What is the link between mindfulness and coaching?
Mindfulness practices help us to gain calm and focus although navigating through the practice on our own is not easy. Apps, books and guided meditations will provide the support to some extent but for those who are intrigued to dive into the deeper exploration of the practice teachers, communities, coaches and often gurus will be the only way to step to the other side of the looking glass.
"The most difficult thing in life is to know yourself" -Thales
In coaching, we use powerful questions, metaphors, active listening, meta views and a variety of other coaching tools that help clients to reach awareness. Awareness is the foundation for both coaching and mindfulness. They are twos skills that have a complementary focus on using awareness as a stepping stone of behavioral change.
When working with clients we can see two ways these disciplines interact creating their own rhythm of ‘dancing in the moment’:
1. Coaching for mindfulness practitioners
2. Mindfulness as a coaching tool
When coaching mindfulness practitioners topics may involve:
Motivation to maintain the practice,
Exploration of emerging obstacles related to emotions, e.g. inner critic, resistance to change and habitual patterns
Change of approach to personal practice, shifting of the practice focus etc.
We can apply mindfulness in any coaching situation but there will be more challenges when the client does not have personal mindfulness practice. In this case, the critical step is to coach a client how to shift from thinking about the past or future into the awareness of the present moment and, together with the coach, engage in the third level of listening.
In coaching we identify three levels of listening:
· Level 1: Internal Listening — Listening to your inner voice
· Level 2: Focused Listening — Listening intently to another person
· Level 3: Global Listening — Listening to others in the context of their entire surroundings.
With mindfulness, we easily access Global Listening and together with the client and achieve heightened awareness of the internal and external environment. If a client is not a mindfulness practitioner it can sometimes take more than one session before a client becomes familiar with the shift of attention and sees the value emotions have for awareness and decision-making.
Do you want to know if Mindfulness Coaching is for you?
Join our FREE online "Mindfulness Coach in action" session, every second Tuesday of each month 5pm-6pm, to be coached on the topic of your choice.
Do you want to learn BMC signature Mindfulness Coaching techniques?
On the 14th and 21st April, founder of the Beijing Mindfulness Centre teaches the best practices, tools, and techniques of mindfulness coaching. To register, extract the QR code below.
Press and hold to register
Dalida Turkovic
Founder of Beijing Mindfulness Centre
Dalida has worked in the field management training and consulting in China since 1995. While living and working in this fast-changing environment she gained deep insights on the pressures people have in their professional and personal environment. In all her work Dalida is driven by a profound interest in what moves and motivates people. She believes in big change through small steps, whilst keeping the body and mind in balance.
She believes in the wisdom of emotions and coaches her clients to use this wisdom to bridge professional challenges and enhance presence at home, with their families.
Dalida is the founder of the Beijing Mindfulness Centre, author of Mindfulness for Beginners, the book for mindful parenting, and holds certifications as Professional Certified Coach (ICF) and Mindfulness, Wellness and Somatic Coach (Mindfulness Coaching School).
Her TEDx speech “The road less traveled” is available on https://bit.ly/2vEvaUd.
www.beijingmindfulness.com
hello@beijingmindfulness.com
Tel: 010-64034923
Address: No.44, Qian Yong Kang Hutong, Dongcheng, Beijing