Put the Attention Where It Belongs: Being with Yourself and Not Your Author Problems
10 of 28 big ideas from the world of coaching to grow your author business
The tenth in a 28-part series on 28 big ideas from coaching for authors to coach themselves, adapted from my book, The Coach Within.
“The privilege of a lifetime is being who you are.”
— Joseph Campbell
It is not uncommon for a client to heap problems at the feet of her coach and wail. A masterful coach will set the problems aside and focus on being with her client. Her job is not to solve, fix, or diagnose anything. Not you. Not your torments. She detaches from the strife and stays present with you.
When you’re suffering — be it from minor setbacks, a walloping dose of bad times, cumulative stress, general self-pity — try the same on yourself and see if it’s not quite a bit easier to dissolve some of the hurting and the angst, and move beyond it.
How does one BE with oneself and not one’s problems? First, stop trying to do something about the pain, to make it go away. Just be with whatever is. Acknowledge it. Name it. Let it be. Second, quiet the chatter and obsessing in your head the best you can and follow suit by calming your body. Try fresh air and walking. Try steady breathing and meditating. You may choose to remain with yourself, just being, and not returning to wrangle with the troubles.
Or, when it seems to you that you’re more with yourself from those first two steps than with the problem, that’s sufficient if you’d like to check in further with yourself — and not your problem — with some open-ended questions. No need to attain ultra-zen status first.
Here are some possible productive directions if you go down the latter path:
Probe from a big-picture place:
· Just what the heck is going on with my author activities?
· How does my internal state match (or not) the actual irritation at hand?
Idealize who you want to be:
· Who do I want to be under these circumstances?
· Who do I want to be in my author life?
Decide how you want to be:
· How do I want to approach my business and book marketing troubles?
· How will I handle myself as a professional author and businessperson? How will I be in this situation?
Find the matching feeling:
· How does it feel to be the person and author I want to be?
· How can I get to that feeling — where I want to be in my author business?
Explore broadly a better future if you can remain detached from particular results:
· What does a resolution of these author and publishing woes look like?
· What is my preferred outcome to this situation?
· What do I most want here?
The point is, coach yourself to stay with yourself. Let the problem stay in the background while you get to where you want to be.
Coaching Yourself In Action
⎕ Practicing this one out in the world with those you know may be the best way to grasp the power of this principle. The next time someone comes to you with a problem, resist the temptation to offer a solution or to delve into solving it with them (or for them). Instead, keep the conversation on where they’re at. Just be with them in the moment. Ask wide-open questions like the ones above to remain with them and not their difficulty. Notice what this does for them and their perception of their struggles.
⎕ Explore detaching from a problem and being with yourself in your journal or in meditation. Pick a current irritation or predicament and go from there. Before concentrating entirely on being with yourself, try going back and forth between modes (being with yourself and being with your problem). See what they feel like and recognize the differences.
Share with Your Agent. Share with Your Publisher. Share with Your Book Coach and Editor.
The Profitable Author: 1,001 Ways to Build a Business You Love Around Your Books is the book your agent, your publisher, your book editor, and your book coach NEED. It’s the resource that will help their clients and authors meet their author goals and build income-generating, sustainable author lives they love. It’s the next step, what else there is. It provides all the things these pivotal people in the book world can’t. Help them help their authors. There’s special volume pricing just for these special people to be able to help their VIPs.