The Dangers of Unmonitored Beliefs

We do not really see through our eyes or hear through our ears, but through our beliefs.

Lisa Delpit (1995)

There was a period of time when, unbeknownst to me, my belief system was driving my actions and making me miserable. These beliefs ran rampant, like deadly viruses, until a pivotal moment in a workshop on coaching with Leslie Plettner, the masterful coach I mentioned in the Introduction. Leslie responded to a question and, while I don't remember the question, her response is etched into the forefront of my memory.

What she said was this: “No one can learn from you if you think that they suck.”

I felt sick as this statement echoed in my mind. In a flash of painful awakening, I realized that I had indeed thought that some of the teachers and administrators I coached sucked. Semiconsciously, I thought they were incompetent people determined to oppress children.

As this awareness crystalized, I felt ashamed. Why would anyone want to work with a coach who thought that he was incompetent? No wonder they didn't want to meet with me! No wonder they were defensive and resistant! I really did think that they sucked!

I had a hard conversation with myself: “Either you quit this job right now—today—or you shift this belief,” I told myself. “It is not serving you, it's not helping kids, and you are contributing to anger and pain in the world.”

As I reflected on what I was feeling, I also realized that these beliefs did not align with my core values. And actually, I wanted to be a powerful coach who could change the education system far more than I wanted to cling to those beliefs. “Goodbye, my nasty little friends. Be gone,” I ordered. Easier said than done, of course.

I printed Leslie's words in two-hundred-point font and posted them on the inside of my office door. I used them as a mantra, calling them forth when I noticed I was tumbling into this black hole of thinking. And little by little, I started deconstructing my beliefs and shifting into a new set from which I could be an effective coach. It took a while, and occasionally a sneaky little thought comes into my mind that harks back to this old belief system, but more often than not I operate from a different set of beliefs and I know that as a result I'm a much better coach.

The Basics about Beliefs

Here's the thing about beliefs: we all have them and they drive our actions. We experience our beliefs as truths, and we can usually find evidence to support them. Subsequently, they create boundaries around what we think we can and can't do, what can and can't be done in the world. Some of our beliefs are tucked into our subconscious, where they operate without our awareness. Sometimes our beliefs contradict each other or our core values. Some of our beliefs make us strong, powerful people; some do not serve us.

The good news is that beliefs can be updated or changed. Think about your own beliefs about your life—perhaps about what you have believed you could do or not do. Which have served you? Which have you given up? Although we experience them as truths, they are just mental creations. We can select the ones that will lead us to fulfill the vision we have for our work, or a relationship, or the kind of life we want to live. We created them, so we can modify, strengthen, or release them.

Here's another thing about beliefs: they are simply strongly held opinions. They are not facts, although they can appear to be. We might have plenty of experiences that seem to prove that they are real, but we can just as easily believe in the opposite experience and make it real in our lives. For example, have you ever embarked on any kind of exercise program and thought something like, “I can't run a 10K, I've never been physically active and I can barely walk a mile!” And then did you see your body adapt and strengthen and see yourself meet a physical fitness goal? Did you notice that along the way your beliefs about your capacities changed? You shifted from believing you couldn't do something to holding new beliefs about your abilities. In other words, we have a lot of agency over our belief systems, which is great news!

We don't see things the way they are; we see things the way we are.

The Talmud

An essential component of coaching is supporting others to become conscious of their belief systems—about children, learning, students of color, immigrants, and so on. But before we can engage in this work, as coaches we need to become aware of our own beliefs. Otherwise we run the risk of rogue beliefs taking over our internal operating system. Understanding our own belief systems—how they were formed, how we can become conscious of them, how we can change them—makes us much more skilled at helping others do this work.

Coaching Beliefs and Core Values

At the beginning of this chapter, I described my epiphany when I realized I was operating from destructive beliefs about the teachers I was supposed to coach. What I realized was that this declaration was in sharp contrast to my deeply held values; I just hadn't noticed that they conflicted. This belief—that the teachers sucked—was a recently acquired belief. I had only recently left the classroom and had worked with many phenomenal teachers. Naming the belief allowed me to dislodge it; it felt like a scab that I quickly picked off.

In order to become an artful coach, I needed to do two things: deconstruct how I'd arrived at that conclusion so that I could take the assumption of “truth” out of it, for there was no truth in this declaration—only a limited data set. Second, I needed to articulate the set of beliefs from which I intended to work as a coach.

One stop on this reflective journey was at my core values. Core values are deeply held personal codes that reflect our ethics and what is most important to us. They come from our families, religious teachings, schools, people we admire, and from our culture (CampbellJones, Lindsey, and CampbellJones, 2010). Research on school leaders has found that core values play a key role in how educators build personal resilience. It is the process of “privately clarifying, publicly articulating, and consciously acting on” core values that resilient leaders identify as the greatest source of strength in helping them face adversity and emerge stronger than before (Patterson and Kelleher, 2005, p. 51).

Within the context of our workplaces, very few of us have had an opportunity to clarify or articulate our core values. Given that they are our moral compass, it follows that we are often misguided or floundering when we aren't being regularly guided by them. Before you articulate your belief system, I encourage you to identify your core values. On my website you can find an exercise to help you do this. It is also a fantastic exercise to do with anyone you coach—it is empowering to your client and it offers you a set of data that can anchor many conversations.

My Transformational Coaching Manifesto

Many schools and organizations have sets of norms or community agreements that guide the behavior of their members. This manifesto works in the same way for me: it emerges from my core values and helps me stay aligned to my vision.

I offer this manifesto to coaches as an opportunity for reflection on the beliefs we hold in this work. While there are some core beliefs that we might need to agree on as coaches, I also recognize that some of those on my list may not resonate with all readers. It has helped me to articulate them and make them explicit so that they are not quietly lurking around—on the forefront of my consciousness, they are far more powerful.

1. Everything is connected. I start with this premise, what systems thinkers call the “primacy of the whole.” Everything is connected in space and time; every action has a reaction and influences other pieces of the whole now and in the future. We are all bound to each other by invisible webs of interrelated actions. From within this belief, there is no single person to blame for what's not working; we're all connected, we all share responsibility.
2. Meet people where they are. If a systems-thinking perspective is like looking through a wide-angle lens, then from this second belief I look through a telephoto lens. Here, my compassion is activated as I seek to understand why a client is where she is. I don't make her wrong for being wherever she is—she's just there. We're all somewhere. And we don't have to stay there. But if my work is not infused with and coming from compassion, there is no possibility for me to positively affect the world. Meeting people where they are means exercising compassion, and it really is the only place to start when trying to make meaningful change.
3. There is no coaching without trust. A teacher or principal will not reveal the areas that she's struggling in, or share beliefs that might be holding her back, until she absolutely trusts you; trust defines a coaching relationship. It takes time to build, and once it has developed, it should not be taken for granted. This statement comes into my mind as a reminder that I must always tend to this fragile state—we don't work in a very trustworthy world of education these days, and many school teachers and leaders feel under attack. Chapter Five is devoted to translating this belief into action, as it is so essential.
4. “Words create worlds” (Hartman, 1991). This belief instructs me to listen very carefully, to explore what is possible given the language that a client uses, and to find a high-leverage entry point. It also reminds me to be mindful of every word that comes out of my mouth. If I remember that words create worlds, I can make choices every second that allow me to fulfill my vision for coaching.
5. Be here now. In order for me to meet someone where she is, I need to listen very carefully. To do that, I need to be fully present. Clients sense the quality of a coach's attention, and in order for them to take risks, a coach must be fully present. This is challenging to do, but it is a practice that can be developed. Sometimes when I'm distracted during a coaching conversation, I remind myself to “be here now.” I feel calmer and more grounded when I do so, and I know that my clients need that.
6. Transformation takes time. Sometimes I get frustrated that the teachers or leaders I'm working with aren't changing fast enough, and then I remind myself, again, that transformation takes time—an undefined amount of time—and that I must be patient. Working from a place of impatience and urgency won't result in a transformed system—it'll simply reproduce what we have now or provide a quick-fix bandage that will not be sustainable. When I remind myself of this, I am able to be in the present with a client, and I can more effectively respond to where he is now and assist him in identifying and taking the step that comes next for him.
7. Justice, justice shalt thou pursue (Deuteronomy 16:20). I experience this belief as a mandate. It demands that my work be driven by a pursuit of justice and pushes me to explore my notions about justice. What is justice? What would it look like in our schools? How do we get there? And do the ends ever justify the means? These questions are especially important because I often feel impatient with the rate of change. It also helps me make personal decisions in coaching—who to coach, how to coach, what boundaries I draw. And it keeps me focused on the end goal—justice, which helps me manage the desires of my own ego and the results and beliefs I am attached to.
8. The journey is the destination. This statement follows the last for a very important reason—so that I don't get trapped in the-end-justifies-the-means thinking. It reminds me that every action on the journey of transformation needs to be imbued with kindness, fairness, and compassion. Sometimes putting this principle into action presents ethical challenges and pushes me to consider questions such as: Would I coach a principal who is intent on firing her whole staff because they are ineffective? What if I agree with her that her teachers are not serving children? Can justice be pursued by traveling down this road? This belief, however, reminds me that for every action there is a reaction, that we are making the future today, and that if I envision a just, fair future, I must behave justly and fairly today.
9. Be unattached to outcome. Given that justice is the outcome, this statement makes me very uncomfortable, but it does so in a way that I welcome. I am attached to the outcome of transformation, but I also don't know what that outcome is or what it might look like (beyond a few characteristics), so as we move forward on this journey, I need to avoid getting attached to the possible outcomes that arise.
   For example, I remind myself of this belief when I've been coaching a principal to lead a big meeting with her staff. It could be a meeting that moves the school in a positive direction, if she can carry it off. In my mind, as I'm coaching her to prepare for this meeting, I begin thinking about how important it is that she does this well, that all hinges on her ability to reach certain outcomes on that day—I develop a story about what should happen. Tumbling into this train of thought not only takes me away from being fully present with the principal, but it also locks me into thinking that there is a single right outcome. Perhaps there's an even better outcome that I can't imagine? Maybe the meeting falls apart and the agenda is scrapped and a real, honest conversation ensues among the staff and a new, more powerful outcome is reached. I cannot know the future; I cannot determine the “right” outcome for this group of people.
   When I get attached, there's usually a part of my own ego that's getting sucked in. This belief reminds me to be humble and open on this journey and that I don't know what is right—and that's a hard one to give up. But from this stance, I can see infinite numbers of possibilities for coaching actions to take.
10. We can transform our education system. I have made a choice to believe that transformation can be realized. I struggled with this idea, because for a while I didn't really think it could happen. I'd try, I thought, I'd give it my best shot—but I felt pretty hopeless and cynical most of the time. Then I decided to stand in a place of neutrality—I don't know if we can do this. Maybe. Maybe not. Regardless of whether or not we would prove able to transform our schools, I worked toward that end. Maybe this was an example of being unattached to outcome, but operating from this stance felt a little dull and lifeless. It didn't help me.

With our lives we make our answers all the time, to this ravenous, beautiful, mutilated, gorgeous world.

Reverend Victoria Safford (Loeb, 2004, p. 9)

Now I work from a place of believing that we can transform our schools and heal our world. I have more energy when I come from this belief, I feel more true to myself, and I believe I'm a more effective coach. I'm much more likely to convince others to become leaders on this journey if I come from this belief. In this place, I can access tremendous reserves of energy. I can inspire others. I can share the “data” that I gather that makes me believe that this is possible. I see evidence everywhere that we can do this. I see transformational moments all around us. I have seen individual schools transform and the people within them. We need to transform our schools, and I believe we can do this.

Identifying and Using Your Coaching Beliefs

I encourage all coaches to articulate the beliefs from which they want to work. Start by identifying your core values. Then consider how a core value translates into a belief statement and how those show up as actions. If one of your core values is appreciation, then a corresponding belief statement might be “Always acknowledge the positive,” which could guide your actions in a coaching conversation.

After you formulate your set of beliefs, try them on—stand inside of them and speak from them in different coaching situations. See how they feel. See which ones give you the most energy, power, clarity, and groundedness. Notice which resonate. These questions might help you reflect on your belief statements:

• Does the belief bring you a sense of relief?
• Do you feel more empowered when you stand in the belief?
• Does it open more paths for action? Does it point to new directions?
• Does your belief align with your core values?
• Does it allow you to fulfill your vision for coaching?

I print my coaching manifesto on small pieces of card stock. I carry them in my bag, tuck them into my notebooks, and sometimes stick them in my pocket. They reside with my vision statement (see Chapter Two) and remind me where I want to come from.

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field. I'll meet you there.

Rumi, thirteenth-century poet (Banks, 1995, p. 35)

My list of beliefs has changed over the years. You can change yours, too. The point is to be mindful of the beliefs from which we're working and to notice the effect of working from those beliefs. Then we can make a conscious choice about the actions we take.