[Nadine]

When I think about coaching and/or guiding others, Women come to mind, most definitely. More specifically at this point, I am sensing a pull towards women in their 50s who find themselves at a crossroads in life, they are stuck in a rut, or maybe they are looking to transition or they already are in transition (relationship, workforce, career, mid-life crisis, finding themselves…) and they may benefit from a greater sense of self and empowerment. Though I understand it is not necessary for a coach to have gone through the same experiences as the clients’ in order to be able to successfully help, I am drawn to this target audience because I am part of it, and I am experiencing first hand some of the struggles one might be encountering. This is a challenging time in someone’s life, a time where we are looking to be more fulfilled, and also maybe a time where we are no longer sure what it is that we love.
I could also consider venturing into business coaching as I feel like my background in the corporate world and my atypical professional journey would lead itself for being prepared for this work.
Another target that comes to mind is young graduates in search of direction for their career. There is a lot of apprehension as to what direction coming out of college.

What excites me when I think about coaching women into empowerment is to be able to create experiences where the clients would live it viscerally. I am envisioning retreats in nature for a few days, but it could also be a motorcycle ride, or even traveling abroad with small groups, but all would have the same theme of exploring, discoving, pushing our limits one way or the other, getting out of our comfort zone, getting back to the basics, reconnecting to ourselves and the world around us, and expanding our horizons. Me, in the role of a mentor, I would hold space, I would be ready to support and willing to encourage. Me, as a guide, would use these experiences as a catalyst for coaching to create meaningful and lasting changes in their lives and for developing an action plan for transforming their life … and the world.
Before these events could happen, I would imagine an already established relationship with the clients and having completed a few coaching sessions to better understand what the client is looking to transform. These elements will be important to understand in order to mold the experiences to access the needed learning (disclaimer: as I write this I am fully aware how easy it is to write and how little insights I have into how I will do that, or even if I have what it takes to do it…)

Take time to consider all that you’ve learned during these Foundation Modules and express how you might work with your ideal client.

I would be looking at empowerment coaching and transformation coaching, and I would design experiences outside the office to use as a catalyst for personal transformation and new lifestyle choices, from family and relationships to life events, personal health, ecological footprint, social purpose… The work would prefe

I didn’t realize how saturated the women empowerment coaching seems to be already unil now. A basic google search lead many examples already. I will have to continue thinking through to come up with a unique value proposition, to distinguish my services.
https://www.empowerlifecoach.com/, support in life, career or business. Claims she empowers clients to get out of their head and into their hearts as they dig deep and discover how it is all connected
https://www.crystalandrusmorissette.com/what-is-empowerment-coaching Women empowering women. Global coalition for women to step into their power.

https://womensempowermentlifecoach.com/. “ My life’s passion and purpose is to be of service to women who want to become empowered to alter the course of their lives. I offer workshops, seminars, keynote speaking and coaching that promote personal and professional growth through the study and practical implementation of proven methods.”
https://www.empoweringwomen.coach/
Through an Ontological approach to coaching, I guide you through the practices of continually choosing love in the face of fear. You will learn how to overcome those all-consuming thought patterns and dim the voices that scream, “I can’t.”

https://www.bemytravelmuse.com/what-is-a-life-coach/ Women adventure tours

https://www.transformational.travel/coaching, Transformational travel is intentionally traveling to stretch, learn and grow into new ways of being and engaging with the world. Offers Transformational Coaching including Pre-Departure Coaching, Go On Your Adventure!, Post-Adventure Coaching.

https://coachfederation.org/blog/coaching-through-the-outdoors. Outdoor leadership coaching combines adventures provided by guides with conversations fostered by coaches trained in International Coach Federation Core Competencies

[Nadine]

Sorry a bit late too… I am planning on submitting it shortly. Hugs to all.

[Nadine]

My experiences as a client in the threshold happened when I was being coached in Nature during the Intensive training in the Aspen Grove.
Each time I was asked “how could we use the environment to experiment,” I had the same initial and skeptical reaction. “You want me to do what?…. Sure!!!” I went along because that was part of the training but honestly I did not think it would yield any learning. But every time, Nature delivered powerful messages and insights and I had to recognize and admit that it was a powerful tool for coaching. But then my mind started to predict that sooner or later I will run out of ideas, metaphors, and there will no longer be any insights. That has not happened yet, and deep inside I believe it will not happen as long as I keep my heart open to it. I have many personal examples to draw from, and have witnessed my Cohort 18 to have many more.
My insights, metaphors found during the thresholds were powerful, visceral, and true. They were many, varied and unexpected, and most importantly always relevant to the questions I was bringing forth. There are still very fresh in mind because I truly had an Experience. Two months later, I can still access the emotions and feelings attached to the threshold, and when I get overwhelmed and do not know what steps to take, I refer back to them, because I truly know they are the doors to my answers.
That said, I know there will be moments of doubt. I expect they will be times, maybe more often than not, when clients or me as a coach will naturally question and wonder whether the process will succeed THIS TIME. I will always remember Sheri’s look of distrust when I asked her the first time to experiment in Nature.
What I learned from my experience is that being confident, and trusting the process will be critical as we are entering into the unknown. Creativity will also be an important part of the equation as we will be actively participating in the threshold experience with the client.
If I were to tie this back to the ICF Core Competencies, I would pick the following:
“Coaching presence, ability to be fully conscious and create spontaneous relationship with the client, employing a style that is open, flexible and confident”.
“Active listening: Ability to focus completely on what the client is saying and is not saying, to understand the meaning of what is said in the context of the client’s desires, and to support client self-expression.”
“Designing actions: ability to create with the client opportunities for ongoing learning, during the coaching and in work/life situations. Promote active experimentation and self-discovery.
I would also add to this list the NCC Core Competencies: “Deep listening: Ability to allow nature to participate in the process, both directly and metaphorically, as an active collaborator and co-guide in the experience.

[Nadine]

I have so many take-aways from foundation 2. Just to recap a few:

Creating and sustaining a high level of trust and candor during a coaching conversation is what gives coaching its power. It requires skills to communicate acceptance and respect.

Coaching is about drawing out intrinsic human resourcefulness.

Coaching is based on the concept of choice and self-responsibility, a.k.a.the belief the client is resourceful and can make choices and is responsible for him or herself.

Coaching is about raising self-awareness as a precursor to exposing the nature of the choices we are making. Realizing that we have choices is in itself powerfully motivating.

Refrain from advice-giving has a coaching tactics. The energy will likely go into repelling the advice (all the ways to defend existing position, amygdala is alerted and ready to resist, conversation precludes any real honesty…). But mostly it doesn’t get to the reason why (e.g. you smoke) and why you might want to stop.

If you step in as a rescuer with clients, you deny them their ownership of the issue And when you lose faith in the clients’ ability to solve their own problems, you are losing faith in the coaching process, thus ensuring that it fails. Even when it is OK to give advice, always better to offer what you said as information, making it clear that the client has to make up their mind about using the decision and positively inviting the client to comment.

Authentic listening is genuine listening, it is about acceptance. When you are in rapport, you will be matching the other person: body, voice volume, breathing, gesture, space, language, pace and energy

Success of a coach always involves high levels of self-awareness and ruthlessly exposing yourself to your own prejudices and assumptions.

The most powerful level of listening for a coach is level 3. Listen for the silences and the hesitations, for the metaphor and for the emotion behind the words. Leave space in the conversation to be filled by the client if s/he wishes. Identify the underlying need that the behavior serves. By noticing the negative energy that the stress is creating, it is also harnessing a willingness to begin to change process.

The coach’s role is to ask questions to uncover the client’s agenda and make it explicit, turning this agenda into the goals which the client can work on.

Traps to avoid in languages are: advice-in-disguise questions, The Why questions, researching the data, asking about people who are not present.

Tactics that work: As a coach you can remain detached from the outcome the client achieves. You do not need to know the whole story. The past is less important than the present and the future. You do not need to be right. You do not need to understand the context in order to coach effectively

Effective questions in coaching raise the client’s self-awareness by provoking thinking and challenge. They encourage the client to take responsibility for themselves. They stick closely to the client’s agenda. They lead to learning for the client. They are more likely to begin with the words “what” and “how”

There are a set of Magic Questions in Coaching Skills on p84

Coaching questions are more likely to begin with the words what and how and coaching conversation reduces itself to three ultra-short questions:
What? – Identifying the issue
So what? – Implication
What’s next – Action

Summarizing shows that you are listening. It also reassures client you are keeping track of things.

The reason clients find it difficult to follow the apparently obvious path is that feelings are getting in the way. Evidence from Neuroscience shows that feelings precede logic in our responses to an event. The Logical solution may be obvious, but remains unimplemented. As coaches, our role is often to help clients articulates feelings that are there but go under recognized.

When you ask a client about feelings, you will often get a thought (you will hear the word that) You are getting a feeling when a client says for example “I feel excited / interested”. There are two natural places to ask for feelings. At the beginning of exploring an issue and at the end when the decision has been made by the client about what to do.

[Nadine]

[Nadine]

Ecopsychology might be a new term, but working in the context of environmental reciprocity was the way of the oldest healers and witch doctors in the world. “Ecotheraphy represents a new form of psycotherapy that acknowledges the vital role of nature and addresses the human-nature relation. It takes into account the latest scientific understandings of our universe and the deepest indigenous wisdom.”

Ecopsychology proceeds from the assumption that at its deepest level the psyche remains sympathetically bonded to the Earth and that this ecological interdependence would be part of the evolutionary heritage that bonds all living things genetically and behaviorally to the biosphere. The perspective that all people are intimately connected and inseparable from the rest of nature opens a new field of research and new ways of addressing depression, anxiety, and stress, by reconnecting with nature and one’s own body.

It also believes that mind-body-world web contains its own freely available healing potentials.

Some go as far as connecting the epidemics of mental distress in industrial society with the destruction of our own habitat and elimination of the species, and that there is a connection between inner and outer devastation. Behaviors leading to destruction of this world, the death of so many living beings and the ongoing distress of earth, air, and ocean life around us, will be experienced as self-destruction.The sick world is speaking through us, and it speaks the loudest through the most sensitive of us. Suggesting that people are bonded emotionally to Earth could read a powerful new meaning into our understanding of sanity.

[Nadine]

Sorry, I will be late posting!

[Nadine]

Hello everyone,

I have so many takeaways, here is a non-exhaustive list in no particular order:

– Power of the community, to hold, to carry, to share the load, to encourage, to shine a light, to make the journey a bit more comfortable
– Community = interconnection (people with people, people with trees, trees with trees, well in fact that are all interconnected, hence to be sensitive to each other, to all)
– Nature heals, provides clarity and comfort
– Nature is the language of the soul and spirit
– Trust Nature will provide
– Don’t be afraid to look like you do not know what you are doing or that you do not have full control
– Nature as a doorway for people to safely connect to their inner journey
– The rich and infinite amounts analogies, symbols, metaphors in Nature to create visual and visceral connections
– Everyone has a different way to be connected to nature. That could be important to understand when incorporating into our coaching practices.
– Many ways to turn your Passion into a Profession: Outreach, grief work, create wholeness through experiences, …
– How important is the choice of words: (Exciting vs difficult), and to tailor the words based on the audience (not all audiences embraces words like soul, spirit, ceremony…)
– Vision: How does it feel?
– Passion comes with living with purpose
– Nature connection = access to Passion
– Awareness of critical boundaries and critical space
– Food to fuel the body and the inner hunger
– Stay hydrated!
– Value of the core routines to stay connected.
– Community to stay connected
– Practice, practice, practice. Use it to lose it!
– Partnership!!

Let’ keep the Fire Roaring!!

[Nadine]

Hello Amber, I really like the sound of developing the ecological ego and the idea behind it, it could be a powerful start. I realize we are not supposed to worry about the “how we will do that” at this point, but I still question how we can be effective in educating, touching lives when the willingness and openness to hear something different aren’t there. When people attribute droughts, changes of climate, etc… to the bible, or other uneducated comments. It makes me seriously wonder if making a difference if even possible in this world of such polarized views. Sorry for my doomed outlook today, I just watched a few episodes of the series “Years of Living Dangerously” where the human impacts on climate changes are explored. I am horrified how disconnected people are.

[Nadine]

At this stage, I am starting to wonder and question how much information is to be shared with the clients to explain some of the concepts, or provide explanation and scientific backing? Much of what I read requires me to process the information mentally, intellectually and that alone strays me away from being connected with my heart and soul. Does sharing such information increase our legitimacy as coaches/guides or will we run the risk to lead and invite the clients to process information intellectually, which may might be counter- productive to our process?

[Nadine]

Hello Sheri, thank you for your post.
Your post details quite well what I also believe are key components to facilitating the learning and awareness building that occurs soon after the guide and the client determine the focus of the session. It is obvious from the experience you describe, from my experience as well, and from the readings that in order for this phase to be successful, both parties have responsibilities. As a client, you mentioned being in a state of oneness and openness, you were willing and committed to do the work. For you to get there though, so also mention having had a solid severance phase, and trust in the coach and the coaching process. That trust will crucial for us as Guides to establish, and it is the Guide’s responsibility to create and provide a safe container. The Guide’s responsibility also extend to establishing a collaborative relationship with both the client and Nature, and to bring creativity to the process.

Any ideas/thoughts as to what we can do as Guides to build that unique and creative coaching presence?

[Nadine]

Hello Sheri, thanks for your post. You are bringing up Story Telling. I like the idea too! When reading this passage in the Coyote’s Guide, I understood how useful it could be when in the role of a mentor, but if brevity is of the essence in coaching, is that a tool we can really use?

[Nadine]

Hello Melody, I really like how you say it: “Ecopsychology tries to explain the why/how and coaching is the doing”. For me it is interesting and it is nice to know it is backed by research but I doubt this is what I will use to persuade others to come to Nature Connected Coaching. I related to that most of that information and with my head, whereas Nature Connected Coaching is to be felt viscerally.

[Nadine]

Hello Kim, I miss you!!

Looks like these articles have triggered quite a storm within some of us!! I was personally mentally blocked to the point that I could not respond to any of you, and spent a lot of time in inaction. So this weekend finally, I have allowed myself to not comment and to move on to a different assignment. It took some time to get there. I am not against pushing my limits (I did learn a lot), but I find it important to honor what feeds me from what depletes and stresses me. I am not a scholar, and I am OK with that.

On the different note, I find the Coaching Skills very useful, palatable and easier to digest. That is where I focused today and that has re-ignited my fire a bit.

[Nadine]

Your son’s comment made me think of this poem from Mary Olivier. Micheal had mentioned it a few times, I like to remember it because it is so real.

The Journey

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice–
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
“Mend my life!”
each voice cried.
But you didn’t stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do–
determined to save
the only life you could save.