Practitioner Pondering: Assumptions…
One of the things I'm learning about running the Practitioner Empowerment Retreats, is to be completely unattached about what they might look like or how the client might want to use the spaces, or any of the tools or toys on offer.
As I set up for my retreat in early December, I noticed that I was making some assumptions that we would be using the big downstairs coaching room, and perhaps even using it in specific ways. Luckily I was clear enough to notice those potentially limiting assumptions, and to let them go.
Perhaps I was helped in that noticing by an intuitive sense that the client arriving wouldn't actually be drawn to use this room at all…. which as it happened turned out to be the case! And I was able to flow with that effortlessly because I’d already noticed my assumptions and opened up.
Fast forward to the end of the retreat, and she’d had her own experience unique to her.
Unlike some previous retreats, there was no exploring using art or music, no drawing on giant post-its and sticking them on the wall. There was no brainstorming and scribbling ideas down, and standing back and seeing the big picture. All of those things are great and perhaps she might want to go there another time, but this time she didn't. So we didn’t!
We flowed with what she needed and created a unique retreat experience for her and where she was at, which for her included body-work, eye gazing, energy work, fire ritual, and more…
Later she mentioned that she found it so liberating that I wasn’t attached to using the ‘main’ coaching room I’d set up, and that I was happy to flow with her. She said that made her feel that she wasn’t having to fit into a pre-set process, but that instead I was fitting with her, and that we could go anywhere. And we did! Hooray!
(I suppose thinking about the interplay between assumptions and attachments...step 1: I noticed my assumption that we'd be using the big coaching room in a certain way, and step 2: I then wasn't attached to that being the case, so could climb out of my assumption trousers with my limber non-attached limbs?!!!)
The tricky thing about assumptions is that they can be difficult for us to spot. But we can at least be aware that we might be/are probably making them. Myself included of course!
Bonus round: practitioner pondering prompts:
• What assumptions might you be making about your client as they enter the session?
• What assumptions might you be making about the way you'll be working together today?
• Are you noticing any patterns in the way you show up as a practitioner?
• (What patterns are you *not* noticing in the way you show up as a practitioner?!)
• Where are you not going in your sessions?
• What might an inspiring practitioner version of you in a parallel universe be doing - that you could learn from?
How do you look out for assumptions? Feel free to share your ideas below : )
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