Recently I was offered the opportunity to write a book. After some negotiation – first with myself, then a proposal submission and finally the arrival of a contract – it all seems very real. Eeeekkks . . . panic! What have I committed to?
Simultaneously, I decided to attend a writing retreat. This represented two half days of “me” time. I would never have anticipated how valuable this standing back and giving myself space was going to be. Space to plan, reflect and organise myself to write efficiently and effectively. It was sheer luxury.
There were two aha moments that I would like to share with you.
1. Writing is thinking
Wow yes, ponder on that a moment, writing is thinking poured out on to the page. How important is it therefore to allow ourselves thinking time, reflective time if we want to write anything worth reading?
2. Planning to write, writing and editing are three very different activities.
They could be represented as illustrated below:
We need all three to write competently, make sense, be relevant etc. If we use this model as a metaphor for our coaching it might look something like this:
We need all three of these to coach competently.
To make my book worthy of reading, all these elements of writing must be present. In addition, there will be a welcome and rigorous review process which will assist refinement and offer another perspective, a different lens on the written thoughts, to develop thinking further and more comprehensively. In the case of coaching, this review and further development of thinking is through supervision.
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