I was working with a client. She had sent me her plan beforehand and when I looked at it my initial reaction was to ask myself if that type of plan worked for her. I recognized all the tools of the trade. She had thought about the result describing it with “Why, How, What,” there was a SMART goal, and she also had included an action plan as well as a timeline. It seemed all done by the book.

And yet, I knew that it was a plan I would not be able to implement. We explored how it worked for her. Doing this, what became apparent was that she had been able to take a dream and divide it into smaller parts that could be dealt with. However, what wasn’t yet present was clarity on how these smaller parts could be implemented. We could have gone down the lane of discussing what she would implement and when. What we did instead was investigate what the different parts meant to her. We started to draw an image of individual parts, making her initial description more colorful and more precise to herself.

We also passed by some of her challenges and started to learn about them. They certainly will reappear in the process of implementing the plan, and not only once. There will be several instances during which we’ll have to learn more about the challenge she experiences and how it is affecting her in this or that situation. That is until she finds a way to coach herself when the theme reappears.

Implementing a plan is a journey.

One that often starts with helping the other see his own plan.

Not the vision, but also. Not every single detail or part, but their meaning and how they contribute to the bigger picture. Not only the anxiety in the challenges, but also the opportunities.