All Ears Catholic Spritual Coaching and Strengths Exploration

For those who may have an interest.

Working with a coach can help you learn how to develop a healthy self-love so that you thrive without others being your source of growth; otherwise, you'll always be stunted.

A focal point of Lent?

Spiritual growth and a transformation of oneself to become more Christ-like despite one's sins and brokenness.

Here's a starter guide:

Working with a Catholic spiritual coach can help you stay focused on what you can control in your faith journey: yourself.

This is what coaching is all about.

While coaching absolutely is not counseling or therapy, working with a life coach can help quiet the brain's revolts through deep listening and asking questions to soften the ruminations, anxiety, and discomfort and uncover self-management tools to successfully cope and thrive.

Deep reflections from a fellow coach.

"What in your life needs the watering of prayer or the feeding of scripture? Where is your joy being squeezed out? What needs to be said that isn’t being voiced or listened to?"

https://www.gardenerstouch.net/2023/07/28/front-porch-friday-the-slow-pace-of-growth/?fbclid=IwAR34SpYVtgVTgQKcB0CR2UMjsRf9nt6DYqj2OUKPVs7ZYFH0aP6_JCqydT4

FRONT PORCH FRIDAY | The Slow Pace of Growth With the warmer days of July upon us, the lazy days of summer conjure up images of rest and relaxation. I love sitting, overlooking the garden with good book a

Wishing you a blessed Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus!

These past few years, God and I have certainly been dancing - and it's been awkward at best. With practice and patience, I've been working hard as a student, listening to the Instructor and fumbling through the new steps He's trying to teach me.

Dancing With God

When I meditated on the word Guidance, I kept seeing "dance" at the end of the word. I remember reading that doing God's will is a lot like dancing. When two people try to lead, nothing feels right. The movement doesn't flow with the music, and everything is quite uncomfortable and jerky. When one person realizes that, and lets the other lead, both bodies begin to flow with the music. One gives gentle cues, perhaps with a nudge to the back or by pressing lightly in one direction or another. It's as if two become one body, moving beautifully. The dance takes SURRENDER, WILLINGNESS, & ATTENTIVENESS from one person and gentle guidance and skill from the other. My eyes drew back to the word GUIDANCE.
When I saw "G: I thought of God, followed by "u" and "i".
"God, "u" and "i" dance."
God, you and I dance.
As I lowered my head, I became willing to trust that I would get guidance about my life. Once again, I became willing to let God lead. My prayer for you today is that God's blessings and mercies be upon you on this day and every day. May you abide in God as God abides in you. Dance together with God, trusting God to lead and to guide through each season of your life.

Fifteen centuries ago, a young man abandoned his scholarly studies in Rome and ventured into the Italian countryside, where he founded a monastic community and wrote what he called “a little rule” to help his fellow monks live a spiritual life in community.

That man was St. Benedict of Nursia, better known as the founder of the Benedictines, a Roman Catholic order that still thrives today.

“So how does this apply to me?” you might be thinking. “I’m not a monk. I don’t need "The Rule.”"

Not true. Although St. Benedict’s Rule was written for monks, his advice covers much of what encompasses our everyday, right here in the 21st century: worship, prayer, work, study, relationships, our use of time, community and hospitality. St. Benedict’s Rule is more useful to us now than ever.

Benedict begins the Prologue to "The Rule" with these opening words:

“Listen carefully, my son, to the master’s instructions, and attend to them with the ear of your heart.”

For me, the concrete thinker that I am, listening with the “ear of your heart” doesn’t make much sense. At first. But I’ve come to realize more I practice quiet, focused listening, the more I understand that looking for God in all things, in the ordinary circumstances of my life is possible.

As Jane Tomaine, author of "St. Benedict’s Toolbox: The Nuts and Bolts of Everyday Benedictine Living," writes, “God is before us and within us, waiting to be found. The challenge is that every day we have so many things to do, and the crush of work can leave us hurrying through one task to move onto the next. But is it possible instead to do our work on one level, yet reflect with our mind and heart on where God is in the task? Can we allow the task before us to reveal itself as an opportunity to find God?”

Tomaine gives her readers a number of ways to practice this discipline, this listening with the ear of your heart:

1. Keep a gratitude journal. Take a few moments to reflect on your day, the small instances in which you felt the presence of God in your life.

2. Notice the metaphorical breadcrumbs God leaves us to follow. Look back over your life, suggests Tomaine, to uncover the threads that led you to where you are today. Sometimes our God vision is 20/20 in hindsight.

3. Take a thankfulness walk. This is perhaps better accomplished in warmer weather, but the point is to walk slowly through nature, focusing on your senses – the chickadee chirping in the white pine…the scarlet berries dangling on delicate branches – and giving thanks for the hand of God in all things.

Like any spiritual discipline, listening and watching for God in the everyday takes practice. I’ll be honest, some days spin by so rapidly that I don’t notice Him at all. However, I continue to persevere in the discipline, and little by little the extraordinary shines through the ordinary.

“Incline your ear and come to me; listen, so that you may live.” (Isaiah 55:3)

How do you listen for God in your life? How do you “incline your ear” or listen with the “ear of your heart?”

Working with a Catholic Spiritual coach can help develop one's mindset to always chose the path led by faith through the coach's deep listening and curious questions designed to bring awareness to one's mind of the fears within and the means to replace those lies with truth.

Non-directive coaching, which is done through deep listening and curious questions, can help a client establish a hedge within themselves to maintain a barrier between what they can and cannot control within their own mind thereby establishing a sense of peace within one's self.