Incorporating ritual in coaching

Skywatcher by Susan Seddon Boulet

“A ritual is the enactment of a myth. And, by participating in the ritual, you are participating in the myth. And since myth is a projection of the depth wisdom of the psyche, by participating in a ritual, participating in the myth, you are being, as it were, put in accord with that wisdom, which is the wisdom that is inherent within you anyhow. Your consciousness is being re-minded of the wisdom of your own life.” ― Joseph Campbell

Ritual is 1) a formal ceremony or series of acts that is always performed in the same way or 2) an act or series of acts done in a particular situation and in the same way each time (the daily ritual of preparing breakfast, the bird's mating ritual).

Ritual is a way of connecting to what is larger and more permanent than our own personal lives. As coaches and facilitators we can and should use ritual as a way to help clients 1) come into the present moment, 2) feel grounded and connected to the earth, 3) ease anxiety, 4) ease grief, 5) alleviate disappointment, 6) and create a sense of sacredness and meaning.

But how do we introduce ritual? How do we, as coaches and facilitators, raise awareness about the benefits of incorporating ritual, not only into the coaching space but into the daily lives of our clients? Raising awareness involves modeling the use of ritual in our sessions. This can be a series of simple but consistent gestures that you go through as coach or facilitator at the start of each meeting. Rituals are a formalized set of steps that can act as a beginning and end to the coaching container.

We want our clients to understand that what makes ritual so powerful is the intention and the mindfulness that we bring to the process. An afternoon cup of tea, the setting of items on a table before a meeting, a walk through the garden, the watering of houseplants. All these activities can be mundane or they can be transformed into sacred acts when we turn it into a formal and ritualized process.

In the Authentic Wholeness Coach Training Certification Program, I teach the importance of incorporating ritual into your coaching and facilitation practice, sample rituals you can use in your own life to deepen your connection to soul, how to help clients draw on the power of ritual, and how to help clients open to the sense of connectedness that comes from creating sacred moments in their daily lives.

Connections by Marge Piercy

Connections are made slowly, sometimes they grow underground. You cannot always tell by looking at what is happening More than half a tree is spread out in the soil under your feet. Penetrate quietly as the earthworm that blows no trumpet. Fight persistently as the creeper that brings down the tree. Spread like the squash plant that overruns the garden Gnaw in the dark, and use the sun to make sugar. Weave real connections, create real nodes, build real houses. Live a life you can endure: make life that is loving. Keep tangling and interweaving and taking more in, a thicket and bramble wilderness to the outside but to us it is interconnected with rabbit runs and burrows and lairs. This is how we are going to live for a long time: not always. For every gardener knows that after the digging, after the planting, after the long season of tending and growth, the harvest comes.