[David Fontaine]

Love this idea to elaborate on the competencies and share this discussion with students! What all of you kind of reinforced in my thinking of Coaching Presence is that the concepts within it invite the coach to relax and allow things to flow. Some key words you said were “curiosity”, “flexibility”, “humor”, “spontaneity”, “trusting intuition”, “go moment to moment”. Particularly as new coaches I think we have a tendency to take it so seriously that it’s hard to get out of our heads enough at times to really be showing up fully for our clients. Yes, what we’re engaging in is very serious but it’s helpful to remember that this is a time for being a present witness to the process. We can be spontaneous, fun, humorous all the while keying in to the important words, moments, energy shifts and flowing with all of those without necessarily having to think about doing all of that. When you were talking about the pieces of Coaching Presence that you’d really like to see being developed in your students, “the pause” came up. This was and really still is one of the things I need to be more comfortable doing. When I put myself in the client role, I would really appreciate a coach taking the time they felt necessary to take stock of where we are, take some notes, process what was just said,etc. My hang up is, as a coach, I am still thinking a little bit linearly. Like we have somewhere to head towards and I need the progress to stay moving forward. Pauses take time, pauses might look like I’m not paying close enough attention or listening well enough. This is where flexibility in the process and within myself is needed.

Some metaphor in nature that comes to mind around coaching is rising water (lakes, rivers, oceans). I think of a tide rising. When water rises in nature doesn’t choose where to go, it has no plan. It just flows to all of the lowest points and gently fills them. How can we be like water and allow our presence to fill the space naturally?

[David Fontaine]

James, if you need a chef for this camp to prepare the wild and cultivated foods, I’m your man! 🙂 Reading your post makes me smile because it makes me think back to every time someone asked me what I would do if I could do anything. You’ve just described my exact answer! This also reminds me of what we spoke about earlier today and wishing I had experiences like this and/or a mentor when I was younger. I feel that these very immersive and lengthy experiences can forge lasting impressions and changes in people. Think of the experiences and take-aways we had at our first intensive in Boulder as a perfect example of that! A client can half ass show up in a one hour session but he/she can’t run from a 5-7 day experience, nor do I think they’d want to. Lengthier offerings ensure that the more serious clients will attend. Serving younger clientele can have such a huge impact on the future of the world and may even encourage them to do this work when they’re older, creating a lineage of your teachings, which is fucking awesome to think about!

[David Fontaine]

Foundation 4 – The energy peak of threshold has just been reached and now it begins to sink in with the client that they have a job to do. They have something to take home with them that will be a big responsibility and a challenge to incorporate into their lives. I love the idea of offering some space at this moment in a session for the client to settle into this. I know in some of my experiences as a practice client, I immediately attempted to go into planning and listing out tasks that were coming to mind. Some of my practice clients did this as well. While that is an important piece of incorporation, there is a foundational discussion to have that will help the client see the big picture and remember what they might be up against when they go home. I’m seeing the importance of this transition of the session being carefully guided so that it can be as successful as possible for the client. This is one time where I feel like we can impose our plan a little more on the client and guide the ship through incorporation. Getting them to state any challenges they know they may have in taking this home is helpful in goal setting. I love the questions “who or what are you going home to?”, “what area(s) do you feel like you may struggle to incorporate this new way of being?”, “what have you tried in the past?”, “what do you have working in your favor?” I also like the idea of having a conversation about how challenging it can be in general to make a change in your life. And now, what goals can we set while keeping these factors in mind that are realistic, achievable and challenging? As I worked on establishing my goals or action items in each session as a practice client, it was so helpful to have that guidance and input to make them as specific as possible. The “when” was defined to a specific time of day, for how long, a specific amount of times per week, etc. Details of how and where were even discussed to give it shape and tangibility. It opens the door for them to even visualize themselves doing it because of the level of detail in the goal setting.

I’d love to say that I came home with the gifts and action items from each of those practice sessions at Star House and that I’m successfully in incorporation for all of them, but the reality is that I’m not. And we need to be prepared for this with our clients as well. In my limited practice sessions with other clients since being back home, I have really enjoyed touching base with them post-session to see how things are going. This reaching out feels good and I think it sends a powerful message to a client that we care, not that we wish to hound them about their goals. Secretly, we do want to hound them :). I can see a definite contributing factor as to why I didn’t incorporate on some things and that is that I didn’t establish the accountability person(s) that I committed to to hold me to the action items. If I let that slip as a practicing coach then I can be assured that this will happen with clients as well. In some cases, we might be the person holding the accountability for them and while that is something else to have to manage, I would prefer that over my client not having someone to do that for them. In the case of relapse to old ways or “snap back”, I would love to offer some education to help them understand the inner workings of human change. I can think of a worksheet I’ve worked with in the past around identifying competing commitments that would be extremely helpful. There are tons of articles that can be shared around brain programming. I think this is where we follow our gut and offer anything we think will empower their goals and make change not only possible but inevitable!

The discussion topic and visualization exercise we did with Ivy pertaining to ideal client really has my mind working in many directions. I think there is a tendency to want to coach a demographic that we’re familiar with. Maybe we have personal experience with that type of person or we ARE that type of person or we have been through what that person has gone through. I can’t help but try to tie this back to Bill Plotkin’s Wheel of Life and ask the question; is our desire to coach individuals that we closely relate to our way to revisit incomplete parts of the wheel that we still have tasks to complete and somehow work through those through coaching? By coaching others through issues we experienced but may not have handled so well, are we learning the intended lessons through the client/coach experience? Besides that deep and possibly nonsensical question, I do firmly believe that a coach, therapist, councilor, or anybody working with another individual can be highly effective if they’ve experienced a similar life, a similar event or challenge, a tragedy, ect. The saying “you can only understand it if you’ve been through it” comes to mind. I think it’s important as coaches to convey to our clients stories of any commonalities we may have to help build trust and rapport with them, but not in a way that comes across as “here’s what I did to get through it. We want them to find their answers but we can skillfully guide them tapping into our experience as a resource.

[David Fontaine]

Hi Deanna! As I read your post (specifically the statement “I have found that I want to work with people who are like me, and who are going through challenges that I have faced or am faced with currently.”, I think that many of us are in this same frame of thinking, whether consciously or subconsciously. Our strengths lay in our past experiences, our life lessons, what we’ve come to know we’re good at……and who we want to reach will likely be a reflection of those things. There’s huge benefit in being able to share your personal stories, when appropriate, that might give some comfort to a client that they are working with someone who understands what they are going through. While I type this, I also consider the pitfalls of having this type of clientele where we’ve been through what they’re going through. The challenge will be to keep our own experience and our resolution to the experience out of the picture, leaving space for them to come to their own realizations. When I think about my past encounters with what I would now call my ideal clients, that was centered around advice giving or “here’s what I did” in an effort to be helpful. As humans, this is almost a natural tendency that we as coaches will need to disconnect from our brains. Additionally, we need to be prepared for any emotional relapses we may have in hearing someone going through a similar issue and keep those emotions at bay.

On a completely personal note, I absolutely love your inclination toward working with young women as I see that as such an important group to focus on, especially these days. You’re a perfect fit and a prime example of how powerful a woman is and should be in this world!

[David Fontaine]

Susan, I am seeing those ways you are showing up in the F Yeah way of being in all of our communications and it makes me so happy!

Coaching is absolutely impacting my parenting!! I am HEARING way more from her than I have ever heard. And by that I mean I am hearing beyond her actual words. I find myself asking her open ended questions a lot to get her thinking more abstractly about different things. When we’re in nature together, I invite her to lead, I don’t speak a lot and I sense myself taking on her powerful sense of playfulness and curiosity. We get down in the dirt and investigate together and I challenge her to identify what we’re looking at. Coaching has added a dynamic to our relationship that I have been seeking since I moved here. It’s incredibly special. Thanks for asking about that 🙂

[David Fontaine]

When I think about guiding, I lean toward the population that has little to no outdoor experience or connection to nature. Throughout my life there has been a common synchronicity for me and that is that I have been fortunate to be influential in many individuals’ first time connecting outdoors. This part of my life has been very influential in my own path and why I am in this course. I’ve always been involved in many outdoor activities and spent a good deal of my life doing that on my own. Often, friends would get curious about it for themselves, even though they had never kayaked, hiked, camped in the wild, ect., and I would invite them along with me. The reaction was always the same. “Wow, I can’t believe how peaceful it is out here”. “I haven’t thought about work or home life once while we’ve been out here!” “I feel like a different person after this weekend!” I always take so much joy in hearing this and, even more so, getting to witness it! Something clicks for them and they get hooked on it. I believe these experiences open so many doors for people and can very likely lead to a lifestyle change toward a more nature centered life. I think of it as being a mid-wife. I invite them along and then I step out of the way and let nature and the individual do the rest. There’s an opinion that “some people just aren’t ‘outdoorsy’, they don’t have it in them.” I have never agreed with that because I’ve witnessed the least likely people to strap on a life jacket and start paddling a kayak that you could ever imagine! I like to say “they’re not “outdoorsy YET”. Young, Haas and McGown say,
“The big idea behind Indicators of Awareness admittedly rests upon an assumption on our part – the assumption that connecting with nature is a natural thing for human beings to do. If this is true, then certain outcomes and qualities will emerge within the nature of the people themselves.” (Coyote’s Guide to Connecting With Nature, Chapter 12).

While I am on the fence about having my own practice after this course is finished, I have still imagined working with this type of demographic and see myself doing so with a combination of outdoor adventure activities, nature connection activities (such as meditations, sensory awareness exercises, encouraging connection routines in their personal life, etc), basic environmental conservation education, and coaching. I see it being a diverse offering that opens up more opportunity for longer term clients. It also allows for creativity to flourish in tying all of these pieces together. There may be clients who never want the coaching piece but can still be clients in other aspects of the offering. There may be some who I can create a program for to include all of it. There’s so much opportunity to incorporate coaching without even calling it that or with the client necessarily knowing it is coaching (the Coyote way!), just by getting them to agree to go outside with me. There is a big part of this that will be reliant on the EBI teachings of nature connection as this is my first formal training in the subject. Coyote’s guide uses the analogy of musicians/bands who get their start playing and mastering cover songs. “First we get really good at playing the creations of other people, then as we internalize the principles behind the songs or the Activities – we begin to write our own”.

I don’t know that there will be common categories of goals in these clients once their first real connection to nature has been established. It kind of opens the floodgates as they start to see the bigger picture and realize they don’t have to struggle through the things they have struggled with for so long. The thought here would be to start small with them and then, as confidence builds, start working on the bigger goals they have.

My google search yielded a program that First Descents is partnering with REI on to introduce the outdoors to folks who have limited to no experience. The program seems like it relies completely on the experiences themselves in its claim that they will lead to personal growth and development within its participants and, while I don’t disagree that that is possible, I feel like there is an element missing that could forge that even stronger. Teaching even the most basic awareness skills and opening up a client’s mind to really SEEING nature is key to their success. I could float down a river all day long and not really see what is being reflected to me if I’m socializing with other participants or caught up in taking pictures of beautiful scenery (all of which I have been guilty of myself many many times). At the end of the day I’ve had a nice day outside and got a sunburn. So, in some cases, the activity itself may not have a big impact or any impact at all. Activity with a specific intention to learn from and connect to nature is needed.

Another program targeted for my ideal client is a program called I Can. Theirs and many other programs that try to lure newbies outdoors are built solely around teaching “outdoor skills” or teaching basics of specific outdoor activities. Again, this obviously can be very beneficial and powerful if you’re teaching primitive skills, but if we’re just doing the activities, how are we connecting with nature? Think of the experience one could have if you discovered they resonated with the natural element of fire and then you taught them how to build a primitive fire and have conversation with it.

[David Fontaine]

Hi Maria! Great question. My immediate response is that this current crisis has put most of the human population into an unexpected Severance. We’ve had to give up a lot of what we built our lives around (jobs/income, socialization with others in a face to face sense, exercise in gyms, freedom to go wherever we want whenever we want, etc) and we’re now being invited to create a new way of being. The problem with this is that it is a largely unsupported Severance for many. Many are struggling with change, isolation, anxiety, fears of the unknown with no-one to guide them through it. So I see a call for anyone to reach whoever they can in a supporting role. It’s a call to take as many people as we can into a Threshold-like experience and that could take many forms. I’m showing up for my family and friends by checking in on them and exploring any insights they’re having in this new way of being. Or, conversely, being curious about the fears and uncertainties they’re having to see where those are truly rooted. You’re right, I am rooting into trust with everything I have right now and I know that showing up fully at work and relying on my natural ability to remain calm is being seen by others. I see an opportunity with each customer that I pass by during the work day as a chance to positively impact their day. If I can get them out of their heads even for a few minutes with some compassion and listening, then I believe I have benefitted them.

[David Fontaine]

When I reflect on Foundation 3, I think about the “critical space” exercises we did out at Star House on that beautiful morning of day 5 of the face to face intensive. I was really surprised with my sensitivity to feeling the threshold and critical edge of others. With my first partner particularly, I would approach her and then would be standing with a foot in the air, contemplating whether I could go the last step because I was sensing the boundary. Each time I was playing with that last step, she indicated I was there. As I think about this as it applies to my life right now, I am understanding why I have been very often triggered at work, where it can be a full day of dodging around people in close proximity. It has certainly made me more aware of how I honor others’ space in that environment. I remember we played around with this exercise, changing the approaching person’s intention and how that did have an affect on the feeling of that interaction. This was a great exercise for building onto our own personal leadership and creating awareness for how our proximity and our intentions can affect others.

It was touching to read the very vivid recollections of the cohort on their experiences being guided in threshold. This should serve as a reminder for any of us having doubts in the process or in our capabilities as coaches. Our experiences left lasting impressions on us and it sounds like many of us are incorporating the action items from those sessions into our lives now. If that can happen out on the Star House grounds, it can happen anywhere. WE witnessed and supported those experiences by showing up for each other as coaches and as clients. Threshold time for me in some ways felt like a relief in the role of guide. Severence can be a lot of hard work and energy and, when the deeper need is reached, it’s like breathing room. Now we get to go explore this and invite nature to participate in the process. From a coach’s perspective, we’re witnessing nature participating in our client’s process but I think one of the most incredible things that happens here is that our client now becomes part of nature’s reflection to US. Now we’re in kind of a multi-dimensional learning process and we can ask ourselves the sacred questions to find deeper meaning in that for ourselves.

One big takeaway for me is tracking of the energy within threshold. This is so crucial to the process and having awareness of the energy flow can help us guide the process. We’re looking for that peak of energy within threshold and then a decline in energy as that sinks in with the client. It almost feels like a realization that there’s now work to do to achieve this way of being. While it can be envisioned and felt as though it’s already been attained, we must now guide them into creating some goals that will feed that new path.

[David Fontaine]

Susan, what a beautiful account of your threshold experience! What stood out for me was “We may do all of these things and our clients are the ones who ultimately choose whether or not to show up and step in to growth, deep self awareness, and learning.” You chose to show up for that session as a client and had a powerful experience, even though you had some initial hesitation because you hadn’t spent a lot of time with that individual. I believe a coach’s demeanor and presence can set the stage for calming worries and inhibitions. We’ll all encounter this, particularly with new clients who we may have never met or spent time with. My question for you is, what qualities of yours as a coach will elicit this same type of dropping in from your clients when they arrive that day with the inhibitions you felt?

And a second question, in what ways are you saying “f*ck yeah to all parts of your life TODAY? 🙂

[David Fontaine]

Rollin, thank you for your reflection and kind words, my friend! As far as a direction, I’d say I feel a pull to the south. The learning portion certainly feels like “the heat of the day” and very busy for me as I practice applying what I’m learning to all parts of my life. Also, while this time is busy and a lot of work is being done, it also feels like I’m doing what feels good. Getting to practice this knowledge and seeing the fruits of that practice has brought a smile to my face on several occasions. And whether I’m doing that with a practice client or out exploring with my girlfriend’s daughter, the benefits and impact that I am able to make is truly a gift to me. And to answer your question, yes, I want to master active listening and coaching presence. It would be a goal to have a my clients talk of their experience with me the way Susan so elegantly wrote of in her share of her threshold time.

I pulled this quote from your share (which sounds like a damn Thoreau caption!) “Nature turns out to be the hero character in this story. The participation of nature was clear in the speed of a downhill slope and the struggle of an uphill climb. The wind chimed in with wisdom and the birds whispered until something was cause for alarm in the area. Nature spoke softly in my ear…the lessons that no human could utter.” This reminds me of my threshold time when you coached me in the Fishbowl session. A literal “downhill slope” I felt no reason to go down and a literal “uphill climb” to finish out my threshold time! Nature surely showed up that day and you played off that so skillfully. Your point is so true in that, with both client and coach putting full trust in the reflection from nature, the possibilities are limitless as to where that session can go! Thanks for sharing your experience and it’s wonderful to see how something that began as very triggering for you ended up in a positive place, one that you are still reaping the benefits from today from the sounds of it.

David

[David Fontaine]

It feels like it’s been a year since we were at Star House for Foundations as I think about my experiences in the threshold there. It can be difficult to remember a lot of the details because I feel like I’m in another dimension when I’m in threshold. Being a part of the coaching experience in general makes me feel that way. One session stands out in particular that had a lot to show me about my coaching. My topic was around my desire to be less influential on and more patient with my partner’s personal growth. I wanted to let her find her own aha moments and feel her own pulls. My coach and I entered the threshold and I felt pulled to go to the labyrinth. I remember getting there and just staring at it, not sure how I wanted to use it. My coach could sense that and offered a suggestion to walk in it. Even with that suggestion, I don’t think he had any idea how that would play out. That, to me, was a demonstration of absolute trust in nature and the process. He asked how I saw his involvement in the walk and I preferred him to follow along. Throughout the walk around the labyrinth, he checked in periodically when he felt things were happening. He asked good questions about what I was noticing. The first thing I noticed was that I was walking really slowly and carefully because there was ice in the path. He asked what that was showing me and I replied “it’s showing me to be patient because normally I walk really quickly”. He then asked “what if you used this same kind of slowing down and patience with your partner?” And I said “it would give her room to grow on her own time”. I then used a metaphor of a flower and how it grows and blooms in its own time, exactly how nature intends. I continued walking and, when I got to the end, I stood before a pile of randomly placed rocks. I immediately smiled and started to tear up as I paused there. He touched base with me again, sensing something was happening for me. I told him I was seeing this pile representing my partner. Each rock evidence of her own personal transformations to this point. And while the pile looked messy and disorganized, I said that it was perfect just the way it was and that I wanted to just be a witness to the pile continuing to grow.

My coach had an incredible sense of when to be quiet and when to check in (Coaching Presence: accesses own intuition and trusts one’s own inner knowing). He tied little bits of our past conversation into the threshold experience to make it more impactful (Active Listening: integrates and builds on client’s ideas and suggestions). These are both competencies I feel good in but want to continue to build on as they are so critical to the client/coach relationship. I really felt like we were connected and going through the process together, not as me doing it and him observing. Each moment was guided whether that involved any kind of interaction from him or not. He was open to not knowing where the threshold time would take us and wasn’t afraid to take a risk by asking “what if you walked in the labyrinth?”
Nature participated by reflecting to me things that made my experience powerful and gave it weight. I had no idea there was ice in the path prior to entering it and that made me slow down, which an insight was gained from. The rock pile to a passerby would be just that, a rockpile. But in the threshold time, it was there for me and it represented my partner. We can never know how someone will interpret what is reflected to them or how powerful that experience will be for them. My job is to intuitively guide the process from moment to moment and support them. It reminds me of a quote from The Way of the Wilderness when Steven Harper says “Trust process, support process and get out of the way. If in doubt, do less”.

[David Fontaine]

Reviewing the material in Foundation 2 takes me back to Star House and sparks memories of working in the severance phase with partners. There were times when it felt really successful and others when it felt like we just rode on a mary-go-round for 30 mins, complete with the dizziness and confusion of a ride coming to a stop, haha! I found myself trying to remember all the ways to actively listen and engage them all and, in turn, found that consciously thinking about doing those things led to me not listening well. There’s a state of surrender we can be in where active listening happens subconsciously, if we can get out of our own way. Once I let go of trying to control my listening, I found I was able to pick up on the shifts in baseline. I was able to sense power words. I was feeling into where the conversation was flowing and reflecting back to my client, either for confirmation that we were on the right track or for further clarity. All of these things led to powerful questioning that made the client pause before answering. We were able to get beyond story and move into the deeper need. One big take away I have that relates to working in severance is that there’s sometimes a need to pause the session and regroup or just simply ask where we’re going with it. This didn’t feel natural to me at first. It felt like I should be able to get them through severance no matter what was thrown at me. But by giving myself permission to put the brakes on for a minute when needed, we were able to see where we currently stood. That in itself can bring clarity to the client and I found that when we got started again, we had a more successful exchange. I learned and am still learning that working in severance isn’t easy and it’s not always going to be hashed out in time to move into the threshold and incorporation phases within one session. Being okay with this is also a challenge for me.

As I’ve gotten into a few practice sessions back home, I’ve realized how it can be pretty easy to sense level of interest vs. level of need in the client. It’s interesting to see this playing out in the interaction with them. It also inspires some creativity for how you can move someone into a more desired place, if you feel you have someone who is on the lower end of interest and/or need. I find myself, as I’m listening to a client throughout the sessions, picking up on important little gems they share that I store away and can circle back on to heighten interest or raise the energy level when needed. Tuning into things they enjoy, things they’re good at, or things that challenge them are all useful in getting them into a more balanced state of interest/need. I enjoy incorporating connection and awareness exercises into the sessions that build onto the experience they have with me and it seems to be successful in rousing more curiosity into what else they don’t know about their own connection to the earth. As we discussed in our cohort forum, ecopsychology has an important role to play in coaching for us. We can be a midwife of sorts in our clients re-connection to the environment. Ultimately, they have the resources within them to cultivate this connection, we only help to create the awareness.

[David Fontaine]

Hi Leslie! First off, I feel like I’m reading an assigned reading when I read your posts, haha! They’re so thoughtful and wonderfully written. I just wanted to share that.

Secondly, I really connected with your statement that “both ecopsychology and coaching are meant for everybody, because no one can afford not to connect with themselves and the world around them.” This is so true to its core and necessary for the well-being of society and the world. As we keep diving deeper into this course, I feel a stronger and stronger need to build education and practice of the education into my coaching. Education on what it means to be connected to ourselves and the earth. Education on how to make those connections. Education on us and the earth not being separate from each other. I think of this knowledge as life saving or life giving knowledge that literally everyone should have. Much of the world doesn’t value themselves and that is apparent with the condition of our environment. I don’t think coaching clients on just their issues will make the necessary connections for them to remain engaged in their life and the care-taking of the environment long term. We must be teachers as well as coaches.

[David Fontaine]

Sir James! I love this idea of using imagination in our practices and it brings some things to mind for me. By engaging imagination in these interactions, we’re removing or disabling in a way a brain function that can limit our experience. In talking to a tree, per your example, if we approach that conversation without imagination, we’re left with our brain telling us this is a fooling one-way conversation. With imagination, we can get a response because the brain doesn’t have any “real” experience to go back to and make connections to….and the question I’m asking myself right now is, where is that the response coming from? Is that the soul answering? Is the soul the source of our imagination?

This also makes me think that the more variety and creativity we can build into our practices the more apt we are to limit the automated brain responses that have a tendency to keep things kind of surface level. If we can create unique experiences for ourselves while doing these practices, we’re almost programming in the types of experiences we want to be influencing our minds.

[David Fontaine]

In Psyche And Nature In A Circle Of Healing, Buzzell and Cholquist define ecopsychology as “the study of the psychological processes that tie us to the world or separate us from it.” All of us are inherently built to understand our human nature and our relationship to the earth. A healthy understanding and a living of this natural way of being comes with habits and behaviors that are reflective of that…..the person taking care of the earth in the same ways he/she would take care of him/herself. Many human beings live in a state of forgetfulness of this connection and, in turn, struggle with the physical and mental symptoms of this way of being. In fact, we’re the only living things on the planet that can mentally separate ourselves from the earth. Seeing nature and the earth as something that is separate from ourselves can lead to mistreatment of the earth because we don’t consider them as part of our personal sphere of things to take care of and manage. This speaks to the psychological processes that can separate us from the world. When Theodore Roszak writes about the principles of ecopsychology, he tells us that the goal is to “awaken the sense of environmental reciprocity that lies within the unconscious”. That’s where Coaching comes in. In some respects, Coaching could be considered applied ecopsychology, from a non-clinical perspective. And like ecotherapy, coaches aim to reconnect the psyche, the body and the earth. As coaches, we have the opportunity to be a part of this awakening, or reawakening, as I prefer to state it. We get to take clients onto sacred land and watch it interact with our clients. We get to teach them about how the reflection of nature is a reflection of their internal state and how it can be insightful on their behalf. We encourage personal empowerment in our clients, which is another principle of ecopsychology that, when supported, “nourishes the ecological ego”.

“The oldest healers in the world, the people our society once called ‘witch doctors’, knew no other way to heal than to work within the context of environmental reciprocity.” -Theodore Roszak

This blend of Ecopsychology and Coaching adds to my interest as a Nature-Connected Coach because it seems like a less “activisty” way to get people on board with the environmental movement without them really even knowing they’re getting on board. Just by coaching, we can re-connect clients with themselves and the natural world and postively impact their impact on the earth. I can say that initially, I didn’t see Coaching having this far of a reach. As a coach, I want to instill nature-connected routines in my clients that create lasting connection and that build better habits that serve the earth and themselves in more substantial ways.