I am a Certified Professional Coach at ICA

Hello

This week I received my certificate … I am a certified professional coach certified by ICA an ICF accredited education program for coaches.

I have worked myself through the classes. ‘Worked’ is the wrong word – I have really enjoyed the international calls, sharing our thoughts on the different themes that were proposed for discussion.

Also I have coached 5 people during 12 coaching sessions each – I was coached myself for 31 sessions.

I have created my own coaching model, have made my own power tool. Also I have written a study on how the very functioning of our brain impacts coaching.

I coached  and listened in  in supervised coaching sessions

It took me overall 2 years with about 6 months of low activity.

I am satisfied and proud of my work and my achievement. Also I am happy that quite a lot of people encouraged me to continue.

It was a great journey : ) – now up to the next: applying my skills as a private coach and taking up additional training opportunities.

I am now looking into gestalt therapy  – the HR department of my employer thinks and talks quite highly about it. If you can send me some info it is greatly welcome.

Speak to you soon 🙂

Tunnel vision versus broad or multi-dimentional vision and coaching

Hello there

As part of my ICA coaching graduation I write a research paper on tunnel vision versus broad vision.

You could wonder how I got fascinated by the subject.

During my coaching I experience that we all have it hard opening up to possibilities outside our own limited world that we see now. For instance this typically shows up when people are looking for new carreer opportunities. They feel unhappy where they are now. And still they find it hard to look outside the experience they have build till now. Off course it is good to look at what you have gained as experience and build on that. But still that omits people to look behind that. To dream big. What do I want to do? Who do I want to be? in case I hadn’t any restriction.

In what directions I am looking at?

In first instance I am looking at what makes us limit our view. And then I come to the functioning of the brain. Currently I am reading a book from Edward de Bono – I am right, you are wrong. He clearly describes how the very functioning of the brain makes us filter what we see and this in turn limits us to return to the big patterns in our brain that were formed based on our experience. We get into a kind of circular movement : we look at the world and our possibilities through the lens of our patterns which filters what we see, thus what we see confirms that our patterns are right which reinforces our patterns and strengthens our filter …

What I am looking at is: what makes us look outside of circular movement of our brains? What tools do exist that I can use during my coaching sessions for my clients to also see other possibilities?

Edward de Bono speaks about: provocation, any given word. I will discover as I move forward in the book how they could serve for me in my coaching.

Also he mentions a program he developed to teach ‘thinking’ at schools called CORT (Cognitive Research Trust).

So in case you can help me with clues to broaden my view on possible tools or share your experience in this area, let’s discuss here on my blog.

I will be sharing my discoveries with you on this blog. Let’s interchange information, thoughts, feelings, …

Ready to receive an abundance of information : )

Hilde

My coaching model – Fluid Goal Oriented Coaching ©

Hello

Please check out my coaching model – Fluid Goal Oriented Coaching on a new seperate page on this blog.

Feel free to contact me in case you want to explore !

Love

Hilde

This fragile balance :)

Hi there,

I find it a challenge to stay in balance now that I am starting a new job (new in content and company) and wanting to develop my coaching practise.

A full time job in a quite busy environment during the day time. In the evening coaching, reading people development books and taking some coaching classes. In between I want to spend some time with my husband and daughter. I also work on softening our communication. I am also organizing a birthday party for my daughter this Saturday (15 young and exciting kids of 8 to entertain for 3 hours). And in everything I do I want to be good.

With this schedule I am currently leaving out my personal time (doing yoga, taking tango classes) and time to keep up with my friends.

Choices ! That is what it is all about… setting priorities and enjoying the choices that I have made and not bothering about the things that I have left out. Choosing what I love and loving what I do.

I need to reflect on the different elements in my life and the time spend on them and evaluate …

What about you ? How are you dealing with the overload of choices we have ? Curious to hear and learn about you.

Give yourself permission to shine …

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of the universe. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” Discover Your Joy…. www.soulexpressions.net

How about you ?

Do you feel free and strong enough to live your full potential ?

Or do you let your fear of other people’s judgement restrain you from doing so ?

How does it serve the world if we all strive to be the average person ‘John Smith’ or ‘Jan Modaal’ ?

How would the world look like if we all did ?

if we all averaged out our specificity, our potential to shine

ooh … and guess what … your specificity will be cheered for by some and ‘boooo-ooood’ by others

Remind yourself  “… people that mind don’t matter and people that matter don’t mind” – Dr. Suess

Do you give yourself permission to be who you want to be ?

Hi, it has been a while since you have received post from me. Main reason for this is that I was in the middle of a job switch. I am now working for one month with my new employer. It is all of what I had expected and a little more of it.

I did not expect great luxury but found that it was worse than I had expected. Also and more importantly I had expected my colleagues to be friendly and understanding and I found more than that. People are really who they are, do not put up a façade (what you quite often see in multinational companies). They are friendly and open. Also I knew that the company organizes personal development training that you can follow in your own time. There I have found a wider range of training possibilities than I could imagine and covering subjects like mindfulness, yoga, meditation, alfa training, being before doing, … There is also an alfa room available as a retreat if you want. Do not imagine great luxury there either (a forgotten room next to the airconditioning motors on one of the top floors, with blankets, matrasses, cushions) : all you need is there ! Great !!! I have found myself a place that really suits me : )

I want to share with you today an aha-moment I had during one of my coaching courses at ICA. The facilitator and other coach-pupils were coaching me on a blocage in one of my coaching relationships.

The background : I had aligned my energy level to that of my coachee who felt quite down and had reasons for it. I didn’t dare to really ask probing questions first to kind of spare her and also because I felt she was overall quite sceptical about coaching and the ’emotional’ approach (how do you feel about … ?). These were difficult questions for her. For 5 sessions I felt little progress.  My coachee did not really share breakthrough steps except for her feeling better after the sessions and also she mentioned that they helped her not to let herself pull down by the circumstances what she would normally do.

I want to share some aha-phrases in my yesterdays session in ICA class : your client is like a mirror of you (she wants to have an impact on her life as much as you want to have impact on her), probing questions : what contract do you have with [your limited belief] ?, what is withholding you to dream big ? but the best one was :

Do you give your client the permission to dream big dreams ? By acknowledging your client for where he or she is, by enthusing him or her, …

And also

Do you give yourself permission to be the coach you want to be ?

This was an eye opener to me : I was withholding myself, not daring to fully follow my gutfeeling in the coaching relationship, being afraid to hurt my coachee. I physically felt a change, an ‘opening’ after having heard that question. Yes, that was it.

‘What coach do you want to be ?’ I would fully stay in my own positive energy, dare to ask powerful questions, accept longer silences, allow plenty of space for the coachee to think.

I believe we (my coachee and I) have reached a breakthrough during our 6th session and have touched on a UAC (underlying automatic commitment=an absolute belief you are committed to). We will be exploring and working on this during the coming sessions.

Do you give yourself permission to be who you want to be ?

In case you feel stuck ask yourself that question. How does the above work for you ? I would be happy to hear about your experiences…

Changing your life towards ‘who you want to be’

I  am changing lives. What a big decision… Not easy to take. You get stuck so easily in a golden cage. Very hard to get out or just step out.

This makes me think about a comment an instructor gave me more than a year ago at the end of an influencing course just before my sabbatical. You will open your cage now, make sure you step out of it to know or understand what is outside.

There is also the story about the baby elephants that are chained at the foot. As a baby they try to break lose but they are not strong enough and as time passes they omit or forget to try convinced that it won’t work anyhow.  Once they are strong enough to break the chain they have forgotten to try…

Some animals that get used to their cage will not risk stepping out once the cage is opened afraid for the unknown.

For me it hurts to let go of my … luxury …

I am or was quite well paid with a lot of financial advantages in my former company. Now I have decided to change jobs. Take a step down in the hierarchy and also on the financial side. Although I am convinced that I will live an exciting and more peaceful live with a much better work-life balance I still have from time to time an akward feeling of having to let go of the luxury. From time to time it pops up and the feeling can be quite strong. Luckily I come back to the ‘who do I want to be’ feeling in the end. And the balance still goes in favor of my taken decision.

What is sure is that changing does bring fear of the unknown (which for me is less applicable) but also and more important for me the mourning of letting go what you had or what you leave behind. It was nice and it has served me for that time. It was the best thing for me at that time. Now it is time for something new, something that suits better ‘who I want to be’ now.

It gives me a great and proud feeling to be brave enough to take this step.

It also helps me advance in my coaching carreer which I develop in parallel of my job. Not only the flexibility of the job enables me to invest time in my side job, my own experience of daring to change my life enables me to help and guide others that think about a life change. I help them bring more clarity in their drive, their dreams, ‘who they want to be’ by exploring all the different elements that come into play for them. And I stay along side them during the potential change to sheer them up when they are having a difficult time, to bring them to ‘who they want to be’. Change as such should not be the driver, only the clarity on ‘who you want to be’. The motivation needs to be a ‘towards’ not an ‘away from’ to be strong and sustainable.

My coaching niche : Inner strength

INNER STRENGTH – By internalizing spirituality, living in the moment, being present, being conscious you bring inner peace & inner balance as a sound basis in your life to live an active life in a challenging and rapidly changing environment.

Spirituality or your inner strength as part of your current active life to fully enjoy and live life enthusiaticly!

I also have lived a stresses, never fully happy, empty, rushing, ‘searching for short & rapid pleasures’ live. I did not know what could exist outside of that as this was the only kind of life I had ever lived and seen around me. Until I stepped into the adventure of discovering myself, my inner self on my pace. I know there is a different life out there. That everyone can live. Only essential thing is to discover your inner self, your inner strength and keep in contact with it.

With that bagage you can then step into your active, challenging life and make the correct choices that correspond with ‘who you are’, ‘who you want to be’, ‘the consciousness you want to be’. You hold this vision within yourself and use it as your inner kompass to make the best choices.

My limiting beliefs about coaching

What’s happening to me ?

I want to become an excellent and  brilliant coach being able to make a living of it.

This is what I came up with during a ‘Reaching your dreams’ workshop organized by a coach friend.

I was so amazed that she had given up her day job to entirely dedicate her time to being a coach. What she did was very professional. I was impressed : very nice 2 sided name cards with a slogan on it, wonderful postcards to anounce some activities of here (a get to getter on the Law of attraction and a business networking club), documentation for the workshop, flipchart, pens & paper, drinks, … Everything was organized super well… and I was impressed. So much even that it gave me an odd feeling. Is it about ‘I could not do this’ or ‘why am I not doing this’ or even something else.

What is withholding me ?

Is it lack of experience ? I am coaching 2 persons now and still continuing my training. This argument tells me to stay put where I am and continue my coaching training. Wait till I am better.

Is it fear of letting go of a fixed job ? Ease of money and security ? yes, a part of me has difficulties letting go and my husband is an essential element supporting this view as well.

Is it the fact that in my group of friends people really do not act enthusiaticely when I speak about my training ? Why ? Because I communicate in a hesitant way – ‘coaching is not a profession but a hobby, not highly perceived’ or is it because they don’t know what it is really about ? … why would I care … Remember ‘people that mind don’t matter and people that matter don’t mind’. Still I do not feel a lot of animo in my group of friends around coaching. My neighbour did and had worked with one. Who else ? Can not think of anyone else. Maybe one of my coachee’s who has spoken about the possitive effects to a collegue who would be interested as well.

Anyhow I need to discover my UAC beneath what is prohibiting me from launching myself in the coaching. I feel I can be happy doing this.

I will be posting a request for coaching on the ICA discussion board. I feel I need some help here : )

To be continued

Integration in the body and cells for sustainable growth 2 – pictures of ‘happy’ water :)

As promised in my last post hereby additional information on the ‘happy’ and ‘sad or angry’ water.

The scientist name is Masaru Emoto and his book on the water pictures is named ‘Messages from water’.

You can admire some of the ‘happy’ watercrystals on the site

http-www.hado.life-europe.com-english-

Enjoy : )

Integration in body and cells for sustainable growth

I love coaching : )

I have 2 clients now and I enjoy every session with them.

It gives me a great feeling to help them, to guide them, to give them a better feeling at the end of the session. This is their feedback. What is important to me is to ensure that it means sustainable growth for them. That they integrate in their body, in their cells the new perspectives. Only then they are sustainable in the long run.

Compare it with people that YO-YO with their wheight. They have a certain perspective from time to time which might be ‘want to be loved’ that will support them losing wheight. After a while they will maybe notice that even being slim this doesn’t give them what they were looking for initially ‘the being loved’ and they fall back and gain wheight. The internal driver can also have been ‘away from’ and in the end one notices that this doesn’t help by losing wheight and falls back. The only way to get out of this is to find YOUR underlying automatic commitment why ‘you are eating more than you burn’ and then reframe it. It is my impression that most often it is related to loving oneself or having self confidence, knowing that it is OK the way your are. You are an OK person. To integrate this in your body or cells is highly powerful not only to loose wheight. : )

Getting more and more clarity on this makes me see that my niche is spiritual coaching.

What a dragon of a name … for a lot of people. A lot of people fear going in that direction. Maybe it’s about the connotation with religions, dogma’s, wacko-jacko stuff. 

I believe I need to find another name for my practise. I like transformational coach. However it makes me think to much about this series on tv where they transform someone completely with cosmetic surgery. Maybe I need to refer to this integration in the body or cells essential for sustainable results.

Two ‘to do’s pop up in my mind :

1/Look for the site and name of the scientist that has photographed frozen water in different circumstances (happy, sad, agressive, …) which proved that ‘happy’ water gives wonderful symetric cristals, where ‘sad or agressive’ water results in ugly cristals. I am sure this is the same for our body cells. In the movie ‘What the bleep do we know’ it is also referred at.

2/Read and learn about techniques to integrate beliefs in the body cells and practise it with my clients.

What a great insight for me.

3 ways of walking (or living ?!) parallel with 5 Rythms dance

English translation below

“Il y a une façon de marcher qui fait de nous des touristes, une façon de marcher qui fait de nous des randonneurs, une façon de marcher qui fait de nous des pèlerins. Il ne s’agit pas d’opposer l’un à l’autre. Marcher comme un touriste, c’est peut être marcher sur l’écorce de la terre; marcher comme un randonneur, c’est connaître la sève de ce monde, entrer dans cette sève, ce mouvement, dans cette énergie même de l’univers et revenir le soir avec les senteurs de la nature, les sons de la forêt, la beauté des paysages. Marcher comme un pèlerin, c’est marcher avec le souffle qui donne vie à la sève, avec ce qui nous anime et nous permet de nous tenir droit dans la lumière.”
– Jean-Yves Leloup

Free English translation
“You can walk like a tourist, like a hiker or like a pelgrim. The goal is not to oppose one to the other. Walking like a tourist is possibly walking on the crust of the earth; walking like a hiker is knowing the energy of this world, entering in this energy, this movement and come back in the evening with the odors of nature, the sounds of the forest, de beauty of the landscape. Walking like a pelgrim is walking with the breath that gives live to the energy, with what is animating us and allows us to hold ourselves upright in that light.
– Jean-Yves Leloup

I would like to draw the parallel with the 5 Rythms of dancing (see interesting sites) :
Flow, Staccato, Chaos, Lyrics, Silence
They also represent a different way or depth of being. All 5 can be interesting to us depending on the situation that we are in. The goal is to play with them and to adapt them to our current situation.

Definition of success (John R. Wooden)

“Success is peace of mind which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you made the effort to become the best of which you are capable.”
– John R. Wooden

Also interesting is his pyramid of success see http://www.CoachJohnWooden.com

Simple definition for Mindfulness

“Mindfulness is kijken in de spiegel. Met gesloten ogen. Kijken naar jouw denken, je gedachten. Ze zien en er niet in mee gaan. Zitten en kijken binnenin. Je emoties voelen, zonder erin de verdrinken. Ze omhullen, zonder ze te verdringen. Je lichaam voelen, weten hoe het voelt. Opmerkzaam zijn voor al wat er is in jou. Met aandacht hier, nu, helemaal.”
– Mindfulness voor kinderen, Pim Catry en Jan Decuypere

Free Englisch translation :
“Mindfulness is looking in the mirror. Eyes closed. Looking at your thinking, your thoughts.
Seeing them and not going along with them. Sitting and looking within. Feeling your emotions, without drowning in them. Enwrapping them, without suppressing them. Feeling your body, knowing how it feels. Observing everything that is in you. With attention here, now, entirely”                             – Mindfulness voor kinderen, Pim Catry en Jan Decuypere

I am so proud of myself : )

I take care of myself. I defend what I find most important.

That goes for personal, family matters but also for professional matters.

This WE I really felt like walking in the close-by forest. It was a wonderful sunny automn day…

Only my daughter and husband did,’t feel like it. Finally we went but after a short while I felt that it was against their will and we decided that I would be walking and they would be picking me up when I was full of it. I enjoyed it so intensely. I deliberately got lost twice as I followed my gut feeling to take the paths that felt the most ‘inviting’ ones. And you know what I finally arrived at a place where it was very easy to pick me up. I decided though that I would walk all the way home. Just feeling happy, proud, enjoying it.

For what the professional part is concerned I have been proposed 2 international projects. In my selection proces I am very clear about the fact that I am not looking forward at all to travel around the world. Also I take my time to discuss the content, possible roadblocks, etc… by speaking to stakeholders and my network. I am proud about my maturity in this approach.

I intend to enjoy every second of my life : )

One tool to add as basis for my re-found energy !

In my previous post I declared my diet and the dancing 5 ryhtms to be the basis of my re-found energy. But I have forgotten one very important tool that my coach Noella has thought me : put yourself in the different NLP perceptual positions. This exercise has made me aware that I lived the maior part of my live in 3th position or as an observer not really taking part of live myself, everthing passing by at a distance. I also have spend quite some time in 2nd position where I feel very sensitively the moods of others that I tended to relate to myself as a reason. (This by the way is typical for highly sensitive people).
The position that I am hardly in is 1st position. The position in which you are aware of yourself, your body and also of what you believe in, the position in which you defend what you stand for. Noella explained me that this is typically a position that is highly developped during puberty period. I say this for 2 reasons. First : I have not lived an intense puberty, I mostly behaved as I was expected to, I was hardly ever a rebel. Second : When I excercised in being in 1st position I really felt like wanting to rebel, tell what I want because I like it like that, I even found myself not controlling my own power (for instance in opening a door) or talk too loudly when defending my point of view. This as well gave me a boost of energy. Doing what I want to do without a break on myself. Great … I really enjoyed it even though I found it scary as well from time to time.
In the meantime I have been able to channel this extra energy in a better way (dancing 5rythms has helped me in this). But I do consciously put myself in 1st position when I feel I am living my life at a distance or feeling too much the other peoples moods, when I want to feel stronger and centered.
How I do this ? By getting in contact again with my body, feeling my legs touch the ground, feeling my arms, my whole body, my head – by feeling the inside of my body. This helps me to come back to myself.
I have used this recently – only then I became fully aware of this possibility – in a discussion with my HR director as I felt I got lost in my feelings, feeling attacked and sensing that I was retreating in 3rd position as I used to do. It pulled me completely back into the discussion calmly but firmly stating what I needed to know.
1st position is the position that I want to find myself primarely in to defend what I stand for.
I do understand of course that my strength of being in 2nd and 3rd position will help me greatly in my coaching career.
To be continued …

I feel full of energy again – Yeahhhhh !!!

I feel full of energy again & it feels great 🙂

What lead up to this ?

Well first of all I am convinced that my sabbatical without specific deadlines & rushing has helped a lot. But there is more. Why else did it take me almost 9 months to get fully back on track.

First of all there is my diet. After having read the book ‘Homo energeticus’ from Peter Aelbrecht I have followed his proposed diet. I have re-introduced fish and eggs (special Columbus eggs, I have a tendency for high cholestorol) since I ate animal proteins before my puberty (for more details I refer to the book itself). Each day I eat leguminous plants, nuts and seeds on top of once vegetal proteins and once animal proteins and vegetables and 5 pieces of fruit. I did not loose the kilo’s that I would loose as a side affect but this is really of less importance.

Besides the new diet I have also started 5 rythms danse (only 3 times now) but I feel it is ‘moving’ me not only fysically but also mentally as my coach had predicted.

Both feel good … it is the right direction for me for now …

On the job side no new info. A next meeting with my HR director is planned for September 17th.

In the meantime I enjoy every minute of the last month of my sabbatical preparing for a new and fresh professional start.

Cheers

Self management & the 4 NLP positions

My coach really gave me an excellent exercise to help me ‘manage myself’.

She explained me the 4 positions that NLP uses and asked me to exercise & ‘play’ with them to feel the difference in myself.

1st position : self => this is the position that I am focussing on for now because I feel it makes me feel stronger and connected with my inner self, who I am & what I stand for

2nd position : other => as my coach said this is my strength & my weakness as I have the tendency to go too often in this ‘mode’ and when I am in this mode it is interesting to look at myself from the other persons perspective (quite powerful !)

3rd position : looking without emotions to the situation from a distance

4rd position : let’s call this the super distance position for now.

Thank you coach for this. I like the exercise and I feel that it can help me a lot.
More to follow …

Feel more and more into coaching

Today I took my last foundation class and I am really happy for this.

Yet, what is more important is that I feel more and more confident that one day I will be able to coach.

I also feel the urge and the fun to start trying out some basics that we have learned (eg reframing perspective, effective feedback, powerful listening). Even more important is that I allow myself the time to do this … I have plenty of time and I am going to enjoy this 🙂

Self management

My theme is all about self management !

 

The reason for taking my sabbatical in the first place is lack of self management. I loose myself in wanting to do well for others… to do the best I can. It is important to understand that this ‘throwing myself into the well doing’ comes entirely from my own motivation, my own enthusiasm. Once my sabbatical stopped I directed this well doing on my little daughter that I dedicated a lot of time and attention to till that as well became too much for me and never enough for my daughter. Today I realize that I have again a similar week behind me. Not realizing it and finding it quite OK at the time itself I spend nearly all my time with my daughter, preparing for a diner with friends, going to a  birthday party and cleaning the cellar and my daughter again … till I realize now that I have dropped my own meditation. I feel tired because of a lack of sleep but more I believe by doing nothing in particular, not being focussed on anything.

At the root of this empty feeling I also see the fact that nothing really progresses as I would like it does :

• my attempts to assemble information through friendly contacts in my former company are not really succesfull except for one that delivers information I believe is not really positive
• the dancing classes “5 rytmes” are only taking place at about 1/2 to 3/4 of an hour from my home and on the same night my husband has his outside activity since ages. This requires finding a babysit for our daughter for a couple of months on that specific day and finding transport to get there (in case my job would end).
• although I have been succesful in finding succesful coaching questions on the net I am a little bit anxious about me getting all this in my fingers. Especially after having read a book on NLP (Changing your beliefs from Robert Dilts) I feel I still have quite long road ahead of me.
• the book also raises questions in myself about my own ‘limiting’ beliefs and what to do about them. I honoustly doubt now whether a ‘normal’ coaching training is capable of changing them in depth. Let’s say I doubt this till proven otherwise => this is a good question for my new coach (NLP coach going through a ‘normal’ coaching training)

 

A lot of doubts and confusion after a couple of very good and optimistic days … Where does the sudden change come from… The only thing that has changed is the stopping of my meditation…

I really need to integrate this again … to make contact with myself, to ground myself and get in contact with my intuition more constantly so I can react directly when I feel I go in the wrong direction.

 

As said in the title … it’s all about self management – spend enough time with and attention to myself.

PS1 Strangely enough this were also my pitfalls that the public discovered during a speech training I have followed

PS2 I was surprised to read that the CEO of ICA had the same challenge – giving too much and by doing so loosing herself and as a result of that the she runs out of energy – therefore her focus needs to be on self management as well, recharging her batteries on time.