Coaching is about learning to tune into what you want, and clearing out the voices that tell you you can’t have it. This session my client didn’t want to talk about her career. That had been the primary focus working together. This time she wanted to talk about finding a new lover. So we switched gears for a session. Everything is connected. What we discover in her approach to looking for a lover could help us understand how she approaches moving forward in her career.

I asked her what she wanted in a lover, and what had worked in the past to find one? Dancing, she said. When she lived out west, she would go out dancing and amaze her friends with her ability to reliably pull in men. She had a sensual shrug in her shoulders. (She showed me over Skype and I could believe it.) Now she lives in New York and she had not been able to find the right kind of club to go dancing. The only places where people danced, she said, people were drunk and out to score or grope, and the dancing did not have the natural, uninebriated quality that she likes.

I asked where else does she feel turned-on in New York City? “Good question,” she said, and listed some possibilities, though none seemed to be the answer. We hit a blank place, familiar to single men and women. Where to find that person? I asked her to sit into herself and breathe deeply and then to think of the first words that came to mind. Anything.

She said, “Plants, stars, and pizza.”

“What does this have to do with anything?”

“This is your intuition!” I said. “Follow these words and see where they lead.”

Between coaching sessions my clients have homework. The most important part of coaching happens between sessions when they explore what we have talked about and then report back. Her homework would be an art-life project, following plants, stars, and pizza.

She texted me two hours later. “”Just met a guy in front of a pizza place!”
I texted back, “No way!”
“Yes, ma’am.”

I was so turned on by my client’s quick success, I tried this method myself. That afternoon I went to Trader Joe’s. When I got out of the car I took a breath, before opening to door to leave, and decided my word would be “pumpkin.” The word itself gave me a sly feeling as I shopped. I felt more friendly too.

As I finished up in the produce aisle, a man turned to me with his shopping list, and asked, “Squash?” He wanted to know if Trader Joe’s sold squash, and what on earth was it? I told him Trader Joe’s sells cubed butternut squash and pointed him to it. He asked, “What kind should I buy?” I said, “There’s only one choice, that’s the only kind they sell.” He said, “Thank you, and by the way, you are beautiful.”

I said goodbye. It was kind of intense. Hard to receive the compliment from a stranger, I suppose. What to do now? I went on to the grocery line where I spotted a box full of whole butternut and acorn squash. I left my cart to go tell him. I felt obligated, having given him misinformation! I showed him the squashes, and we chatted. This was the pickup conversation in the grocery store that I always imagined would happen as an adult. He seemed great with one exception: he had a strong alcohol breath at 2 pm on a Wednesday.

As I checked out, I felt energized. This squash guy is not for me. But how cool, I thought pumpkin and got squash! It is amazing that both I and my client could set an intention with a simple, intuitive word. What a mystery life can be when you tune in to your intuition. Life can take on a magical, unexplainable depth. Choose a word, believe in its power and see what happens.

The flip side of getting what you want, of course, is the ability to receive. My client told me, “The guy outside the pizza shop was all turned on about me. instead of going for it fully I hesitated. He asked me for my card. i gave it to him and ran.”

Next up, the challenges of receiving what you want.

The story of this session was published with the permission of my client. Her intuitive words were not changed. To learn more about coaching with me, click here.