THE POWER OF BEING HEARD

With every new client I coach, I learn something new that helps me be a better coach.

Last year I had a first coaching session with a new executive client.

She was a super busy, highly educated, incredibly stressed professional.  She had huge responsibilities, no personal time, was sleeping and eating poorly and got zero exercise.

In a nutshell, she was truly a walking time-bomb and she knew it.

What I learned with this client was that what she most needed was to be “heard”.

To experience the feeling of being valued for her dedication and contributions.

To express her frustration with not having any “down time” in order to process her fast life.

To receive acknowledgment that she was entitled to be frustrated and that she had the power to change that.

She desperately craved to give voice to her distress.  To be heard.  So that she could start to address both the internal (within herself) and external (her workplace) conditions and behaviors that were contributing to her stress and unhappiness.

So she found a coach.

The coaching sessions allowed her space and time… a safe place and dedicated time to reflect upon where she found herself and explore new ways of approaching a way forward. 

As her coach, I got to see first- hand yet another example of the incredible power of coaching.

And I learned that sometimes, what some people are most wanting, is simply to be heard.