Thus the separation between the rational intellect and the experiencing body began.

What happened was that once scientific thinking took hold, it made it harder for us to accept our direct experiences as valid. We might know, for instance, that the earth revolves around the sun, but we experience, and our language supports this, that it is not the earth that moves - we still talk about the sun rising and setting.

As rational thinking became the dominant way of exploring and understanding life, so we have learned to invalidate more and more of our direct experiences.

We can see this even in children - if a child cries because it has dropped something petty (like a sweet), we might reassure it by telling it that it's of no consequence, it's only a small thing, it doesn't matter. This is not the child's experience.

Similarly, when we fall in love with someone, we might judge that we are acting irrationally - and outsider tend to look on lovers with a mix of scorn and pity, compounded with a dose of "realism" - "it won't last, you know".

We now have books and manuals on the "right" way to bring up children, have relationships, even how to make love "properly" - as if such activities which we have been engaging in for millennia, can now only be done in rationally-developed ways. The arguments put forward by the medical profession against breast-feeding in the post-war period are a tragic case in point.

What does this have to do with coaching?
It's increasingly easy nowadays to find information and advice for all of the difficulties and challenges that we might face - there are "how to" books on almost everything you can think of (and some you can't!), and it seems as if everyone has suggestions to offer on what to do about any particular problem.

However, often what's needed is not advice or helpful suggestions or solutions, but simple listening. In fact, I'd say that's something that's so vital and so rare.

So bombarded are we with information and advice, and rules and how-to's, that sometimes we miss the obviousness of simply giving someone the gift of listening.

Something I've noticed in my coaching work with others, is that people often report that they've spoken of something with me in a conversation, that they had never spoken to anyone about before, and that just the speaking of it was enough! I didn't have to "do" anything, other than be there and listen in such a way that what wanted to emerge from the soul was able to do so.

Listen, listen, listen
Simply listening can be the most precious gift - simply put, I think the soul longs for, perhaps more than anything else apart from connection (which might be the same thing anyway), to express itself and be heard or seen. It doesn't need to be fixed, or told what to do next, or given a solution - it simply longs to be witnessed.

In our increasingly rational culture, we have learned to invalidate that which can't be measured or analysed. We don't value that which makes no sense, or has no purpose. What this means is that we don't have the space to simply express who we are. We learn to communicate "strategically", "effectively", and "intelligently", but at the expense of truly expressing ourselves.

And, when we cannot express ourselves fully, our magic cannot show up. We might well be performing well against measurable targets, but we are like empty shells, living lives that are automatic and soulless. Something is needed to re-awaken the dormant spark within us.

And that something is as simple and as rare as real listening. That is the true magic of coaching - the listening to the soul that longs to express itself.

What wants to manifest?
This is one of my favourite quotations, from Master Coach Julio Olalla, and sets the perfect "mood" for coaching.

When we can listen to our clients from this perspective, we are able to support them in looking deeply at what their soul longs to express. From that perspective, whatever the client says is a "window" to their soul - and we can begin to get a flavour of what is bubbling up from within.

And in that journey of witnessing, without interference, something may get to be expressed that is so profound, so magical, that the person's life takes on a whole new flavour. There is nothing to fix any more, no goal to be reached, just a completely different territory of life.

© Aboodi Shabi - 2004