3 Essential Elements To Being Coachable [Step 1: Choose A Goal]
Coaching isn’t for the weak. Moving forward isn’t usually easy. It takes clarity, confidence and courage to advance, for both the coach and the coachee.
Let’s break it down. If Coaching = moving from here to there, then a vital element in the coaching conversation starts with the “there”.
If someone isn’t sure where they are heading, they are just roaming.
Roaming means wandering around, or not having a destination. There are two common detriments that distract people from having a focus.
1. Lack of vision. This type of roaming focuses more on circumstances than the change needed to experience release. It comes out as complaining and can disguise itself in the need for empathy and validation while being absent of hope and forward movement. [The 10 spies had this problem! What they saw was real, they just didn’t have the right focus. Or the guy with one talent who did nothing with it…]
Honestly this can happen for me when I am looking at being there for my family more. My parents are looking at selling their lifelong home, my oldest daughter is moving, my youngest daughter is finishing a Masters program and has decisions on her plate. I have two other adult children making decisions. And then theirs the grandkids, Eric’s family and our extended family. We live far from most of them so staying connected is tricky.
Sometimes I feel like I am letting them ALL down.
It can be paralyzing to think about who to contact first, or how. Maybe that seems trivial to you, but it is real life for me.
Other focus stealers in real life are loss, pain, and transition. There is certainly a season for focusing on the moment and the issues at hand, but if there is no future goal of healing or movement toward resolution then roaming can take over and the result is feeling (or being) stuck.
2. Endless ideas. Dream roaming means having all kinds of “targets” but not really focusing on one. It is the excess of hope with an absence of choosing one vision at a time. [How about the people in Jerusalem in Nehemiah’s time, they had all kinds of dreams about how things could be but they were not unified around a goal. Or the apostles when they needed to decide to focus on teaching and release the table serving to others…]
I have endless ideas of where to go next with Bridges Coaching. I have a curriculum about healthy communication more than half way finished; I have a dating book even closer to completion. I’d like to start an Advanced Coaching curriculum. My Associate Coaches could use some attention and I am in the process of developing the Facilitators recruitment package…. If I don’t do these one at a time though I will be in this same place next year… and we can’t have that!
When we don’t have a goal we aren’t likely to arrive somewhere. Every true coaching conversation starts with a goal. It sounds like this:
- “What is the vision on your heart?”
- “Which dream is it time to turn into a goal?”
- “So what would you like to focus on today?”
- “What would it look like if that area were a 10 for you?”
- “Which area is tugging at your heart?”
- “What will it look like when this season is over?”
- “Out of all the options, which one is next for you to focus on?”
- “Would you be okay if things were still like this in a year? (if not then) What would need to happen for that not to be the case?”
Roaming around is fine if your goal is to spend time driving around enjoying scenery. But if that is your every day life I’d like to challenge you that there is so much more out there. God has great adventures and nexts for all of us!
So if you or someone you are coaching is struggling with lack of vision consider this. While circumstances may be screaming out for attention, the offer of looking at Jesus instead of the waves is available. There is a peace that passes understanding, there is a calm in the storm, there IS a way out, or a way through or a way to get over the situation!
FOCUS shifts the attention from what is to what could be!
If instead you or someone you are coaching is struggling with choosing a next out of the endless options, consider this.
Proverbs 29:18 hosts the classic verse on the importance of vision. The New Century Version says,
Where there is no word from God, people are uncontrolled,
but those who obey what they have been taught are happy.
“What is the word from God?” This is most powerful question any coach can ever partner with someone to answer.
So which is your tendency? Would you be more likely to talk about your situational circumstances and miss the future focus goal?
OR would you be more likely to have multiple dreams and not choose one solid target to go after?
How about the person you are helping? What is their focus obstacle? Where do they want to go?
Want more?
Here’s some nexts that are available. (parenthesis mine – scripture from Isaiah 61) Maybe you need one of these items God offers, or maybe your dream is to come alongside others and offer. Whatever your next- LIFE IS A JOURNEY if we don’t get stuck!
1 The Lord God has put his Spirit in me,
because the Lord has appointed me to tell the good news to the poor.
He has sent me to comfort those whose hearts are broken,
to tell the captives they are free,
and to tell the prisoners they are released.
2 He has sent me to announce the time when the Lord will show his kindness
and the time when our God will punish evil people. (justice)
He has sent me to comfort all those who are sad
3 and to help the sorrowing people of Jerusalem.
I will give them a crown to replace their ashes, (celebration)
and the oil of gladness to replace their sorrow,
and clothes of praise to replace their spirit of sadness.
Then they will be called Trees of Goodness, (reframing)
trees planted by the Lord to show his greatness. (growth)