Blocks – Recognizing and Dismantling Them

More often than not, my clients come to me with a fairly well defined idea of what they want to accomplish, who they want to be, and how they see themselves in the future. Yet they come to me. Because something is preventing them from focusing on what they need to do to get where they want to be.

Every person that seeks out a life coach is a person who is motivated to do something positive. What varies from individual to individual are the degree to which they are accustomed and willing to work toward their goals, the type of goals they have, their tendency toward and history with being success driven, and their ability to focus on important tasks. Of course there are many other things that differ from person to person, but when it comes to the reason why someone is seeking the services of a life coach, those are the biggest factors.

It’s not important to segment people according to their position in life or apparent success. What is common with all people I have worked with is that something is blocking their ability to reach the solution to what they are seeking. Whatever those blocks may be, they all have one thing in common: they affect our thinking ability.

If a brick wall is blocking us from physically moving forward, it is not the individual bricks that are doing the blocking. One brick can easily be ignored – even if we stub our toe on it, the worst result is that we will be cussing for a moment or two about how we could have been so inattentive to have let that happen. Two bricks are not a lot different than one brick – they still don’t form a wall, just two things to stub our toes on.

But many bricks, when cemented together, can create an obstacle that’s much more difficult to get around.

And so it goes with the issues in our minds that are preventing us from seeing the solution.

Taken one at a time, they typically do not form a figurative brick wall that we can’t overcome. NOTE: If you’re thinking about an issue that you once had to get around, an issue that was so big that you couldn’t see the forest for the trees, hence taking exception to the first statement in this paragraph, think about it again. If you think hard enough, you can surely remember that there were a number of things that were complicating the situation, that made “Issue A” that much more formidable an opponent.

For example, perhaps at some hypothetical point in the past we were trying to start our own business. Suppose that the biggest thing standing in our way at a given moment was the fact that we underestimated our advertising/marketing budget, and had no idea where we were going to come up with the money. Would that in itself be a deal breaker? What other things might have been complicating the problem? Take a look at some hypothetical examples:

• We’ve never been an expert in marketing, and the learning curve is going to take time
• Taking time for that learning curve will take time away from our main focus – making money – and bills are due
• The person we hired whose resumé boasted about great prospecting skills knows less about marketing than we do – do we fire them and find someone else? What are the chances that any new hire will possess BOTH skill sets?
• Our nearest competitor just put up a huge billboard on the highway
• We just found out about a big problem at school involving one of our kids
• Our car’s check-engine light went on during the morning commute, and that may mean some expensive, time-consuming repairs

I’m sure you can think of more, but you get the idea.

The main issue, that of dealing with an increased advertising/marketing budget, taken by itself is not insurmountable. But what can happen to a person’s thinking when it is clouded with myriad other issues, some related and some not?

Each separate issue has the tendency to multiply all of the others. Suppose we assign a number to each issue that relates to its discrete importance and difficulty, on a scale of 1 to 10. Suppose the number we come up with for each discrete issue is 2. Then suppose that there are a total of three issues. Added together, they would equal 6. But if issue 1 multiplies itself by issue 2, then issue 3, and the others do the same, and we then add them all together, the “issue index” becomes 24 on a scale of 1 to 10. Oops, looks like we broke the scale.

Of course that would be all in our minds. So it’s not important.

Except that the level of difficulty becomes real in our minds. We lose our ability to focus on any of those issues because we allowed them to multiply each other past the boiling point.

However, we still have the innate ability to solve each of those problems by themselves. After all, we only rated them as “2” on the 1-10 scale, right?

Why can’t we just take one issue at a time, solve it, then move on to the next? Mainly because we perceive that the interrelationship among our myriad problems is logical and real. We can’t solve Issue A until we get a grip on Issue B, and Issue B depends upon Issue C, and so on. Regardless of the degree of truth to those assumptions, the effect is that our minds become cloudy, and our ability to focus on problem solving becomes compromised.

If only we could borrow Harry Potter’s magic wand.

But there is a magic wand. Except that it’s not magical. And it’s not a wand.

Unraveling knots in our brain is something we can actually do without even realizing it. It involves a skill we all have.

Talking.

Talking about our goals, plans, issues and road blocks with the right person tends to clear our minds and help us focus on what is most important. There is a reason why “with the right person” is italicized. The right person will likely not be our best friend. Or our business partner. Or even our mother or father.

The right person, the one who is going to BE the magic wand that gets us to the solution to our conundrum, must be a good listener. Must be completely non-judgmental. Must not offer too much (if any) advice. Must not try to “fix” things. Must ask the right questions. The right person must be and do all of those things. They don’t have to be an expert on marketing or whatever the area we are having difficulty with is – they just have to have all the qualities mentioned.

The not-so-right person, though well-intentioned, may inadvertently allow us to get ourselves worked up. For example, if the “listener” says, “If I were you, I’d just fire that prospecting person,” what is our reaction likely to be? Frustration? Faster, louder speech accompanied by heavier breathing as we try to explain and re-explain the other issues that will cause? Uh-oh, things just got a little worse.

Expressing ourselves in a neutral environment, eliciting thought-provoking questions, and not being blamed or judged for our problems, is the magic wand that will clear our minds so that we can 1) envision, clarify, and define our goals, 2) clearly see the tasks necessary to meet those goals, 3) develop a plan to accomplish those tasks and goals, 4) develop and maintain the motivation to complete all of those steps.

Each block must be recognized for what it is. Taken by itself, is it a deal-breaker? If it were the only issue facing us, how would we deal with it? CAN we deal with it now? Or is better left to another time? Recognizing the block is the first thing to do.

As a life coach, I will help you recognize, one at a time, how each issue stacks up against two criteria:

1. Is it something that can be solved or changed now?
2. Is it at the top of the list of all issues that meet criterion #1?

If it doesn’t meet criterion #1, it will be saved for another day. I guarantee you won’t forget it anyway, but I will help you put it on a back burner and recall it when you need to.

If it meets criterion #1, and it wins first prize in the “Criterion #2” contest, we will focus on it. All other less important issues will be considered if necessary, put on the same back burner if not.

It’s that simple. I make it that simple. For you.

Working with the right life coach will enable you to reach your goals, even if the underlying issues seem confusing and overwhelming. A life coach who doesn’t judge. Who just listens, asks the right questions, and COACHES.