Coaching in Conversation
Coaching in Conversation is a chance to discuss and explore, not just how we can keep developing and maturing as coach practitioners, but also to consider how coaching is evolving and its future potential and place as a powerful vehicle for human development in todays and tomorrow’s world. Tracy Sinclair, MCC will be sharing some of her own thoughts on these topics and we will also hear from some great guests from around the world who bring their unique experience and perspectives.
Coaching in Conversation
Mastery Series: Vulnerability and Mastery with Ailbhe Harrington
In this episode of Coaching in Conversation, Tracy Sinclair speaks with Master Certified Coach Ailbhe Harrington about the intersection of vulnerability and mastery in coaching. Ailbhe shares her journey into coaching, emphasising the importance of self-awareness, compassion, and continuous personal growth. They discuss how mastery involves being present, connecting deeply with clients, and the courage to be vulnerable. Ailbhe also reflects on her personal experiences, including the recent loss of her husband, and how it impacts her coaching practice. The conversation highlights the role of intuition, the importance of trusting the coaching process, and the unique value of human connection in a fast-paced, results-driven world.
Ailbhe Harrington works with leaders as a thinking partner, providing a reflective space where they can explore, discover, and liberate themselves. This enables them to embody the full essence of who they are and who they are becoming, and in turn bring greater value, positive impact, and improved performance to the people they serve. She believes that everyone carries within themselves the resources for self-understanding and change, and that, given the right conditions, individuals can tap into their own answers and access their full potential.
With over thirty years’ experience in learning and development, Ailbhe has coached leaders and teams since 2003. She works with a wide and diverse client base, both nationally and internationally, supporting C-suite executives, directors, and middle management. Alongside her executive coaching practice, she has trained coaches on ICF-accredited programmes for fifteen years and serves as a coach supervisor. Ailbhe is an ICF Master Certified Coach and has trained in a variety of approaches, including Positive Intelligence, Transactional Analysis, Multiple Brain Integration Techniques, and NLP, among others.
She is passionate about continuous learning, travel, sharing food with friends, gardening, yoga, spending time in nature with her dog, and finding meaningful ways to give back to others.
Learn more about Coach Advancement by Tracy Sinclair.
Follow us on social media:
Instagram | Facebook | LinkedIn | YouTube
Hello, my name is Tracy Sinclair and welcome to Coaching in Conversation, the Mastery Series. This series of conversations explore. As the concept of mastery in coaching, and I have the great pleasure of talking with several ICF master certified coaches from around the world to understand what mastery really means to them, both as coaching practitioners and also as human beings. We explore many different perspectives and nuances of this topic, and I hope it is of use and interest to you as you continue to navigate. Your own pathway of development. Hello everyone once again. Welcome back to Coaching In Conversation with myself, Tracy Sinclair, and today I have the great pleasure of talking with Ailbhe Harrington, who is a master certified coach, and our conversation is part of our Mastery series. Ailbhe has been coaching for many years. She has a lot of experience across the field of learning and development, coaching leaders and teams for over 20 years. She's also an accredited coach, training provider accredited by the ICF and a coaching supervisor. And Ailbhe is also someone who is not only very highly skilled in the field of coaching and very highly trained. She also has a deep passion for learning and being curious about herself and her own life, which really does form a theme of our episode for today, which is called Vulnerability and mastery. I hope you enjoy listening. Well, thank you so much, Ailbhe, for joining me for this conversation. I'm really, really looking forward to this and as hopefully our listeners know, this is part of the Coaching and Conversation Mastery series, which is an exploration of, of. Mastery in coaching, but perhaps also mastery beyond coaching. So I'm delighted to, to have you talking with me about that. And I'd really like to start by just being curious about what got you into coaching in the first place. Hmm. Thanks Tracy. And yeah, thank you for inviting me along as well. So looking forward to having our, our conversation. You know, it goes back a long way in a funny kind of way. When I finished school I hadn't done particularly well. Things were very challenging in my home life, and so I kind of decided to repeat the equivalent of my A levels on my own. And what had happened in school when I was about 16 was that I was told the career guidance teacher told my mother. That the furthest that I would go would be behind the till in a supermarket. And that would've been fine if that was what I aspire to, but I kind of thought there was more out there. So when I went to repeat my A Levels equivalent to a Levels leaving cert I decided I wouldn't go to school. I would do it on my own and I would do a two year course on my own. And I used to go to an institute where you did an hour a week of a, a class for the subject you were doing. And I suddenly realized, first of all, how much I love learning and what a self-directed learner I was.'cause I'd get up every day and I'd study, but I, I, I'd choose what to, to, to focus on, you know, depending on how I felt. So I was my own I at this. I think it was a real start of the need for autonomy as well. But what I discovered that year was I loved learning and I kind of went. You know, when I left school I felt like I was stupid. I was no good. And I suddenly found the key to my own potential. I kind of realized here I have, I have lots of potential, and that was the beginning of where I realized I wanna work with people to help them to access their potential. I didn't know at that stage how or what way that was gonna happen, but I think that was the kind of seed, if I put it like that, that kind of got planted at that stage. And you know, through my kind of early career, I worked in London with unemployed young people and helping them to set up their business and. And then I got involved in, in a training as a, an integrative arts therapist. But kind of decided, no, that's, I, I don't quite want to be a therapist'cause I felt this huge responsibility. And that didn't sit well with me 'cause I had kind of grown up having to be responsible and emotional caretaker for everybody. And then one day somebody introduced coaching to me and I went, oh my God, this, this is it. This is what I want to do. This is exactly connected back to kind of what I had felt when I was kind of 17 and finding my own potential and realizing, you know, it's just a matter of somebody finding the key to accessing that. So that that really was. Kind of the beginning, but then somebody introduced me and I trained as a coach. And that was 23 years ago. Yeah. Wow. And the journey never stopped. The journey has never stopped through life of learning new things and, you know, growing as a human being to enable me to yeah, to move towards that mastery.'cause I think life is a journey of a journey of. Different aspects of ourselves coming to mastery. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I love the the comparison and the parallel already of mastery in coaching and mastery in life. And you, you said something when we were just chatting. Before we started, which I'd love you to share a bit more about, which was, we are a human before we're a coach. So the master, the life mastery is almost more important than the, the, or precedes the coaching mastery or, well, you know, let, let me just put that over to you. What, what do you see as the relationship there? I think as I, I remind coaches, I train and as a supervisor, you know, that we're human first, you know, so we're not perfect. And we have to go on a journey of growth from the inside out. So it has to start with us as, as a, as a person, I've had to go on a journey of really getting to understand, know myself. Understand how I get in my own way whole compassion for myself, which is, I, I believe for many, pretty much everybody, it's quite a journey of being gentle and compassionate with ourselves and being able to, as Bernie Brown would say, to see our vulnerability is our strength and not a weakness. And I, I think only by me having gone on my own journey. Can I be a, a, a masterful coach? It, it has to come before I, I that's, you know, they, they feed off each other, but, but the journey has to be about myself. And it's a little bit like when I, for years did leadership training and I'd be with managers and, you know, it'd start with them and they'd say, look, what, why are we doing this? And say, well, the only way you're gonna be a really good manager or leader is if you start with yourself. You've gotta start with yourself. Yeah. Yeah. I, I, I guess what was coming up for me when you were sharing that is, is this idea of we are an instrument self as instrument. I love that term. Yeah. And, and we seem to, some of us sometimes can seem to think that when we train as coaches and developers, coaches, we are just trying to get better at doing a skill. With someone else where and it's all, you know, this thing about, it's all about the client, which of course in many contexts it is. However, it's also about who we are, isn't it? I was thinking about what I think it was you that says you can only take a client as far as you are able to go yourself. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely. And you know, as I would say to coaches and training, I'm. That they're the most important tool in the coaching which is that whole piece of self as instrument.'cause I know so many, there are many coach training schools maybe who say, oh, it's all about these tools you have to have outside of yourself. But actually it's about the capacity to be absolutely present with yourself and connected with yourself that way. You can connect at that deeper energetic level with your client, and also you can connect with your intuition and have the courage to offer what you're noticing is happening in that here and now coaching relationship. And that for me, from my experience has where the most powerful coaching has happened with the work I've done with clients. But it can't happen if I'm not connected with myself. If I haven't built that deeper understanding and, and trust of myself is probably as well. There is a trust element there.'Cause many of us have been trained to stay so in the analytical space and inner our heads and not connected in with our bodies. So we don't actually, we don't even hear it. We don't even tune it. I mean, this is where people get sick before they listen to their bodies. But it, it's that for me, you know, I know my journey to mastery has been about getting outta my head and getting into my heart, my gut, my body. And, and as you said, the more I've gone on that journey, then I'm able to meet my clients in a much, much deeper place than where I began as a coach. Which, you know, I know now as I reflect back was very transactional. Whereas now I'm, it, it's a greater, greater level of comfort with being in the unknown and just letting things just in many ways organically kind of. Happen in the moment as opposed to needing to feel in control. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. You are making me think of a conversation I had just this morning. I was holding a, a supervision group for some internal coaches and this very thing that came up was around need the need to add value. And how as a coach, you know, when I've got that inner chatter coming into my head, how, you know, I, I, I suddenly think how, what, what, what can I say to help this person? What is it I need to do, particularly if the client is feeling stuck, which is what this particular coach brought in. And it was so fascinating because. The client's stuckness became the coach's stuckness around, well what do I need to do to help this person to add value to this person? And then it quickly goes to control around, I need to control this in some way. So, and yet we are, we are talking here. You are talking here about the complete opposite to that. Yeah. And it's so funny you say that 'cause I had a supervision group this morning and the exact same thing came up. Yeah. It's just bizarre. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, and I, I, I, you know, I think particularly for newer coaches going out there, that that's a big piece in their head about adding value, but then it causes them to kind of stay, well, potentially to jump into that rescue mode and then to kind of start working hard. And it's a kind of a natural. It's a natural mechanism for many of us.'cause of course many of us in our work are, you know, rewarded for stepping in, taking control and telling people what to do. So it takes, it takes a lot of learning and trust to step back and to just let things kind of happen in the moment, I suppose. But, but it is about using self as instrument as you said as well, and that's a, that, that. That takes trust in ourselves and attunement to ourselves. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. And and I think as well, a willingness to be vulnerable actually. There is a willingness to be vulnerable because you don't know. Is, is the, is the coachee going to go? Yeah. Yeah, that's, yeah. That, that's exactly how I feel. Are they gonna look at it as if we've got 10 heads? But I, my experience is generally it lands but there is a vulnerability in, in, in that sharing.'cause you don't quite know where it might go or what might happen. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And I think I heard you say earlier about vulnerability not being a weakness, and yet it's so often framed as one, isn't it? Whereas actually, from what I'm hearing from you, and I don't want to put words in your mouth here, rather, but I, I'm, I'm really making a connection between vulnerability is a characteristic of mastery in, in a way, the capacity to be vulnerable. Yeah, absolutely. Tracy. I believe so. And I, you know, I think back to when I did my training as a therapist, one of the big things for me was that I had from my family situation, my, my dad, I, Joan mother was an alcoholic. The way I learned to survive was to be strong. And so it was almost kind of being vulnerable. Well, a, it wasn't safe. To be vulnerable. But secondly, it was very much seen as a weakness. And I, I, I, you know, for many groups I've, I've been with it is kind of almost, there's a, I I think as well, there's that whole piece beneath the vulnerability is the shame of, you know, people really see me for who I am. Then will they love me and will I, you know, will I be okay? And I know for me that that's been a, a life journey of, a really knowing, you know, I can ask for support. I don't have to hold it all together. I can be honest about how I feel. And I've learned through many of the groups I've trained that the more willing I am to be vulnerable, then it opens up and gives permission to others to be vulnerable. And with that, yes, it's challenging. Because there's emotion usually beneath it for people. Yet there's some huge release and movement and shift that happens. And I guess really for transformation in many ways to happen for people, we have to connect with our vulnerability.'Cause I think it allows us to connect with all the parts of ourselves that sometimes we've shut down and closed off for fear of judgment and fear of not being loved. And even as I say that, I feel it in my heart for so many people I've witnessed to have shared because I've shared and have particularly not that I wouldn't have shared beforehand, but in the last two years with my husband going through cancer treatment and then kind of coming to where unfortunately he wasn't successful and he, he died nearly a year ago. That my sharing of my journey. With people has, has, has really given them permission to be okay with sharing their, their, you know, sometimes I think it's like, it's like sharing our soft underbelly. It's a little bit like that, and a lot of us have our armor around it at most of the time. And so that's, I suppose, psychological safety has to exist before. And that trust needs to be there for people to share. But when somebody shares, it opens the door to it being okay. Yeah. And not being seen as a weakness, but actually seen as a, you know, as a strength to, in many ways, own the parts of ourselves that we don't show to everybody that often. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. And, and maybe a strength to, to meet what is real. Not, not what we think we should feel or should say, but to really meet the truth, the reality of ourselves in that moment or in that context. Yeah, absolutely. And I think it's what, you know, I, I thinking about all of what's happening in the world of coaching now with ai and, you know, how's that gonna impact coaches and. I like to think that it, our humanity and our ability to be present and connect and connect at that deeper, more profound level that that's the difference. That's the difference that I think as coaches and I try, I, I believe that's the difference I make with the people I train to become coaches and the clients I work with. That it's about building, it's about creating a greater sense of our humanity, our connection with each other, that we, we are all one. And that to hold that kind of, I dunno, acceptance and compassion for each other. Yeah. We're all doing the best we can with the resources we have at any given moment. Absolutely. And. Something. Just going back a, a few moments that you shared about this is to feel, to be vulnerable, we have to have safety. We talk a lot, don't we? About creating, cultivating trust and safety for our client to do their work, and yet if we are going to offer vulnerability as a permission for further, you know, deeper exploration and sharing, we as the practitioner. Have to feel safe to do so. Mm. So the safety is not only for the client, is it the safety is also for the practitioner, the tool? Oh, yeah, without question. And and this goes back to how important it is that we take the time, you know, to build that partnership and kind of alliance with our, with our client, because it's a relationship. It's not a one way, it's not a one way street. And that's where, you know, some coaches, it's, it's all about the client, but actually, you know, where am I in this and what do I need and what do I need to feel safe? So, and this is where the relationship is so key. And I think again, it's back to. We have to go, we have to go our own journey ourselves to be able to articulate and feel safe to ask what, what we need and to find that equal partnership with our clients. Yes, our focus is on them and their agenda, but actually it's a relationship that needs to hold trust and safety for both, for, for any real, I think deep work to, to happen. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I, I, I think I might be stating the complete obvious here, Ailbhe, but just for clarity's sake, what I'm picking up here is that even though we are wanting to be in service of our client, we can't support the client in doing their work unless we are doing our own work. And that is an ongoing thing, isn't it? That doesn't end until the day we die. You know, it's, it's a, a, you know,'cause sometimes, you know, I suppose, you know, whether people, and sometimes clients have the expectation that, you know, well, how long is it gonna take? How long will it take for me to kind of change these things? And I kind of just say, well, this is life work, this is, this is, you know you know, we don't get rid of our experiences from the past. We get to understand them and to. Be able to notice what triggers them and what might, you know cause different feelings and emotions to come up that are linked, you know, to the past where we get rub abandoned back. But it's in knowing that we have a greater chance and choice of choosing how we want to respond. And, but it doesn't mean that all goes away, you know, it doesn't go away. So, you know, I know for. For me right now I'm very conscious that as I'm coming up to you know, my husband owns first anniversary that my dad also died a Christmas and he died on my birthday and it was my parents' wedding anniversary and Christmas was hell growing up after my dad died. And so I know, I'm very aware that there's a younger me. That's kind of almost getting anxious, you know, about coming up to this because it's now I've got a double whammy, you know, but it's my younger self that is, is kind of almost kind of popping up with that anxiety and fear. But I know it and it's like I have to just keep reassuring her, okay, this will be okay. But, you know, but it, it doesn't mean to say she doesn't appear 'cause she, she does, you know, but it's like me knowing and being aware. Makes all the difference rather than kind of going, what's wrong? What's wrong with me? I dunno why I'm feeling this way. Because some of those are old feelings as well as new feelings. Absolutely. And thank you so much for sharing that because you are making me think about this point that you made around we are humans first. But also how so often, you know, my experience and I'm, I'm sure I'm generalizing a bit too much here, but. I always think of coaches as being good people who, you know, nice people. I know not describing someone as nice isn't always good words to, but, but just good caring people who, who want to make a positive difference. And so sometimes that can equate into, well, I have to be perfect then, you know, I, I can't have any skeletons in my own cupboard or dark, dark sides to me. And yet, you know, what you are describing there is that little girl that is getting anxious. She's always going to be there. It's not that we suddenly become superhuman because we are coaches, but we are aware of those parts and how we, how we tend to them. Yeah, absolutely. You know, it's. I, I absolutely agree. You know, so many people who come in who want to be coaches, want to create a better world, want to help people to be the better versions of themselves and grow and develop. And yet, yeah, it's, it's interesting how then there's a, an expectation that they place on themselves somehow, I've gotta get this right and I can't make any mistakes and I better be perfect. And and yet, you know, I always think of Carl Rogers and, you know, as you said, there's nothing, this person, I can't, you know, I can't remember the line of it, but it's kind of almost like it's, there's nothing this person has experienced that I cannot connect with because I am human like them. Yeah. And it's not exactly his words, but it's our humanness that frees us. By being human as a coach with your client, and in some ways, sometimes normalizing things. Now, I don't mean getting into our story, but you know, for many clients when I might say, you know, yeah, I, I, I. You know, I've been in a place where I haven't felt confident or I've been in a place where I didn't have all the answers, or I've been in a place where I've been vulnerable. And it's kind of funny 'cause some, some clients can look at you go, really? And it's like, yeah, because they sometimes the client almost sometimes sees you as if somehow you've got it all together as well. And we have to remind them no, actually I'm human too. You know? None of us have this all worked out. I think I, I think as Carl Rogers said, that that's what it is in that capacity of, as he said, the wounded healer. It's like we're all wounded at some level, but because of our wounds, we can heal, but we can't, not to forget our wounds or somehow thinking, oh, well I better show up. Like I've, I've, I've got this all together, but there's no question in my mind from all the people I've met, we all. As you said, we all have our skeletons in our, in our cup. We all have our baggage, we all have our different things that have happened to us. And it is, that's, that's what makes us human and helps us to connect and have presence and empathy and care and compassion for others. Hmm. I'm really picking up here around, and again, forgive me if I'm. Kind of putting words in your mouth here, but I'm getting this real sense of mastery. Two things really. First of all, mastery is not about elevating ourselves through perfection. You know, I've, I've got that t-shirt and I've done that. Which of course, you know, is a, is a lovely myth to dispel in that mastery is not about superiority in any shape or fashion or being an expert. Exactly, exactly. But, but the other part of it was around how mastery seems to be more about how you are being with your client rather than what you are doing. We can get quite fixated, can't we? On Well, what should I do when this happens? Or what do, what should I ask? You know, what are the strategies when my client brings this? And it's, it's often about doing, and yet we've got this sometimes elusive shift in understanding around the doing of coaching and the being of the coach. Yeah. I think it's linked to that we forget that we're human beings and not human doings, and yet, you know yeah, and it, it's, it's it's a journey I think for all of us to be okay with the being in just in our lives. You know, I would say. What I've noticed with myself and so many others is this kind of absolute kind of you know, it's, it's almost like being busy and doing is a kind of a gold star. You know? It's, it's like, well, you know, if you're busy, if you say no, actually, well, no, I'm, I. I'm taking it easy. It's kind of so our whole culture, our whole kinda society is all about busy, busy, busy. You know, it's nonstop, nonstop. And for people just to sit and be is it's a challenge. And yet it's, it's, it's, I'm in my supervision group this morning. It was that conversation about, that's what we offer as coaches is. Is for somebody to really have spaciousness and to stop and to be heard and be really listened to, and somebody being really present with them which sounds really simple, but in the world that we live in today, that is a massive gift. Yeah, it, it, it's because nobody has time to really listen anymore. Nobody has time to just be, so it's, and that's where I see, you know, that there is this growing need and has been growing and growing for, for people to have a coaching space because there is nowhere else to stop, connect, be present with themselves, be held in the presence, in their own presence with themselves, by the presence of somebody else. And it's. It's, it's a massive gift. It's, yeah, and, and I think in that kind of enabling. The person to be able to have a conversation with the different parts of themselves. So whether it is me here today or the, you know, my younger self appearing and what's the relevance of that for me today? It's not, not that it's about going back there, but you know, what is the relevance now? Why is that that part of me, you know, what is it that's going on within me That to a large extent, there isn't even time to be with that for most people. So. To step into a space where we're held and really listened to. And it's, it's profound for many people.'cause it just doesn't exist in our society today. Yeah. Yeah. It, it strikes me as you say that Ailbhe, that in some ways this is the gift of coaching and at the same time, systemically, we're often swimming upstream. Because the culture wants answers, wants speed, wants action, wants delivery. Yeah. At an increasing pace. And we must have been in a parallel universe this morning in our sessions because my group was also talking about how there is this strong invitation from the system to give advice to, to add value in the, in the way we are. Culturally conditioned to add value, which is through our ex, through our expertise, by, you know, offering strategies, ideas, suggestions, guidance, et cetera. So there's a, with coaching, the gift is the antithesis almost of some of these norms. And so perhaps the mastery is also about how do you hold, well, I called it hold the faith in a way. How do you trust, again, perhaps, how do you hold that? Yeah, I agree. And I think that's again, you know, being comfortable with holding silence and space. Mm-hmm. Which many people, it's like, well, I better jump in with something. But being able just to hold that and to, I, I think, you know, it is about skill and learning. You know, how to notice what's happening in your client and noticing and sharing and. Working in different ways, whether it be with Metaverse or the body, because I think the more we stay in our heads, then we fall into that invitation actually, you know, into the invitation of provide the solution, provide the, you know, because that's where the system is. The system is just in its head all the time. And actually the more, as coaches, we can stay connected with our whole self and stay connected. With the heart, with the gut, then there's a greater chance we can actually invite the client into that space. And then that shifts the whole thing, that shifts them to a different space. So they kind of stop in their tracks and start connecting with themselves. That's, yeah. You know, that will resource them in a far, far better way than. Thinking they want, you know a particular strategy or, you know I mean, it does depend upon the organization in terms of their perception of coaching as well. But but I think there's, there's, there's greater I don't know. I suppose there's a greater wealth of, of learning and insight that's not only for the individual coachee, but for the system. They go back into. You know because of how they'll be with a greater level of awareness of noticing also what's happening around them and making different choices. Yeah. Yeah. But there is, I mean, it is the challenge and it's the cha, I mean, we're living in this chaotic, uncertain, fast-paced world at the moment. And so. Again, if you think that's what we're all out into, how do we come back to a space of grounding ourselves in ourselves so that we're, we're really clear about, well, what is the best choice here for me to make? And how do I engage what's happening outside? If we are centered within ourselves, we're in a much, much better place to, to manage what's coming from the outside world. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I think, you know, well my, my thinking, so this is my thinking that that what's missing in society so much is connection. Hmm. And I think, you know, we, we, we have seen a huge rise for young people. And not just young people, but in terms of mental wellbeing and mental health and, you know, we've moved so far away from connection at so many levels.'cause everybody's almost in their individual lane. They're so, you know, laser focused on getting through the day and that we're, we're less and less. We have, we have less communities, we have less connection, we have less support. I was only saying this morning, I was in my group. That, you know, in Ireland, because of the whole shift in the Catholic church and religion, and not that I, you know, it's, it's whatever, whatever came spiritually from that has, has been lost. So now there isn't even that kind of space sometimes for people to have that kind. And for me, spiritual is really connecting at that, that deep soul level with ourselves and with others. So it's, it's almost like we're, we've lost so much. Like, this is where I think coaching in terms of society and humanity is so important.'cause it, it, it, it allows that coming back into some connection with other to allow connection with self. Yeah, yeah, yeah. A a a great friend of mine and coach talks about this idea of in business being a sole trader, but he then changes it. From SOLE to SOUL, and you are a sole trader in that your, your work is to support the connection with your soul and of others. Just really reminded me of, you were saying there, 'cause it's, it is so important, isn't it? And that is the, the, the essence of humanity. Yeah. Yeah. And, and that all connection isn't happening. So many levels, I think, because of the world that we're in right now. That's right. Yeah. That's right. Yeah. And it's sad. Yeah. Yes, it is. It is. It is sad and I, I noticed. You know, I find myself very torn with that in that it's sad and troubling. And at the same time I do feel as though coaching has its best opportunity to add a difference. Yeah, absolutely. I agree. And that's, that's the time. Yeah. That's why I, I love what I do, you know, and I keep doing it.'cause I know this is, you know, in how. I'm working with people. It is in some way rippling out and helping to, you know, I suppose in many ways the word that's coming to my mind and everything we're talking about is love. That's really, you know, it's about spreading love. Yeah. Rather than fear, you know? And you know, whether it's helping people to. Fall back in love with themselves. So they then I think once it's back to that thing about the relationship we have with ourselves and the quality of that relationship impacts the quality of the relationships we have with everybody else. For sure. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. We could keep talking about this. It's such a fascinating conversation, Ailbhe. Thank you. And, and I am, I'm just mindful of our time for now. Just as one final thought, knowing I guess that we all track our own path towards being masterful in life or work, it's not the same path for everyone. We don't do. The same things have the same experiences, but if you, for anyone listening here thinking, gosh, you know, okay, I understand all of that intellectually. Mm-hmm. How do I, how do I make a start? How do I start to discover more of this for myself? What, what has been, what would you offer them or what has been useful for you in that pathway? Oh gosh. I dunno, I suppose I've, you know, I've done so many different learning programs or journeys, you know, of learning. I suppose it's really to be willing and give yourself permission to take the risk. To be vulnerable, to step into spaces that you might feel uncomfortable in, you know, to, to be willing to kind of stretch into your growing edge and listen to your intuition about what you're drawn to. Because as you said, we're, we're all different. We all follow different paths, but. You know, I, I think that's the key, is tuning into intuition. You know, if you feel pulled towards something, then go that way, because that may well be, and whether it's a program or people, you know, you're drawn to somebody. But I, I, I, I think it's. It's hard to kind of say, 'cause I'm thinking of all the different things I've done in my journey that have enabled me, you know, to kinda come to the place that I'm in. I had so many different things when I, when I, I only was speaking with somebody yesterday about, you know, how when I was younger. I realized I didn't have a voice in how I had to find my voice. I think it's a, it's, it's, it's such a journey at so many different levels. But I think go and be curious about yourself and if that is to go work with a coach, or it may be for me, when I started with I had to do therapy, but I think really just step into a space about being curious about yourself. Yeah. And. Be gentle and compassionate with yourself on that journey.'cause stuff comes up and we give ourselves a hard time about, you know, the different things we chose to do or not do or whatever. But I think it's, it's just taking the risk to reach out and get curious and yeah, go to those shadow places because actually when you bring 'em up to the light, they're glorious. Oh, what a lovely, what a lovely thing to say. Well, glorious. Yeah. Well, thank you so much, although it's been such a pleasure. And, and thank you for being vulnerable yourself, and I know it's been a, a challenging year for you. So I'm really grateful that you've come and beautifully modeled mastery of, of life in all its forms. So thank you so much for that. Oh, thank you. Thank you, Tracy. And thank you for yeah, having me here with you to talk. We, we could go on, there's loads more we could talk about, but thank you so much and, and thank you for yeah, allowing the space for me to be real and vulnerable and human here too. Thank you. Thank you. You have been listening to Coaching in Conversation, the Mastery Series. A podcast that takes a look at mastery and coaching, what it is, what that means, how do we nurture or cultivate it, and many other interesting questions. You can hear more about coaching, education and development@tracysinclair.com and follow us on social media. If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a rating and a review. And also share it with your network to help us expand our reach. Thank you for listening and see you next time.
