Coachee Reflection 5

Coachee Reflection 5

Today I spoke with Amy on two conversations I had this week.  The most valuable one was with my close friend Travis.  We have been best friends for as long as I can remember and although we still remain close today, we do not see each other as often as we once did. Travis is an individual who has made some poor decisions in life and as a result his options (career and living arrangements) are limited.  This mainly has to do with his lack of responsibility and inability to recognize that there are repercussions for his actions that may effect his future.   Without getting too involved with his background, I will say that he has had a somewhat rough upbringing and I imagine this has had an effect on his functionality.  

The last few days I have spent with Travis because his sister is getting Married this weekend in California. We flew out together and I recognized that he would be the perfect person for this week’s assignment.   Once I picked him up for the airport he realized he had forgotten his $300 sunglasses on the plane.  He shrugged and said I’ll just get another pair.  Then he took out his phone to show me the new pair he intended to get, which were also $300.  Keep in mind this is a person who can hardly afford rent and he was about to spend a large some of money to replace the sunglasses he had lost as if he were buying socks.  Normally I would get extremely irritated by this type of behavior from him and immediately try talking sense into him.  However, trying to be an empathetic listener, I asked what it was about the sunglasses he was showing me that made them so desireable and worth the price tag.  Was it their functionality in protecting his eyes from the sun? Or was it a fashion statement where the design looked a way that was appealing? His replied that because of a nose injury from earlier in his life his nose was somewhat misshapen.  Since expensive sunglass companies offer different size measurements for the nosepiece of the glasses, he was able to find the ones that fit him correctly.  I was actually impressed by his answer and could see from putting myself in his shoes that this wasn’t such a ridiculous purchase. 

The next conversation I had was with an old friend who used to be my boss when I worked construction.  He is a great guy who is wonderful to talk with.  When speaking with him I recognized that he is an empathetic listener and that as a result I am too.  He creates this container which makes me feel more inclined to be empathetic in my listening.

After explaining all this to Amy she had a really wonderful question she asked which was when I was being an empathetic listener in the conversation with Travis, did it have the same effect as my conversation with my boss.  After thinking about this insightful question I cam to the conclusion that it had.  Normally I would have attacked Travis on how I believed the glasses were a stupid purchase and to some extent that’s the reaction he expected of me.  However, by being empathetic in my listening we were able to completely dissolve any type of issue or conflict that may have arose, which resulted in a more empathetic conversationalist on his end as well.