By choosing to walk the coach’s path, we mount a sustained challenge to the primacy of knowledge. The journey is exacting. It goes against attitudes we’ve embraced from an early age: Questions have answers; it’s better to be right; knowledge is power. It also flies in the face of what many clients say they want.
When clients ask us to tell them what we think they should do, it can feel awkward — as though we’re eroding our partnership — to hold a dynamic tension. Wouldn’t clients be happier if we imparted our sagest advice? Only if we’re willing to step away from our own path toward masterful coaching and sacrifice our clients’ growth!
The horizons we discover when we meet our clients with curiosity are spellbinding. We develop an ability to limit our expertise. We become less dependent on knowledge. We make room to reliably access the creative force of intentional ignorance that is the beating heart of masterful coaching.
In our knowledge-is-power culture, clients will shortchange themselves by shopping exclusively for expertise. Let’s discuss our responsibility to help clients grasp how a coach’s virtuosic “not-knowing” can accelerate them meeting their objectives. Let’s talk about how we can hold the path toward coach mastery.
Learning Objectives:
Increase your comfort working in a space of not-knowing.
Communicate to clients the value they will gain from engaging your ability to not-know.
Consider how cultivating not-knowing will shape the very contours of your life.
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