Coach Express

Judith Killen is an accredited life and vision coach, physical therapist, traveller and mother. After losing her sight at the age of 2, Judith went on to study coaching at International Coach Academy, travel the world solo and build a successful career as a “Vision Coach” – > Listen to Audio Interview You can listen to our interview with Judith here and experience first hand the courage and strength that enabled Judith to overcome adversity and achieve her dreams

Tell me more - > http://www.icoachacademy.com/spotlight_special.html

By Bronwyn Bowery-Ireland

I have been working with my coach to take my leadership skills to the next level. This week we looked at an emotional intelligence framework to better understand leadership.

The grid, as outlined below, has four quadrants. To demonstrate great emotional intelligence the aim is to be highly skilled in all four quadrants. My coach began to outline that I was fantastic in three areas but one area was greatly missing. I began to wonder what could it be. I thought I had a pretty high emotional intelligence, well at least that is what all the assessments had reported.

-> Self Awareness
-> Social Awareness
-> Self Management
-> Relationship Management

Then I realised it was self management. Now you would think that we all get the importance of managing ourselves first, or at least equally, to all the other areas above. But this is not the case. I spend great amounts of time everyday managing people at work, socialising with them and developing our relationships. What I often notice is that at the end of the day I feel a little all talked out.

Over time, this feeling moves into a general flattening of my batteries and then eventually the batteries get rusty and need to be charged or changed. Now if we don’t identify the need for recharging or changing then all that is left is the ‘need’. The need grows and we become needy and then resentful and then blaming and then generally all round negative about most things. We cycle down into the space of negative energy, allowing our self talk to exacerbate this feeling until we feel very disempowered to move out of it. Slowly we spiral down into complete darkness, action is not part of our life and we have stalled everything. It really is a pretty bad picture when you think about it and we have all been here.

So what to do:

1. Put in place a self management plan and ask your coach, friends and family to support you in achieving it.
2. Take one step at a time. Introduce one new self management technique at a time. Give yourself one month to practice this every day and then introduce another technique.
3. Ensure your day is balanced between each of the four quadrants. Too much relationship development and no self awareness is not good.
4. Recognise what you look like when you aren’t self managing. Identify the early signals and act upon them.
5. Stay in action, whether it be thoughts, plans or doing. Keep moving forward.

After all this you will feel great as you are not needy and can openly express what your needs are and have them met. Your emotional intelligence will be rocking off the scales and you will feel invigorated and able to give more generously.

I am off to enrol in a yoga class. I will keep you posted to let you know how it is going in a month’s time.

By Robyn Logan

Hey lady, you lady, cursing at your life
You’re a discontented mother and a regimented wife
I’ve no doubt you dream about the things you’ll never do
But, I wish someone had talked to me
Like I wanna talk to you

Artist: Charlene
Song: I’ve Never Been To Me

Do you remember that song? The one that went like this “I’ve been to Paradise, but I’ve never been to me?” Well, I am happy to say that, I’ve just been to Paradise AND I’ve been to me!

I have just come back from a ten day trip to London without my children. Let me just repeat that in case you didn’t get it the first time. My partner and I went on a holiday and our kids went to their cousin’s house for an adventure. Not only that - but I also went off by myself to Portugal for three days out of the ten.

Now I must say this decision wasn’t made easily and even after I made it I still had to deal with that devil-guilt-mother on my shoulder saying things like “What sort of mother are you leaving your kids just to go off and enjoy yourself?”

Well, now I can answer that devil with “I am the sort of Mother who knows that if I take care of myself I can take even better care of my kids!” It’s sort of like the oxygen mask theory, you know the one.. on airplanes when the flight attendant tells mothers to put the oxygen mask on themselves first and then their children. Makes sense really… if you pass out, you can’t take care of your kids.

This 10 day trip was like one great big oxygen mask. I got to do a lot of things that having a 5 yr old and a 3yr old (and a business) don’t enable you to do.

I got to spend long hours just walking.
I walked for miles through the streets of London and then later I walked fro miles along the beach in Portugal (from Espinho to Aguda to be exact!). That sort of long, lazy walking doesn’t happen very often, which means that the sort of thinking that happens on long walks doesn’t happen very often.

I got to read.
And not just business, marketing or coaching books, but an actual novel. And quite a dense one (Wolf Totem by Jiang Rong).

I spent quality time with Deb (my partner).
We actually had conversations that weren’t about who was picking up what kid from which activity at what time (can you relate?) And we had absolutely carefree fun, something that also doesn’t happen that often with both of us working full time.

I spent quality time by myself.
I have always loved holidaying by myself and I did a lot of it in my 20’s. I used to book a place for a week or a weekend and just go away and read and walk and be with myself. To have the opportunity to do this again was pure magic.The result of these activities is that I got to step away from my “normal life” for a few days. I got to be “not a mother”, “not a partner” and “not a business woman”, I got to be “me”. It sounds corny I know. In fact I can hear the chorus of “I’ve been to Paradise” in my head as I type.

On the way home on the plane (bumped up to Business Class just to top off a perfect vacation) Deb and I had a mini strategic planning session for our lives and our family. We talked about our vision for ourselves personally, our vision for our kids and our vision for our family as a whole. We then looked at practical strategies we could put into place to make that happen. It occurred to me while we were dong this that what we had done was really no different to corporate planning retreats.

It is common in business for whole teams to go away for a week or so and do some strategic planning and maybe a touch of team building. Business owners recognise the value in getting people “away from the office” and they recognise the value in taking time out periodically to evaluate where you have been, work out where you are going and identify how you are going to get there.

I think it’s a shame that a practice that is very common in business is not so common in our personal lives. In a way I do this sort of activity with my coach every week, but it is not the same as taking out a block of concentrated time. I know for me this is now the first of many. Deb and I have committed to taking three days off a year and going away by ourselves. Our kids will hardly notice, our work will go on as always, but for us the value is immense.

What do you do to find the time to “just be you” and to reflect on your life and plan for your future? Post to the blog and tell us, I’m interested to see how people configure this into their lives.

Alan Seale, leader of the Spiritual Coaching Community of Practice, has recently published his third book, The Manifestation Wheel: A Practical Tool for Creating Miracles.

“In this groundbreaking book, Alan provides even the most ‘left brain’ of thinkers with the means to infuse their work with ’soul’ and ’spirit.’ The net effect of his approach: superior business or personal results achieved with less stress and strain. Finally, a ‘how to’ guide to turn the concept of manifestation into something real and actionable. Skeptics, this is the real deal.”

(Paul Sherman, CEO of Team Coaching International)

The Manifestation Wheel offers a simple, practical, and powerful system for coaches to use with their clients in accomplishing goals and realizing dreams.

Drawing on his deep and profound knowledge of ancient wisdom traditions, how life works, quantum physics, and our increasing understanding of energy fields, not to mention his work with thousands of people who want to bring change into their lives and the world, Alan Seale has written a book that gives you a clear and practical system to do just that.

For many years, Alan used the Lakota Medicine Wheel and its concepts to powerful effect in the building of his life, career, and relationships. Recognizing that the language of the Medicine Wheel was a bit arcane for today’s world, he adapted the Medicine Wheel to create the Manifestation Wheel, a tool that is accessible, practical, and immediately productive for individuals, businesses, and organizations in the 21st century. Now Alan has written the guidebook to the Manifestation Wheel, making this simple yet profound process available to everyone.

Manifestation is a process of alignment of thoughts, intentions, beliefs, decisions, actions, habits, and practices with the desired goal or vision. Rather than being about making something happen, manifestation is about creating the conditions most favorable to the greatest potential unfolding.

The Manifestation Wheel is made up of eight “houses” or steps: intention, peace, energy, guidance, empowerment, action, surrender, and legacy. Through these eight houses, the Manifestation Wheel offers a process that helps readers create the conditions necessary for their vision to manifest. It calls forth the reader’s intuition and develops deeper and higher levels of awareness. Alan explains that in beginning a project, we usually begin by clarifying what we want. However the immediate next question, one that is rarely asked, must be, “What is the greatest potential wanting to unfold?” This is the true catalyzing question. The Wheel takes you beyond personal wants and desires to tap into a bigger picture—a picture of “what wants to happen,” a picture of your greatest potential and the greatest potential of a moment, situation, project, or vision.

A dynamic resource for both coaches and clients, the Manifestation Wheel can be used for any project large or small: to find a new job or a new love, to create a new direction for your life or to lose 10 pounds, to design and implement a new company initiative or to strengthen a work team’s performance. As you engage with and surrender to the process, your vision becomes reality. Equally important, you become more conscious of your contribution to the positive evolution of the mass consciousness and take your next steps toward giving your unique gifts to the world.

In the end, manifestation is not so much a process as it is a way of life—bringing all aspects of your life and work into alignment with your soul, the greater Consciousness, and the greatest potential waiting to unfold. Alan Seale’s new book, The Manifestation Wheel, can be your guide and partner toward manifestation mastery.

Order the book directly from Alan Seale or from amazon.com

For more about Alan’s work and coaching, visit his website at www.alanseale.com