so i have a question why are you all always trying to “coach” and “mentor” each other?
have you ever tried just having friends and acquaintances and listening to their stories and offering your perspective?
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to me it seems like resilient relationships of mutual concern will outperform illusory clout of monetizing / professionalizing friendship but maybe i’m a sentimental old wizard
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I totally want to sign up for all of yalls patreon/substack/bandcamp &c — but I just want a world where everybody doesn’t have to have a hustle
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i mean look to be clear i’m not going to tell yall how i make money but it’s not pretty — my life is riven with internal contradictions — if you’ve got a grift that works i respect that, it’s all any of us can ask in this vale of tears
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my point is do we really have to hurl ourselves headfirst into relations of mutual exploitation?
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don't like this, don't agree that "coaching" or "mentoring" is inherently exploitative. it's just a different kind of conversation. i make different moves when i explicitly adopt a "coaching" frame with a friend and sometimes those moves accomplish a lot
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i've offered free coaching to multiple friends, on multiple occasions helped friends cry about wounds involving their parents they hadn't been able to access themselves, on one occasion helped a friend deal with acute pain using IFS
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it's not a substitute for the friendship it's just a different thing we can do within the friendship. i explicitly put myself away temporarily in order to make more room for them, then i come back
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sounds like you maybe don't believe that coaching can be very good, or like it consists of telling other people what to do / think / feel? that's not how my coaching style works at all. the whole thing is about making room for what the client / friend already thinks / feels
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thank you for taking the time to respond so clearly qc
it sounds like your experience is that the coaching "frame" gives you access to a changed perspective -- perhaps even different resources? that would not be available to you if you were just hanging out like buds do?
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yeah, ime there’s not quite enough room in ordinary conversation to do the stuff i and other coach friends of mine can do in coaching, at least not deliberately. it can happen spontaneously which is great but coaching can be laser-targeted and much faster
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when i adopt the coaching frame i release the other person from having to care about entertaining me in the conversation; they can be much more selfish about attending exclusively to their own experience and i can provide scaffolding for that
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beautifully put and thank you for doing this for people i am sure you have done much good
last question: is it really that ordinary conversation does not allow for this? or is there some other inhibiting factor?
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I ask because I, too, occasionally set myself aside, make space for my interlocutor and occasionally helpful words may even come out of my mouth, but in any case my friends feel heard and seem to achieve some kind of resolution.
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