The bottom line:

• Have an open mind, free yourself from distractions and show “compelling” curiosity; you will be amazed how much more you gain in your observations because you talk less and listen more.
  
  Powerful Questions:
  
  
• Honestly, how much time do you spend talking compared to the candidate?  
• What can help you to listen and observe more the next time you are interviewing?  
• What will you be listening and observing for when the candidate is talking?  
• What key questions will you be asking to find out the suitability of the candidate to the job they are applying for?  

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The bottom line:

• When a message appears rude or negative, do not react straightaway; instead give yourself space to think and reflect.  Look for ways to give the message and the sender the “benefit of the doubt”.    
  
  Powerful Questions:
  
  
• What is the message as it appears to me right now? 
• What other meanings are in this message?
• What state of mind was the sender in at that time that make it understandable they wrote it this way?
•  How can I accept and be positive of its actual meaning rather than the one that I currently have?

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I am sure you must have heard of this saying “enjoy the destination as much as the goal itself." It took me years to understand this myself till I experienced what it was like getting what I wanted yet feeling the “void” inside me. This “void” is about feelings of emptiness, meaninglessness and sometimes, even nothingness.

What Is It?

This personal experience always reminds me whenever I support my coachees to set and get their goals.  I always co-create with them to find the joy in their journey as part of the game plan. Think about it, would you enjoy mountain climbing if all you want is getting to the peak only?  Very likely, you will not enjoy the freshness of the air nor notice and appreciate the lovely butterflies around you, the rich flora and fauna, the breathtaking landscape, romantic sceneries and the many other wonders of the world around you.

Think about it; is life all about chasing after goals alone?  Sure, we can’t afford to be “goal-less” because without them we will not get the push forward nor the “fire” to ignite our lives.  But when you have to give up too much of yourself to pursue them, then it is time you do some serious thinking about your life and your purpose in this world.

When Is A Goal Not Worth Its Efforts?

I have, and perhaps you too have experienced it, when your hard-nosed boss tells you “I don’t care how you do it, just do!”  If this comes too often from their mouth, then I would strongly recommend that you better call it quits fast before they turn you into human robots in this world!  

I am particularly strong about this feeling because our life in this world is temporary, and most of the goals we want are temporary in nature; a car, house, a rewarding career to even a lovely person you want to live with “forever” will be taken from us one day.  There is no guarantee of permanence in any of these areas. It is sobering to think about it, but it is true.

So what is something that has permanence and is 100% worth working towards?  It must be a goal that is not dictated by forces outside our control, be that our boss, the economy, nature or another person.  So what is this goal?  This goal is to gain deeper and deeper self-knowledge about ourselves, or knowing what we are made of.

Why Is Self–Knowledge A Goal?

I truly believe that self-knowledge is the most important goal in our lives.  In the end, all we are ever left with is ourselves, our experiences and what knowledge we have gleaned through that process called Life.  The best we can hope for is that we have gained so much about our own awareness that we discover more about who and what we are, and unfold more and more of our untapped potential so that we can touch more people’s lives in this world.  

The worst thing to happen is that we have been asleep throughout our lives, refusing to learn and grow from our experiences and stubbornly declaring innocence, ignorance or even proclaiming that there’s nothing else to learn or that you are already living a perfect life and being a perfect human being!  

In my way of thinking and in working with my coachees, I often get them to reframe their goals; that they are there to help them in the process of discovering who they are and their strengths, qualities and abilities they never knew they had.

We also should not feel irresponsible when we do not consciously set goals for all areas of our lives; for Life itself has an uncanny way of throwing up challenges anyway. You could say there is no escape!

In the same light, we should not cry and moan when we do not reach our goals because there is one thing that is far bigger than what we have anticipated: Personal Power. True personal power is the kind that comes from our life experiences and as long as we have good self-knowledge of ourselves, it can NEVER be taken away from us or by anyone, unless we choose to give it away. If we do that, it then create the whole cycle of feeling like a victim in life.

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1.  What are you really like?  Describe yourself.

2.  Why do you say the things you say?

3.  Why do you do the things you do?

4.  What do people say you are?

5.  Whyis it that you can get along with some people, but not with others?

6.  Why are some people so difficult to you?

7.  What makes you so difficult?

8.  What is good about you?

9.  How do you want to be seen by others?

10. What must you do to change to fit into the perception of others?

11. What is required to make you become psychologically and spiritually a whole being?

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It is not easy to decide on this when you are at a crossroad in your life, choosing between doing what you are passionate about or doing what your heart tells you what is the right thing to do at a given time in your life.

Ideally, happiness comes around when you can follow your dream.  I tell that to my clients too, and I am sure you too have heard of this noble advice over and over again.  Sure, this is everyone’s desire to do the things that make us most happy if we all have the luxury to choose what we want instead of what we need to do expediently.  The world will indeed be such a happy place when we can do this.

But God has his plans; most of the time, it is mysterious and we can’t understand, even accept. When this happens it simply throws us off from our dream plan.  Take for instance, being retrenched from your job, suddenly lose a source of income or having dried up all your resources trying to start up your business that did not work well.  If you are on your own with no commitment or responsibility, I guess it’s your call whether you want to throw caution to the wind and keep going.

Is Yours A Broken Dream?

But what if you still have a family to support? Is it wise, desirable or appropriate to keep on this path of following your dream if it means others will be impacted by your action?  Will this be selfishness on your part if you did that?  I would think so, it is like becoming dreamers living in fantasy.

Personally, I had my fair share of experience here as well.  I had to keep a full time job for 23 years although I loathed it, forgoing my dream to start this coaching business till 7 years ago.

In my work in certifying people to be coaches, I always come across many people who came in very passionate about wanting to be in this profession of building and growing people, but for some important reasons, they have to settle to be a “non–revenue generating” certified coaches for a while, even forever.  

Is This Self-Betrayal?

When this happens, do you feel guilty, regretful, frustrated, angry or even betraying yourself?  In the beginning, I went through much soul-searching and questioning whether I was just copping out on my dream and passion and whether I should just jump ship and let fate decides for me.  But I am glad that I didn’t, and it is the same thing that I advise my friends and clients when they decide to shelf their dreams, maybe for a while or maybe forever. The point I am making is not to feel that all is lost but instead to reframe to find the other passion in the alternative as Life demands us to do.

We have to face the truth that not everyone can follow our passion. There are times in our life when we have no choice but to follow our heart.

And these two options are not mutually exclusive. So when we take a detour from our original plan do not feel that we have betrayed ourselves.  Life (and God) moves in mysterious ways and it’s impossible for us to know for sure why things happen the way they do.  All we know for sure is that they just do and we make the best of what we have to do, and be happy!  

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1.  What does your conscience or that "little voice" inside your head, say about it?

2.  Could it hurt anyone, including you?    

3.  Is it fair to all those who are affected by your decision?

4.  Would it violate the Golden Rule of “How would you feel if somebody did it too”?

5.  Have you been told it is wrong?

6.  Deep down, how do you feel about it?  

7.  How would you feel about yourself later if you did it?

8.  What would people you respect say about it?

9.  Considering the above, what do you need to “abandon”, and what do you need to take on?

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Many clients have told me how disappointed they felt about giving feedback. Some comments range from “my intention was good but I never can get my friend to change for the better” to “he was reactive when I gave him the feedback when all I wanted to do was to improve his situation”

Does this sound familiar?  Have you been in similar situations about giving feedback to others, when a favour becomes a disfavour, or a service becomes a disservice? Just before you give up on giving feedback to others, allow me to highlight 3 cases on what we can learn about this highly important, but when it is misused, can become a fatal tool as well.

When Is Feedback A Criticism?

The first case is about a client who raised an objection that feedback is never always good because the other person may not be accepting it.  So here’s the background to this case.  He is the head of department in a government hospital.  He said that he was never able to get his junior medical technicians to stop smoking in the hospital compound.

Although this feedback and advice were good for them it was not heeded. On probing further to find out why such good feedback and advice went unheeded, I uncovered it was the way he relayed his feedback to them.  Personally, he hates people who smoke.  So when he noticed his people smoking, he felt that it was time to go to war against smokers.

 In that frame of mind, he was giving “feedback” on their indiscipline and on the harms of smoking. Obviously, his moods, choice of words and body language made them felt that they were being criticized instead of getting feedback that was well intended for.

When Is Feedback A Blame Game?

The second case involves a coach-student and me who was the coach-facilitator for a recent coaching program.  She felt that I was been slighted and reacted negatively when she gave me feedback on how I could improve my instructions for greater clarity so that she and others could do a better job in their presentation.  Shame on a coach, if he acted this way!  So did I?  I was more disappointed than been slighted by it.  Why was it so? There’s a learning lesson about feedback giving.

 To start with, the mental outlook of the feedback giver has to be positive and who honestly regards giving feedback as a healthy practice.  When this belief is warped then guilt show in their faces and mind when giving the feedback.

 Secondly, we need to be honest of the intention behind the feedback giving; is it to honestly help the person improve or is it to find a person to blame for their poor performance?         

When Is Feedback A Feedback?

The third case also involves me and another client who is an avid reader of my weekly articles. In one of our conversations, we spoke about the insights he gained from reading my articles.  The conversation took a different turn when I asked him where I could improve further so that I can attract more readers.  He looked me into my eyes and he asked me to confirm that I really want this feedback from him.  When permission was granted, he told me, with great sincerity and humility how I could chunk-down the articles with short subtitles (like what you are getting now) to make reading much easier especially for the busy ones to leave and go back to it with ease.  I really appreciated and thanked him for his feedback and I immediately worked on it.

 So what’s the learning lesson?  When feedback is solicited and when the feedback giver is sincere and humble, it makes a world of difference to how feedback becomes a gift to the other person.   

So when we really want to be of service to others through feedback, the result must be uplifting and empowering to both parties; for true service supports all people in developing and enhancing their potential.

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