Posted by 64bowtie on July 18, 2004, at 12:02:07
Bursting the Client Balloon…
Give a kid a balloon and don’t dare try to take it away. From the kid’s perspective, it’s his first balloon to be defended to the death. It’s his only balloon even if it isn’t his real first balloon. Don’t pop his balloon or you will discover a new definition of “I hate you!”Morning Coffee…
With my Dad, it was the way he was making his (HIS) morning coffee. Experience showed me that if you are stingy with the beans, the coffee turns out awful tasting. But it is HIS coffee, after-all. Whether he could distinguish good tasting coffee from the bad tasting stuff, he smoked for forty years, smell and taste share “gustatory” brain cells, he wasn’t going to let on since I was trying to take away HIS coffee experience.Old-Dog Learning…
This has been a great lesson to ‘splain why I wasn’t getting results in my practice, no matter how carefully I had rolled out the information. From the client perspective, I was taking away something from them, making their life appear “smaller and less”. From my perspective I was trying to add new stuff. My vision was that whatever I brought to them that was new, made their whole life “bigger and more”.My Coaching Conundrum…
How do I produce the results the client intends to receive without triggering this rigorous defense of their illusions?Background…
I long since accepted that whatever impact I might have on my Dad was left to happenstance. I also discovered “personal contracts” as a gentle and acceptable way for a “stranger” to produce a lasting impact on the life of another. Everyone seems to be good at avoidance of “the new” people, places, things, and ideas. Furthermore, we as a culture appear to be less and less competent to fill our roles in life as adults. Insight and intuition says we are getting behind by hanging on to obligations and expectations way beyond their usefulness for survival, as life advances in technology.What’s Next…
Even though family-enmeshment messes up any chance I normally might have to create a difference in my Dad’s life, he needs help with his sabotaging “internal voice(s)”. I see his “internal voice(s)” orbiting out-of-balance from time to time. If I am right, he may trust his “internal voice(s)” more than he trusts his own Son, me. This is all why I am forever grateful for my Dad’s “coffee” lesson helping me connect with the “kid’s balloon” lesson. Hopefully I can now do better at sidestepping the potholes of the past, for my Dad, my clients, and most important for myself.Rod
poster:64bowtie
thread:367373
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20040717/msgs/367373.html