Look back—and celebrate!

Being present right here, right now is a great way to live. Sometimes it is helpful and necessary to look back, however.

I often ask clients to remember back to how they felt when we first began the coaching process. Many of them come to me totally burned out, in a stuck place, unhappy with themselves and/or their life situation, afraid, or absolutely unfocused. No problem. That's what coaching is all about: helping someone access their own solutions in order to move forward. Listening someone into a new and better place.

So I like to take time occasionally to have my clients remember where they were when they began—and to celebrate their progress. So often when progress is gradual, as most of it is, we aren't even aware that we have moved forward. It is good to see how far we've come and stop to celebrate those victories, for they definitely are victories! When we do that, we receive new impetus to continue on the path toward our bigger goals.

From time to time, I like to do what I call "harvesting my journals." These are the times when I'll look back in my journals to see where I was one month ago, one year ago, five years ago. Often I will have completely forgotten that some challenge was weighing me down then, and I am so surprised by how far I've moved beyond that. However, sometimes I see that an issue continues to plague me and is more of a neuralgic problem. OK, time to get down to work on that one. Looking back really can help us move forward.