[Wendy Barnett]

I haven’t had practice clients until very recently but have found that I have been able to bring in the concept of Partswork to my 2 most recent clients, both of whom are now paying for my services.
Partswork has always resonated strongly with me because it made sense and I’ve always found that when I can understand something myself, I can explain it to someone else in a way which resonates for them. With Maggie, I talked thru the concept, which she understood, but haven’t yet been able to follow up on this. However, she’s a lawyer and works on facts and information, so I sent her a written summary of what Partswork is and how she might dig into her own parts. I’m looking forward to working on this with her because I can see some parts which show up and I’m excited for her to discover them and be able to understand how they inform her behavior and reactions to situations and people.
When Lauren and I worked on this at the retreat cabin, it was fascinating and a little scary to watch how a part will show itself, whether or not you want it to. I distinctly remember her child showing up in a very powerful and ‘I demand to have a voice now’ way. It surfaced so much for her, and that was while we were simply working thru’ what parts she thought she had.
As a coach, this was the module which resonated most with me and, therefore, probably the one I will default to based on comfort level. We do tend to speak the language ‘a part of me…’ so I believe that it resonates with people who aren’t coaches. I have also seen this play out already with Maggie. However, I don’t intend to use it exclusively, it’s just another tool in the toolbox – I consider it a great foundation. Even today, during my coaching session with Blayne, while we didn’t speak about Parts, she was explaining how her current leader triggers her because he reminds her of her mother. I haven’t ventured down this path but, in my follow up notes, have noted that we need to explore this as it’s come up in both sessions so far. I want to explore the part of her that’s triggered and why so that she can learn to manage it. For now, we talked about a mantra to manage her emotions in the moment but I am confident that Partswork is just around the corner!
In reading ““Self, Soul, Spirit”, I was interested to see that Roger assigned animals Roger to his parts. When Lauren and I did this activity, I wrote down animals and objects which aligned with each of my parts (and couldn’t help but build my whole mandala); I found this to be very helpful as it gave body to a concept and helped me to relate to each part in a way which helped me understand it. I would, without a doubt, encourage a client to do this as it helps to bring the part to life, give it emotions and makes it relatable.
Another interesting article was “Part 2, Changing for Good” – the concept of the rut and the sheer effort it takes to rewire the brain, the idea that failure is not actually failure but just an opportunity to do it differently and better next time, it’s just a relapse – it’s forgiving language which is so important when we are trying to change habits and behaviors; our Judge/Critic can be very vocal at these times. I’d likely recommend this article to clients who are seeking to make a change as it explains just why it’s so hard to effect change so that it becomes integrated into our lives.
So, while I’m still at the beginning stages of coaching clients, I know that this will be a powerful tool for helping my clients to understand themselves and their behaviors in a healthy and, hopefully, non-judgmental way.

[Wendy Barnett]

Summary:
Before this module, I had never really considered the type of client I would want to work with, nor had I considered that I could choose not to work with someone. Saying ‘no’ is very hard for me so this was a powerful realization. Since this realization, I’m very clear about who I want to partner with and think that it will likely make me a more effective Coach.
The other aspect of this module is the concept of being made up of different parts. I’ve always known that there are aspects of my personality which, literally, drive me to behave a certain way and to take risks but, before this module, I never understood why. Having a deeper understanding of what makes Wendy Wendy is incredibly empowering.
Of everything I’ve learned, I feel that Partswork is something I’d like to bring to my clients because the language and the concept seems to be easily relatable to anyone seeking to develop a deeper connection to themselves.

[Wendy Barnett]

Summary:
As I went into this module, I found it hard to imagine how such a seemingly structured process could work. We studied the theory and the many components of the threshold experience but I found my brain telling me that it felt awkward and unnatural. However, the experience that Lauren describes above felt quite the opposite – it flowed so organically and she was the one who took the deep breath and the end and said she felt complete and ready.
I recognize that this is not always the case and I have continued to find it hard, at times, to help a client to identify the deeper need. Much as Amanda has said, I find that I can get into my head and be too focused on the desire to get to threshold; I have to remember that we won’t get there every session and that’s OK. As long as I remember the sacred questions, try to guide my client back to the want and deeper need and away from story and partner with them thru’ the session, that’s likely a good outcome.
It’s clear to me that it takes tons of practice to become skilled at the severance process but I’m also committed to it now that I’ve witnessed it have such a powerful impact, literally, on someone’s life path and relationships.

[Wendy Barnett]

Response to Amanda:
Thru’ the year, I’ve watched you torture yourself over the notion that you have to get it right! You are an intuitive and gentle guide and I recommend that it would really benefit you to continue to recognize when you get in your head and call a time-out to remind yourself to simply stay with what feels right.
I often forget about the power of the sacred questions but this could be a great tool for you if you sense you’re getting in your head – stop, ask a sacred question so that the client can talk and you can get out of your head and back into your awesome coaching flow.

[Wendy Barnett]

Response to Lauren:
I remember this session as if it was this morning! It was truly one of the most powerful experiences in the whole program to have the privilege of guiding you thru’ that threshold experience. At the time, neither of us knew how it would turn out but, your life now…wow!
As a coach, for some reason, this session stands out for me as something which just made sense and flowed pretty organically. The want and deeper need seemed to surface fairly quickly and then it made sense to move to threshold. As you say, we moved to the swing and Nature just became part of the experience. It was a safe and comfortable space which seemed to nurture you in a way that you were able to envision the future conversation with your mom.
(I often go back to that spot as it has amazing energy, particularly with the memory of that session, which seemed to break your heart open in a beautiful way!)

[Wendy Barnett]

Summary:
As I think about my goal of bringing Nature into corporate America, I know it’s going to be critical to find the right language so that people can be open to the concept that we are one with Nature and our planet. It makes so much sense to me and the only way I can think of is to use personal experience as the ‘hook’ and then find ways to help people experience it for themselves.
Many of us point fingers at others when it’s easy to see something obviously harming the planet – exhaust fumes, plastic, cigarettes…but even those of us who are trying to live consciously and ethically contribute to the destruction. I want to do my small part to bring people back to Nature in a way which has a multiplying effect; we all need to role model the behavior. My current favorite quote by Gandhi “you have to be the change you wish to see in the world”.

[Wendy Barnett]

I’m responding to both Lauren and Amanda’s post (since I’m behind!) as all three of us clearly are bonded to Nature and, as Lauren says, Gaia. They both speak from their souls, Lauren with vivid examples from her own life experience, and Amanda from her professional life experience. It’s really about how we remind people that we are not separate from Nature, Earth, our planet but that we a part of it. Amanda, you make sense when you talk about self destruction; it’s so true – that’s what we are doing, every day. Even I in my mountain home, have contributed to the destruction of the forest where my home was built. It’s a conundrum; how to live in this world and have minimum negative impact on it…

[Wendy Barnett]

Reflective summary post that expresses what you are taking away from the module.

It’s interesting that Partswork is not mentioned in this because this is such an integral aspect of the week and one which I think might make Gestalt ‘more complete’ (for me). What I mean by that is that having learned about Parts, people make so much more sense to me, even I make more sense to me! The fact that we are are a complex composition of parts which interact constantly, sometimes in harmony and at other times seemingly in conflict, makes it easier (at least in my head) for me to consider how to be a more effective coach. I believe that having a developing understanding of Partswork and Gestalt gives me the ability to understand my client more clearly; there’s a part of them (or maybe a couple of parts) showing up a certain way while the rest of them is in the background and I can help them to become aware of this and integrate.
As women, we so often believe that one negative thing that happened means we are fundamentally X (unlovable, unsuccessful, unattractive…). However, we can guide our client to awareness that there is only 1 part of her which is owning that negative introject and that in that moment that part is dominant, but by experimenting to bring awareness to her other parts, she can challenge that introject and bring herself to a place of acceptance again.
I am also excited to become more focused as a guide which means further developing my listening skills. Again, as women, we can often be upset about 1 thing but we tend to pile on so many other issues along with it that clarity can be hard and can make the situation worse. As a coach, it is critical to listen and sense which of the issues has the most energy and then help the client to focus on whichever it is. Our curiosity and opinion is irrelevant; it is all about meeting the client where she is at and guiding her to a place of awareness. During my 1:1 with Katie, she said at the end of the session that she felt that she had learned something that she could use; that was a great thing to hear and will be a goal I seek – guiding my client to a new homeostasis through experimentation and integration, aka ceremony (severance, threshold and integration).
I’m so excited to have done this section of my course as I found it to be fascinating and challenging and wholly in line with my coaching philosophy. Gestalt, Partswork and Nature Connection are kind of inextricable, for me 🙂

[Wendy Barnett]

* Provide us with a short back story of the client. Note: it helps to consider people in your life to create this scenario.
* Unfortunately, I do not yet have a practice client so I will speak from the experience I had on site, how I observed Derek and what I would now do differently as a result of those observations and also from a theoretical point of view of what I will do when I have a client.
* My client had been having an increasing build-up of anxiety over the previous couple of days and leading up to our session. She had indicated that she was feeling overwhelmed and unable to keep up with the expectations of life, professionally and personally.
* Describe how you would Establish the Coaching Agreement
* The first thing I would do is confirm that we are in session by asking permission to be my client’s guide. Then, I would provide the assurance of confidentiality, as a way to create some trust. Then I would ask the very simple question “so, how are you feeling right now?”. This would help me to get some context around the issue(s) which might be current for my client and perhaps start to identify which appeared to have the mot energy. I would find ways to ask questions to focus in on the most important issue and then start to guide my client down that path.
* What opportunities could arise that would allow you to apply the concepts learned in this module, and how would you invite it in.
* As noted above, the foundation of gestalt is about being in ‘the now’ so by asking the question “how are you feeling right now”, this would, hopefully, bring my client into the present moment and give her with the ability to explore those feelings and what might be causing them.
* Something I noticed during my on site observation was how Derek had the client sit on the grass, focus on how it felt and describe it. He also did this with me by asking me to pick up and describe a pinecone. What is fascinating about this very simple request is that, as the client, it is not possible to focus on anything but the object you have been asked to describe and sense; it is a powerful grounding technique which requires nothing complicated or beautiful, just something from nature to bring you back to the present moment. The effect it had on me was to provide absolute focus and actually some joy in the discovery of something I’d never spent any time considering – a dead and decaying pinecone! It calmed me physically and emotionally and while was not an instant cure, certainly brought me out of the terror in reliving the experience and into the safety of the present. It created the possibility of me feeling safe again in nature, something which had been violated with the bear encounter.
* This is certainly a technique which I would use going forwards if I felt it would be helpful to shift someone from memory and the storytelling that can come with that, to the present
* Another thing I experienced myself was the way he shifted me from aboutism into the present. I was deflecting by using humor and recounting my experience so that I didn’t have to fully experience the fear. I’m very used to overcoming obstacles and I do that, generally, by avoiding the emotion and just getting on with life. He clearly saw this and while I can’t remember what he said that triggered me, I remember going from feeling cavalier (while internally terrified) to being utterly terrified, which is when he had me use the pinecone.
Challenge: What I noticed when Derek had to take over my session on site, was that I missed the key issue which was the client’s repeated answer ‘I don’t know’. I didn’t do a good job of hearing that and fully digesting what it meant to her; I tried to get creative and move around and divert but kept getting the same answer. It seemed that I may have contributed to the eventual breakdown in my client; I believe I added to her anxiety of not being able to feel she could meet me with an answer. Knowing (after the fact) that the context of her stress was not feeling able to meet the many expectations she had of herself and that believed others had of her, I can see how this happened. The session ended up actually focusing only on getting her to a calmer place, both physically and emotionally. It was very intense yet calm and my observation was that it took a lot of patience. Interestingly, Michael interjected at one point with a very useful observation – this showed me the power of partnership in supporting someone and reminded me of what Michael has told us about not feeling we need to be everything to our clients; sometimes they may need someone else too or even someone else and not us and that that’s OK.
While I think I listen well, I need to listen more deeply to what my client is saying. As I reflect back, I didn’t understand the significance of the repeated ‘I don’t know’ answers and therefore didn’t simply explore that. Going forwards, I would try to be calmer and slower with my client and connect more deeply through feeling so that I can support and guide more effectively.
When I think about the interaction of Gestalt and Nature Connected practices, it’s almost hard for me to separate them, based on the 2 experiences I had or observed. It’s powerful to be able to ground someone into the present through such a seemingly simple technique as describing a pinecone or sitting on the ground and feeling it and smelling something. Also, when you think of the Threshold experience and the ‘experiment’ in Gestalt, they are both ways by which you help the client to create a new homeostasis. They are also both driven to create awareness in the client, require the guide to have great listening skills and, at their very foundation, require trust.
Given my significant life change, I have not had much recent opportunity to coach at work but I am excited to start now that I have registered as a practice coach.

[Wendy Barnett]

WOW! This seems like an intense session and I’m sure one that you might have had to be very conscious, as you say, of your risk of confluence! I was wondering how you managed to do this in 1 hour (my naturally-established time based on work parameters) so I’m not surprised that this was a 2 hour session. I also really appreciated how you re-focused her back to the original reason she came to you; she seemed to be all over the place and it’s easy to get drawn down the many paths our clients can lead us down.
I’m not surprised because you’ve coached me and I know how gifted you are but Nicole is fortunate to have you as her guide! I’m eager to here more. Congrats on starting the journey as a guide 🙂

[Wendy Barnett]

* Kick-off Question: When you think about coaching and/or guiding others, who comes to mind? What is the population that most excites you, and why? How do you imagine working with them? Take time to consider all that you’ve learned during these Foundation Modules and express how you might work with your ideal client. What would be the common categories of goals that you foresee them working towards? How would you like to collaborate with nature to support their awareness and success? Also, search the web and share with us a few examples of individuals or organizations who work with similar populations. Add to your post, a comparative critique of these organizations based on what you know about Nature-Connected Coaching.
* Use citations from assigned readings (or other resources), your experience over the weekend, and your past experience to discuss your perspective.

I am writing this paper having done 2 days of Gestalt work and 1 day of Parts work so I am aware that I am using language in advance of what I knew when I completed Foundations Four. However, as this is all driving towards an end state, I don’t feel it serves me to exclude this information and language and write from an incomplete place.

I have always been drawn to the idea of supporting the female population, more specifically, women in their late teenage years and beyond, who have experienced a life-course altering event such as the death of a family member or friend, a divorce, bullying, abuse…
I have already met some of these women in my life and can recall the conversations I’ve had with them as it relates to how these events have temporarily defined them or, in fact, redirected the course of their lives for the good, empowered them. I’m excited by the privilege and opportunity to guide them and partner with them into a place of knowing that they don’t have to be defined by their experience but can, in fact, use it to empower them to go on to do extraordinary things and live extraordinary lives.
I also want to remain open to the possibility of guiding men who may seek out my guidance but I have not had the powerful vision of this being the population most in need of my service.

Reflecting on the 4 modules, I would start by taking time to hear how my client’s experience has impacted her by listening to the words she speaks (are they emotionally charged, clinical, neutral), by observing her sentence construction (is it grammatically correct or is it all over the place), by observing her body language (is it congruent or incongruent with her language) and perhaps invite her to explore how her body language reflects her feelings, perhaps even more truly than her words. This will help guide me to know how to meet her where she is at. My ability to move into severance, threshold and integration work will depend on where she is at with these emotions, her process and her healing and her willingness and readiness to explore it all. I believe that it will be different for each client based on her level of emotional distress and even distance from the impacting event.

Common categories of goals:
1. how to feel and become more empowered
2. how to speak her truth / find her voice
3. identify and verbalize her self worth through learning, understanding and articulating her strengths
4. how to build and maintain her self confidence
5. how to say no or yes; both are important
6. how to be optimistic / positive in the face of seeming hopelessness
1. how to find that tiny glimmer of light in the darkness, that ember that can fuel and light the fire
7. how to believe in herself again (if she has lost it)
8. how to reclaim her self respect
9. how to create an alternative / believing in the power of possibility
10. how to develop a ‘yes AND’ mindset
11. for me, as the guide, to create a safe space for her to explore and work outside her comfort zone and face her fear without judgment
12. to experiment with failure
1. how does that impact her self worth
2. what did the failure teach you
3. how did it feel to fail
4. how can you use it for good to empower yourself

How I would like to collaborate with nature:
* get her out of enclosed spaces to free her mind
* take her to places to show her, thru’ living examples, how hard some plants/trees have to work to survive, but still do, against what seems like all the odds!
* Create the opportunity for her to question how this could be analogous to her own life
* take her to an area previously damaged by fire and witness the resilience of nature as it is reborn in this seemingly hostile/destroyed/nutrient-deprived environment (this is sort of the same as the above, but more specific)
* build a fire (safely!) – demonstrate how a huge fire can grow from a single ember
* again, this could be analogous to her own life – if she can find that single, tiny hope, how does she think she can build her future from it (this would be baby steps work!)
* have her pick something up off the ground which looks dead or is dying to see if and how she can find beauty in it
* leaves in the Fall, a fallen pinecone
* take her on a walk without purpose or a map
* has her trust been broken thru’ her experience and can she trust you
* can she lead and trust herself
* can she surrender to not knowing where she’s going or why (this could be analogous to her life)
* if it’s all too much/too soon, just take her to simply be outside
* what does she smell, hear, see, sense, taste – bring her back to self and ground her in the present, not the past, not the future, the now

Other organizations:
* Divorced Moms on a Mission: divorcedmoms.com (this is an online forum of many resources, from legal to emotional, but has no nature connection)
* Meetup groups (Local. Can also include men. Are not necessarily professionally run and may create a social support structure without the therapeutic support. Meetups can entail going for a hike but it isn’t necessarily the main focus of the event and is not communicating as such either)
* Womansdivorce.com: (another website which offers support solely from a procedural and resource perspective: lacks the nature connection)
* Psychologytoday.com offers many resources and ways to connect with groups or individual therapists for abuse, divorce and behavioral issues. There are hundreds of therapists listed, just in the Boulder zip code, who offer professional services in these areas, however, in their intro bios, I did not see any (in the few I spot-checked, who offered nature connection as the foundation to their practice)
* In searching yoga therapy for divorce, no sole practitioners surfaced but law offices and the Huffington post had articles about the therapeutic benefits of some yoga postures but did not offer yoga as the basis for healing and recovering

While my vision is still nascent, I know that my offering is unique and also something that will likely appeal to a specific demographic, even within my chosen client population. I have used nature for my own healing and believe that by sharing this with others, even if it’s not verbalized, my soul-directed coaching will communicate for me.

[Wendy Barnett]

Assignment:
* Kick-off Question: Reflect on your experience as a client in the “threshold”. How does that experience inform your coaching and why? How did Nature participate in your process and what does that tell you about coaching others? What ICF core competencies are essential for you to practice and build on to feel confident in that “place” as a coach? This is not a feedback session to your coach, but a self – reflective response

As I’m very delayed in writing this paper, I’m having to recreate the particular threshold experience I was guided thru’ by reviewing some of my notes. I remember starting in a place which was totally different from the one I finished at. I can’t remember where I started but I know that I ended in a place of intense and overwhelming anger. I was exploring my experience of living an inauthentic life because I was afraid of disappointing others. It revolved around how I show up, feeling responsible for others’ experiences, and how the life I wanted to live was not the life I was living because I felt that I should be doing everything I could to be more successful at work, which manifested as more money, and more senior. I wasn’t happy with where I was living because I felt suffocated in an environment which was not conducive to healthy and authentic living, in my definition of the meaning of healthy and authentic.
What emerged during the session was that I felt very angry did not feel permitted to live the life I wanted to live because others would judge me. A lot of that was centered around my need not to disappoint my father.
By truly digging deep into understanding what was at the root of these feelings, I could start to create a path towards severance. Out in the open, I wanted to run away, as far as I could but Michael guided me through a breathing and visualization exercise which allowed me to become more grounded.
I believe that we all come to the coaching, guiding and therapeutic fields by way of our own personal journey of self discovery, exploration and, frankly, pain. By going through these experiences, as a coach, I believe I am able to create a deeper connection with my clients; we can empathize, sometimes we may even have had a similar experience. Through our own journey through the myriad emotions which are a part of these experiences, we can ask questions and guide our clients into and through their own emotions in a safe way, perhaps having a deeper awareness of the risk involved to them in being vulnerable. I know, in my soul, that as a result of my own challenges in life, I am a more empathetic guide, a better listener and someone who can create a safe place for my client to explore their own emotions, without fear of judgment.
As it relates to the core ICF competencies for me to work on, I believe that they are all, and should always be, a work in progress; we are never perfect at any of them and should always be striving to enhance our skills. That said, powerful questions will always be one of the ones I want to focus on. I have a deep curiosity about people; I love to learn about them on every level, however, that curiosity, as a coach/guide could be misplaced as the dynamic can shift to me wanting to get more knowledge for myself rather than asking the client questions to enhance and increase their understanding and awareness of themselves. (another ICF core competency). As a naturally-inclined problem solver, I can believe that the designing actions competency is easy for me, however, once again, it is important to remember that this should be co-created, with the client leading; I’m not there to provide the answer but to guide the client to actions for which they are responsible and over which they have a sense of ownership.

[Wendy Barnett]

Where does Ecopsychology and Coaching come together? How does this blend add foundation to your interests as a Nature-Connected Coach. How might it fall short? What skills are needed?

I have to be honest, I found some of these papers really hard to read; they took me away from the simplicity of what I’ve some to be able to articulate about nature connection – the simplicity of the Coaching Skills book and the purity of the Coyote Guide – into an intellectual space of words that, for me, complicated the essence of nature connection.
That said, I really found value in the discussions in John Davis’ The Transpersonal Dimensions of Ecopsychology paper and John Scull’s Ecopsycholgy: Where does it fit in psychology. The way that they both discussed the distinct differences between psychiatry, psychology and ecopsychology was fascinating and stretched may brain in a way that really made me dig into understanding the differences, needs they each serve (application) and value they each bring for a given situation. In order to have informed opinions and truly guide in a wholistic way, I believe that it is imperative to be educated and informed on all modalities which exist. By being educated, you can then choose the path which speaks to your truth and be the guide you want to be.
I particularly loved the phrase ‘trees, soils, streams and skies, animals and insects are coparticipants – subjects in their own right with their own precious needs and freedoms to preserve’ in Linda Buzzell and Craig Chalquist’s paper ‘Psyche and Nature in a Circle of Healing.’ I am so often frustrated by the arrogance of humans who exert our will (not power!) over all other things and this concept of being an equal partner to all other things in our universe is a belief I hold true. (As an aside, this week there have been 10 deaths of the endangered white rhino because of man’s impact not only on the land on which these rhinos live but because man decided to relocate them to what they deemed to be a better location. 10/11 died! If you need a real-time and really distressing example of mans’ arrogance, both as we impact nature and the animal kingdom, you need look no further. (Positive intent but devastating impact.)
Theodore Roszak, in his paper ‘Where psyche meets Gaia’, he tells us the ‘witch doctors knew no other way to heal than to work within the context of environmental reciprocity’ and that concept of ecopsychology dates back millennia.
Again, in John Davis’ paper, his descriptions of peak vs plateau experiences was fascinating as I realized the possible transience of a peak experience which, in the moment feels so powerful but, without intention, does not sustain lasting change or transformation. It transported me back to the field at the Starhouse and guided me to question what my experience had been. I believe that, as powerful as it felt in the moment, many of my experiences were peak but, with intention and repetition, they have transformed into plateau experiences as I have put in place changes in my life which are immediate and will be lasting.
Where ecopsychology falls short, for me, is that it seems to create somewhat of a feeling of man-made and industrial is wrong and raw nature is best and I don’t necessarily agree. I think that John Davis says it well when he says ‘Here is a difficult ridge to walk; to the left we have the ocean of organic and domestic tiers, to the right the abyss of atomic individualism’. While I agree that my personal preference is for pure and raw nature, there is value in the argument that many places that are currently accessible to the average human, wouldn’t be if it weren’t for the intervention of man who has created navigable paths through our extraordinary landscape. Hence the ‘difficult ridge’.
John Scull reports that ecopsychology has been defined as ‘a field of inquiry rather than as a set of beliefs’ which lends itself well to the concept of surrendering our treadmill lifestyle to trust and openness.
All of these papers, in one way or another, state or imply (or at least I inferred) that perhaps ecopsycholgy is a term that is not needed; that it’s become an amalgamation of many different modalities, both ancient and modern. The danger is that without a clear differentiation from other modalities, it gets dismissed as faddish.
In summary – as I become a Nature Connected Coach, my preference would be not to label this style of coaching but instead to draw upon the partnership that Linda Buzzell and Craig Chalquist talked of. I consider myself fortunate to be received and supported by Mother Earth and will use her as my guide and, in my role as guide, encourage others to do the same. I want to embrace the unspoiled lands and the industrial so that we can co-exist in a healthy way which enables us to maintain balance, joy and calm. I believe that everything has the ability to heal if it’s utilized in the right way.

[Wendy Barnett]

Foundations One: Summary post.
My life has transformed so radically in the last month that it makes my head spin. For the last few years I have known the type of coach I wanted to be and that it was clearly connected to nature. I knew it but couldn’t find the right certification which fulfilled my career goals but also had a level of credibility in the broader (less enlightened) marketplace. Then, thank you Universe, you gave me EBI; everything I could possibly have articulated and more about my goals; nature connection and a professional certification which would bridge the gap for those perhaps not yet connected to nature as I am but needing guidance.

I arrived in CO believing I was open and ready. I KNEW I was connected to nature and she had helped me to heal – right?! Well, not so much! Foundations One broke me open in the most powerful, transformational and beautiful way – it gave me the gift of being vulnerable in ways I had forgotten how to be and was too scared be. The sacred questions are SO simple yet SO powerful – how can such simple words create such depth of emotion, questioning and awareness? I use them in all my coaching sessions in my corporate world and they feel natural to me and my clients don’t even realize what we are doing; they just jump in, trusting and opening like flowers. The joy of guiding them to an awareness or realization is like no other gift you can bear witness to.

I remember my panic on day 2 at the thought of having to sit in my sit spot – visceral and overwhelming to the point of tears. How I have come to love, cherish and crave my quiet time – my core routines. It’s powerful when you can put words to things that maybe you’ve been doing without even realizing them because it makes them repeatable; they can become routines because you create the space for them in your day.

Friday and yesterday were really tough days for me – the changes I’m intentionally creating in my life are amazing and exciting and they move me daily towards my vision but they are also stressful and at times pretty overwhelming. I was having very strong physical reactions with shallow and fluttering breathing (my heart was fine, this was just my emotions manifesting physically). I was talking to my dear friend and life coach, Toi Lyn, and she asked me to engage in a somatic exercise with her. I closed my eyes and visualized my feeling, high up in my chest/throat and it was the shallows of a river where the water couldn’t flow easily because of all the rocks in the way. The noise was not the beautiful, relaxing bubbling of a stream but a jangling cacophony of disconnected sounds. I realized that the noise was all in my head and the rocks were all the perceived obstacles to my move. I say perceived because when I analyze them, they are not even obstacles, they’re stories I’m telling myself. So, I plan to find a creek and build myself a small representation of this so that I can physically remove these barriers and let the water flow freely.

So, Foundations One, for me, has been learning, personal development, affirmation that I’m doing what I’m meant to do, empowering and, last but not least, meeting incredible people who I am speechlessly blessed to be sharing this journey with. ❤️

[Wendy Barnett]

oh wow “(I already bought the domain: Women Empowering Women Alliance).” That is amazing – you’re already starting to live your vision – I’m so excited for you that you have been able to put a name to it.
Reading your post, I’m blown away by how clear you seem to be around the population, structure and even your offerings. It’s so interesting to see the commonalities in the population we want to serve yet the differences in how we plan to approach it. It just illustrates to me that there is room for both of us (and more) in this unique space!
You really gave me food for thought about my own vision and how I can go deeper – I loved how clearly you had laid it out, particularly your partnership with others to present a holistic offering. I also have that vision but am further behind you in terms of manifesting it.
Your passion for this population comes through so strongly in your words and I can clearly feel the personal experiences which have influenced your soul-direction.
Another thing which resonated really strongly with me was “Many of these women are still single because they don’t have time to date, can’t meet men that live up to their expectations, or constantly meet men that are intimidated by them.”; this is so true for me that I’ve given up. I would love your guidance on how to create the time and space for the possibility of a relationship while never dimming my light or feeling the need to apologize for who I am.
This was such a great post – thank you for sharing it!!