Our enormous potential for inner growth

I’m excited to share several deeply fulfilling opportunities for inner growth that I have experienced over the past few months. 

The first opportunity was five sessions of Life Coaching. I’d had therapy previously, but not coaching. Having created a number of websites for coaches this year, I have learned that coaching is an opportunity to optimize one’s life. How cool is that? Why wouldn’t you want to create and live the best life you can?

So when a chance arose for me to apply for a special, reasonably-priced coaching package with a member of a coaching certification cohort in May, I jumped at the chance. I had Discovery Calls, where we see if we’d be a good fit,  with three potential coaches. One was clearly the coach for me; spiritually and energetically attuned, warm, intuitive, and intelligent, Andria Seneviratne and I instantly moved into a spacious, intriguing, creative space of inquiry. I had found my guide.

As part of a completion session we’re doing this week, Andria asked, What have you learned about yourself over the last three months?

I responded,

I’ve learned that I have answers within. That I have values that serve as a foundation for living my life, for making choices and decisions, and for being in the world.

You mirrored back to me that family, freedom, creativity, and gentleness clearly resonate with me, along with authenticity, truth, wisdom, and kindness. You identified them as values that I can rely upon in decision-making.

Through visioning and somatic work with you, I’ve become more open to receiving love, to walking in the world as myself, in truth and in beauty. And to do so right now, in the present moment, not in some future time.

What are doing differently today compared to three months ago? 

I feel more confident, embodied, and grounded. I’m more comfortable in my own skin. I move forward and take action with more assurance.

The results of our coaching work have also translated into greater mastery of my writing and design work. My two most recent projects have been the most extraordinary yet on both a professional and soul level. How deeply gratifying!

The second opportunity was a virtual weekend retreat I attended with the Insight Meditation Society (IMS), the mothership of American Buddhism in Barre, MA.  The teacher was Narayan Helen Liebenson, a senior Buddhist teacher. The retreat was entitled Your Life is Your Practice, which I thought would include talks about weaving practice into our lives. It wasn’t that at all. It was so much more. We focused deeply, intentionally, on calm, stillness, gentleness, and kindness, what in Pali is called samadhi.

For those of you interested, I entered the first jhana state, one of ecstatic joy, and remained in it for days. This can occur as a result of deeply concentrated practice. And somehow this was the moment for me to be still, to go deep, to feel peace and calm.

I can’t express the gratitude I feel for both the guidance I received in Andria’s coaching, which took me deeper into my somatic being, and Narayan’s teachings, which led me deeper into my heart, and which have blended together to nourish extraordinary inner growth.

I’m encouraging you to seek and commit to opportunities for inner growth, no matter your age! 

Photo by Luke van Zyl