Integral Coaching

Today is the closing day of the one year New Ventures West Integral Coaching program in DC that started in 2018. I feel honored to have contributed as faculty in the role of pod mentor. Having graduated as an integral coach in 2015, I continue keep learning so much. It never ends and goes deeper and deeper. Amazing!

I felt inspired by the participants journeys and their efforts in breaking with mental, emotional, physical and energetic old patterns of conditioning that were holding them back from being well and fulfilled. Everyone wanting to grow and evolve, taking the risk to really getting to know their authentic selves and express that in the world.

I was touched by the pain and courage from the men and those who identified as men, who wanted to be fully themselves in a societal system that is not designed for that to happen. Thank you to all of you who are redefining what it means to be a man in current times! We need you.

I was touched by the participants' discovery of the power of their femenine wisdom and integration with the masculine and all the parts and dimensions of ourselves that make us human. Basically, a work of integration. 

I was in awe of the faculty, admiring their capacity to love, care and commit to seeing, supporting and holding everyone in their struggle and their full potetial. Wow! Thank you! 

#newventureswest #integralcoach #pcc #humanpotential #ifeelhopeful

Sadness and Shame

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Sadness and Shame

SADNESS

I have been feeling quite sad and particularly today the feeling is debilitating. I have so much nostalgia for so many things. For some love relationships that I have had and no longer do. For the young age vanishing rapidly. For the not too young body feeling a bit achy now. For my family far away. For myself sitting in the living room, writing these words. Nostalgia about parts of me that I have not found/seen yet…

I am also feeling sad because recently, together with an amazing group of people we got our butts kicked by many of the very people who we wanted to engage in our work. I resonated so much with this team’s vision. I felt it so true in my body and yet, last week we got a large number of people hating our work and making sure to let us know. This has filled me with shame. It’s a similar feeling I have had in the past were right after I have spoken some people would say “it’s too abstract and of no value, not useful”.

I am sad because I find very difficult to feel that I am understood. It’s like a core wound I carry -the not being understood and seen-. Ufff.

The other feeling I have is that of being trapped in a consciousness that is fundamentally born from shadow. Basically, what I want to say with this is that I feel trapped in my own shadow. It feels like I can’t exist without it. And other people can’t either. And hence, all we see in each other is shadow. Others just see my shadow and I see theirs. And we keep hurting and killing each other misinterpreting what each really means with our behavior. And I feel tired of it.

SHAME

I breathe and it hurts. It feels inside the skin and it shortens my breath. It feels like a cold current throughout my body that is taking with it, all I am. It’s like a cold shower that paralyzes me and makes me want to disappear. It accelerates the beating of my heart. It feels like an illness taking over my body. Why? I don’t know. It just a physical and psychological reaction when I feel that something I have done is rejected and criticized by others. It literally makes me feel sick. Why? I don’t know. Perhaps, the obedient girl I was taught to be feels that she is disappointing the world and fears the physical backlash that not being obedient could cause…

Flirting with Playfulness

Why is playfulness difficult to embody for me?

I close my eyes and is hard to feel or be playful. I have a yearning to bring more joy or better, to be more joyful in how I live my life, but it is difficult to do. I can in my thinking relate more to bliss as the feeling I feel when I feel whole with the world.

I can flirt with bliss and joy but I is not easy for me to arrive to those states through playfulness which, logically, feels like the shortcut to joy.

Looking back, I did not learn to be playful. I was not taught to be playful or joyful. I was taught to be obedient, well behaved, a good girl. And playfulness in many occasions, was seen as misbehaving.

Additionally, given the violent context I grew up in (Colombia), playfulness and temporary joy were used to escape or minimize the grief and pain generated by the violence and anger.  A shallow playfulness became dark humor. A way to ignore the truth and protect ourselves from emotional pain.

In few words, I was not educated to be happy, blissful, joyous, playful.

Initiations

In·i·ti·a·tion

iˌniSHēˈāSH(ə)n/

The action of having an experience that will transform you.

In my experience initiations refer to the transformation that happens when we embark in a particular experience that will require us to be different and will change us forever. These moments of disruption make us let go of our identities and help us see that we could be more than what we thought we were.  I feel that I have gone through many initiations, but only now I am able to look back and “make sense” of the journey, recognizing that I am yet to experience many more.

Through initiations, I have been able to get closer to what feels my “true” essence - a strong connection with the web of life, with my ancestral wisdom and with a deep calling to contribute to our evolutionary purpose, protecting our planet and enabling others to see their true calling too. I can (more and more) feel, be, behave as and manifest reality, as the wise woman inside me.