“The power of Thought, the magic of the mind!”
(Lord Byron)

A few coaching sessions ago, after the use of a carefully chosen comment, one of my clients accused me of performing magic. Now this isn’t the first time I’ve been accused of doing magic, being a witch or generally possessing supernatural skills during a coaching session.

I’m certainly not claiming to be unique in this – I know I’ve commented to my coaches in the past that if they had lived in a different era they may have been burnt at the stake!

I would like to offer that this isn’t magic, but it can be a magical experience. As a coach I’m not creating an illusion, if anything I’m often challenging illusions that individuals have created for themselves.

One of the things that I am listening for when I coach is the beliefs and the stories that an individual are telling themselves when they describe a situation.

Sometimes, a client will tell me directly, perhaps prompted by a question or a comment from myself as a coach.

On other occasions it’s implied by what they have said – it’s what must be presupposed for a statement or a comment to be true. I’m often looking for what someone must think is true for the experience they are describing to be real for them.

I mentioned challenging illusions earlier and I think that a stumbling block for a coach can be if you “buy into” a client’s illusion and treat it as true. If you do that then you are reducing the number of options that you may take with that client and potentially reducing the effectiveness of your work with that client.

It’s one thing if there is a conscious decision that a different route of questions is where you want to head. It’s another matter all together if that alternative direction of questioning is never even considered.

One of the concerns I can hear from those beginning gaining coaching experience is about what they can do if they ever find themselves stuck for what to say or ask next. While there are several things that you can do, if you ever find yourself “stuck” for the next question then you may want to consider the possibility that you have bought into your clients illusion. It may be that the thing that has you stuck for a question/comment is exactly the same thing that is tripping up your client.