[Mandy Bishop]

Hi everyone! I MISS YOU!!!!!

I’m writing to reach out for connection from our beautiful cohort. I find myself thinking of each of you and wondering how you are, how your days have been, how this process and this EBI journey is going for you, how your business is developing – or not, or if your vision has evolved into something surprising and new altogether. It feels to me that the tightness that we all felt in January when each of us experienced such deep and profound insights on that land up there at the Starhouse has loosened and we are each probably finding our unique way forward. And this is so awesome! And I am feeling a deep desire to reconnect and touch back in.

I wanted to see if there are others that would be interested in coordinating a group check in session just to say hi. Probably just a 30-60 minute Zoom meeting. I am happy to set it up. Please let me know if a group check in is of interest, and if either of these days/times would work best.

This Wednesday 10/10 at 5:30 MST
Next Wednesday 10/17 sometime between 1:00-6:00 MST

[Mandy Bishop]

Initial Post:

My client is a 20 year old guy who I work with. He was among a group of coworkers who got an email from me offering practice coaching sessions, and he reached out. He has never had any kind of coaching or counseling, and taking a look inward is somewhat new for him. When we first met for a quick chat to talk about what he was looking to get out of coaching, he said he wasn’t really sure but that he just had been feeling a lack of energy, motivation, and enthusiasm for life and after receiving my email, he thought why not try to do something about it.

I include this background because I believe my client was in pre-contemplation for the most part when we first met. I actually believe that he began to make the move from pre-contemplation to contemplation when I asked him to complete my intake forms. I have several questions on there that required him to consider what specifically felt challenging in his life currently, and what his goals are with coaching. Having him complete these questions helped move him into the contemplation stage by our first full session, as his brain had an opportunity to identify a goal of having a sustainable state of emotional health and a feeling as though he is moving forward in his life. Even just answering this intake question laid a framework for his brain to identify different thoughts, patterns, and behaviors that are possible, laying down a brand new track in his brain for a different neuropathway, creating the potential for new circuitry.

We have now had the opportunity to have two sessions and I have been able to see that my client is moving back and forth from contemplation to pre-contemplation, with the majority of the time in contemplation. He has identified a Want to be moving forward, to not be stuck any longer, and to have a greater work/life balance — contemplation. However, he will move from moments of acknowledgment and clarity of what he wants to deflection and demoralization. “Precontemplators are often demoralized. They don’t want to think, talk, or read about their problem because they feel their situation is hopeless.” (Prochaska, Changing for Good, p.41) In our second session, my client was able to get to the Deeper Need. However, after just a few moments of touching it and experiencing the new state of being, something came in and dropped the energy that had been building. I asked him what he was noticing and he said “everything just felt so daunting”. It’s as if the natural cycle of change is pulling him into contemplation, but he still has a foot in precontemplation. I have a sense that this is a natural process that takes time and by raising awareness his system will naturally arrive completely in contemplation, wanting and ready for change.

In the first session, I brought awareness to different parts that I heard in his telling of his issue. We explored the parts which opened the door to increasing self awareness. We collaborated with the landscape to externalize his parts, which further helped him to see externally the dynamics and reactions happening automatically in his inner landscape. I have had a couple teaching opportunities to talk about what parts work is, how the brain is wired, and how change happens. I think for this client, increasing his awareness of himself through reflections, experientially with the land and parts, and through teaching moments is helping to create a pathway for him to land fully in contemplation and to begin the preparation phase. “Knowing about the brain empowers you to transform confusion into insight, self-blame into self-compassion. When we teach others and ourselves about the brain’s mechanisms of energy and information flow, the mind is strengthened as we move from blaming the self for automatic behaviors and instead transform our experience into self-understanding and self-responsibility”. (Siegel, Interpersonal Neurobiology, p.3-2)

To me it seems imperative to include some education around how the brain functions, how we are wired neurologically, and how change happens so that our clients can understand where they are in the process. This helps them understand why they are experiencing the behaviors they are and it helps to normalize their experience to date. I think it also helps each person to understand that they can have control over their lives, that change is possible, and that they are not beholden to their habitual ways of being — that even if they’re currently rafting down the Grand Canyon in their neuro-landscape, they can find an eddy, get out of the raft and choose to walk down a path less traveled towards a new way of being.

[Mandy Bishop]

Sweet David! It is awesome to read your reflection on these two sessions! It is amazing how clear you are on the stages of change in your client and in the brain circuitry that is being activated. It is also illuminating for me that relapse is super real and is going to happen. Probably lots. And that that is not a failure of any one person, but that it is a natural stage in the change process and our work is always creatively meeting the client with where they are at in the moment.

[Mandy Bishop]

Hi!!!!

I’m so excited to see everyone in a couple days! Miss you all!

Here’s an interesting read I found regarding the challenges/reality of starting a life coaching business. I’m not sure about everything she says, but a lot of it speaks to me of the importance of the Value Proposition and Service Descriptions. Drives home for me that we are focusing on what will help us succeed through this program. It’s a little daunting, but inspiring too.

The Truth About Starting A Life Coaching Business

[Mandy Bishop]

Summary Post:
From reading back through these posts, I am really inspired by the level of deep listening and sensing that we are tracking. It is amazing to me that many of the posts write about sensing when the client is transcending the moment or beginning to flood with emotions and many of you utilized some form of connecting with the earth to ground and bring the client back into the present. It is really cool to see this across the board! Where nature connected coaching and Gestalt meet.

[Mandy Bishop]

Hi friends!

I have not been utilizing art so much in any of my practice sessions lately, though I love the idea of dropping in before or even after a session to create something intuitively and to see what resonates both for me and the client.

I have however been coaching myself quite a bit through my own processes, and this has been a total collaboration between nature and art. I have been exploring my own traumas through the land, essentially doing a wander on the land with the intention to see what I need to be shown to heal my traumas. I am finding that when I arrive at the place I am called to, the way that I am able to process all that is arising is through artistic expression in some form. So far, this has taken the form of speaking or writing poetry, drawing, singing. I am super curious how this will continue to unfold.

I also had a good time creating parts cards as a way to try to understand and get to know my parts better. They sort of remind me of tarot cards for my parts! Trying to drop into what image would represent the part and drawing that image allowed me to drop more deeply into what the part really felt like within me. On the back of these cards are descriptions of what these parts bring to the system. This has been fun and helpful. Potentially something to do with a client if they are interested.

[Mandy Bishop]

Initial Post:

What steps did you take to establish the Coaching Relationship and focus the session?
I had the intention going into the session that I wanted to practice some of the things we learned with Gestalt. I wanted to be super aware of the here and now with my client, paying particular attention to body language and any emotions arising during the dialogue. I also set an intention for myself to be open to moving wherever the “gestalt” moved and to let go of any expectations I had as far as outcome for the session. This was an observed practice session and I let the mentor know I wanted to practice Gestalt as well, and asked for his guidance if he saw areas to help.

How did or could Gestalt fit into your nature-connected coaching session? How did or could you collaborate with Nature and combine Gestalt and Coaching principles?
Nature was the perfect collaborator for a Gestalt based session! My client was working with the challenge of expressing frustration and anger within a difficult work dynamic. Once we got clear on the issue and the want, I suggested we try out an experiment where we imagined a bush being the leadership team my client was having issue with. My client had a difficult time feeling her anger was valid and expressing it was very challenging, so working with something neutral like a bush removed some of the pressure of being face to face with me while trying to express. My client was able to pick out branches of the tree that represented different people within the leadership team and slowly voice her feelings to them. Over the course of our session, her energy moved from doubtful and hesitant, to being aligned and speaking her truth from a deep place. By the end, my client said she now felt like the bigger tree, at which we suggested she see what it felt like to stand by the big tree nearby facing the small bush. This is where I think the experiment began the incorporation phase and the embodied state of confident expression my client reached began to sink in. I think I combined coaching principles with Gestalt by spending a little more time in severance getting clear about what my client wanted before moving into the experiment. In addition, we wrapped up the session by talking about how my client could remember the embodied assertiveness she arrived at towards the end, incorporating a mantra for my client to write down. It’s as if the Gestalt drove the process of the session, but it was held in by the bookends of coaching principles.

What challenges did you face? How did you adapt?
One of the challenges I faced was during the first half of the session. I was a little timid to really step into the Gestalt therapy type shoes and was still approaching the session in a traditional coaching way — a completely client led way. When I asked my client if she had any ideas of how she’d like to play with the identified want/need, she did not. I scrambled a little offering up a couple ideas that my client said she felt unsure about trying. I had to turn a corner in my approach and move from gently making a few suggestions, to energizing myself and the client and saying “I’ve got an idea! Would you be willing to try something out with me?” I think this shifted the dynamic and energy of the entire session in a way where we were now in greater contact and fully in experiment together.

What flowed and how did you build off it?
The part that flowed for me was in using statements rather than questions during the experiment. I felt that I was able to empathize deeply with my client, putting myself in her shoes and offering up statements that resonated with me from that place to see if they resonated with her. It definitely kept her in the embodied experiment without having to come out into her head to analyze a question I asked. It seemed that some of the statements that really resonated for her helped her go deeper into her own awareness. This was a point that Derek made during the face to face, and is further emphasized in the reading, In Gestalt Therapy: An Introduction. Yontef writes, “The Gestalt therapist is encouraged to make I statements. Such statements facilitate both the therapeutic contact and the patient’s focusing.”

What did you learn about yourself and nature-connected coaching?
The thing that sticks out to me is that moment when we transitioned from talking about the issue and wavering around how to play with it, into me taking some leadership and bringing up the energy and asking my client to dive in with me. I learned that the sessions, while still client led, truly are a collaboration between client and myself and I can effect the energy, the contact, and the psych with my client based on how timid/unsure/hesitant I am versus how curious/impassioned/energized I am. It felt like I was stepping from the role of nervous new coach into the part of me that is a guide and to just showing up with my humanness. I felt for the first time in this setting a real leadership coming from me, which I think I will use when I step into the role of facilitator with the guiding and rites of passage work I’d like to do.

What ideas do you have for how you might use Gestalt and nature-connected coaching in the future with your client?
I feel like Gestalt is something I want to incorporate as a sort of baseline in all my work. It feels like it incorporates present moment awareness with somatic awareness and embodiment and incorporates the “do it now” experiment/threshold experience. It makes so much sense to me that it is in this manner, during the experiment/threshold that real change actually occurs — not in just talking about it or theoretically understanding why we are the way we are. In Gestalt Therapy: An Introduction, Yontef writes, “Gestalt therapy emphasizes that whatever exists is here and now and that the experience is more reliable than interpretation. The patient is taught the difference between talking about what occurred 5 minutes ago and experiencing what is now.”

How does Gestalt Therapy effect or enhance your Coaching Presence and approach?
I think it brings my awareness of contact to a new level, as well as the depth of my listening. With contact, I am aware at all times of not only my energetic contact with my client, but also how my body language is compared to my client’s and how the tone of my voice is in relation to the tone of my client’s voice as well. And listening then just goes so much deeper, listening for minute changes in tone, subtle shifts in posture or position, arcs of energy, etc. I feel like Gestalt is ideally approached from a super-attunement state, which is my goal.

[Mandy Bishop]

Initial Post:

What steps did you take to establish the Coaching Relationship and focus the session?
My intention going into the session was to pay close attention to any parts that came forward with a voice, or any tensions between parts, and ask if my client would like to explore them. When my client and I met, she voiced that she was recently back from a trip, very tired and feeling a little out of it. Here is where the 50/50 rule, and Gestalt came in. Instead of jumping right into the session, I acknowledged her current state, met my client where she was at, and redirected. I asked if she would like to do a grounding visualization first to arrive in the space and into her body and to see what was most present that she’d like to work with. After the grounding exercise, what was most ripe to discuss had to do with communication within an important relationship. I wasn’t sure if I’d get to apply any partswork, but I wanted to stay with exactly what was up for my client and allow the session to unfold as it needed to.

How did or could PartsWork fit into your nature-connected coaching session?
As my client discussed a challenging interaction with her partner, she mentioned a reaction she had to a hurtful comment that felt almost uncontrollable. My gut sensed this could be a part expressing, which it was, and a part that my client was familiar with. My client also expressed that she had a reaction to her reaction that was one of feeling shame to having responded that way. I had a suspicion this could be another part, and asked if it was. We identified this was probably another lesser known part. In Self, Soul, Spirit, Strachen writes, “Self comprises as complex set of subparts that form a gestalt. It can have many reactions to life situations during which one or another part voice a thought or take action, directing the individual proactively or reactively.” One of the goals my client identified was to increase her awareness during times of heightened nervous system activity and to have a tool to be able to step back and discern what her needs are in that moment and what reaction is appropriate for her — empowering her to move from reactivity to responding proactively. Since one of the well known parts revealed itself already, and a lesser known part reacted, I we decided to play with the dynamic of these parts keeping the goal in mind.

How did or could you collaborate with Nature and combine PartsWork and Coaching principles?
I asked my client to choose objects found in nature that could represent each part and one for the soul. It feels important to have the client choose objects to represent parts simply to help the transition from one part to the other during the interview process. I also think it’s fascinating to see what objects the client chooses and how it relates to the part, sometimes without them even being aware of it. My client chose two dandelions in flower for each part, and placed in the middle a dandelion in seed for the soul. At the end of the session I pointed out how amazing it is that the soul in the middle was in full expression, fertile, ready to plant her seeds and sprout new growth, which we both laughed about as it was so perfect to where the session took us — her increasing trust in herself and being empowered to voice her needs (parts) allowing her true self (soul) to express. So beautiful that she chose that!

What challenges did you face? How did you adapt? What flowed and how did you build off it?
One challenge I faced in the session was when my client tried to transition from the well known part to the lesser known part, I felt a hunch that it wasn’t actually the identified lesser known part speaking. I asked who I was speaking with now and my client wasn’t sure but had the awareness it wasn’t the original part. I flowed with it by relieving any pressure to have to name or identify this part, but asked my client to just stay with it. I began asking questions of this new part to help get into what it felt like, talked like, sounded like, etc. Through this process, my client realized this was a part very close to the soul that she had previously not been aware of, but that managed and maintained balance between all her parts. Through this process a name naturally arose for the new part, the Manager. It was so amazing too that my client then realized the Manager held the key to the discernment she was seeking. This part was the tool!

What did you learn about yourself and nature-connected coaching?
Through this process, I’ve witnessed myself being more and more in the allowing state as the coach, meeting what arises in the moment and moving with the flow of the session. I’m learning to listen on a different level, to hear different voices and tones as the client speaks, and to be super curious about the different parts that may be a part of the conversation. I’m also learning that I am super empathetic and can feel into the personality of a part deeply, which is helping me identify with my client’s parts and intuitively ask them questions on a deeper level. This allows me to tap into the complexity of my client and her wants and needs as well.

What ideas do you have for how you might use PartsWork and nature-connected coaching in the future with your client?
In the future, I am very curious to see how becoming aware of the Manager and identifying this part as a tool will shift the way my client responds to difficult situations. I can imagine finding a space in nature to set up a whole constellation of parts specifically invested and involved in the dynamics within the relationship my client spoke of. I could see finding objects in nature that represent all the parts involved in communication and reaction, finding an object for the soul, and also finding an object that represents the particular conversation with her partner, or her partner himself. I would be curious to see how the parts respond to speaking freely towards the object representing the difficult conversation, as well as how the Manager participates. Strachen writes, “By listening to their Self parts and Souls, clients learn what they specifically want for themselves and how they might make decisions and work towards achieving the wants and desires of their individual and collective parts.” I can imagine exploring in this way would work towards the goal of increased self awareness and ability to discern, as well as helping my client get a deeper understanding of her truth and a felt sense for expressing the needs of all her parts, thus giving her greater choice over herself.

How does PartsWork effect or enhance your Coaching Presence and approach?
I think one way Partswork (and Gestalt) could increase my coaching presence is to show up with my humanness and disclose my parts to my client. In Self, Soul, Spirit, Strachen writes, “Since we as facilitators are part of the process, we share how we deal with our own mandalas… It is a way to walk alongside clients. The client gets to see that both of us, individually and together, work with the diversity of our own Self parts and Souls.” This would really help to deepen the trust between myself and my client.

How does Nature-Connected Practices, and PartsWork interface?
I think they interface because our psyches actually exist in nature all around us and nature is continually reflecting back to us our inner landscapes. This means that our soul, as well as all our parts, are being reflected back to us in the outer landscape. Whatever is happening in the moment all around us is a direct reflection of what is happening inside on some level. Nature connected principles is a co-facilitator and collaborator for us as guides to be able to notice and name the multitude of our parts and complexity of our inner landscape. It is also a way for us to let go of judgements about our parts as being good or bad, as most of us do not judge the outer landscape as we judge ourselves.

[Mandy Bishop]

Hey all! Just wanted to let you all know I am doing the posts for this module a little backwards. The session I had this past week with my practice client was parts work related, so I will post about that first and plan to focus on Gestalt next week in my sessions.

[Mandy Bishop]

Rachael, how cool that you just naturally moved into parts work without even trying in this session of yours! I love that you dropped in and started the gestalt state even before the session just listening to what was calling you in the moment, and that that resonated for your client. I also really resonate with the last part of your post, where you write that Gestalt and NCC “feels like the same thing to me, whether I’m noticing that two cats start fighting in the background or whether I notice her body language and voice change when she talks about competing dilemmas, in either case I can name it and we can discover together that we’re officially dealing with parts in conflict. So whatever awareness I do have, I can trust it. Because the same present moment pattern is playing out everywhere, just waiting to be noticed.” Especially agree that the same present moment pattern seems to be playing out everywhere around us, just waiting to be noticed!

[Mandy Bishop]

Thanks for sharing, Rachael! I’ll be excited to hear how this continues to unfold with this client, as it sounds like you’ve had a powerful foundation laid.

I totally agree with having the biology to back up what can seem spiritual about the power of ceremony. I personally live deeply in the spiritual realm and don’t feel like I need a scientific explanation, however my clients DO! It is so wonderful to have a variety of ways to explain what we are doing to clients to meet them where they are at and in a language they can buy into!

I also totally resonate with what you said here, and have been feeling into this in my life lately as well: “I have begun to see EVERYTHING as a collaborator, like nature. The books in the room, the location we choose, inside or out. Everything can be and is a reflection if we choose to use it, and I’m loving the little ways those keep getting worked in.”

[Mandy Bishop]

Kaity,

Awesome to read how you are beginning to integrate what we are learning with EBI into what you have from Yoga Therapy. It is inspiring to read how they are coming together for you!

I appreciate what Daniel said about how sometimes the deeper need can be more apparent – i.e. needing to feel grounded and safe. In my coaching I feel like I am sometimes searching for a super deep and juicy need, when what my client needs in the moment is a sense of safety. So, that is helpful to relate to and have reflected by Daniel.

I also totally appreciate what you brought up in this part of your post: “The thing that felt challenging to me was how to balance the planning and action in the change model without fueling the obsessive compulsive symptoms she experiences. I felt like there was a fine balance between accountability and being gentle when it came to this particular issue.” I can totally relate to this as well and have a client who is very critical on herself. I am finding it a balancing act to move between planning and action and holding my client accountable when relapse happens without fueling the intense critic. I am noticing that with this client I am often also focusing on self-care and resourcing. Perhaps that is establishing the foundation and ground needed for future change to actually occur.

Thanks for sharing your insights and experience!

[Mandy Bishop]

Rachael,

I am inspired and impressed with your summary of your work with this client! It is great to hear about an experience where it took several sessions to lay ground work before really getting to a major epiphany experiment. I know I sometimes have sessions that aren’t the most show-stopping major transformational epiphany sessions, and I find myself feeling insecure or doubtful of my coaching abilities. But it is wonderful to be reminded that not every session is going to be like that, and that it is really necessary in some cases to slow build a foundation with a client in order to experience a transformational moment. I love that this moment was both rewarding for your client AND for you! I imagine the more we work closer and closer with our visions, the more this will happen — that the growth and healing that occurs for our clients simultaneously effects our own growth and healing. Beautiful!

[Mandy Bishop]

Hannah,

It is amazing to watch how your coaching and guiding is developing! I loved reading about your experience and your awareness — not only of your client, but of yourself and how the big emotions were effecting you. Awesome! I especially appreciated how you worked with a grounding exercise to bring your client back into the present and begin integration: “To end the threshold, I guided her through a somatic grounding exercise while she laid on the grass with her limbs sprawled out on the ground. With each area of the body, I reminded her how the Earth was holding her, and to feel the elements in contact in her awareness. This resulted in her being way more prepared to go out in the rest of the day because she “felt the support” from the ground, as she said. It that instance, the Earth gave her way more as a guide than I ever could.”

This really brought back one of the readings for me, where in Gestalt Therapy, Yontef writes about the bulk of the healing happening in between sessions, that “The patient is often left unfinished but thoughtful, or opened up…like a roast that continues to cook after being removed from the oven.” And that in Gestalt, “We facilitate growth rather than complete a cure process.”

This has been really helpful for me to remember as I’m working with a client. I think going along with feeling like I need to do something as a coach, I have also become aware of feeling like I need to leave the client in a position where they have a huge ah-ha or feel complete in some way about their issue. It is a real change in perspective for me to take that responsibility off my shoulders and change my responsibility to just showing up with my humanness, staying as present as possible through the session, and making inviting a grounding and integration for my client before they leave the experience. This is a real shift into trusting that the process of healing has opened and will continue far past the session.

[Mandy Bishop]

Wow, Kent! I’m really struck by your ability to see and sense in your client when she is speaking from the head and when from the heart. I got the image of you as a master tracker, tracking her energy moving from one place to another. Sounds like you were able to bring some awareness to that for her that will hopefully be the beginning of more and more awareness for her. I really loved how you incorporated the body into your awareness with her as a way to come into the here and now: “Conversation goes back and forth from her head to her heart so I ask her to be still for a moment, take a few deep breaths and focus on what sensations she is feeling in her body in the moment.” Nice!!