Got a question
Today a friend and colleague asked a group we’re a part of a simple question. It’s a question that’s on his coaching intake form. It’s also a question that precisely one of his coaching clients (and he’s had a bunch) has answered. Well, more specifically, they answered it with something other than the more common answer of ‘??’. The question, friends, is:
“What personal gifts or talents have you not given full expression to?”
So, you can gather now that I lied a bit. It’s not exactly simple. Not for me, and not really for anyone else on the call that we were on. People shared some uncertainty, some shame, some bewilderment. The conversation wandered from singing to writing to dating. It also came up against what one of the folks on the call called “the edge of existential angst.” Without going into detail—confidentiality is too precious for that—it’s safe to say that it’s a question that sparked a lot in the interiors of those of us on the call.
Personally, the question brought me right up against some of my most tender woundings. It’s vulnerable to share, to be sure, but there are ways in which I have a hard time sussing out what is a “gift or talent”, what is an introjected idea of who I should be, and what is some delusional thinking. And when we carry around a trauma related to our worth, it’s easy to question everything, even the things that everyone reflects to you as a talent.
I might be an extreme example. I also might not be. I may be just naming something that many of us are experiencing: how am I supposed to know who I am or what I’m good at when the world keeps telling me to be better?
And this was a point that another friend on the call raised: trying to answer this question can drive one into an ongoing self-improvement project that does little to satisfy the heart. It can set us up to believe that going to the grave with no song left unsung is possible. Chances are, we all will. We all do. That’s part of what makes life, life. Not just our glories but our losses. Opportunites seized. Opportunities squandered. Our culture tells us that we should grab life by the collar and squeeze it for what it’s worth, to mix metaphors.
But perhaps life’s more likely to grab us by the collar.
He went on to say that perhaps it’s the process that’s valuable. Perhaps being in the question, talking about it with people you trust, is more important than actually answering it and doing anything with it.
When our friend sent the original invitation with the question in it and shared that only one coaching client had ever answered it, he added, “Maybe I could drop the question.”
Today, after being in this conversation, after bumping up against some very challenging internal churning around it, after feeling the value of swimming in the process of it, I decided that I’d pick it up. I’m going to start asking clients questions like this more often.
So. How about you?
What personal gifts or talents have you not given full expression to?
