Lilia Kapsali
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I struggled a little bit with this exercise because I am still not sure who would want to use my services, and what exactly my niche is. I think this links to a greater struggle to identify where I belong here and who resonates with me. I had to think about the people I have “coached” unofficially in the past who are drawn to me and me to them. These are mostly women (but also some men), who have had an experience in life of not completely belonging somewhere, to their family to society, and whose personal healing is somehow linked to their professional life, or to the healing of the community. Usually, it is deeply introspective people who are drawn to expansion and growth, self-awareness and self-discovery. Often times it is people who have had some sort of traumatic experience (divorce, death, other trauma) which caused them to question their beliefs and the concepts they have inherited from their family or society about how to live their life. Perhaps it is people who already have had some therapy under their belt and are looking to go beyond healing, to alignment with soul purpose. It’s people who are trying to offer or express something to the world, artists, poets, educators, parents, visionary people, who keep pushing the boundaries of what is known/knowable/experienceable/possible.
I find that they are not limited by age, but education and income might have something to do with it, as it is people who are privileged enough to have these sort of professions and indulge in these deeper existential questions. Geographical location also plays a role, as my city does not have a very large artist scene or massively attract visionary people (i.e. people who go beyond the bounds of what society prescribes) – but I might need to do more research on this and remain open to possibilities. Perhaps their deeper need is related to this question: “How can I be true to myself and also live in this society/world and support myself?” “How can I live authentically, with meaning, joy, confidence and the power to pursue my dreams?” “How can I have a deeper relationship to myself and to the world around me?”
Common goals along these lines would include “more awareness of who I am and what I value/believe/love doing”, “how to have the confidence to use my voice/be myself”, “establishing boundaries”, “how to create more time in life to pursue my dreams”, “developing self-compassion and acceptance of self”.
I envision using nature connection to develop deeper awareness of self, by practicing presence, embodiment and developing the senses. Also by allowing the mind and emotions that are repressed to come to surface gently through interacting with nature and the metaphors/ mirroring it provides. I would like to employ methods from environmental education as well as the arts to tap into this greater awareness and enable expression. Also visualization and mindfulness for grounding.
https://www.ericwindhorst.ca/about-eric-windhorst/ – He seems to be a counsellor, coach and psychotherapist all in one, and I am assuming he picks which hat to wear according to each individual client and their needs. He believes that the main reason people get “psychologically stuck” is because they lose touch with their inner nature. He describes on his website that he uses ecopsychological and transpersonal approaches as well as more traditional psychotherapeutic approaches to bring people to an understanding and acceptance of who they are. He specifically works with gifted, highly sensitive adults. This all seems very close to Nature-Connected Coaching, but he doesn’t mention a ceremony framework or explicitly describe collaboration with nature, and so I am unsure as to how he relates inner nature to outer nature.
https://mermaid-forest.com/work-with-me/ – Her approach seems connected to NCC, though there is no explicit mention of working outdoors, but mostly with dreams, the body, synchronicities (also nature). She explicitly focuses on giftedness as a trait, with assessments etc, but I think NCC considers everyone who is on Earth to have a gift, the only thing is to draw it out and honor/hone it.
https://www.naturalchange.co.uk/about-us/our-story/ – Project Natural Change is what inspired me to study Outdoor Education. They call what they do ‘Sustainability Leadership”, which I now find a bit vague and funny, as both those terms are highly contested and also, in a way, antithetical (that’s a whole other philosophical conversation however). Research done on their project suggest that people who participate in it shift from an ego identity to a transpersonal one, and in essence they help people go back to their professions with a different set of values. Their approach seems very similar to NCC but their niche is very specific, focusing on groups of people who are in positions of leadership.
I think overall, I would like to be coaching primarily women who are disillusioned with and constrained by the stories given to them about how they need to live life, and who have some budding creativity that wants to come out and be expressed in the world, but who are unsure what it is and how it can be part of a way of being, not just a way of doing. I still feel like I need to flesh out the details of this and how to phrase it better.
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As a client in the “threshold”, the most powerful experiences have been ones where Nature participated the most in the process. Usually, it acts as a regulating presence, helping me ground my nervous system and broaden my awareness. This, I have found, is relatively possible on Zoom within a limited timeframe, but I have experienced powerful thresholds by myself out in Nature, where the presence of the natural world was especially participating in my moment to moment experience, and providing me deeper self-awareness through mirroring, metaphors and examples of resilience, rebirth and hope (new growth, flowers, birds, predators, etc), as well as relating and attunement, even curiosity and being seen (birds/animals and some plants will respond to a human presence, first with apprehension and fear, then with curiosity, and finally with just being themselves or even playfully engaging with humans in some cases). In terms of coaching others, this tells me that one of the most important skills is a solid presence which allows the client to co-regulate and relax, as well as creating the right conditions for increased consciousness/self-awareness, whether by asking the right questions, reflecting in powerful ways, and picking up on the language and metaphors used and foregrounding them/ inviting an exploration of them.
There are several ICF competencies that I think are essential to build on in order to achieve the above as a coach.
A. Foundation> 2. Embodies a Coaching Mindset>4. Remains aware of and open to the influence of context and culture on self and others: to be sensitive to a client’s context is to be a step closer to seeing the world through their eyes, therefore being able to pick up on what’s important, which values they hold important, which metaphors might be powerful for them, what experience during the session might be most impactful.
A. Foundation>2. Embodies a Coaching Mindset>6. Develops and maintains the ability to regulate one’s emotions and 7. Mentally and emotionally prepares for sessions: The ability to regulate one’s emotions and embody one’s chosen coaching qualities (e.g. for me integrity, confidence, compassion) allows the coach to create a safe and strong container for transformation, much like Nature is. The more grounded nervous system regulates the others, therefore the coach wants to ensure their emotions are not haywire wrecking the session, but in control.
B. Co-creating the Relationship >4. Cultivates Trust and Safety: Again, this allows for a solid container and also the most meaning to take place, much as nature would mirror the inner world of the client because the client would selectively become aware of certain things in nature based on their own perception, in this case the coach is sensitive to the perception and worldview of the client and attunes oneself to it. Also, nature is open to everything that takes place without judgement and with vulnerability even. This makes me personally feel closer to nature, particularly in landscapes which are inviting, transparent of their “secrets” or wonders and trusting with my presence (one can experience this with finding a nest of baby birds or a litter of kittens, a patch of blooming wildflowers or even insects mating on a leaf, eben with the darker side of death, the bloody fur of roadkill by the side of the road, the dead fledgling recycled by ants in the garden – one feels touched by the openness and vulnerability of the moment). When I experience this vulnerability of nature, I develop a trust in the processes of nature because I can relate to the joy and suffering of birth and death experienced in life. A coach can develop this openness, transparency and vulnerability with the client (6) to build trust in the coaching relationship and process. “We will go up and down together, cry and laugh but it’s OK”.
B. Co-creating the Relationship> 5. Maintains Presence: is related to all the above in similar ways, especially managing one’s emotions to stay present with client and being able to work with strong client emotions (3, 4) feeling comfortable with the unknown of the threshold (5) and allowing space for silence where inner processing takes place (6). Curiosity, responsiveness, empathy and focus (1) create a safe container and build trust also, letting the client know they are being heard, seen and responded to.
C. Communicating Effectively> 6. Listens Actively and 7. Evokes Awareness: these are linked to points discussed above. Nature is very responsive and allowing, and provides ample opportunities for insight and awareness. The coach can deliberately work on these skills to draw awareness to patterns and beliefs and evoke those insights, by being responsive to the client, noticing words, voice, body language, energy, emotions, and non-verbal cues(4, 5), using silence, powerful questions, invitations, support and reflecting/ sharing observations etc.
All competencies are obviously very important, and I have left out integration (D>8), but with respect to threshold, the above competencies are very rich and particularly important to me. I want to grow as a coach by practicing them consciously in every session. Because threshold is stepping into the unknown, it is important for a guide to feel confident in guiding, and a client to feel trust in the coaching relationship, even if strong emotions come up and uncertain situations are encountered – knowing they are supported through it I believe can help transformation happen.
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Hi Greg and Julie,
thanks for reading my post and commenting 🙂 I think the philosophical response can be overwhelming when presented on a discussion board such as this, indeed, but as you both mention in your posts, it’s all about showing, doing and above all, being, which by the way could have been the nutshell of everything I wrote above haha. It’s something Daniel keeps drawing my attention towards also, “how do you want to be with your clients?”. The philosophy and science behind it is just a preparation in my mind for what happens in the field, and it is important to know ourselves in order to understand what exactly it is we are working towards, what tools are we working with and what is our vision of who we are becoming as people and who we are being as guides with our clients. Having said that, Greg, I really appreciated your question and it’s a million dollar question for me: How do we mold all those elements without overwhelming the client? So I will try to answer in terms of being, reiterating some qualities Simka mentioned in her last post: As a nature connected coach and person I want to show up in humility, vulnerability, reciprocity, attentiveness, presence, curiosity, trustworthiness, courage, integrity and also openness to what’s happening around me.
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Ecopsychology and Coaching seemed the obvious blend for me, since Ecopsychology is concerned with the relationship between human and more-than-human, namely the idea that both come from the same ground of Being, and therefore are interconnected at all levels: body, mind and spirit. Unlike some of the authors in our required readings (part. Linda Buzzel-Saltzman and Craig Chalquist) I did not come to this work through a psychology or therapy background, but by realizing as a conservationist how ineffective public outreach and environmental education has been in stopping the destruction around us. Therefore while I see the potential in ecopsychology as a critical lens with which to approach and integrate issues that are seemingly disparate (social, political, psychological, environmental etc) – a transcontextual container if you will – I share the authors’ concern with using nature merely as a tool for human healing (p.20), which remains a dualistic and anthropocentric practice that defeats the purpose of the simultaneous healing of nature. For that reason I reject the term ”ecotherapy” as applied ecopsychology or as something I would personally practice, and prefer the term “guiding” for what I would like to do.
I am still exploring how coaching can help me facilitate that understanding of interconnectedness in my clients and facilitate the mutual healing of both humans and nature, and I think one has to be very careful in applying this work because if used to just enable individuals to function better in a consumerist, profit-driven society it cannot be called Nature-Connected. Ecopsychology can therefore provide the critical tools that question the fundamental assumptions of our modern societies, ways of life and being to a Nature-Connected Coaching practice, and inform the ways in which we are viewing our personal relationship with nature and also what kind of relationship we are facilitating for our clients. The ecopsychological theory is therefore useful if we do not want to perpetuate dualism, greenwashing and all the other -isms that stem from dualistic thinking (racism, sexism etc). There are however different branches of Ecopsychology from what I understand, and as with everything, some are less radical than others.
In terms of what ecopsychology means for how we approach our clients, by definition, an ecopsychological awareness of an ecological unconscious (Roszak) requires that we go beyond ego, something which Nature Connected Coaching tries to do with the presence of the vision council, the acknowledgment of the 50/50 dynamic of the coaching relationship (trusting nature to do a large part) and the ceremony framework. I think there are many creative ways this assumption of a greater ground of being can help the coaching process, and clients can explore their own connection, permeability and deeper states of mind (intuition, flow etc) in many ways from art to poetry/journaling, visualization, shamanic journeying and storytelling, depending on what skills and interests the coach also has. Funnily enough, sometimes I feel like ecopsychology is trying to re-invent the wheel, whereas it could enter into a discussion with indigenous ways of thinking and see how each person can find their way to their own ancestral memory and mind.
Lastly, as someone who dabbles in spiritual literature and practice, it was very interesting for me to read the article on Nonduality by Davis, and its critiques of an Ecopsychology that does not go far enough into the transpersonal. I don’t know about psychologists, but I agree with him in terms of environmental educators, who perpetuate the reductionistic mechanistic Newtonian models of the world, despite developments in ecological thinking such as the advancement of complexity and systems theory. I think the article might be slightly outdated in this regard, as in recent years Joana Macy’s work blending Buddhism and ecology has been quite popular, and I think other such efforts to blend ecology, psychology and spirituality are underway in the West. What I am taking from Davis is the suggestion that one has to be even more deliberate about the transpersonal process if one wants to truly be Nature-Connected, or rather to go beyond connection to becoming nature itself, through an awareness of a dimension of being that is beyond just intellectual understanding or an emotional bond. This requires a shift in ontology, and while I believe some of these deeper dimensions are not a difficult thing to recognize and experience with discipline and practice, they are quite a difficult thing to maintain, requiring a discipline that is perhaps beyond the scope of a Nature-Connected Coaching relationship. I would hesitate to call myself a spiritual teacher, though a connection with nature is inherently a spiritual thing, and I do not have enough experience in transpersonal practices to comfortably guide clients through these nondual dimensions, however I recognize the importance of continuing my own deepening awareness of Being, and understand this is a growing edge for me alongside gaining more traditional psychology-based coaching skills. I liked that he emphasized the integration of any shifts in being with everyday experience and action, as I think Nature-Connected Coaching is ideally situated at that intersection between inner transformation and action in the world. This groundedness is something I love about the coaching process as it is quite pragmatic. His examples of transpersonal practices really speak to the creativity of what we can apply as coaches, and I found it a very stimulating read which sparked my own imagination of what is possible within the Nature-Connected Coaching container.
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In Summary:
What I am taking away from this module is the delicate art of holding space and directing attention to the natural surroundings and the client’s senses, inner world, words and energy, and trusting nature to provide a container, metaphors and circumstances for wellbeing and healing. This can only come through my own continued nature-connection and development as a person and a coach (practicing self-severance…).This first module has also been a confirmation that this is my life’s purpose (for now) and I am looking forward to exploring and refining further what my vision for this work is. I have enjoyed and learned from hearing everyone else’s experience and approach to nature connection, and I am genuinely excited to see where this path will take everyone, and the unique ways this work will be applied through the conduit of each personality.
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Thanks again for seeing me Erin, I do feel like our approach has many similarities, and I always appreciate your feedback and presence.
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Also, I know for sure that you are right about confronting oppression and the history of colonization. I think that’s part of the personal process which then gets translated into real actions on the collective level. Blind spots are a real thing, and really frustrating. Personally, for me, this looks like owning my voice more and speaking out, but I acknowledge also the difficulty of walking that fine line between honouring my truth and alienating myself from the collective which shuns the “whistleblowers”, and also being compassionate with the people who are ignorant of the power dynamics they are perpetuating. Perhaps the people who would most be helped by coaching are the people least likely to pursue it, unless they hit rock bottom in relationships and life….now that’s something for me to mull over. How to let people know the importance of coaching, and market it to people who might need it the most?
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Hi Simka,
I admire so much how deeply and compassionately you think about these things.
I absolutely agree that it is not enough to stop at personal responsibility, and personal trauma/wellbeing. Spot on. I think if you’re doing it right, inevitably you hit that part that’s collective….but the main critique of ecopsychology is that, that pscyhotherapy didn’t go deep or wide enough to include society and nature. Similarly, all these wellbeing practices that address the individual are not radical enough, and they perpetuate the problem. That alone is a great starting point I think: Knowing this, how do we coach?
You said you want to be part of a community of people who do things differently…right on. I’m still exploring this question myself about the community where I find myself in. I can’t wait to see where this exploration takes us both.
You mentioned glorification or romanticization of indigeneity. On the one hand there’s that (the “noble savage” image), but on the other hand there’s its complete opposite (the “primitive” who gets in the way of progress, and “look how much better we are now than 300 years ago”) and indigenous people the world over are still facing genocide and erasure. I hear you totally on the deep listening required. Incidentally, I didn’t mean borrow indigenous people’s thinking or practices, but to understand ways of thinking and relating. I think our western societies have educated those ways out of us, and it is important to study and take seriously these alternative epistemologies in their own right. The practices in themselves are not just “woo woo” or superstition, but most of the time (though not always) hide behind them a logic we just don’t understand. If you’ve ever been in any western institution you might have noticed the resistance by the establishment to even entertain these different ways of being and thinking. There are literally no spaces for us to engage in serious study and exploration, except in our own private rooms and chat rooms, often without rigor, just shooting in the dark for some understanding. At least this is how I’m experiencing my own exploration, and inevitably I come across some total spiritual nonsense on the way, but I appreciate the freedom not being a part of an institution offers me to engage in free thinking and experimentation.
As far as pessimism goes, I think for a long time in my life I was really in a dark place about the state of society and the planet, but I realised that being in the system is inevitable. Even the people who think they’ve escaped by living in some alternative community away from mainstream society are participating in it in other ways, or have been afforded the privilege of “escape” through having the means to go out and escape. “Sustainability” comes with a price tag, and working “sustainable” jobs similarly comes with privilege. Guilt is not very conducive to change, meaning is a better compass, at least from personal observation. As you said, we are part of a collective, and it will take generations to transition. I have realised for myself that the best thing I can do is create those relationships and opportunities for something new to arise, like you said, so that perhaps a little shift in being can bring about a new configuration in my descendants, and the transition will be helped along. Not sure if this sounds really vague, but basically allowing myself to enter the compost of my community where all our ideas are mushed together, and offering ideas which are a little more aligned, a little more harmonious with the land and living from those ideas as much as possible in a system which requires conformity and stamps out all the little seedlings of difference. It’s a very small thing and yes it requires a lot of inner and outer reckoning and healing, but we have literally no idea at this point what can bring about the change without perpetuating the thinking that got us into this mess.
Being willing to do the work requires the skills of humility, courage and transformation (I call them skills because they are not easy and take practice), and this is where my faith in nature connection and coaching comes in, cause I feel like coaching is meant to take you to uncomfortable places and push your growing edges in order to bring more awareness and change in your life. So, while not enough in itself, I think NCC is a good first step towards a life of adaptation, uncertainty and opportunity, as we are increasingly being faced with. We need mature, self-actualized human beings if we are to tackle the crises that are facing us, and this includes being able to see all the ways of being that are not conducive to what we want and shifting to better ways without meltdowns, fragility, deflection and victim mentality. It’s hard work but it pays off in the long term.
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Hi Erin 🙂 I totally hear you on the change of paradigm. “What if nothing is broken and just needs aligning and direction with a powerful intention?” LOVE THIS!
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That’s wonderful that threshold has been such a positive experience for you Greg, I relate to that feeling of hiking and feeling “connected”. That’s awesome that you know that the calm contented feeling is how you want to show up as a coach, and I love the “Maintaining presence” section of the ICF competencies too. From that place of groundedness in self, one can allow the client to be wholly themselves, whether calm, uncomfortable, joyful or tearful, and the client will lead the way. This is their journey, and it’s an honor to be able to walk alongside them.
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Hi Julie, I enjoyed reading your thoughts here. It sounds like you are transforming through this experience overall, which is both exciting and uncomfortable at the same time. I like how you identified the coaching experience as a paradox, since we are supposed to guide clients, but we don’t actually have the answers or path! I also loved the part about the importance of how one is being, and the emphasis placed on that in the ICF competencies. I think it’s interesting that you have felt the need to perform for the coach during your sessions – being with the unknown is against so much of the left-brained cultural conditioning which requires of us certainty and answers. I also don’t experience thresholds as easy or comfortable, and think they are meant to not be so…I think of that every time I see an empty butterfly cocoon, cicada shell or snake skin….ouch!
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Yes Julie, Nature is a great coach I believe because it is inherently relational, not a mute “other”, neither a machine nor inert matter, but alive and responsive. In many ways I see my own coaching process as a process of “becoming more alive”, which is reflected in that rise in energy that happens in a good threshold. Both coach and client can feel it, and it is beyond just technique and how-to’s (though it includes them); it is transrational. I have experienced coaching as a paying client before – even during the difficult times I experienced deep connection with my coach, and sometimes it felt like a flow experience, much like I get from a wonderful hike in the mountains! I was afterwards inspired and energized.
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Hi Simka,
thanks so much for this well researched and nuanced post, I really enjoyed reading it, though I naturally felt some resistance when you mentioned yoga, forest bathing and nature connected coaching, as all those are things I practice. You could add mindfulness to that list, which drives me crazy these days when everyone and their grandma is advocating for it regardless of context and stripped of its spiritual potency and culture (I practice mindfulness too).
I hear loud and clear what you say about colonialism and white supremacy and wanted to ask: who do you envision will be reching out for your services as a NCC, and how do you view your practice as an opportunity for an intervention?
You said: “Coaching, then, becomes a practice of guiding people to explore their relationships with the planet. This point of relationship is what we explored in our last forum posts – that nature connection amounts to relationship and reciprocity.” I thought this was beautifully expressed, and I have been thinking very deeply along these lines for a long time myself. What I have come to realise is that beyond the cultural practices, indigenous ways of thinking are a method or a process, and these methods and processes can help us change our perception of reality itself, towards a more aligned way of being on this planet. Isn’t that sort of what we are learning to do here at EBI, reframe our perceptions, learn a method of transformation that helps us keep growing, not in material ways but in fulfillment? The question for me then becomes, in what ways can those assumptions of fulfillment and success that exist in the current Western paradigm be questioned and reframed within a nature-connected coaching relationship? If deeper needs are what we are looking at, without having evidence to back me up, I would say most peoples’ needs are along similar lines: connection, love, freedom, community, validation etc. Are these really found in the surface level things that we usually think about and are sold on such as soul-draining careers that harm the Earth and ourselves, material things, status etc? or are they found within structures of society that are more ecological and compassionate to people and planet? Furthermore, if Nature is seen as a collaborator, co-creator, container and source of deeper knowledge as part of the paradigm of NCC, is that not challenging to the western idea of the solid, fixed individual (and therefore the perception of fixity of others which causes us to objectify them) Is Nature Connected Coaching then a secular yet “sustainable” practice? I suspect it might be if the client is able to grasp those things i.e the assumptions behind the modality. Furthermore, I think people who are fulfilled, nature-connected and taking responsibility for their lives don’t go around behaving like addicts or adolescents hurting others in the process, but become of service to the greater scheme of life. However, I do believe like you said that the coach still needs to have all these things clearly thought out and to be aware and questioning of their own privileges and blind spots, to be able to draw attention to these insights as they arise, and maybe to frame them in a greater scheme of the collective for the client too. What are your thoughts?
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Hi Erin,
I enjoyed reading your thoughts and it gave me a different perspective on Ecopsychology and Nature Connection. To be fair to the Ecopsychologists, they are not a uniform bunch. Some of them see the human unconscious not extrapolated outside but as sourced from the same “place” as the source of the Earth and the world itself, but I agree with you that this notion of fixing a relationship is perpetuating a dualism in itself, whereas the viewpoint of Nature Connection you describe has the potential to align to something already there, a sort of drawing of one’s attention to what’s already present, our reality as being Nature ourselves if you will. Your succinct description of this helped my own thinking along so thanks!
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Simka,
this is a very stimulating conversation for me, and could talk for ages! I think you’re onto something with the sensory aspect…which begs the question: How can we bring our clients’ attention to the sensory realm and the body during a coaching session? My practice client today told me that closing her eyes during the surrender breath exercise made her realise how much sharper her other senses became..something as simple as that! I was struck by the reality that so many of us are disconnected from our senses, and an activity such as gardening or even cooking a wholesome meal can be a powerful nature-connection exercise!
As for the Serviceberry, I read that article on Emergence magazine by Kimmerer and loved it too! Yes, she expresses reciprocity so amazingly! I am still reading Braiding Sweetgrass but will let you know what I think when I do…Incidentally, my opening to this world of connection was through Carl Jung, who was deeply interested in alchemy, and whom some consider the grandfather of Ecopsychology. He certainly had lots to say about the separation of Heaven and Earth, and some of his students, particularly Marion Woodman, picked up that thread you talk about regarding the rejection of matter (which she considers the feminine principle) by Christianity, and tried to reclaim it in her own psychology, bodywork and spirituality. Maybe we can continue the discussion in the next forum, and…in the cafe! xxx