Relationships

Can I talk at you for a bit?

Can I talk at you for a bit?

One simple question has made an enormous difference to my life, my relationships, my choices - and a lot of conversations with my husband: “Can I talk at you for a bit?”

I know now that when I’m stuck or need to work through something, I do my best thinking and feeling when the words come out of my head.

Often, I really don’t know how I feel about something until I say it out loud, and it can take me by surprise.

I’m so glad that I know this now, because it’s not a neat process.

It can take some time and lots of verbal circles - creating a messy first draft and then revising in real time. I need to follow the thread without worrying about it making sense.

And for that, I need a patient witness to listen and let me talk it out. To be OK with me talking AT them for a bit, rather than WITH them.

“How do they prefer to communicate?”

“How do they prefer to communicate?”

I’ve done a lot of coaching sessions recently around communication.

How do we understand what someone else is saying?

How do we make ourselves understood?

There can be a lot of emotion when it feels like it isn’t working - frustration, anger, disappointment, bitterness...

Both people are trying their best. But often the conversation doesn’t bring out the best in either of them.

“How do they prefer to communicate?” is a great question to move past the challenge and find a way forward.

What's your perfect solution?

What's your perfect solution?

Over lunch the other day my husband asked me this question and it was brilliant.

Because I couldn’t answer it.

I had been bemoaning the lack of a perfect solution in a few areas of my life - not big challenges, more small niggles that didn’t feel quite right.

I really had to stop and think.

And it turns out that was exactly what I needed to do :-)

How to help when you're not a subject matter expert

How to help when you're not a subject matter expert

I’ve spent a good few hours working 1:1 with someone over the last few weeks, supporting them, coaching them, helping them prepare for a big life event.

And I’ve had almost no idea what they have actually said.

My son has been prepping for his German A level speaking exam, and I’ve been the person listening to him as he practices out loud.

It’s helped something really click - that coaching, or supporting someone in any form, is so often about focusing on the person and not the problem/topic/situation.

Who are your energisers?

Who are your energisers?

Who are your energisers?

The people who you love to spend time with?

The friends who leave you feeling lit up after being in their company?

Where there is a natural reciprocity - of sharing and listening, of give and take, of uplifting and supporting?

I’m just back from a walk and talk with coffee in the park with someone who I feel this way about.

She’s a relatively new friend, from a short overlap in a volunteering role, and we meet up every few months.

We spent the whole time chatting away about everything and anything. I feel happy and connected and energised, and ready to take that into the rest of my day.

What a gift.

If only we’d had a conversation beforehand…

If only we’d had a conversation beforehand…

If only we’d had a conversation beforehand…

Almost 18 years ago Stu and I went on holiday to the Lake District.

It was one of our last times away before having our first child. I was 6 months pregnant.

We thought it would be lots of fun to cycle from where we were to Keswick. Not far away at all said Stu…

If you know him, you know that he is a brilliant, strong, capable cyclist who absolutely loves being on his bike. Me? Not so much.

What's your relationship with feedback?

What's your relationship with feedback?

Do you love feedback, or loathe it?

Does receiving it make you feel uncomfortably in the spotlight?

Does it feel like a judgement about you?

I’m back for the third time in Tara Mohr’s Playing Big Facilitators Training (as an alum I get to go back every year and experience it again).

It’s hands down one of the best investments I’ve ever made, and the book is one of my most valuable resources - and the one I most often send the women I work with.

I use a lot of her principles and practical tools in my life and coaching, but one of my favourites - and a gamechanger for both me and others - relates to reframing our relationship with feedback.

We’re on this section of the course right now, and listening to the call this week I was struck all over again at the effect our relationship with, and experience of, feedback can have on us.

Are you feeling frustrated by something?

Are you feeling frustrated by something?

It has taken me over 2 years to write this post it!

Over 2 years of feeling a burst of irritation anytime anyone has a wee in our downstairs loo while I’m coaching (it’s the room next door).

Over 2 years of thinking ‘do they not realise I’m coaching?’

Over 2 years of wondering if the sound is audible (!)


And over 2 years of not actually saying anything to anyone in my family…


Until now.