It challenges what most of us have heard or experienced about Coaching. Is it really possible to coach in just 20 minutes? Normally coaches typically take an hour, sometimes two.. so what could possibly happen in a mere 20 minutes?

I discovered … quite a lot. And I have to thank Mike Jay (www.leadu.com) who helped me see this. I think it was 2005 if I am not mistaken. I was invited to a session on the net in which we saw how it is indeed possible to coach powerfully in 10 minutes.

So what makes this seemingly impossible feat possible and how? How is it possible bring about insights and significant shifts in just 20 minutes?

The simple answer is this:

Through the power of Silence and Questions, it is possible to transcend time! And access a space and a potential which is normally lost to us in the noise of the daily life and mind.

When we bring in Silence into coaching, the quality and texture of that silence, the power of listening and questioning born of that, allows a lot to happen! Often I and others who have experienced or practiced this method have been baffled by what becomes possible. I remember instances of people breaking down out of certain realisations, people suddenly feeling light as if a huge burden was lifted from their shoulders, a transformation in which both the coach and the person being coached experiences a state shift.

What becomes available is the power of being, the gravity and invitation of silence. Silence, when used consciously blows the mind. In fact, the deeper truth is that Silence cannot be used, we must allow ourselves to be used by it. When we trust it, it weaves its magic. It evokes, it provokes, above all, it invokes essence.

There are many subtleties and revelations of the process and also something that can keep deepening. In addition to what I have shared above what happens is:

• The Coach enables the people being coached to own the challenge and without providing a solution invites them to think
• They become acutely aware of something that they don’t normally pay attention to since in our normal daily living we don’t make space and silence.
• The silence is all the more powerful when followed by a question. It focuses attention and as the coach holds a safe and loving space, the people are able to risk entering into tunnels they have not entered in the past.
• The nature of life is such that often the issue/ challenge that the people come with inevitably mirror something that the coach has either walked through deeply or to a fair degree of depth and is currently grappling with. This makes it very real.
• Both come in touch with how time is actually non-linear. We have all seen that often more gets done in an hour than in a whole day. Which clearly shows its not just about time but the quality of presence we bring to that time.
• One of my dear friends told me many years back.. the only thing that we can ever give or receive from another is a fragrance .. an aspect of our being.. the rest is entertainment. Meher Baba said, ‘Anything of true value can be given and received only in silence’
• Each time there are newer depths revealed of the process and also of the issue since there is a certain newness and now-ness that is accessed through presence, questions and silence.

The nature of questions in this process I mostly use are what Mike Jay called ‘Ping questions’ – i.e. they always check with the person being coached what s/he feels – the idea is to allow them to lead and your role is just to enable the discovery of what they need to find out. For example, ‘Is it about seeing it from a different angle?’, ‘Is there a question you would like to ask yourself?’ ‘Is it about you or the other?’

There are a variety of Coaching processes and each has its own power. But, I have seen that this one can be, not just a great tool but introduce people to way of being with the challenge which is spacious, patient and reflective.

It is about discovering and accessing intuition. The resolution can be ‘received’ instead of being ‘thought through’ or analysed through ‘Problem solving’. Often what results is Problem dissolving’! The process of ‘Creating’ becomes available in which there is no problem. Everything that emerges is honored.

Would you like to experience this process or learn it? Do write to kirangul@gmail.com, and I will get in touch with you.