In circles of empowered people there is a huge fear of being in a negative state. As if people who know better must always do better.  Experience has taught me that the negative states are not always bad, in fact, they are often necessary.  Being in a negative state long enough allows for leverage to really pull out of it instead of finding a quick fix for it, sedating yourself from it, turning to an ineffective resolution method. As coaches we learn that pacing and leading is critical in helping someone get to where they want to be.  If you do not pace a person enough, you run the risk of damaging the rapport you have with them, running them off track, raising fears before you’ve installed the resources to deal with challenges.  Ineffective pacing can be very problematic.  It often happens when we care very much and know the person’s potential to move into where they want to be.  Leading before you’ve paced someone enough is like trying to shift gears without pressing down on the clutch.  The gear won’t open until you’ve pressed down.  You run the risk of choking, staling, grinding gears etc.  Leading into another gear has to be timed and synced.

The easiest  way to pace someone into shifting gears is to start with where they are.  Find the best feeling place about where they are. Find the positives, the ones they can associate to, build on them.  Have them relate to these positives on their own.

Having been in an incognito negative place for a a few weeks now, I finally in the last 48hours came out of mt own closet.  OK, this is where I am, let’s explore this place and see what gives.  Taking myself out of where I wasn’t that I wanted to be, I was finally where I was. In a negative state.  What I found is that this negative place felt much better than staying in the I’m not where I want to be state of mind.  There was a huge difference in being present with where I actually was.  I started first with that distinction, literally building on my preset negative state, drawing power from it, more and more power from it. Letting myself stay there to fully feel where I was and building leverage.  Pacing myself, pacing myself, pacing myself until right now being at that place where I am just ready to press down on the clutch and shift gears.  Such a huge difference from tying to shift the gear before I was ready to get the clutch open.  I had been, for weeks, trying to lead myself without the pacing, and people around me, caring so much, wanted to lead me as well, knowing full well my own amazing potential way beyond this crappy place I was spending time in.  But I’d been gearing up, knowing what I needed to do and knowing just how to do it.

So amazing is it when we understand the power of all emotions and how they serve us. The goal is never to shift an emotion until we’ve milked all the goodness it has to offer. Better to explore and explore and explore until the better feeling gear opens itself to us.  You can’t hammer a better feeling into place from a negative place.  You’ve got to shift into it, smoothly, just as smoothly as you kick it into 5th on that long highway stretch on a beautiful day, after you’ve been held back by 18 wheeler for 45 minutes. Shift shift shit, it happens naturally then.

Q♥