Picture – for a moment – the first time you tried something new. It may not have gone quite to plan. It might have been an abject failure. Yet with encouragement, persistence and learning from your mistakes, you achieved it in the end. This is what coaching is all about.
From our very earliest experiences as we are born, we are are in learning mode. Every teetering step of the way, we learn life skills through trial and error. As small children, we fall over, dust ourselves down (with maybe just a few tears!) and give it another go.
Through our childhood years we learn to walk, run and jump. we learn our communication skills of talking and also ways to get what we want – often to our parents dismay too!
As we get older, we have the core of what we need to survive and, depending on our experiences from now on, we might constantly seek new skills or sometimes we falter, because we don’t like to fail; or be criticised; or ridiculed. And many people go into their shell because social pressures cause us to stay safe. After all, safety is a natural goal in our lives, isn’t it?
Where coaching helps, is to encourage us to realise that there is much more in us than we are prepared to let on. We have capabilities either that we don’t realise or that we hide to avoid being criticised or failing – neither of which might have been a pleasant experience in the past.
Where the best coaches help is by not only helping individuals discover their latent potential, but by helping them eradicate the demons that hold them back. Yet much success can be found by simply getting on and doing, rather than simply not trying at all.
As people try and make small successes, they build confidence, take on new skills and responsibilities and they thrive. All they need is the simple toolkit of try, do achieve and move on.
That’s all it takes.
All they need is a kick-start to simply try. Then they are so often surprised at what they can achieve and ultimately, that there are few actual boundaries in their way to a much richer, more fruitful life.
