Strengthening your reflective practice in 2023
by Wolfgang Jani, PCC, dipl. Coach SCA
What a year this has been.
As I share some of my reflections and learning as a leader, coach, and human, and what this means for me in 2023, I invite you to consider your own path and how you might want to strengthen your reflective practice. Reflective practice is the intentional way we choose to learn from our experiences.
Among the various areas, projects and my own growth and development, I have been paying more attention to who I am in relationship to my work as a leader, a coach and just as a human being. It has always been important to me that my work flows out of who I am. And yet this is the ‘part’ that I can so easily ignore, by remaining busy with ‘work’.
Saint Paul writes in 1 Timothy 4:16: “Pay attention to yourself and to your teaching…”. Observe. Attend to. Give attention to. Oneself and one’s work. It is simple and it is challenging. For me this means: unless I engage in regular reflective practice, I will not be able to be and give my best to those I am called to serve.
In the context of the ICF’s core competencies, this is all about the coach embodying a coaching mindset. Point 3 states: “Develops an ongoing reflective practice to enhance one’s coaching”.
As I begin to ponder 2023, I am resolved that, as much as I will pay attention to having clear priorities and alignment, I will continue to be intentional and pay even more attention to who I am being as a human and as a professional. Again, because my work flows out of who I am. My particular focus this year, which I will continue to work on, is being connected to my body and heart, not just my mind and spirit. In other words: being fully human, fully alive. Being a follower of Jesus means living our faith in the body. It is an embodied faith or spiritual way of living. How am I being like Jesus in the unique way he made me?
I will continue to strengthen my reflective practice in 2023 with reflection around the theme of being fully me. These questions are fluid, a starting point:
· How am I showing up as a human being?
· How am I being fully me?
· How am I coming from love to all interactions?
· What am I withholding that I could bring?
Here are ways in which I engage in reflective practice:
· Daily reflections and setting my intentions: Journaling consistently around who I am: thoughts, emotions, sensations, body awareness, spirit etc. What is God’s loving voice saying to me? While doing so, it is important that I do not censor or judge what I write and ponder. Just notice and wonder. I can review and make meaning later, see themes that emerge, and what I am becoming aware of.
· With my peer group: we reflect together on who we are being and how that impacts our coaching work.
· With my coach: this regular dialogue helps me make consistent progress in areas that matter.
· With my supervisor: where I ‘sit at the feet of my work to learn’ and become more aware of my blind spots, assumptions and biases, strengths, and uniqueness in order to be and give my best.
· After working with clients: reflecting on who am I showing up as? How did I connect and engage from love?
· In my personal relationships: asking myself how am I showing up? Where am I (not) being fully me, coming from a place of love?
So, as you are heading into a new year, besides having clear priorities and goals for yourself and your work:
· How are you going to grow in and strengthen your reflective practice to live fully out of who you are, allowing your work to flow from that place?
· What will become possible?
· Amaze yourself: what would you want to look back on at the end of 2023?
Wishing you all a fruitful 2023 where you too are more fully who God made you to be. The world needs YOU. Your work matters.
Warmly,
Wolfgang
