[Morgana Moyers]

Summary Post

During quarantine I actually had the opportunity to use Gestalt in an impromptu coaching session. This particular person was going through a bit of an identity crisis and felt like they were broken. They’d been a student so long that now that they were in the real world they had no idea who they were. I gently introduced the concept of Gestalt that they were not broken but merely in an old Gestalt that is currently going through a transformation. That concept sparked something in them and they felt a lot better about where they were currently at. I think Gestalt is going to be a big part of my coaching technique. Bringing clients back to the present and taking a look at what no longer serves them in this moment and what we can begin to unpack and transform seems to be so powerful. That simple statement of “You are not broken” can be so impactful. I look forward to working with Nature alongside Gestalt techniques to bring inner awareness and changes to all aspects of a clients life as well as my own.

[Morgana Moyers]

Cory,

Great awareness of realizing one of your strengths is staying in the present moment. Using Gestalt and Nature as a means to help a client stay in the present rather than her daydreams can be a wonderful thing for that client. It can be a challenge to stay in the moment when we are used to being sucked into the stories in our head. Love the little reminder of “Be Here Now”. The now always has something to teach us.

[Morgana Moyers]

Taylor,

Love the insight here and how you’re starting to connect some things and allowing the flow to happen. I think starting out it’s going to be hard not to get caught up in the story. We want to be there for our client so it’s definitely going to be a learning curve to fully show up but not get caught up. It’s great that you were able to help clients bring more awareness to their body by offering examples of words. It might be useful to supply clients with a chart like that that they can take a look at, like the Wheel of Emotions to help expand their vocabulary too.

[Morgana Moyers]

Foundation Three Summary Post

Chapter 9 and 10 in the Coyotes guide sparked a lot of ideas in my head for coaching and ways of getting in tune with the Natural Cycle. I already utilize the feng shui bagua in my daily life by orienting my room and my meditation area to the directions as closely as I can in order to have proper energy flow in my life. As a Pagan I also pay attention to and celebrate sabbats and esbats, also known as the Wheel of the Year. Admittedly though I have slacked off in this area. Reading the chapters on it in Coyote Guide got me thinking about it again and how I can potentially use it in my coaching, especially during the threshold time. Thinking about those peak times in Nature when the sun hits its highest point and in threshold when the energy crescendos up and then drops. How can we not only utilize then land during this time but also the seasons? The Turning of the Wheel within us so to speak.

Bringing in that ceremony piece with Nature guiding us. We all have natural cycles we go through. Times when we reach peak creativity and have energy for days and times when all we can do is rest and self care. Just like Nature we go through rough patches and stormy weather. How can we let nature guide us through these times and allow it to inform our threshold experiences? Right now we’re all in a new cycle of growth. Of learning new skills and becoming in tune with both our inner and outer landscapes. For me I want to look at the threshold experience as a turn on the wheel. Utilizing the deep listening and the sacred questions to bring awareness to where we might be on that wheel, where we got stuck and didn’t complete full cycle cause we we’re going into our dormant winter stage and how we can now bring it full circle. This is how I see Nature informing the experience and coaching. This is where we can have a truly transformative experience.

[Morgana Moyers]

Cory,

Great awareness here around creating the intimacy of a safe space for the client to drop into. Trusting in the process and allowing space for things to come up is huge!Great awareness around how holding that space allows for those transformational processes. I fully agree that establishing that competency with a client is an important one.

[Morgana Moyers]

Ben F.

I completely understand the part of being unsure if you’re going to have an experience. I was definitely in my head about that and feel like I couldn’t really make that connection. I think you’re right that in coaching our client (or ourselves) may be dealing with things that are uncomfortable. Providing that safe space for them to explore is essential and I do believe on occasion we will need to “push” our client to let go and have an experience. Watching for those incongruencies and tracking baseline and knowing when to push and when to let them be. Great insight from you!

[Morgana Moyers]

Foundation Three Initial Post
Being in threshold was an interesting experience for me as the client. I felt I had a hard time letting go and just doing something. It’s not that I didn’t trust Nature would be there for me. It was more I didn’t trust myself to find something out on the land to aid in my threshold experience. Like I was too in my head and overthinking it. You know those repetitive thoughts of “I need to do something, find something, I’m suppose to be experiencing something now but nothing is happening?”. I had a hard time connecting with myself and the land because I was so in my head. It’s a self conscious thing that I’m working on. I know at one point I wanted to scream but settled for throwing pine cones at a tree because it was less embarrassing or attention drawing. I often know how I want to react, especially with intense emotions but typically I find myself pushing them down and not being in the moment with them, especially if others are present. It’s like, yeah I feel they may judge me, but it’s more I judge myself through their eyes, if that makes any sense.
Going forward with my coaching, this experience will help inform how I can guide clients who are experiencing a similar thing. I’m sure as we progress with EBI and we get to know each other on a deeper level this will start to subside for me on one level or another. Taking note of when these changes occur and what helped to get me to open up will give me ideas on how to help my clients or to just be aware of the changes they go through. This means making sure as a coach some of the competencies to really bring forward are establishing good coaching presence and establishing trust and intimacy with the client. The trust and intimacy is a big one I feel. If a client doesn’t feel safe and supported then the chances of them opening up and really going through a transformational experience are nil. Guiding the ceremony and having confidence in your listening skills is something else to work on.

[Morgana Moyers]

Summary Post

I’m sitting here at my desk pondering all the different steps of moving through severance, especially around closing that gap that appears. That gap of “this is where I am and here is what I want”. I feel like I get stuck in that area in my own personal life a lot. Sometimes it’s little things that keep me stuck. Things I’m not ready to move on from or often I don’t know how to resolve within myself. It’s weird because I’m almost in the exact place I was a year ago when I started this journey with EBI. Last January I was going through major changes with my partner. I wanted to move back to my moms to save money but I risked losing my partner. So I went ahead with an apartment under the assumption I would be having help financially since my boyfriend was supposed to move with me. But during the first week of EBI I learned he wasn’t coming with me and that put considerable strain on me. Now, a year later, January started the same. Almost a do over, except my partner was now my ex. I ended up back at my moms after almost six months of us not speaking to one another. And surprisingly my ex came with me. I had offered the space as I knew financially he wouldn’t be able to afford his own place, but I also assumed he would go back to living at his boss’s place. I was surprised when he followed me after all the circumstances leading to our break up. More story than needed but felt like sharing. Now as I sit here, listening to the audio recordings of the first week I’m back at that gap. It’s like the universe said here, start over the way you wanted to start last year. “No fear about losing someone, no fear about focusing on yourself and doing that deep inner work that is needed”
I feel like I’m constantly working on myself, asking those deep questions and coming into contact with what I want but then that gap appears. This self imposed gap that I know isn’t really there yet it feels so real. Moving through this gap is and learning how to get into threshold and integrate all the new circuitry is my biggest take away and challenge right now. It’s interesting all the awareness that I’m having about myself and my own patterns and behaviors that I’m learning from being in this course. I am my biggest obstacle when it comes to closing the gap and having that understanding about this gap will definitely help me in my work with others.

[Morgana Moyers]

Daniel,

This is beautifully written and very thought provoking. Your idea of the semi-porus membrane that separates us from nature and how it’s not our job to eliminate that but become aware of it and work with guiding others to a point of exchange is something I haven’t heard or considered before. Thank you for giving my mind something new to consider and work with.

[Morgana Moyers]

MJ,

I thoroughly enjoyed your post about societal norms and people saying they prefer the city life to the outdoors. Asking some good questions there! Your thought on why you never move forward with any business ideas due to the pressures society and other people put on you really struck a chord with me and helped me find some answers to my own “failures”. I appreciate your enthusiasm for following what you want to do and making it more about helping others than “taking on the world”. I enjoyed the awareness you brought forward!

[Morgana Moyers]

Initial Post Foundation 2
It’s interesting to be re-reading the articles on ecopsychology during this time of quarantine and pondering where ecopsychology and coaching come together. A quote that stands out to me comes from Where Psyche Meets Gaia by Theodor Roszak, “We are living in a time when both the Earth and the human species seem to be crying out for a radical readjustment in the scale of our political thought. Is it possible that in this sense the personal and the planetary are pointing the way toward some new basis for sustainable economic and emotional life, a society of good environmental citizenship that can ally the intimately emotional and the vastly biospheric?”
This stands out to me because we seem to be on the brink of that tipping point. This lockdown, though uncomfortable and stress inducing for many, is an opportunity for us to really see the cracks in the system. To really take a look at ourselves, society and our connection to nature and reevaluate it. What is the universe trying to teach us right now? Being in isolation, alone or with others, shows us a deep need for connection. That tribe and community that comes together to assist each other. Right now we are witnessing these acts more and more. We are realizing the deep need of connection, not just to each other but to nature. We are watching nature heal itself and connect with us on another level. Animals are coming down to check things out, they sense a change in the universe. And a change is happening. While we have always been moving towards this revolution the world was still content to sleep. Those of us who have been awake for awhile were already finding ways in their own lives to bridge the gap between personal and planetary. For me, I never really looked into what ecopsychology was. I guess I had a stigma that it meant being an activist and going to rallies and jumping on whaling ships to destroy their equipment. And I thought, that’s not really me. I want to connect to nature and save it and make a better world but I’ve never been called in that direction. It wasn’t until these readings that I got a better grasp on what ecopsychology really is and I’m now really excited to learn more on it.
With Ecopsychology looking at our ingrained bond to mother earth and how important that bond is and the therapy coming out of it based on the interaction with the earth I see where it connects with coaching. Our use of the planet, whether healthy or not shows our internal state. With Nature-Connected Coaching, we see this as well. Looking and interacting with the natural environment around us and how it reflects back to us our inner state. With the current state of affairs it’s interesting to see how mother earth pushed us to isolation so we were forced to look at our inner landscape. Nature is interacting with us now more than ever. Which is why Nature-Connected Coaching is so important now. Any nature connected therapy is going to important now. If we can bring our inner selves into harmony with nature and all the living creatures on it then we have the opportunity to create massive change. And here we are seeing it on a massive level. Not just one or two people coming to coaching to remedy the split. This is worldwide. Working with nature and the human heart is what causes profound changes that ripple out in all directions. Bringing these two elements together to help others reconnect to themselves makes perfect sense. And it definitely links with what I’m wanting to do with my coaching. I’m not sure if the question is asking where it may fall short in my coaching or in general but in my coaching I can see it falling short with my knowledge base. I have a limited knowledge on the principles and concepts behind this movement. While I do a lot of nature therapy and connection on my own with Shamanism and my Pagan background, I’m still learning how to integrate into my coaching.

[Morgana Moyers]

Foundation One Summary Post
I’m not really sure what I expected when I showed up to Foundation One. All I knew was that I had followed my intuition and was eager to see where it led me. Meeting everyone for the first time, hearing their stories and perspectives on life, coaching and nature brought a lot to the forefront for me. Reading everyone’s take away in the forums was especially thought-provoking and enjoyable. What I enjoyed the most was seeing so many different personalities coming together to bring Nature-Connection back out into the world, spreading it as far as we can. I think my biggest take away is knowing that I can reconnect with nature. That I can develop those awareness skills and not only become more aware of the environments baseline around but also my own baseline and how I affect the environment around me. I thought I had lost that when I stopped being in nature and became more reclusive and stayed inside. It made me remember the little girl I used to be. The one so determined to be connected with nature and animals that she would stand outside, next to the bird feeder and still herself, no matter how long it took, until the birds were not frightened by her and came down to the feeder. I want to be that way again. I want to walk through the woods with a baseline that doesn’t disturb them. Now I know it’s possible. Now I know I can sit outside, in snow even, and make that connection again. I’m excited for what’s to come and feeling blessed to be sharing this journey with such wonderful souls.

[Morgana Moyers]

Initial Post
So, I truly believe timing is a thing. Finally getting around to posting this and as I listened to the recordings again a lot of pieces resonated and fell into place for me for where I’m currently at. This is one of my favorite forms of therapy and really helps me focus my mind and brings awareness I know I have a little bit more into the light. Currently I still have no practice client. Having some trouble convincing myself I can actually do this and guide people. Now might be a good time to start reaching out while we’re all quarantined away.
Looking back on the intensive and getting a fresh view from listening to the recordings I realize how far I’ve come. During the face to face I was dealing with a lot of stuff revolving around myself and my relationships. How I constantly changed myself to fit in with those around me and that only a select few knew my true self. I struggled a lot with projecting, interjection, deflection and of retroflection. Interjection and retroflection were the two big ones for me. Growing up with a covert narcissist mother created interesting stories for me. She was oddly supportive and yet dismissive at the same time. She would say things to strangers like “My daughter Amber has a beautiful voice,” and then almost offhandedly look at me and say “This one can sing too.” Almost like I wasn’t good enough or as good as my sister. Looking back on it and thinking it over now this is what causes me to stop something I enjoy, like piano, especially when I start getting good at because why continue when someone else will be better at it? I dampen myself because that’s what I grew up with and I’m just now really starting to recognize and bring awareness when I do this. This is also why I haven’t really dived into my coaching practice yet. I’m working on moving through that and having a creative experience with myself. I’m also working on the retroflection part where I have a tendency to pick at my skin until it bleeds when I’m stressed or feeling any intense “negative” emotion. I have recognized this as a coping mechanism and I’m trying to find a healthier outlet.
When I do finally reach out it’s important to establish the coaching relationship. For me a big part of this is that initial contact. Getting a feel for the client by asking what they’re looking to gain from coaching, explaining how coaching works, what it is and isn’t, expectations, and personal responsibility. I want to make sure both client and myself have a clear understanding with each other to make sure I’m a good fit for this person. Maybe offer a trial period at a discounted rate to see if I’m the right fit. Bringing in the connection piece from Gestalt, being fully present and providing a space for a client to be heard is important to me. Connecting to others can be hard and it doesn’t automatically happen often for I feel as a society we have a lot of barriers up to prevent us from getting hurt. My goal is to just let the client know I’m there and yes I am separate from them but we are in a space of sacredness that we are co-creating.
How could Gestalt fit into nature-connected coaching and how could I collaborate with Nature and combine Gestalt with coaching? Since I’m focusing my business on the Celtic Shamanism and spiritual side of things, these all collaborate beautifully. Connection to nature is an essential part of Shamanism. Bringing in the coaching aspect with the spiritual teachings will help to guide people through the dark night of the soul and other such times to bring them back into connection with themselves and nature and to reclaim their power. Gestalt fits beautifully with this as it allows for more creativity and experiential moments to bring out the full expression of another. A challenge I face with this is how does this type of coaching play out? What does it look like? I’m still working on that. Another challenge is this might not work for everyone so building clientele might take a moment, but I’m okay with that. This will be trial and error for me and I’m open to finding what works and what doesn’t.

[Morgana Moyers]

Hi Taylor! Loved your post! I too really enjoy the thought of the 50/50 rule and having a good chunk of unstructured time. You’re right in saying we don’t see that anymore. So much of our time is planned out that it feels weird to just go with the flow or to sit and do nothing. The openness of being a nature-connected coach is definitely inspiring. I love the enthusiasm you have around all the readings and the materials being presented here. It’s infectious! Can’t wait to hear more from you!

[Morgana Moyers]

Hi Sandy!

I just wanted to say how wonderful your writing is and I love how you talk about being “all in” when you are fully connected to your environment. Allowing nature and the curiosity that comes from it to guide and inform you not only externally but internally as well. When you talk about the firsthand experience and not having a story we want to attach to things really got me thinking. I think as society we are caught up in our stories about ourselves and those around us and we have all these preconceived ideas that prevent us what you were saying of just having an experience.That’s powerful right there. Thank you for sharing.