Being present in your life

Do you sometimes feel overwhelmed and stressed out supporting others in your coaching practice? Do you notice your clients also have difficulty being present in their own lives? Would you like to instill a practice of paying attention to what your mind body and soul is telling you?

At Empower World in all of our training, facilitation and coaching programs we introduce and practice the principles of mindfulness: being present and focusing on what is happening right now both externally and internally. This means paying attention to our thoughts, emotions, body sensations and breath. When we acknowledge we are whole human beings connected to our mind body and souls, it can have a huge impact on how we view ourselves, the decisions we make and our experiences of life and fulfillment.

We believe paying attention to ourselves or being mindful, impacts our coaching presence, which is one of the ICF (International Coach Federation) core competencies essential to becoming even more effective professionals. The ICF describes coaching presence as the ability to be fully conscious and create a spontaneous relationship with the client, employing a style that is open, flexible and confident.

As coaches we believe we can increase our impact as professionals through using mindfulness before, during and after our work with clients. And we also believe our clients can benefit from mindfulness practice in managing the challenges in their life and choosing a life of joy and success.

Tina Ringer Mogensen, Danish Psychologist and mindfulness teacher with over 20 years of experience in both organizations and clinical work shares how the practice of mindfulness can positively impact our lives. Passionate about supporting people to thrive, connect, grow and be fully alive, Tina supports clients to reclaim their lost parts of themselves and grow into their full potential for themselves, relationships, families, societies and the world.

Tina explains how she came across mindfulness 10 years ago when she was in a very stressful period in her life. She was juggling small children, building her career and taking care of other people.  She said, “I started feeling burned out and sold out and I just needed to find something for myself where I could actually be with myself and be present with the people I was working with.  So it’s been my journey over the last 10 years, I would say, to integrate mindfulness into both my private life and my professional life. And lately, bringing mindfulness into organizations more and more.”

She says, “I think mindfulness is a way of living. It’s a way of being in the world that can be cultivated with practice. The thing about mindfulness that is also very appealing is that it’s so simple because the only tool we need is actually our breath, our body.”

Tina continues, “We do not make very wise decisions when our nervous system is always on alert and our brain is flooded with stress hormones. So coming back to that state where we are our mind is also connected to our body and calmness in the nervous system allows us to be more grounded and make wiser decisions. So the breath and the body I would say are like “hooks” that we can hold on to. These “hooks” are ways to support us from being lost in the river of life and we can use them to climb up the river bank and get some calmness in the mind and in the body”

At Empower World, we believe the practice of mindfulness enables us to become more connected to ourselves and in turn supports us to be more present with the people we work with. Below are some simple ways for you to bring the practice of being mindful into your own life and the work you do as a coach:

• Take time out to breathe and come to the present moment before each coaching session
• Stop pause and practice paying attention to your breath regularly as a coach
• Come to each session with an open heart and a curiosity to be with your clients in each moment
• Practice openness, compassion and curiosity about you and your client
• Support your clients to pay attention to what is happening to them as they think their thoughts and experience their feelings
• Offer up to your clients mindfulness practices for home play when you believe it may be useful to your client
• Let go of being right
• Trust both you and your client is fully whole and resourceful and know the answers to all your questions and by practicing mindfulness you and they will be able to tap into their own inner resources more and more

Be empowered.