Practicing the COACH State

Practicing the COACH State Video Transcript

Robert: Hi. I am Robert Dilts, one of the co-founders of Dilts Strategy Group and co-creators of Success Factor Modeling. One of the foundations of Success Factor Modeling is it says our success begins with our mindset, begins with the state of our self, and the state of our filters, and to be a successful person, I have to know how to create the best version of myself. How to be in any situation be the best version of myself. We like to say in SFM, this comes from a particular qualities of a state that we call the COACH State. Now C-O-A-C-H in English has... it is five letters that stand for five important qualities.

The first one is to be centered especially in yourself. We say especially in the belly center. The second one is to be open. Open to possibilities, open to see other opportunities, but we say open to receive, and open to give. The third quality is to be alert, aware, awake of myself, but also of what is around me. My team, my marketplace, my organization. Fourth is to be connected. To be connected to myself to all of my intelligence. To my intellectual intelligence, my emotional intelligence, my intuition, my somatic intelligence, but also to be connected to this, what we call this bigger system. This bigger whole on we would say. And finally, I am holding all of this from a place of resilience, a place of resourcefulness, a place of curiosity, and creativity.

Now to get into this COACH State there are many ways but one of my first ways of doing it, I often like to invite people in order to find a center because centering can seem abstract but it actually is a very concrete idea. Literally when we are centered in our physical center, it is halfway between the top of the head and the bottom of the feet. It is in the so-called Belly Center, the tan-tien. This is not only a physical center. It is a energetic center, it is a power center. Now to find that center, there are some things you can do. We do some simple things like okay if I just cross my hands over, where is that center? It is somewhere here. Right? I can find that center of me. Sometimes to be a little bit more active, we say, "Take your elbow and put it to your knee like this." Well, I have to do that. If I make that movement, it has to be around my physical center to find my balances.

Another thing we do is kind of balance yourself. So you bring up one leg and balance on the other. The more balanced you are... so usually it is easier we say, "Oh I balance like this?" but if I find my balance, I bring my hands closer. I find that stability. I am really balanced. I can close my eyes and we usually say you want to do these things like kind of three times on each leg, and it should get a little easier as you do, and you become grounded. Now, then we say we open. We want to open this. We put our fingers around the thumbs. You kind of squeeze the thumbs, breathe in, bend the legs like you are pushing down into the Earth, and then we open up to the sky and we go on the toes and balance, and again we do that three times.

Now these are exercises not just for the body, but we say for the mind. For the mindset. I am opening myself. Finally, we like to do what we call the COACH State Tai Chi which is very just simply where you can say the words to yourself and make the gestures in a very slow mindful way. Like you would make a Tai Chi movement. So we would say, "I am centering. I am centered. I am open. I am alert, awake, aware. I am connected or I am connecting. And I am here I am holding the space." And again, usually we like to say to repeat that two or three times just like you would repeat any movement.

Centered. Open. Aware, alert, awake. Connected, and I am here. I am holding. I am ready. Centering. Opening. Awakening. Connecting. Present and ready. Now, what we also suggest is that anytime, because once you are in that state, and you start to become active and interactive, there is a lot of distractions. We say the opposite of this COACH state is what we call CRASH where I am contracted or I am reactive. I am sort of caught in my analysis paralysis, or sort of separated from myself or others and instead of holding, I am kind of hostile and if that starts to happen, if I start to feel contraction, I feel closing down instead of opening, I start to feel reactive or disconnected instead of connected. We just say we want to simply slow down and slowing down allows us to start to become more aware.

And then we say pause. Pause allows us to find a place of stillness. We say breathe. Breath allows us to open, and then Center. So whenever I need to come back to my COACH State, slow down. Pause. Breathe. Center. Again, this is something that we do not just do one time but it is a practice. You want to do it many times so it becomes like a kind of an automatic unconscious skill and awareness that you can do in any time and any place. One of the things that you will discover is that as you learn to live more from this COACH State, everything becomes easier. You really... this is the idea, that you really can begin to meet any situation no matter how challenging or difficult with the best version of yourself. And of course also to meet the opportunities. To be able to take advantage of the opportunities with all of your resources and the best version of yourself. So I hope this practice helps you to live more of your life from the best version of yourself.