You're at the Coaching Inn, 3D Coaching's virtual pub where we enjoy conversations with people who engage in the world of coaching. Welcome to this week's episode. I'm Claire Pedrick and today I am in the company of Brenda Amon. Brenda is based in the States. Brenda, tell us about what made you want to come to The Coaching Inn and then tell us about your coaching journey. Well, Claire, I enjoy reading your blogs and there was one that popped out at me at what makes a difference.
And when I think about coming to the coaching in, think of how I engaged your, the opportunity to get mentor coaching in a group with Paranel from your 3D coaching. And it was an amazing experience. And I actually was willing to hop in at 4 a.m. calls from the States to be a part of it. And it was life-changing. So that's got me engaged here. Wow, 4am, we salute you. think that none of our mentors would reciprocate the 4am. That's amazing.
So tell us about your coaching journey and then we'll pick up the thing about difference. My coaching journey. I would say for decades, I tried to learn about the human experience and what would work and how I could improve and get better. And then I came across coaching and it seemed like the science fit for me. Yeah. And the science to know that that well, I can get stuck in my head trying to figure things out. Great thinker.
But what does it take to break that open to see new possibilities that you didn't even know were available? And that's the science I like because if we, as I'm willing to explore and not even know what's going to happen, that's when the beauty really happens. That's about control. So yes, I'm on a journey to continue to give up control in my life. Well, you are so welcome here at the Coaching In. So you're in the States for our global listeners.
Where in the States are you, I'm in Lansing, Michigan. I've been a Michigander all my life. And Yeah, I think part of my community has always been about raising my four kids and my husband growing his practice of wealth management. And now that I have a little bit more free time in these last five or six years, it's like, how do I really want to grow that community in Michigan and even globally? And what I've noticed is it's almost an adventure that I never even imagined. Wow. An adventure.
Yeah. I mean, we're all in the human experience and what is that that makes a difference that really brings us alive? And to me, that's created a lot of meaning in my life and that's the doors I open for my coaching clients. And you've chosen to do lots of development with us, with people who are very different from you, from very different parts of the world. Yeah. For me, I think leaders come from all walks of life. I'm inspired by, I don't know, opening up conversations with wherever I'm at.
mean, And, know, sometimes that's not easy. And I think I've gotten better as a coach, just saying, okay, this is where I'm at. Where are you at and getting curious. And that curiosity has really allowed me to make the difference. Because if I come with, I know I've learned, I know this and I'm here. It really kind of blocks that conversation.
And for me, the pulling back and learning from others, maybe in different parts of the world has really said, well, you are a little bit like me, but then yet there's a little bit here for me to learn. Yeah. And actually we're all different. And sometimes visible difference or audible difference just reminds us that the difference is there, doesn't it? I don't even know where Michigan is. Well, we'll have to come over for a visit sometime.
The thing I love about Michigan is there's parts of it that are so different and parts are so much like nature. And I've heard you talk about nature a lot, Claire. And that's the big water is Lake Michigan and all the lakes. It just draws me into that place of peace that's there in nature. And how do we bring that out more in ourselves? That's amazing. I was on a walk this morning and I live in a new build house. So last year, the edge of the where the houses are was just rubble and mess.
And this year the weeds have come back and I promise you they are the most beautiful thing. And I met, there's a man who I meet on my walks in the morning who I call the Badger Man, because he tells me where the wild animals are to look for. And he told me the other day that the thistles outside here, when they got flowers in them, they would be covered in golden birds, gold, yeah, in birds. And I thought, we don't see birds very often anymore. And when I went out today, they covered in birds.
It was beautiful. I just felt I had to share that. Yeah, nature has a beauty and mystery that that when we pause and take it in. and feel that aliveness in ourselves. Yeah, and often in that space is where we get the insight, isn't it? Yeah. So many distractions, but when you pause, can really. be in touch with that aliveness. And so that's my journey. How do we bring that more out in people? How do we make that difference? That's beautiful. So in a one-to-one.
You sent me a let's talk email that said I'm intrigued by your conversation around difference. Let's think out loud. What do you notice in your coaching and in the coaching you observe about managing difference. Yeah, for me managing different difference, the more quiet I can get, the more the difference disappears. I don't know why this is coming up, but I noticed that so many of us have self-awareness. And before I wasn't so sure about that.
Cause I heard a story once that said, if you ask somebody, if they're a good driver, 90 % of them will say that they are. And if you ask somebody, if they have self-awareness, 90 % of the people will say that they do. And you know, I do think people have a lot of self-awareness. What I notice in my coaching and making the difference is... What do we want to do different with the self-awareness that we have?
And being delicate about what stands in the way and how we can begin to see things different is like for me. is life changing. And you might not even know what that is either. I was very struck by what you just said a few minutes ago, Brenda. You said, when we're quiet, the difference almost disappears. And it made me think that shared silence is a very deep shared experience, isn't it? Absolutely. Because in that shared silence, nothing's there and anything's possible.
As long as we're both being silent in the silence. And it's not that one of us is silent and the other one is just not talking. Reminds me of comic strips and you've got that thought bubble and all those thoughts going on. Yeah. Yeah. But truly shared deep silence. is very connecting. Yeah. And for me, that's, that's where humility comes in. I have to be, in this space, even in the coaching space for the client to say, no, that's not what I'm seeing. And to be okay with that.
And not that I'm wrong. I'm just not noticing what's happening for them. And the most important thing is for them to notice what's happening for them. And so that's where that silence and humility can come in. And it almost seems like it's opposite of what we're taught all our lives. Have the right answer. Learn this more, be this more. And that's what I think is the beautiful opening with coaching. And I love it when clients go, well, you didn't give me any advice. You were just there with me.
And I love that when leaders have that response, cause that's like, okay. you dig it thinking into your own stuff. Yeah, there's a sort of fantasy, isn't there, that I have to be the one that notices the big thing or I have to be the one that asks the right question. And actually, I have to be the one who is present as these things emerge. I remember years and years and years ago, I was coaching in a space. with somebody who I worked with over quite a long time.
And I said to him something like, I've got a question. And then I offered him the question. And he looked at me and he went, that's the wrong question, Claire. So I waited and he said, but it makes me realize the right question is this. I promise you, I could have left the building, gone for a coffee, gone for lunch and come back and he's still been working on it. And it was, it was his. Yeah. It never was fine. and that's all he needed. didn't need anymore.
because he'd found the right question by me asking the wrong question and then not being bothered. Yeah. To make that difference, we have to give up being right. Yeah, that's a great question for all of us to ask ourselves, isn't it? How willing am I to give up being right? I did this one practice with my daughter once because I remember the first time I heard that, you know, just try giving up being right.
And I never realized how much it consumed so much of my conversations, right, in my daily actions. So I did this little experiment with my daughter. I'll never forget this. I was leaning against the bar stool and listening to her, and I was going to jump in to add value. And then... I held myself back and then she would say something more and I wanted to jump in again and I held myself back. And then by the third time I'm like, you know what? I'm just going to be here.
And I got the most beautiful experience of who my daughter really was. And you know, that's what I think coaching offers too. a space to see who you really are. And what comes up for me, Claire is like, my gosh, what could be there that I don't want to see? But then the other part that people don't even often consider when I start to engage with them on a journey is what could be there that I've been missing that will make the difference.
So there's fear and then there's expectation, excitement, possibility. Yeah, and how is that sometimes when you share those, I feel like they might be stacked and we have to break through each layer. But what if it's more like a circular kind of a thing and we touch on them until something really hits and provides an opening for an insight. And sometimes the smallest thing has the biggest impact. And it's not a question of taking it down brick by brick.
Sometimes one thing reveals all sorts, doesn't it? Yeah, and sometimes in your mind, you can be convinced of what you're going to have to do to make that difference in your life or as a coach. And you're convinced, convinced, convinced. And then when you're allow yourself that opening, like you say, it is that little small thing and it wasn't anything you were expecting. Yeah. So the brick wasn't really layers upon layers upon layers. And that weed wasn't really a weed.
It was actually something beautiful that brought in a bird or something else we're not used to seeing that's unfolds. Yeah. Yeah. And what I'm noticing with my weeds, there's a prickly one, they're called teasels. And I've never really seen them in nature before. My mum used to have them at Christmas sprayed silver and gold, but I've not seen them in nature before. And there are lots here and they're dry and spiky. And people use them in dried flower arrangements and they do look very stunning.
But right now they're pink and soft and they've got these flowers coming out of the spikes and nobody did anything. It just emerged all on its own. And sometimes we just need to look as things emerge, don't we? We don't need to fiddle. We just need to be patient, be silent, be still, be present. Yeah. And all the, a lot of times as soon as.
I think about being present, but I think about all the distractions that come in that keep me from being present and keep me from what I really want to create. But taking that time to just pause, be okay with being silent, somehow a new energy comes in. new, different. I don't know if we ever give voice to that energy or maybe I'm talking about myself, but that energy is different. The energy of possibility, that energy of, this is the voice that usually happens. The weeds are there.
Instead, the shift is the voice of look at the weeds and now there's flowers blooming on that just shift in perception of what's really possible. That to me, that is energy. So what else are you learning about being present with people with their difference and your difference? to be delicate again, but as you ask me that, think about. a book in a gentleman that made a lot of difference to me years ago, and it's the art of possibility. Love that book. Yes, yes.
And he just kind of says, and I love the TED talk, and I forget his name. What is his name? Benjamin Zander. There we go. Thank you. And Raz, his wife, Raz. Yeah. It's he does a TED talk and he's on two separate sides of the stage. And it's like in one, we have the downward spiral. What can't work and what stands in the way and in all our energy that we give to what's not working.
And then he runs over to the other side of the stage and it's about and what if and what if and I don't know why the very cute story in all of that is there was this gentleman that came from a different country and he said, Mr. Zander, but my country says I'm number 166 out of 167, but you're telling me that I could be something different. He goes, as I'm sitting here listening, maybe I'm not 166 out of 167, maybe I am something different. And just that, that like spark, that energy of wow.
Who am I, really? Yeah, The Art of Possibility is one of my all time favourite books. And in fact, we talked about it before at the Coaching Inn. I think we talked about it with Robbie Swale. I'll put the link in the show notes, listeners so that you can have a look if you want to. I think it's out of print now. Yeah, I could share my tattered copy.
Yeah. It's amazing, though, to live in that space of, of to be open to whatever, even if it's being a part of a mentor coaching group that meets at 4am. Why not? To be open to seeing a week different to be open to being still and present and what might come up. And that also speaks, doesn't it, Brenda, of possibility, but also flexibility and willingness or capacity to be able to move ideas, assumptions, thoughts, beliefs. It reminds me, Claire, of what you shared about how we walk on the path.
I don't know if you remember sharing that with me, but if you're, and I'll make this my own, if you're walking up a mountain on a skinny path and how close do we get to the edge or how close do we reach in to hold on to what's there and how can we be experimenting as we walk along to maybe discover something new. Yeah. I you, I've got so many blog posts coming up about walking. You'll be fed up with walking by the end of the year. Walking is for me like meditation. changes everything.
They've harvested, they've cut the grass in the meadow just here and they bail it. feed horses, they'd make it into hay for horses. And the day they cut it, instead of a field with a path through it, it's just covered in dry, slippy, huge, drying grass. And then people have created a new pathway through. So the first person to walk creates a little space and then the next person a little bit more and now there's a path. Probably in a day or two days, there's a path again.
So sometimes we have to sit, that goes back to what you said about silence, doesn't it? Yeah, is that where we create new paths is in our silence? And in that silence is that new energy that we find. Like I was laying on the couch yesterday and didn't want to. As I have more time for my life, I'm getting back into exercise more so than I used to. And sometimes that takes a little bit of pause to say, okay, do I have the energy? But it really is about deciding.
who I don't know why I keep coming back to this. Who do we want to be deciding in this moments of silence? Who do we want to be in allowing us the space of those moments? And sometimes we, or I can speak for myself. I follow tradition. I try filed what I've learned. but what I'm trying to do now is really making that my own in that silence and allowing the space for others. When I coach them, Make that your own. Don't bring in that voice that you've always heard. Try a new one. Try a new path.
What does that look like? And that comes back to difference too, doesn't it? Because it's saying you don't need to take it and be the same as someone else. You can take it and make it your own and that will be different. And that's great. Yeah, it reminds me of Austin Klein and Steal Like an Artist and Show Your Work. I mean, you asked me about my coaching journey in the beginning, and I just value so many people that have invested their life in how to bring this work really to life.
And as I continue to delve into it deeper and deeper, I realize that coaching really is that science. that is built not to push a product, but it's built for the person in front of you. And that's what I really like. And that to me is making the difference because it's a self rewarding space for the client. And every single person can make it their own and it will look different, won't it? For every single person.
Yes. I've just been updating our training videos and one of the feedbacks that I get when people listen to the coaching demonstration in the video is I wouldn't like it if you talk to me like that. And I say, well, I wouldn't because he's him and you're you. And if we're going to create it together, then it's not going to, it's not going to be the same because And it will be different and it will work for you because we'll make, you know, we'll find out together how to make that work.
I've put a little warning now in the video, there's a little box come up and it says, this is what works for him. What works for you might be different from what works for him. We'll see what that does about the feedback. Yeah. And being flexible. You mentioned that. Yeah. I think we know gone. Well, it really brings me back to valuing people's self awareness. And yet in that self awareness as coaches, how can we really hold that space for something different to emerge?
That they choose to want to implement. rather than. don't know why this is coming up, like keep digging up weeds that kind of all look the same. instead. And as you're talking, it makes me think, you know, we live in a world of obligations. I'm obliged to do this. I have a duty to do that. I have to do the other. And you're describing a place where there's more ease, I wonder. Absolutely. And maybe we won't know that path and that ease.
And coaching provides a space of letting go of the well-trodden path and noticing what's different. So as we begin to move to the end of our conversation, Brenda, my question to you is, what are your hopes for the coaching world profession? Well, what I hope that doesn't happen is that it gets too commoditized. Yeah. And. My continued dream and efforts is how do we have that art of possibility in opening up even more possibility?
Because when it truly is for the person in front of you, like you say, they make it what they want. And I think having that valuable space to think out loud and get insights into your own stuff so that you can make it more of what you want, that's to me what life is about. And so many times we might think, I don't have what it takes, or it might not work, or I can't make the difference.
But if we just take, like I heard you mention earlier, Claire, just like a small, it's that small that shows up that you were never expecting that can really make the difference. And difference, can't, difference has to emerge often, doesn't it? I think there's a belief that know, you can plan your difference. I was talking to somebody last night who was asking me about my Camino pilgrimage and he said, well, where did that come from?
And I said it came from a conversation that said I will do a sponsored walk. One. And then the sponsored walk became a half marathon sponsored walk and then the walk became 12 walks. And then the 12 walks became a lot more walks and there were lots of people now walking with us and now we have an obligation to keep walking. But you couldn't have planned that. You couldn't say... What's the difference I like to make in the world? Right, I want to make this difference.
So what's What's my business plan about the difference that I want to make? You know, that works for some things and other things just have to organically do their thing, don't they? Like the weeds. Yeah. What I'm hearing you say is just show up. We just keep showing up. Yeah. And do what every day. do what feels like the right thing. Yeah. And others will come along. Others will have feedback.
Others will find some things interesting and some things not, but it's about what little seeds are we dropping to grow that garden? Yeah. Well, what a lovely conversation and so much nature, Yes. You'll have to come a visit, take a visit and come visit us here in Michigan and see that nature here, big and bold. Definitely, definitely. We'll do that in the end when I want to travel again. Well, I can't wait to hear about your walk too.
And I love the idea, Claire, that you didn't know what it would turn into, but you just started and... and people began to gather and it formed and changed and making the difference along the way. And I've worn out three pairs of really, really great walking shoes. I'm about to start pair number four. that sounds great. Thanks so much for inviting me to the end today. Well, thank you for coming. And if people want to pick up the conversation, how do they contact you, Brenda?
you can find me on LinkedIn. Brilliant. Yeah. Thank you. So I'll put that in the show notes. So thank you, Brenda Ammon. Thank you, Claire. I'm Claire Pedrick. And what a wonderful conversation this has been. And listeners, we hope you've enjoyed it too. Bye bye. If you've enjoyed what you've heard today, we'd love you to share the podcast with a friend or leave a comment on social media.
And if you'd like to become a regular at The Coaching In, you can subscribe on Podbean and all major podcast channels. We look forward to welcoming you next time. You've been listening to The Coaching In, 3D Coaching's virtual hub. For more information, check out 3dcoaching.com.