Your Life Is Art

Today’s piece is two parts- one part point, one part soapbox!

Love you, enjoy.

Your Life is Art

What if you went to a gallery and only stood in one spot for every item? What if you walked through the gallery quickly- glancing at each item- “I like it, I hate it, like, like, hate, hate, hate”.

Art galleries invite us to stop, invite us to take things in, invite us to walk around a piece and take in all of its nuance and to truly experience the piece. Lighting, set up and atmosphere are purposefully orchestrated to have us slow down and focus.

Imagine a situation you have had recently- one with an emotional charge. Put that on the pedestal in your mind and step back. Step back and take a look. Walk around it.

Give yourself different perspectives walking closer and then further away. What do you see? What do you feel? Is it exactly the way you ‘perceived it’ at first sight.

Okay, let’s ground this in a true story.

My daughter is almost 13. Breathe. She gets up in the morning and mopes about, tries to get out of going to school (every morning since she was 6).

On the mornings when I look at the story from 2D – stand in one position I get this “Smarten up, you are messing up my morning by being so grumpy, get your butt to school and with a smile on your face, why do I have to do this every morning!!! AARRGHHH!”.

When I step back and take in the story I see how beautiful she is, I see how funny it is that we play this game EVERY morning, I see that this will not last forever, I see that most of the times she is smirking under the mope and if I don’t focus on the mope the smirk grows and the mope fades. I could go on and on, but I think you get the point.

In shifting perspective I can get the beauty.

And one more thing….

Do you like to go to art galleries alone? Sometimes. Often however, we enjoy looking at things with another person. We enjoy sharing the experience and it grows richer.

Truly this is the role of coaches and counselors.

Recently I have heard this sentiment a lot “why are there so many coaches?, everyone and their dog are now calling themselves a coach!” It is an emerging field, but I hazard a guess that there are still more hairdressers then coaches. I can’t think of anyone who would not benefit from having a great coach.

Aileen Gibb puts it beautifully:

“My purpose as a coach is to:

• Be another pair of eyes for my client to see with.
• Be another pair of ears for my client to listen with.
• Be another voice to ask questions my client might otherwise ignore or avoid.
  

Being A Coach, Inspired Future Publishing, 2010

Like a fantastic hairdresser a coach or counselor can be a true gift you give yourself.

Your life is a piece of art- every single moment- **take**it** in**.