Powerful coaching dwells in a space of quiet minds, powerful questions, and intense curiosity between coach and client. Solitary insights also live in such a space. A space held by a coach called, "Meditation."
For a long time, I used meditation like a tool, pulling it out of my bag when I needed calm or focus. It was helpful, but I had no idea what I was missing until I applied it like breathing - consistently, and without fail. Every morning, I combine it with journaling to record what emerges from its still, small voice. Yes, meditation has a voice. A voice that is eternally patient, always present, and stubbornly quiet until you give it your undivided attention. It isn't arrogant. It simply knows the futility of competing with your incessant thoughts.
The ever-present nature of meditation's voice has powerful implications. As you honor and develop your practice, it will find other opportunities to speak. Gaps will appear between your trains of thought, those relentless, unbroken strings of words, images, sounds, and memory movies that fill your mind. Gaps of...quiet. Gaps of...stillness. Gaps of...nothingness. Gaps that honor, and invite in, meditation's still, small voice. Gaps that grow longer and more frequent over time.
This is the real benefit of a consistent meditation practice - constant communion with that voice. A voice perfectly tuned to your desires, perfectly timed with your gaps. There is no convincing, only knowing. So do, or don't do, as you wish. Either way, meditation is waiting.
Post-it Note
A few minutes before I posted this, I texted Verna, asking permission to use her photo from her trip to Sicily. She said "Absolutely!" and I hit "Publish." I had a different photo originally, but my "still, small voice" urged me to consider another and led me to hers. She had shared it with me a few weeks earlier.
Moments ago, I texted her again to let her know it was published. Amazed, here's what I got back:
"I meditated in that exact spot with the intention of co-creation! I sat there every morning of my visit to Sicily to meditate. I took the photo mostly as a visual to keep in my mind before I meditate at home! It's my happy place. It's the place I can sit in my true self. And from there, there is clarity."