Gosh, this bird was sqeeking at 5:55am and I woke up, unable to go back to sleep. Still reflecting on the sensational weekend and what a deep, beautiful experience it was. The question for me is how can I bring about that level of presence, awareness and especially *clear communication* about in my own life as a daily practice. As I think about it, I realize that the key to being a teacher trainer (aside from presenting the HGW class format, etc) is indeed the power of *witnessing* and *communicating* in a way which feels like a complete mirror. That way I can provide information to future teachers about certain qualities of their teaching which can be radically improved in a very short amount of time ... and also communicate this in a way which can be easily absorbed without any personalization. Then new teachers can model the process with their own students and provide witnessesing and clear communication in a way which delivers more awareness and mastery.
In this way, holding space as a teacher trainer is calling me to inhabit my own power of observation and speech on a level never I have never before explored. I think that excitement I mentioned yesterday is the buzz of presence which is ratcheting up another level within me. My awareness uses all my tools of perception (sight, sensation, listening, feeling). My communication uses my throat and body language and eye contact. I seek to clearly communicate truth in a direct way which leaves the listener empowered and refreshed ... with a "ahhhhh!" vibrating in the back of their own throats. This skill is a very subtle and delicate art which I am continuing to perfect. The beauty of this process is that it delivers level of presence which instantly becomes useful in daily life.
Teaching about conscious languaging always inspires me to explore my talking habits. It inspires me to transform my talk into a *conscious daily speaking practice*. Where the power and act of making sound becomes more intentional, less reactive, slower, allowing more space for silences, clearly responsive to the speech of others and delivering my own thoughts and emotions in a super pure way.
On personal note, I noticed that I often fill in space with vague words like "awesome", "cool" and "amazing". I want to avoid those fillers and instead speak to the specific thing being referenced in the conversation. Is it a feeling? A sensation? What is it specifically that is good and why? Another flag for me is something which my sweet friend Jasmine observed within me, which is a tendency to say "I'm sorry" at the drop of a pin! She asked me thoughtfully, "are you really sorry?". After that happened I started watching my words more closely and realized I was constantly saying "I'm sorry" when actually I didn't mean it. Also, I heard a lot of "ums", "likes" and "ahs" holding little spaces in trainers' languaging while leading mock classes and saw how it can detract from the power of speaking clearly and allowing actual silences between coherent thoughts.
The act of speaking into a microphone and hearing students speak into a mic really "amplifies" my awareness of the power of speech. What a powerful tool to hear all the subtlties of a voice so clearly!
The training also inspired me to continue my own word play. I want to enrich my own vocabulary with more words which convey what I want to share in a unique, original way. For this purpose, I am starting a *word bank*, a written collection of inspired words and phrases which I can add to review every now ad then to keep my speech diverse and articulate.
Wow, that was quite a lot to write before 7am! I feel called to begin my morning.
Thank you for the gift of awareness!