Mandy Bishop
Forum Replies Created
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Kim, awesome work! Reading this just brought up for me how powerful having educational or teaching moments can be. Look how powerful it has been for all of us! It sounds like helping your client learn about neuroplasticity and the power he has over his own neural connections, as well as his actions/reactions had a profound effect on him. Like you said, there is more work to do in maintaining the new tributary of the Grand Canyon, but it’s so exciting to me how much choice we all have over ourselves and our lives with greater understanding of how we’re wired.
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Wow, amazing posts so far and juicy to read! Reading these gets me jazzed even more about partswork and how powerful it is for both us and for our clients. One of the themes that I am hearing in your posts is some doubt about how to explain this tool and whether or not clients will understand it. While I totally understand, I just want to reflect that each one of us has “gotten” it, and has been able to work with it at least to some extent. I remember Michael saying partswork is an intuitive and natural process. On some level we know we are made up of parts, as we say “A part of me this… and a part of me that…”. However, in our culture, we like to fit everything into one streamlined identity. Introducing the concept of multiplicity (both/and) can be very powerful.
I have found it helpful to create a little handout that helps explain partswork. Just creating it was helpful for me to find the words I wanted to use to explain it, which then helped me in talking about it with clients. Perhaps writing your own intro could be helpful in creating your own explanation, or practicing with each other on introducing this to clients.
It is wonderful to hear of all of your incredible sessions from this module!! Keep it up!!
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Wow, Kim, that’s awesome that you are finding your way of incorporating the longterm coaching approach within your specific vision and business plan! I love that this happened on the water 🙂
“Neither were ready to commit to too long of a term so we agreed to put an agreement together that initially is 3 months with the option to extend or cancel from there. What really started gelling for both them, as clients, and me, as a coach, is that we came up with this type of agreement together so there is more of a commitment.”
I think what you said here, noting that the agreement/commitment was perhaps effected by the fact that you worked together to come up with it, speaks to the collaborating and partnering with the client(s) and to the depth of your listening.
Well done!
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Hi Melody,
Awesome job presenting a plan to your client!!! That takes a lot of extra thought and care and some courage as well. And you did it! I want to respond to what you said here: “A challenge I faced was my client being apprehensive of signing up for an 8 month program, which I totally understand can seem overwhelming so we agreed on a few sessions at a discounted price for now them will revisit. She is aware that there are things she needs and wants to work on which is why I highlighted some things that have come up at previous sessions right at the beginning of this discussion. I am confident that in the next few sessions we will set a sturdy foundation to continue to build this long term program on.”
This is something I have experienced as well as a coach, and can understand from the client perspective. This gives us good feedback, as you noted, that we can present our clients with an overall plan which helps to establish for us both that there is a long term holding and vision for growth, and at the same time we can go at the clients pace and meet them within their commitment window of tolerance. Like you said, the next few sessions will help you to set a sturdy foundation that you can continue to build the long term plan on.
Great work!
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Woooohoooo!!!!
All I have to say reading all of your visions and ways you are being called to bring your medicine into the world is HECK YES!!!!!!
Thank you. Thank you. Thank YOU for listening to hear your own callings and for courageously stepping up to meet who and what is calling to you.
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Deanna,
This is such great awareness and so important for us to continue to hold in mind as coaches and guides:
“Crossing the “threshold” is like crossing one massive edge. To cross that edge, I must feel safe, trusting of my guide/coach, and have a clear plan. Otherwise, I will not want to cross. ….By my coach trusting in my process, empowering me, and reassuring my safety, I feel safe and ready to be in the threshold, explore new edges, and maybe even cross new edges.”
How sacred the threshold space is, and just how important and impactful it is for us as guides to create and hold with the fierceness of a mama bear the safety of the container!
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Wow, thank you all deeply for contributing in such heart-felt ways to these posts and this discussion. They are a joy to read over!
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Thanks so much for sharing, Sarah! It is good to hear your “voice” after all this time 🙂
I totally agree with Kent — that same quote really stood out to me as well. I love the way you describe internalizing aspects and elements of nature in how you relate to the world and your future clients. I will take this with me as well as a great reminder of how I can internalize all that is being masterfully taught through nature and how I can incorporate that into my way of being.
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I totally echo this and really appreciate you including some indigenous beliefs in your writing! This statement about the Navajo, “To live in balance and harmony with all life is one’s ultimate goal, “developing pride of one’s body, mind, soul, spirit and honoring all life”. There are no “troubled” or lost people, no addicts or the insane, there are only people who have lost their way, lost their connection to themselves, their community and the Earth, they have lost harmony and balance” reminds me of the way the Karamajong, indigenous to Northern Uganda, also view the health of their community. An elder there told me that they look in the eyes of every person they meet to determine if they could see/feel the spirit of that person. If they could not, they did not think that person was bad or wrong for being addicted/detached/insane, but they then knew they had to help that person find their way back to the Earth and the tribe. I love this sense of holding within community so much and it is something we have become so disconnected from in our society.
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Kent,
I too can really relate to what you write about in your post regarding straddling two worlds, one of a sort of escape to the natural world which feels whole and cohesive, and the other a sort of messy and dismembered civilization. It is very disheartening for me to see how disconnected much of humankind is from nature and our roots and from the whole web of life. Reading through your post however, I felt such a sense of hopefulness and liberation. When you said, “I’ve slowly learned to accept my place in civilization and the ‘reality’ of everyday life. It exists. I can’t deny it or change it. And that includes people too of course. I can’t deny or change them. What I can do is deepen my relationship with nature, remember who I am, and live my life from the place of my soul.” I felt such a wave of empowerment in my own self reading this. It’s as if by you accepting your place in civilization and into the time and place you find yourself in in this life, and by you declaring what you can do within the relationship to yourself and your own soul, you are actually modeling and gifting and emanating that acceptance and that empowerment outwards to others… even through a thread on a post like this.
“What an exciting and empowering place to be in! I am honored to walk between these two worlds in hope that I will guide even one soul to their origin. Who knows what good that one soul will do for the world.” Also, BEAUTIFUL and I agree. Thank you!
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For me, being connected to nature is about being fully present in my body, in my mind, with the land and with the other beings around me. I feel like there’s a difference between being in nature as opposed to being connected to nature. The former being much more about doing, and that later more about being and relationship. Being out in nature is something that many of us have had the opportunity to do many times in our lives — playing a soccer game, swimming in the lake, riding bikes, or going for a hike. Being in nature implies that nature is something outside of us. We go out into a pristine space that is outside and do some activity in it. We often engage with the outdoors in the same manner we engage with the rest of our lives — in a hurried, outcome-oriented, agenda-oriented, and sometimes controlling manner. This is in stark contrast to being connected to nature.
Connecting to nature involves be-ing in nature, quite literally. This means letting go of the chatter of the mind, the to-do list, the story of the thing that happened yesterday, or having a particular objective or agenda. This means being present with each passing moment, allowing the flow and the natural course to occur in and around us. By engaging all of the senses and concentrating on staying present with what arises we allow our human mind to take a backseat while we re-inhabit our bodies and remember what it is to be a vital living animal within the landscape. Our senses become keen observers to the landscape that surrounds us, and as we notice and track the outside world we begin to notice and track our inner landscape as well. When we connect in this way, we begin to realize that we are in relationship to the plants, the animals, and the elements all around us. We start to notice the direction of the breeze or the aspect of the sun, the way a bird song makes us feel or the sound of our own beating heart. The more we deepen into just be-ing in nature, the more we begin to see and understand the intricate layers of connections and interrelationship between ourselves and all things.
This is such an important aspect of connecting to nature for me. For as long as I can remember, I’ve created a family of my own through the birds and the plants. Having grown up in an household where my mom was very sick and unable to really care for me and my dad was not really present, they couldn’t meet my needs and my sister and I were somewhat neglected, unseen and unheard. I would often “escape” into the wilderness of the backyard where I could dig in the dirt, talk to the plants, climb the trees and keep company with the birds. When I was young, I considered these creatures my family. It wasn’t until I was much older that I remembered this deep familiar connection and returned to it to begin to learn the names of those I had once known so intuitively when I was young. I studied native herbal medicine and wild edibles, local trees and grasses. I began learning the names, feathers and flight patterns of birds. I found that this kind of watching and learning created an intimacy with the landscape. The relationship that existed between us became illuminated and I started seeing myself as one part of a web of relatives that was connected from one circle to the next. This was probably the entry way for me to form a much deeper and reciprocal relationship with her. When I was in nature in this way, I knew I was okay. I was amongst relatives that accepted me for exactly who I was, and that loved and supported me, giving me everything I needed to survive. And I realized I had a responsibility to her as well.
This kind of connecting to nature, of recognizing and acknowledging sacred relationships all around us, creates a sense of belonging that is a critical element to healing and personal growth. In Wilderness as Healing Place, Kaplan and Talbot talk about the profound effect this type of interconnection in the wilderness can have upon our inner worlds. “All of this compatibility can be liberating. It can allow reflection that can lead to discovery of a different self, a self less conflicted, more integrated and more desirable…They feel a sense of union with something that is lasting, that is of enormous importance, and that is larger than they are.” To me, this is the gateway to begin to move through the healing process from a place of not belonging towards a place where one values oneself enough to recognize that they have unique gifts to bring forth into the world. The Coyote’s Guide to Connecting with Nature further emphasizes the importance of connecting with nature for our growth and personal expression. “The natural world powerfully fosters self-expression, because nature itself is so completely self-expressed. When we spend an abundance of time around this uninhibited self expression, we resonate like tuning forks to express who we are: we sing our own gifted songs.” (p. 31)
This has been true for me in my experience. An incredibly deep transformation has begun and is continuing through my connection with nature. It is a place I have gone to that was vast enough, grand enough to hold my grief through the processes of healing. It is a place I have been able watch and learn from other beings how to slow down, how to listen, and how to allow a natural unfolding to occur. It is a place where I’ve taken big questions about my purpose in life or who I really am, and where the land has actually answered me! It is where I’ve learned about how the soul speaks in metaphors and symbols, and where I’ve felt a bubbling up of inspiration, creativity and purpose in my life. In his blog post What is Deep Nature Connection, Jon Young speaks to the transformative power of connecting with nature. “As mentors we are looking at fostering positive attributes that arise when individuals develop connection with other people and with the rest of nature. In the process, a person inevitably learns to connect better to one’s own self. As connections are opened, a person’s inner light begins to shine. An understanding of one’s gifts and vision develops, along with an appreciation of the interdependence of community.”
Connection with nature has been and continues to be totally transformative in my life in ways that aren’t controlled or outcome oriented, but just allow for nature to give me support, belonging, mentorship and unconditional love. As the potency of the connection with nature continues to unfold in my life, I know without a doubt that I will be guided to realize my own vision and bring my own unique gifts into the world. And I believe that this kind of connection can and will do the same for others in their lives as well. I believe that if I continue to see the true mentor as nature, that my role as coach is really to be more of a bridge to the remembrance of nature, without and within. In The Way of Wilderness, Steven Harper writes, “We can reinhabit ourselves only when we have learned to reinhabit the Earth. We are part of a circular, spiraling dance in which every part feeds the others and the whole.” As I continue my journey to be in nature and truly be in my own soul self, I will be able to be a guide or a bridge to that powerful connection with nature for others so that we may all begin to reinhabit ourselves and reconnect in reciprocal relationship to each other and the Earth.
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Rachael,
I really resonated with the part of your post where you mention: “Someone with their wants, needs, and skills aligned in the wild…will have a self that feels more integrated. This sense of belonging creates more spaciousness for inner reflection to be positive (stronger internal connections), and for deepened relationships with nature and other humans to be more healthy and mutual (stronger external connections). According to Kaplan and Talbot, “This can further create a sense of connection with something much larger than themselves, of vast size and high importance – a spiritual transcendence.” And you go on to say, “It becomes easy to feel a sense of belonging, and therefore a deep desire to connect to and support all things both inside and out.”
I completely agree and feel like that is such a deep shift that occurs in us through this type of coaching and soul work in nature. You begin to see the sacred in absolutely everything and start to see that nature (including the nature that is not so pristine, the nature that is happening on the street corner or in the customer interaction, or in the pigeon’s flight) is collaborating with and supporting you and that you belong in that web. Thanks for such a rich post!
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David,
What you write about here is so rich for me! I appreciate how you break up the notions of anomie, alienation and flow into states of being experienced rather than “conditions” that one is sort of stuck with as an issue. It feels to me like the very manner in which you have observed yourself experiencing the movement from anomie to alienation to flow depending on your connection to nature and soul in that moment is in itself an actual flow. What comes up for me here is that perhaps we cannot expect ourselves to be continually in a state of absolute connection and flow to soul (I mean, maybe that’s possible and that is certainly the goal) but that as human beings in this society that we find ourselves in, perhaps some degree of wavering between checking out or feeling bound by social norms is something that might occur from time to time. And that noticing this, tracking this in ourselves and having the tools to return to the “fluidity of the universe” and our souls — that this is our real task as humans and is in itself an allowing and a flow.
I really appreciate your question and answer: “What is the link between estrangement and connection with Nature and Soul, from alienation or anomie to flow – the step in which to take towards the latter? I believe the answer is willingly taking a step into wilderness, finding the place of darkness, of shadow, and of not-knowing, and dredging forward.”
I totally resonate with this! That there is a well of deep wisdom in the place of darkness and shadow, and the wilderness absolutely reflects this to us. I also find this reflected through myth and story. I just listened to one incredible story recently that tells the tale of a Nubian girl who descends deep into the river of the underworld as she is looking for herself and her recovering her soul. It is called the “The Black Nubian Women” and so worth a listen if you are at all interested: https://kedarbrown.com/category/audio-stories-interviews/
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Brian,
Thank you for sharing such an honest and raw look at the transformation you began to experience in the face to face. Like Kent, I also really resonated with this statement you made: “maintaining my personal connection to nature is vital to me being fully available, without judgment, and full of love and empathy for each client that I work with. Connecting to Nature has allowed me to connect with my Soul in a way I never have before. Staying connected to Nature and my Soul in this way will allow me the depth of listening my clients deserve. And from this depth of listening, powerful questions will arise that help the client discover what they are looking for. It will allow me to keep my own agenda and junk out of the picture.”
What comes up for me when I read this is my own conditioned belief that I have to try to control where something goes, or do something to make something happen. The face to face really illuminated this deep pattern within myself — all of the awareness exercises and the medicine walks kept bringing light to this engrained belief and pattern in my life that really goes against a natural process and in many ways gets in my own damn way. It became so clear to me that it is the opposite of this — the trusting, the allowing, the unfolding — that is the way to connect truly and deeply with ourselves, with nature and with our clients. I can tell that this allowing is an edge for me, like a brand new brain pattern that I want to nurture and encourage because I know that this is the way to hear the soul speak. I am so grateful this patterning has become illuminated in my life!