How Neil Diamond Can Help Your Coaching Business
Ever wondered where inspiration comes from? When you get that flash of insight did it come from the deep recesses of your brain? The collective unconscious? That great Wikipedia in the sky?
And what does that have to do with your coaching business?
Without it, I’d have to say my business would be dead. How about you? I thrive on the daily downloads that get me out of all kinds of pickles.
So first let me tell you what I mean by inspiration.
I could go all esoteric here and talk about ‘divine influence’ and ‘breathing in the connectedness of all things’ but right now I’m just talking about damn good ideas. Those light bulb moments where a book title scrolls through in day-glow pink or where doors magically open.
By now you’re probably wondering about the Neil Diamond reference. Well, to me, inspiration is all about convergence, dots joining. Disparate things coming together in a previously unseen pattern.
So here’s an example:
So three days ago a lovely friend and amazing coach Tiffany Peterson put a funny posting on her timeline about how she’d always loved Neil Diamond and how she’d doubtless be taunted for it but in the spirit of sharing dreams, she put it out there anyway. 61 enthusiastic comments flooded in immediately.
More Neil fans stepping out of the closet, including me.
You see Neil’s music was a huge influence in my own life. I also remembered how Jonathon Livingston Seagull was a seminal book for me in my teen years.
And so when the movie came out featuring Neil’s music was all over it: Ah the poetry: “Lost on a painted sky, where the clouds are hung for the poets eye, you may find him… ”
Yesterday in the late afternoon, with just an hour to spare before a tele-class I was hosting, I biked to a local beach. I needed time to gather myself. I found myself drawn to a particular seat and gazed out over the lake, savoring the deep blue of the evening sky.
As I pondered my navel, into the frame flitted a type of seagull I’d not seen there before. Almost swallow-like it darted back and forth across my field of vision, and then shot up high over the water, and hung there in suspended animation before diving headlong into the water. This happened several times. I watched entranced for several minutes, as memories of that glorious Jonathon Livingston story flooded in. Pushing the envelope. Going for your dreams. Diving in.
Neil was in my mind’s ear: “If there on a distant shore by the wings of dreams through an open door, you may know him… ”
The moment lit up. Into my awareness landed the title for my next course (something I’d been struggling with for days), and an unexpected focus for the call I was about to deliver.
By now I had completely lost track of time. I had 20 minutes to book it back home (uphill) on my bike. But I made it, and landed on the call, breathless but totally in the zone.
That pod call was perhaps one of the best I’ve ever done. We went deep, we solved dilemmas, we got inspired. Group mind was so switched on. We went on for almost two hours, and everyone was still there at the end. diamond painting zubehör