[David Fontaine]

Summary Post:
Thank you all for the great conversation and insights on this topic! One big take away for me personally, as I reflect back on the intensive was the exercise we did to name the parts of the brain that our parts reside in. This really deepened my understanding of my parts and opened up some new doorways for interacting with them. When I think about this from a client perspective, this might be a nice additional touch to naming and understanding their parts. Parts that are within the limbic area of the brain will be more susceptible to emotions and unconscious patterns. These could be the source of many topics clients bring to sessions.

Another take away for me is the importance of self-facilitating partswork if I plan to do any work with clients using this tool. The more practice I get with dropping into my own parts and navigating from soul to part/part to soul, the better I will be at doing that with clients. I have found facilitation with practice clients a little bit clunky going into different parts during the conversation. I also find it very beneficial to have and use the client’s mandala during a session to fully understand the snapshot of where they are and the parts that are involved.

Understanding interjects more in the intensive has helped me to identify not only my own but interjects within others more definitively. There is a clear sense that that voice doesn’t belong. It’s coming from somewhere outside the system. What a valuable thing to be able to identify!

[David Fontaine]

@lesliewier
Leslie, I can’t help but wonder how effective partswork could be for your clients in the Noom world!

I 100% agree on your assessment of the ways partswork could be offered. I’m finding that it’s not something I want to offer as a standalone package but I’m keeping this tool in my back pocket for opportunities that might arise with the right client during normal sessions. I agree with what you said as well about the tools fitting the client’s strengths and I would add abilities to that. Not all clients will have the ability to identify or access their parts at will. In my post for example, this is a client that from what I know about her and my gut feeling that partswork could be a good fit, it’s enough for me to at least broach the subject with her and see how it lands. I do like that partswork is something that, once a client is familiar with it, they can do some of their own facilitation for themselves. I see this being beneficial in the time between sessions, especially. For me as a coach, that is the dreaded time, haha! What is going to happen between sessions that could blow this work we’ve done to pieces?

[David Fontaine]

@mariarosagalter

Maria, Thank you for your feedback on my post! In response to your question: I definitely had some concerns in hearing that she was thinking relapse was a possibility in terms of her addictive behavior, specifically because she had also shared that this had happened before with a personal trainer she was working with. That relationship turned intimate. While I have no concerns at all on my end of anything like that happening, I know I need to be very tuned into how she’s doing with our time together. She has been very open so that is telling me that I have established a safe container for her. She has committed to being 100% open about anything that might come up for her regarding any feelings or urges. I know that this opportunity for her to do personal work with a man and have it be successful is a big step for her. She knows that avoiding men altogether is not realistic and therefore wants to challenge herself. The worst that can happen here is that she has some feelings or urges that aren’t appropriate for this relationship. Acting on them will not be an option. So I’m curious what she’ll be able to learn even if that worst case scenario does happen. Thanks for your question!

[David Fontaine]

@mariarosagalter
Maria, it sounds like you were able to accomplish the interviewing of parts AND do some partswork all in one shot here. That’s fantastic! This is a great example of being open and flexible as a coach. It seems like this naturally went into some work and you were ready to support that. What do you identify as the want and deeper need in this session with your client?

I love how your client integrated his partswork in nature on his walk and what a beautiful example of nature collaborating in his process! I’m curious if you were able to establish any other ways for him to incorporate his experience. And how will soul help him in discerning good from bad trouble as it comes up?

[David Fontaine]

Initial Post:
I have started working with a client who is focusing on quieting her mind. She feels that she is not present a lot of the time because of thinking of past and future. She also has a desire to build a stronger relationship with nature and be more comfortable trying new activities outdoors. This client has a sex/love addiction which she openly shared in her intake with me and stated that working with a male coach will be a challenge for her. She’s in a 12 step program working on healthy relationships and that has been going well. She has a sponsor to check in with. Although, she made a comment that she really wants to face working with a man head on and is going to try really hard to work the steps, but that she will probably go back to her old ways and ruin this because her addiction will take over. I kind of just filed that away in my mind and knew that I wanted to do some work with that when the time was right. I think sharing knowledge of the stages of change is important here so she understands that snapbacks can happen and that doesn’t mean the fight to overcome ends. Supplementing that knowledge with partswork could be very impactful for her. She’s an ideal client to do partswork with. She has a good understanding of who she is but I don’t think she is making the connection that her addiction could be a part of her. I am eager to have her identify her parts and spend time with her to interview them to gain better understanding of her as a whole. I plan to share my mandala with her so she can see how it works and explain who some of the parts are. I happen to have an addict part and I wonder how that will land for her. I think her seeing her parts while working with her mandala would create awareness within her that could help her see the bigger picture as it relates to her addiction. I want her to see which parts are present when addictive behavior is taking place or when she is in situations that could trigger that behavior. We could work on identifying what is needed in those times that can support her desire to have healthier relationships. What other parts can be useful. Soul could potentially have insight on that. And if she has an addict part, can we find healthier solutions for that part to use when triggers are present? I see these partswork sessions taking place in nature where she finds things in nature to represent her parts. This will help her to get it outside of her and give her different perspective. It also opens up the field for nature to collaborate and provide insight. My intent here is not to do a lot of direct work with her on this because of the nature of the issue and me not having the proper training in addiction recovery. But I want to create a foundation for her of how to use it as a tool for herself that she can use in conjunction with her 12 step program. While we are working through creating that, I do want to ask her if she thinks it would be beneficial for her sponsor and I to be in contact.

[David Fontaine]

Summary post:
Some big take-aways for me came from my cohort friends:
-being open to a client coming into long term coaching with a model they prefer
-working with the client to help them understand the model I’m working with if we’re using a model of my choosing
-remembering to focus on and use client strengths during coaching
-the earth is round, hahahaha!

Through long term coaching I feel like I am finding my style and really deciding what tools fit best in my style of coaching. This is a really nice change because I felt like a lot of past sessions were always a different version of me, depending on which section of the course we were in. Now with long term coaching, we’re getting to choose the tools that are the right fit not only for us but for the clients.

Setting milestones with the client gives them something tangible to reach for, something to measure their progress and keep them engaged in the behaviors or habits that they desire.

[David Fontaine]

@mariarosagalter
Maria, I feel the same way with a couple of clients I have been working with in that I wish I had had this perspective of long-term coaching earlier on. I will say that I don’t think a reset is necessary to work this in. You’ve done a substantial amount of work thus far. What if you considered that work up to this point the discovery phase? You have more and more insight on this client now than you’ve ever had and now have a model to work with that can support long term work with her. I think you’re right on with your ideas for how to work with her in the South. I think it’s a good opportunity to be open with her and tell her that a long term program would be beneficial to her. One that follows a model and you can teach her how the model works. Do you feel like you hit the deep need with her?

Also, you are enough! And I love you <3

[David Fontaine]

@lesliewier
Leslie, first of all congratulations on this! I know for a while you weren’t taking on clients and reading that you now have 3 clients to work with long term makes me really happy. And I’m happy for them as well. They have a great coach! I can see the work you’ve put in to get the foundation going for these clients. You’ve hit all the key elements, not only pulling in information to get to deeper need, but asking about timeline/milestones, and asking for their input on the program. You reflection about working with client strengths is a great reminder for me. I often forget that the client is bringing that resource to the table. Something I need to tap into more. Thanks so much for your share!

[David Fontaine]

@mariarosagalter

Maria! Thank you for your feedback! Will you be copying your partswork post above into the discussion board for the partswork section? I will save my comments for that conversation chain 🙂

[David Fontaine]

@lesliewier
Leslie, thanks so much for your feedback and yes, much like Gina’s share, I agree with you both! Sharing this model with the client can really help the client track themselves in their process and this could be so crucial to preventing reverse movement. If they’re starting to see signs of the negative expressions of the direction they’re in, this is a time for grounding, contacting your coach, taking a breath.

Have you posted your initial post? Just wanting to make sure it didn’t get lost in the ether 🙂

David

[David Fontaine]

@gmlobito1
Gina, thank you so much for your comments on my post! I feel like this has just become my style of coaching. I find that particularly with clients who are in the West and feeling like they’re starting to hit a wall, it’s a great opportunity to try to prevent the snapback by building them up in the West. Of course, this has a lot of dependency on timing and what has happened since the last session. Sometimes we aren’t able to catch them before the snapback happens, as I’m seeing in your post. This is great identification of both the snapback taking place since your last session, as well as the dynamics of a person starting to change. People in their life aren’t always going to take this well….and the clients themselves even struggle with the change. Her new interest in moving forward with the energy work feels a lot like she went right back to the East in the 4 Shields model, starting over with something new to approach her issue. I like how you brought awareness back to the previous progress and normalized snapback.

What I really am interested in is your reflection on long term coaching and talking about the client where you stated “As coach, offering a clear foundational piece that I base transformation work from must be made clear from the beginning with the client. A basic understanding of the “model” or “map” as we work together is important.” This really resonated with me. I like to arm my clients with knowledge and I can clearly see your point here that this sharing of the model or map is only going to enhance the relationship and potentially the success of the transformation. It gets coach and client on the same page where they can both accurately track the process and it opens up the opportunity for the client to maybe use a model that is familiar to them. I can also see that as the journey goes on, the client is feeling very empowered and more like they are doing this on their own. This is a really nice reflection, Gina! One I will be stealing from you for sure 🙂

David

[David Fontaine]

Initial post:
Long-term Coaching completely changes my approach to new clients. Instead of coming into a session with the mindset that we need to at least walk away with something and we may or may not meet again, long-term coaching opens it up to continual exploration and the slow and steady build up toward a client’s goal or desired way of being. It allows space for a real honoring of where the client is right now with neither the client or myself to feel any pressure to move too quickly. It broadens my ability to get creative with a program that will best align with a client’s process. Throughout the last half of the coaching course, I had my eye on someone that I really wanted to work with and had had several conversations with her that were very much like discovery sessions. I filed away in my mind lots of information that she shared, and it was not just the content of the information that was useful to me but the way it was expressed. As I noted these things, I felt my mind offering suggestions to me on how we could work together on those specific things in the future. After this last intensive, I felt confident in approaching her to see if she’d like to officially start a coach client relationship, specifically geared toward long-term work. She agreed and I asked for her permission to use the content of our past conversations as a foundation. She felt like there wasn’t a lot for me to go off from those shares but gave permission and we set up another meeting time. I needed just a few more pieces from her, specifically around milestones. How would she know that things were improving and how long does she think this progress will take to achieve? That same day, I sent over a proposal, including the details of the program I had put together as well as cost. I was clear that this is not a concrete plan and that her feedback was essential to the overall plan. I got creative on the cost and had a percentage of it as cash payment and some as bartered services. She is a scholar of Astrology and I have been more and more curious about the subject. She was in disbelief over the accuracy of my assessment and the things that I was tracking within her that she thought she’d kept in the dark in our conversations.

In our past conversations over the last several months I had been keying in on certain phrases, thoughts, feelings that were giving me perspective on where she was with her issue. I was also hearing what she was NOT saying. I was using both the stages of change model and the Four Shields model. I’m finding that often the negative expressions of a certain direction in the Four Shields model will be presenting in them if a client is in a place where they are seeking guidance (this was an AHA moment for me during the exercise we did during the intensive). They’re hitting some type of conflict. In this client’s case she is in a place of stagnation and doubt in the realm of the West. Self confidence that was once there has taken a big hit. This tells me that the negative expressions might be starting to have an effect on where she goes from here. I set up the early pieces of the program to help bring awareness to the positive expressions of the West. Resourcing, grounding and revisiting values were big keys to this phase of the work. This acknowledges where she is but also tries to shed some positive light back on it. How will she feel once she finds this grounding in the West? And when she’s seeing more clearly, what does movement to the North feel like? Does it feel realistic, aligned with what she wants? Or will she be in a place of re-creation and feel a pull to loop back to the East? The later elements of my plan are designed for each of these possibilities. If she wants to move into the North as we move along, then I have built in an initiation or rites of passage ceremony to usher her into the North. If we end up back in the East, the program is designed around regrouping, reviewing what worked well in the last experience through the South and into the West. We’ll focus on a new intention, the true need, and finding inspiration to build the new energy.

All in all, I think this went very well. It felt amazing to see the possibility of someone’s future kind of play out right in your mind and onto the program page. I do feel like the money is a growing edge for me and, although I wholeheartedly think I will benefit from the bartered services we agreed on, that certainly didn’t have to be part of this program agreement. I think it made me feel better about what I was proposing and gave her an added incentive to “buy in”. The confidence will come for me on this part.

[David Fontaine]

Summary Post:
The Grief and Loss section of this program was surprisingly one of the more impactful toolboxes thus far. I have to say I never considered grief going beyond the loss of a loved one. Learning about the different types of grief and where it can come from was a big eye opener for me personally as I started thinking about the events of my life and whether I processed those as grief, or at all! I think knowing a client’s timeline of big events, or life story, is so important and can give insight into what factors might be affecting them, especially if there are grief events that have not cycled.

It’s not surprising that the dimensions or “symptoms” of grief can look very similar to trauma. Both can present in hyper or hypo arousal of emotional, mental, behavioral and physical states. This can make identification difficult but the bottom line is, if these symptoms are presenting, its time to pause and check in with the client. I feel good about being able to support a client in grief through active listening and I know where my boundaries are as far as when to refer out or provide resources. As we all talked about in this discussion forum, there is nothing to be “fixed” when someone is grieving. There are no perfect words to console nor are there prescribed ways to move on with life. Everybody’s timeline and process is different and some will not deal with it at all. Nature can be an incredible co-guide and source of support during times of loss. Healthy forests all contain new growth, mature trees and deadfall. They are all important contributors to the whole of the forest. In our lives, loss and can can be a source of new growth in our personal forests if processed in a healthy way.

[David Fontaine]

@deanna.falge

Deanna, this is a tool that I really want to start using in my coaching. I’ve seen many examples through your shares as well as other folks in the cohort of how powerful this question can be.
“I asked her if she saw anything in the landscape that could represent her ‘old self’ and ‘new self’.”

Her internal world became external in this moment and what an incredible way to shift perspective for your client to get to the deeper need. I’m reminded of what Michael said during the Brain 2 intensive that I also happened to take a note of: “when someone identifies what they want, they have integrated it”. And so with this statement, it makes me feel like the direction you were trying to steer this session was spot on. I think the fact that you were able to get to the deeper need here is the key. I don’t think you would have ever gotten there if grief over the old ways was causing dysfunction. As you said, this was a form of pendulation but when she was going back to the grief over the old ways it was from a negative perspective. I ask this question to myself and to you as well, do you think the outcome would have been any different if when she revisited the old ways, you invited her to identify how those old ways DID serve her in the past? Even though they aren’t serving her now, they did at one time. I wonder if it was grief she was exhibiting or possibly shame. We can get hung up in the shame of the old ways because we now label them as “bad”. Pendulating back to the old ways in a more positive light how DID they serve me) and then to present moment probably feels differently than beating ourselves up for the way we used to be. Curious what your thoughts are here.

David

[David Fontaine]

Leslie and Gina, thank you both for your belief in my ability to coach this client! Definitely not a scenario I thought I’d find myself in but the relationship is going incredibly well so far!