Me and My Coach

I decided to check in with my life coach tonight--you know, those special assistants in living that only the trendiest people have. They are usually quite pricey, but mine is exceptionally reasonable.

Besides I had already tried to write a blog post and inspiration was as scarce as yellow bananas at No Frills (they are usually all green, except for this evening after work, I have to say, when they were the perfect shade of yellow with just the tiniest tinge of green at the ends.)

While out with my coach I decided to share a bit about me. You might think that I share a lot about me here, and I do, on a certain level, but there is sharing and sharing.

Today at work I went to a new training in our agency on facilitating personal planning meetings for the people who are really our employers--and who happen to have disabilities. The training was to help us do a really great job of facilitating, "the meeting" at which they share their goals and dreams. I'm smiling at the thought that part of the discussion at the meeting was on how to actually tempt some people to attend their own meeting. It can be a pretty intimidating thing to open up the most sacred ground of your heart--that of your hopes, dreams and goals, in public--even a supportive public.

By coincidence I had spent the better part of Sunday afternoon thinking about my own personal mission statement and goals. I sat in a big floral cushion padded wicker chair, in our window enclosed sun porch, enjoying the spring warmth and light filtering through the half closed blinds.

I looked at my well used day timer and the page at the front headed Mission Statement and Annual Goals. It was no longer pristine, as it had been a couple of months ago. No, it was a mass of indentations and traces of pencil lead--evidence of previous attempts at what I was trying once more to do on Sunday. This time I decided I would do it on my laptop, so that I could play with the wording more easily. I didn't find it easy to pull the essence of my hopes and dreams from my heart and into words and out onto paper. I did manage it though, and once out, they shot me into the week with clarity of purpose.

So I thought I would share some of what I wrote. I don't know whether I did it rightly or wrongly, according to the book, but it worked for me.

Here is my mission statement:
To live, work and lead as a disciple of Christ; demonstrating:
· Passion
· Purpose
· Intentionality
· Discipline
· Integrity

Passion: Proclaiming and demonstrating a particular truth with faithfulness and integrity; inspiring others to follow.
Purpose: Actively seeking God’s agenda and planning to accomplish my part in it.
Intentionality: Deliberately choosing actions focused on key priorities.
Discipline: Choosing to avoid distractions, in order to focus on the truly important.
Integrity: Living true.

I wrote some goals too; work and personal goals, and they have really brought focus to my days since writing them down. They might be boring to share in full here, but one was to exercise daily 45 minutes, 5 days out of 7.

So tonight after coming home, I sat down at my laptop with nothing to write, and a large head with a friendly pair of brown eyes and moist brownish pink nose, landed on a corner of the keyboard. Behind the head was a furry body with a wagging tail. The furry expert at non-verbal communication, said, "Walkies?" I could not resist.

And this is how I came to be out in the fresh, cool, evening air, walking with my golden coated coach with the tail the colour of toasted coconut --and thinking that maybe I should be brave enough to share some of me, if I expect the people I work for, to do so!