Celebrate: What’s the best that we can take forward?
Moments only come once in a lifetime. The moment it’s gone, it’s gone. Just thought it’d be timely to pause and take stock of what has happened in 2020, what is worth celebrating, and what’s the best we can take forward?
I was looking at my diary which i started this year, and found some questions to structure my reflections:
How can you double joy? Or even increase it by just 1%?
How can you double what’s working for you?
How can I better support people around me?
How do I rest?
What’s truly the next level for me? What would the ideal infrastructure look like?
This break has been incredibly healing on a personal and spiritual level. I haven’t really felt so connected with myself in a long time. When I look back at my diary, I notice feelings of stress, overwhelm and exhaustion happened quite regularly, and i couldn’t find the space to celebrate given my packed schedule. So I am real thankful for this breathing space to pause, notice and reflect!
In general, I felt pretty light the past week, and felt a sense of peace that everything is going to work out fine.
I also learnt that celebration is a practice! Sometimes we only celebrate the significant moments, like birthdays - but it’s actually the celebration that makes the moment significant. And i want to create more of such significant moments in my life. We can start by asking, what is worth celebrating today? in this moment, right now?
Caveat: What works for me may not work for you, simply because we are different people. What you could do is to notice what surfaces as you answer these questions, what thoughts/feelings do you notice as you read my responses perhaps? It could trigger experiences you are longing for, back memory lane.
1. How can you double joy? Or even increase it by just 1%?
I noticed that when I sing and play my guitar, time still flies. Sometimes i think music has these very deep pull for me, like it’s hard to pull me out when i’m in the ‘zone’. It’s one of the those things that makes my time fly - I remember the times i used to spend hours in the dance studio in my final year of university, alone, and it was a space free from worries and anxieties.
I noticed that when i manage to create deeper connection with people, it energises me as well. And sometimes that is just telling them what I truly feel.
Actionable steps to choose from:
Create an infrastructure/system that allows me space to have fun with music: could look like going for dance classes, doing covers on a regular basis. It could be guitar jam time on a weekday evening of my choice.
Am running two learning circles related to Enneagram and Personal development, to do my utmost to bring my full presence, to bring value and fertilise these relationships!
2. How can you double what’s working for you?
You are only entitled to the action, never to its fruits.
- Bhagavad Gita
I noticed that i get most things done in the mornings, my energy and concentration is the highest here so it would be great to maximise this momentum. I am most creative and focused in the mornings, after a yoga session!
I discovered through my coaching session with Ervin that working together in teams or just with someone helps me in getting things done, especially tasks i feel resistant too. This has worked really well for openjio, and some work related tasks.
I notice that setting aside time for myself in the morning instead of diving straight into work makes me feel more alive. It’s about recognising and prioritising myself too, that I am important. Sometimes I leave till the end of the day to ‘treat’ myself, but by then i’m already too tired to enjoy this time with myself. Setting aside time for myself could look like doing yoga, writing, setting the intention of who i want to be and what do i want to do.
Actionable steps to choose from:
To start my day with energy, have a short 15 min yoga before breakfast everyday. Really clears my mind.
When I am stuck at something for 20mins or more, get support from people around me!
3. How can I better support people around me?
Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.
- Proverbs 4:23
I am always inspired by how we can grow together, in fuller presence, in wholeness. Supporting me could look like a listening ear, working together with me. Sometimes we often do not know how to support people though we want to…but it could be asking a simple question to understand and clarify.
Actionable steps to choose from:
Notice my own intentions. Ask ‘How are you’ or ‘How can I support’ only when I am truly willing to hold space on focus on the person. Why is it important to me?
Ask, “How can I support you?”
I feel like the questions I learn from circling would be very useful here. Refer to my Circling reflections here.
4. How do I rest?
Self-care is not selfish. Self-care means giving the world the best of you instead of what is left of you.
- Anthea Ong
I think one blessing covid has brought is that since everything outside is closed, it opens up the space for people to look inwards. I think it was one of the factors that led to the birth of this blog! For me, rest is about connecting with myself, my true needs and wants; being able to connect with my feelings even though it may be uncomfortable. Listening to my own voice.
It’s basically doing things that give me energy, and knowing what I do is not about achievement, and about enjoying the process. Knowing when is ‘enough’. Taking time to connect and celebrate with people.
Actionable steps to choose from:
Building connection: Regular conversations with close friends to check-in, how we can support each other
Meditation, taking time to notice what my body is telling me. Often when i feel heaviness in my head and body, it means i already over-exerted myself.
5. What’s truly the next level for me? What would the ideal infrastructure look like?
Maintaining this blog - writing weekly reflections. It’s about creating space for myself, and allowing my intentions to be known.
Maintaining the learning circles, show up in full presence and serve the group.
I think the next level is to attempt to coach people too...but i am having doubts about myself on this, like i need to do more self-work; yet it makes me excited!
Infrastructure: Starting small, asking for support from people around me, declaring my intentions so that i can hold myself accountable. Just like how i am using this blog for that!!
Thank you for reading :) Would be curious to know how these questions and reflections landed for you! What are some things you learnt about yourself that surprised you?
Reflections from a Coaching Workshop
20/6: updated to include my reflections and notes from part 2 too.
I attended a Performance Coaching Workshop by SingaporeWorks on 13 and 20 June! We learnt about various useful distinctions between managing, leading, counselling, teaching and coaching. You can find my notes here for part 1 and part 2. Pre-workshop homework reflections are here, may be good to read both to get a better grasp of the context of my sharing. Or feel free to dive right in!
What stood out for me most were these three things:
1) The intangible aspect of goals I often forget;
2) My experience in coaching N, my groupmate who is from Cambodia
3) My relationship with “challenge”
1) Intangible aspect of goals
When we set goals, we often think about the achievements we want, such as mastering a skill, or getting a degree, or house for example. These are the tangible aspects of a goal.
What we often forget, is what do these goals mean to me? The intangible aspects of our goals. It may become and endless chase for achievements after achievements if we don’t pay close attention to it. Actually, I do feel like social expectations and society’s definition of success ‘pushes’ many people into this direction. I’m not saying that it’s wrong.
There is no connection between the tangible and intangible aspects of a goal, one can feel rich, but empty.
It is worth questioning: what do my goals mean to me? For one, i think i get distracted by what fancies me at the moment. So these questions help to to re-focus on what matters to me most.
Think about your goal - you are actually not after the material aspects of things. If your goal is to earn a million dollars, perhaps what you are after is actually the feeling of financial freedom. If your goal is to save enough for a holiday, perhaps you are looking for the experience of novelty, rest, or relaxation.
I invite you to think about what your goals mean to you:
What is the experience you are looking for? What is the feeling you want to create with this goal?
If I had a magic wand, and you had these achievements you wanted - what would it be like? Where else would you want to experience this?
When i think about this, I think the experience I want is to feel deeply connected with people around me. To feel loved, to have open, meaningful conversations with each other - conversations about our dreams and building each other up with our words and actions. I would like to experience this in my family, and also with my friends and in workplaces.
This is why I really believe in the power of communities - humans are fallible. No one is strong all the time. (That would be borderline psycho)
When we fall, who catches us?
Who are the people we think about? Who are the people I want to surround myself with?
Who do I want to catch when they fall?
We can’t catch everyone. That’s not the point. The point is that even when there is just one person who reaches out, it makes the whole difference to someone’s world.
I want to build strong communities that hold this healing space, so that we can all grow to be more whole and live the lives we truly want.
This is your Why. This is what powers your commitment.
Coaches are powerful not because they impart knowledge. If it were just knowledge-based coaching, the person can only become as good as the coach. Knowing and doing are two different things as well. Americans have the best knowledge in losing weight, yet they have the highest obesity rates as well. Finding out how is not as easy as doing it.
Commitment-based coaching - It’s about doing the practice, identifying what is blocking you, and taking action. With that, growth is infinite!
2) Noticing myself - my first coaching experience
During the workshop, we had the opportunity to get to coach in 2 sessions.
I noticed that when I am focusing on the coachee, i am most in flow. I think about what questions i can ask to support him, and do my best to be a clear mirror that reflects him, asking him if that’s something he really wants to work on. Without judgement, or assumptions. Moments of ‘purity’ i call it.
But there are moments where I notice my own fears, did i catch what he said right? I notice myself feeling the heaviness as he shared his problems - as if it was my responsibility to solve them? The coachee is responsible for doing the work, to continue playing in the field; it is my responsibility to have him reach his goals, and take intentional pauses to reflect and ensure we are aligned to those goals. I notice the tendency to jump in and i want to do this to make myself feel better, instead of holding space for uncomfortable emotions. I notice the feelings of uncertainty, lost - there is comfort acknowledging I don’t have the answers. No one knows, anyway.
3) My relationship with “challenge”
One of the homework given to us after part 1 was to seek feedback from people around us, on whether we are more relationship-focused or challenge-focused.
(Invitation for you to take a pause: which is your dominant muscle?)
Largely the feedback i have gotten is that I am more relationship-focused, though i think in my family i could be more challenge-focused haha.
Through the coaching session with S, I realised this resistance to challenging people comes from my misconception of what ‘challenge’ meant. I realised i narrowly interpreted challenge as being assertive and direct, which could potentially cause conflict. I have the tendency to be conflict avoidant, withdrawing is how i usually respond to tension.
But what I realised when S challenged me to a bigger goal, it gave me more confidence, it felt good. Challenging need not look intimidating; a relationship of growth is when we challenge one another to do better. :) Underlying the challenge, is the belief that ‘I believe you can be bigger’. ‘I see something in you that you may not be able to see right now.’ So the role of a coach is to help people see that potential in themselves too, which otherwise they might not have.
Like what I mentioned in this blogpost:
Believing is seeing. Choosing to see. Helping people to see something beautiful within themselves that they don’t see. Sometimes we forget our own beauty within and we just need people to remind us. We need to remind each other the beauties of our existence, for none of these paths are “by chance”.
Ultimately, what i learnt is that when we focus outwards, these fears become less important. People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. If the intention is to want to care for and help someone, we realise these fears which come from the focus on self will begin to dissolve.
Final thoughts:
The power of noticing and observing are what differentiates good and great coaches perhaps. Noticing what is going on within themselves, and noticing what is going with the coachee.
In fact, if we slow down and notice what is happening within and around us, we may be pleasantly surprised at what we can find.
I noticed that I tend to complain about the feeling of boredom which comes with frustration. This week i notice that if I tried to sit with the boredom, and not jump in to use my phone to distract myself, i become curious about boredom, and how my body feels, what is this boredom trying to tell me?
I haven’t quite figure this out yet - let me sit a little more with it first.