So, what is coaching all about? I had this and a dozen other questions before I stepped into this journey. Unlike other programs, I wanted some upfront clarity before diving in – but my mentor coach just told me I had to experience it first. A few months into it now, I can safely say that is true. It is entirely experiential. It is revealing, and it is transformational.
Initially, I assumed it would have models, frameworks, questioning, and tracking my hours, memorizing good questions. I thought coaching happened entirely from the neck up, but then, the reality of the coach’s chair hit me.
You realize quickly that if you show up to a session spinning in your own head, overthinking your next move, or stressing about your day, the conversation falls completely flat. Clients feel that lack of presence instantly.
It didn’t just teach me a skill; it pushed me to figure out what it actually means to be grounded.
Before this, I would not have transition between tasks. I may jump straight from a chaotic email thread right into a call, my nervous system still humming with irritation or urgency. I was physically there, but mentally scattered. Well, coaching doesn’t tolerate that.
I have had to start using a quick reset before a client arrives. Just dropping my shoulders, feeling my feet flat on the floor and taking three slow breaths to tell my brain that nothing else matters now except my presence.
When I started, though I was aware that listening meant not only focusing on the words but also noticing the expressions and non-verbal cues. But as I spent more time in the chair, I realized that the most critical information isn’t spoken; it’s felt. It carries much more than that – context, environment, experiences, behaviours, values, beliefs and even the identity of an individual.
Catching these shifts requires a totally different level of self-awareness. It is the only way to witness someone else’s storm without getting pulled into it.
Now, I am trying to build a natural default state of forward-looking. I am an optimizer, a planner, a “what’s next?” person. In early coaching sessions, this manifested as a frantic internal monologue: What question should I ask next? How am I going to wrap this up in 20 minutes? What’s the breakthrough here? That anxiety disconnected me from the current moment.
Getting grounded meant learning to trust the present. It meant realizing that the most powerful coaching question isn’t one you planned, it is the one that responds exactly to what the client just said right now. For someone who loves to plan, letting go and just trusting myself to handle things on the fly was unnatural. But it taught me a huge lesson about life: you don’t always need the next ten steps figured out to handle right now.
Ultimately, this process has just stopped me from overthinking everything. It got rid of that self-imposed pressure to perform and replaced it with stability and calmness.
However, I am still human – I still get distracted and some days my mind is cluttered and foggy. But the difference now is I am realizing that is okay, too. Coaching has taught me that the most powerful thing you can offer a chaotic world isn’t a brilliant piece of advice – it is deeply grounded presence, just being fully there.
