In the between?

There is always so much to learn and enjoy from nature. And it is useful to be experiencing this in the season of Autumn transitioning to Winter (rather than my home-town Southern Hemisphere). In the Ebb, as in the Autumn, and the dormant Winter, though it looks and feels like there is a lot of decay and things are baron, what is actually also happening is that plants are seeding for the coming spring - in Autumn they are releasing seeds!! And in winter they are preparing for their spring breakthrough!

Out of the Mud Grows…

"Muddy water, let stand - becomes clear" - Lao Tzu

And the fallen mess, the mess that decays at the roots - this humus, nourishes the soil for the coming months. I love this new etymology lesson via Parker Palmer: humus and humility come from the same (word) root "it helps me understand that humiliating events of life, the events that leave mud on my face or that make my name mud may create the fertile soil in which something new can grow" [Parker Palmer 'Let Your Life Speak']. And I also like his idea that when you aren’t at the top right now, you don’t have very far to fall…somewhat comforting! The ground feels much softer when the distance below is close…

Asking for Help and or Support - Hard to Do And Relieving Once Done!

The multiplicity of our lives - work relationship home friends partners learning and more - means that while we may be on a role / great at work, this may not be reflected in our home life…and so forth…For me this can be hard to be honest about it - and more so, to ask for help and support!!

I recently had to ask and accept an offer for help and support from two friends and I am deeply grateful for their graciousness…and the trust they have in me! Once it was done it was fine but doing it and mustering the courage was HARD! A small part of me even felt ashamed…and it made my question myself about why it was so hard for me to accept help and support when I often give it freely…and made me apprecate ever more the trust that clients and friends have in me!

From Perfection -> Harmony

That said, the more and more I think about authenticity the more I feel called to be honest about my own transitions. And how that though I am one person, my life is also a multitude of things…and will not all work perfectly (this is hard for me to embody!) though life can and does, I believe, work harmoniously when it is healthy… our system will tend towards balance.

More Actions - I do not underestimate how hard they can feel when you are starting!

Yet even doing something ’simple small things’ - cleaning a room in a house, clearing old backlog, letting go of burdens, simply forgiving something and making room / being open for new things are really hard! As on one hand change is simple - we have choices and at any point we can change things in our present - our thoughts, the way we are interacting with others, our level of positivity etc which become our past which feeds and nourish a new future - they can feel really big when we haven’t started, and there is always a time lag between when we change and it gets noticed…and there is also the reality of life impacting on us too: our world is simultaneously all about us and not at all about us! [see some more actions at top]

Towards Embodying This

And thus, for me personally, "way has closed" and there are suddenly walls where there seemed clear paths…and though I do trust "way will open", for me I feel the challenge right now is to NOT overplan, as I am used to. Instead I am clearing as much back log as I can of outstanding work…and learning to trust the seeding that is happening, and the decay and humiliations and failures and mistakes are providing fooder and nourishment for the roots of the my tree of life…and that come the metaphorical spring-summer some great things, some doors, are clear to grow. 

So I will trust in this poem "always…have faith, a door will open for us…" and also heed the lesson: that the door that opens is "perhaps one that we ourselves would never have thought of". I sense the second part, being open to the things I hadn’t considered myself, is the harder and important part for me…I will be open to it… 

Sending a smile and a belly laugh to you in whatever season this finds you in!