September 2006

One of my roles as an executive coach is that I serve as a thinking partner with my clients.  We design strategies to implement for growing your business.  We identify communication skills you want to improve.  We think about the kind of customer who is ideal for you, and how to attract them to your business.  We discuss financial issues, personnel problems, and organizational challenges…and how to address those effectively and efficiently.   This is all important, interesting, and necessary work that we do together. 

Also, and perhaps even more exciting to me, I get to hear your dreams.  This is an incredible privilege, and I’m usually quite amazed by the richness of your dreams, once you begin to articulate them. As you share your hopes for the future with me, I see you come alive with the passion of your dreams.  I encourage (even exhort) my clients to dream.  As Carl Sandburg wrote, “Nothing happens unless first we dream.”

Drawing out your dreams can take time.  Sometimes I have to first help clients turn down the tapes from their childhood.  You know, the ones where you can hear your mom saying “You are getting too big for your britches” or echoes of your pragmatic pals admonishing you to “Get your head out of the clouds!”  We may even work on revising your own tapes which tell you that you need to focus on today, not dream about tomorrow.  True enough….but to accomplish great things requires that we dream big, before we can act to make those lofty dreams and goals come true. 

Dreaming requires that you step out of your everyday, practical life into a place less structured and regimented.  You must give yourself the permission, time and space to allow your mind (and heart) to get creative and listen to your deepest longings.  What kind of a future really gets you excited?  Can you envision it in great detail?  What is it about your dream that draws you to it?  What holds you back from moving toward your dream?  Who would you be if you truly lived your dream? 

So please, keep dreaming.  Share your dreams with me, so that I can see them and embrace them with you.  Together, we can begin to figure out how to make them come alive.  And then the fun and adventure really begins, as you start to live out your dreams.

Sharon
Sharon Keys Seal