Who Ran with Me that Day?

Who walks with me in those crucial minutes?

Who walks alongside my heartfelt attempts?


Who takes charge when it gets precipitous?

Who ran with me that day?

That day when the pulse had slowed down, 
breathing came in heavy; 
when the mind teased to abandon my spirit, 
the body felt heavier than a chestful of weights?

Who did I see appear by my side like a wisp of breath?
Appear as a soft sudden whiff of presence right beside me,
tingling the soft hair of my neck and arm on my left?

Who were You?

Who was it who deftly clasped my palm and whispered
'I am with you, I will run with you; 
right till the end.'

'I will see you through it however slow, however clumsy it is;
right till the end.'

Was it You?
Is it possible to have felt your presence so raw, so bodily?

Because I did feel you in every folding of my leg, each leaning of my body.

You were there, right beside me; 
right till the end.

Because soon enough my spirit soared
trusting the benevolence of the offer.

I sensed a bold addiction glide in, 
gently stroking the weariness of crossing the last mile.

'You will walk with me all the way right till the end?'
—a doubting voice reared itself.

The answer came in the stronger clasp of your grip.
You were not going to give up.
You were in it with me
right till the end.

This was the closest I ever felt to you.

I knew it that moment.
I believed you.

I knew that today was unlike those days 
with shorter goals,
That You were not about to trick me to add an extra mile.
I knew that today You will run with me,
right till the end. 

And the magic arrived.
Slow, soft, meditative, rhythmic in its own way.
The heaviness still there, but befriended!


All a part of the heady mix to take me to the Finish,
my victory lap.

I ran along, holding your hand in this newfound comfort. 
Not fast, only onward, very deliberate.
My feet soft and mindful as it hit the ground.

Albeit heavy steps, 
heart-rate at a deafening even keel;
hope softening the hurdle of the mile ahead,
mind and body getting closer in concert, 
mouth dry as also wet with the emerging vision of the Finish.


Not fast, only onward, very deliberate.

Lighter, headier, body comfortably numb
in every new step in the last stretch.

And we reached the Finish.

No euphoria, no celebration, no triumphant cry at the Finish.
I was alone. We were together.

And the deep knowing.

An acknowledgement that it was Me all the time,
that I totally betted on finishing the run of the day
right till the end;


And a lifelong knowing
that it can be done,
that I will show up at the bigger races of life.


Because my spirit will drum up this memory—
this indelible rush in the veins will spur another last mile.

That every time I give up, I will decide not to.
That I'll always feel safe in the enduring knowing
—'It can be done!' 

{This is a long overdue excerpt of my experience of my first 21k run. I reckon, much like any cherished, challenging last mile}

___________________XX_______________________

p.s.: I live with a compulsion to document many of life's defining, layered or novel experiences—mainly to be able to minutely document every itchy bit of an experience before it gets lost in the lapse of time. This one in particular felt like it was coming for some time and also got rejected at the screening level of 'has been talked about too often before'. The urge for expression lay in the restless reject-basket until I was able to refocus on the single biggest reason I write- to translate the itch into words and balm my restlessness. 

Of course, others finding resonance is a heady by-product! So please post, comment, discuss, share your own experience of the last mile of your life-event. 

Thanks for reading.

About Missing and Owning : While you have been away, Baba.

When I say I don't miss you, or that I've got used to the void of your absence, 

I Lie.

Because I do miss You a lot,

I miss you and me and the certain kind of us that we were, 

together and apart.

I miss a lot of those small things more than the big, noisy, visible ones —

like the whiff of debate and disagreement arriving ahead of our chats, 

many such after the morning newspaper or the evening news ritual;

Or that lull throbbing with the hope of hearing your firm, small voice across the phone-line 

as Ma got you on the line to talk during my daily catch up calls,
filling up time imagining the peculiar shuffle of you feet 
to rise from your age-old armchair 
as you got to the phone,

as I'd try to gauge an understating of your degenerating health.

(I never did tell you though what your weak, feeble voice of some days did to me!)

Or the sound of silence that lurked around and between us 
at odd times, 

holding us together in a comforting hammock like space.

I miss the understanding that always followed and rested—said or unsaid.

I miss those special turns and twists our chats and sharing would take because of both our kind of probing and telling to each other.

I do Miss You. 

And when I say I don't, I'm not quite owning my truth.

Because I also miss Me.

I miss the daughter I was, 

good, bad and in between quite often—the kind I was able to be in your presence;

The kind I was able to be knowing that we were breathing the same day—however separated by air-miles;

Or knowing that we were looking at the same sky—if you happened to glance up from the terrace,

Or that you wondered about what I was upto as often as I did about you;

The kind I was able to be in the moments wombed 

in the comfort of your presence—warm or cold, 

because God knows there were moments of cold as well, just as naturally.

I Miss You,

I miss the truth of our knowing of each other,  

held in mutual response, reaction and presence.

And mostly, I Miss the big, bold, soul comforting truth that You are around.

I Miss you Baba.

And this minute pincered with your presence, 

as I hear you say 'Bhalo Theko Maa', 

I send you  a message that I am well—'Bhalo Acchi Baba'.

(Written on November 4, 2016)

Feel Good is Crucially the Reason we Coach

Met an Executive Coach the other day who expressed a different perspective on Life coaching from how I saw it till then.

{A disclaimer at the very outset: I have a stake in both life and executive coaching and my win will surely be if both grow bigger in the individual and organizational consideration-set as immensely valuable, effective and result oriented interventions that can lead to measurable growth and improvement}

This senior internal Executive Coach of a leading technology services organization described Life Coaching as ‘feel good’ coaching. Her views on Executive coaching, (as compared to Life coaching) was that it is more structured, quantifiable and hence measurable.

While the Coaching industry in India goes through its adolescence and tries to rid itself of the image of its intangibility, let’s try understand this better through this very example. Let’s imagine a scenario in the case of this technology services behemoth – How will it be if Executive Coaching measurably prolongs an 18-month employee attrition cycle to 19 months and eventually to an ideal 22-24 month cycle! Can you imagine the impact of the coaching initiative? I just did and visualized the rush to hire coaches to address all level of employees in this organization. Let us next imagine a more contained impact – a coached employee’s ratings going up from 2 to 4. Whoop! That is a momentous impact and if a sponsor initiated Executive Coaching intervention can convincingly take credit for that – the future of Executive Coaching has arrived decisively!

At this point, we must take note that in Executive Coaching what is critical is the buy-in from the Coachee after he has answered the ‘what’s in it for me?’  & ‘why me?’ questions for himself. Other areas of sensitivity: the reality that a Coaching intervention commences via a nomination (sponsor-led) and is very often (seen as) led by HR. All of this inherently frames the first line of mistrust that the organization has to deal with and assuage. To me, the rest of the process is similar to any other niche of Coaching (that has been duly named). Of course, the tools applied will be specific to each intervention.

At this point, let us look at Life Coaching and what it can impact. A Life Coach, in all cases, is directly hired and paid a fee (directly) by the Client (an exception is an adolescent where the Coach is hired by the parents). The fee is at an average 3K-5K an hour/ per session, for a minimum number of sessions. Safe to assume that Client buy-in is a given. The Client has decided to invest money to impact, streamline, perhaps kick-start a part of life from a limbo, directionless or energy sapping position. The trigger could be in a simple belief that life has the potential to be much better, that there is scope for enhanced clarity and purpose for life ahead.

In Coaching circles it is said that every type of Coaching engagement becomes about Life Coaching from the 3^rd – 4^th session onward. It makes sense, as work too is an integral part of life and cannot be simplified and explored in isolation. Any effective Coaching intervention is able to view life as holistically as the Client is able to share of them with the Coach.

What does the Life Coach typically get hired for? Here I share an extract from my website (LifealignCoaching.com)

Do you often wonder about your strengths, values and life-purpose?

Are you feeling at a crossroad; that a deeper and more meaningful success may be possible in your life, career or venture?

Are you raring to maximize your abilities, leverage your strengths, know and manage your weaknesses, have more satisfying relationships or become an authentic, effective individual?

Is there a longing for greater clarity, confidence, calm, balance or sense of purpose?

Are you often yearning for focus, looking to create a plan and move past your doubts into action, to make a genuine and sustainable transformation?

Is there a best version of you awaiting expression?

Do you want to manage your time more effectively? And commit and keep to deadlines?

These are only some reasons that a Client signs me on for.

All such reasons and the outcome of interventions thereon become measurable when the basic tenet of the Coaching intervention is set crystal clear right at the beginning. ‘Establishing the Coaching Agreement’—no. 2 out of the 11 Competencies laid down by ICF International Coach Federation—is absolutely paramount to begin the process. This naturally ensures result orientation, measurement and assessment at the end of the process. Objective setting is empowering as it sets a clear goal and framework for the coaching conversation to move within and ahead. And it is empowering as much for the Client.

And if the desired objective is feel good about a specific issue in life – that too can be broken down into ‘what does feel good mean for you?’/ ‘how will you know you have succeeded?’/ ‘how will success look like for you at the end of this session?’

For the uninitiated, in Executive Coaching setting up the coaching agreement and goal setting is primarily done with the sponsor. More specific session goals and progress thereon are agreed upon with the Coachee from session to session.

As an intervention model, Coaching, in all its niches, is singularly result-oriented.

In my experience the real distinction that Coaching brings (from other interventions like Therapy) is accountability. As a Coach, I work with Clients to be responsible for their thoughts, feelings and habits and take action that will challenge their comfort zones, create new habits and augur transformation. I collude less with the emotional self and more with the desire for growth that is overshadowed by the emotional self. I focus on the past only in terms of how the attitudes developed then are impacting the present and their future.

In Coaching - taking action; holding a vision of what is possible for the client beyond the story; being open to challenging the Client to discover, create and choose new ways of doing and guiding the Client towards accountability is the big difference that we Coaches can make. And it becomes tangible only when the Unit of Success has been laid out at the time of establishing the agreement.  That is imperative.

Success, you would agree, is directly about the ‘feel good’ for the Client and that ultimately is the essence of Coaching. Feel good is about oneself, about knowing one’s strengths and learning to value and utilise them, about one’s worth at home and workplace and engineering self to build value; feel good is about growing in self awareness, confidence, conviction and clarity about one’s inner resource and capability to work things out; feel good is about knowing and preparing to construct a future capably and intentionally; feel good is about becoming accountable to self and setting and delivering deadlines set and received. This list is ongoing but we can see ourselves in the middle of at least a couple of these. This is a Coach’s delivery, the rest is only nomenclature to help market ourselves in a niche we feel comfortable to deliver and find Clients in – Life Coach, Executive Coach, Accountability Coach, Wellness Coach and so on.

Of course, there is specialised Training, Tools and Techniques that a Coach will do well to learn, reskill in and acquire mastery in, to better their skills in listening, questioning and holding the space.

And in the final assessment, if the result is ‘feel good’ for the client, the sponsor, the employee as well as for the larger organization as measured against the objective set up at the beginning, it is an absolute win in every way. Simply put, the measurability of Coaching lies in the softness or tangibility of the objective set and that steers the delivery of the critical ‘Feel Good’ at the closure of the intervention.

Nivedita Das Narayan, CPC, PCC

Executive & Life Coach

LifeAlign Coaching

Skype: niveditadn

Website: www.sohumansoimperfect.blogspot.com

Power Tool: http://coachcampus.com/coach-portfolios/power-tools/nivedita-das-narayan-perfection-vs-simplicity/

Coaching Model: http://coachcampus.com/coach-portfolios/coaching-models/nivedita-das-narayan-f-i-r-e-f-l-y/

Mobile: +91 7738143477

Confessions of a Non-Marathoner

Meanwhile, life happens. A postscript from this morning

Some years back I said hello and introduced myself to a fellow gym-goer after months of smiling and nodding at each other in the midst of our individual fitness attempts. She reciprocated and introduced herself,  'Hi, I am a marathoner.' Insisting, I sought, 'You are…?' She continued 'I am a marathoner, my name is...’ Till date I draw a blank when I try to drum up her name from my memory duct. I’d stopped listening right there at the beginning of our first hello.

My memory is, however, vivid with the kind of shaken I felt that morning. My confounded self could barely make sense of this label-laden introduction by this nice girl who I was looking to befriend. A matchless encounter with one who seemed to  define herself by what she must hold highest in the pecking order of her fitness-feathered cap.

If you are wondering what happened beyond that promise of a hello – well, no surprise! Till date our familiarity has remained at a docile nod and a smile. In essence, nothing happened.

But something did take place within me. A jolt of a realization that identities can get so intertwined that I too can perilously view myself to be that which I am most amorous of. You would imagine my self-introduction if I hold intellect and advocacy in reverence and you would want to be far-far away from me when I fire my introduction volley.

But today let’s get a bit beyond just the introduction. Think of a scenario where I lose (unintentionally) the most cherished part of my identity somewhere later on in life – or reference the marathon example imagine a Marathoner loose a leg or a vertebrae in an accident! How incrementally dark will the life-after seem to that person. If this happened with me, I would be devastated, perhaps gradually lose the will to continue with life. However other precious pieces make my construct, I will acutely mourn the loss of the identity that I have believed to be inextricable. I will never again be enough for me.

In the last couple of years, my attempts to understand identification with labels a bit better has given shape to an involuntary (and inconspicuous) studying of people in any social context—of course in an unstructured format. An almost subliminal observance of identity-obsession visible in and around me and how much a reality it is in today’s life.

Sample these scenarios. It kicks in every time I meet someone fresh, every time a fellow parent speaks about or introduces their child; every time I meet a new client in a coaching session; every time anyone takes center stage in talking about self and more poignantly every time I am in limelight to introduce myself.

Of these the most piercing and delightful are the moments of self-observance when I acutely see, sense, feel the flutter, measure the urge and the bodily surge I undergo when I am in limelight to talk of myself. I can most certainly share with you that frequently the best insights come from what I'm yearning to say in order to explain, clarify or in response to someone’s query about me— strong cues to my own identity obsession (or preference).

This variety of situations apart, many samples have been readily available in the social media world. A real fascinating lot! I started noticing how each one defined themselves in the 'About Me' section across their social identities. How the orientation of a few were so overwhelmingly around the business card they owned which defined everything from their profile photo to the description on their various handles. An example of an all-pervasive professional identity. I notice how some mighty-pens with big following cared enough to explain their genre of satire, humor or commentary in rejoinders to comments left by an eager-to-please follower, all in an effort to define (read dictate) how even the consumer of your product ought to receive it. Audacious obsession with identity and hence an attempt to control it’s reception and recipient.

Going back to the incident at the gym – I look back at it as an epochal impact on my consciousness. And it has everything to do with how I view my fitness today. I am fitness obsessed but within the fitness options I am full of choices. That single episode heralded for me a conscious rejection of expertise (or student-ship) in any one kind of fitness regime. It literally gave birth to a ‘me’ who is not only a yogi, not only a runner or a gym frequenting fitness-freak. There on, I found myself embrace a more ambivalent fitness-identity—I enjoy a run (which I do), I enjoy a strong yoga routine, I love focused workouts for my upper and lower body, I lift weights and resistance train and I am open to any other option that opens up for me. What does that make me? Perhaps a rounded-fitness enthusiast who also runs, practices yoga, weight-trains, jogs inside the gym, enjoys a walk and a run out in the open - consciously defeating any impulse to confine and define this facet of my identify.

That too is an identity, you would say! But one that I’m able to carry lightly with me. I am free to be anything that is good to be my flavor for the day.

  
I’m not suggesting that my fitness routine is such only because of that incident. What I am surely saying is that the incident raised my awareness around the freedom that comes with No tags hanging from my shirt-sleeves.

In the season of Marathons, in the midst of Zumba and Aqua routines I find myself in a content space - a JOMO kind of state that is bringing me abundant peace. I am not a Marathoner but I can run a fair distance, I’m not a yogi but I love an energizing practice that could run into hours, I haven't appointed a fitness trainer but I do know enough about muscles and workouts for efficient weight training couple of days a week.

My big confession is that the Joy that I feel of being in this space overrides a lot of the seasonal pressure of BEing or not being a Marathoner J (I’m sorry to come back this full circle on the marathon topic!)

I am also simply making a case for meeting and introducing to each other (first) as basic-minimum before we overload the chaste-moment with what gets each one of us gooey and hormonal.

The social-study is work-in-progress and the self-work is underway and hopefully replicable in many other facets of my life.

http://sohumansoimperfect.blogspot.in/2015/03/freedom-in-nothing-ness.html

Disclaimer: This post is not aimed at mocking a Marathoner or that girl in the gym. In fact, this writer admires, adores and is entirely respectful of the hard work and single-mindedness that goes behind preparing and finally running a Marathon. After all, I live with a Marathoner and I love the fact that I get to brag about itJ.