CPD

CPD or continuing professional development is just that: CPD is continuous! Sometimes I feel like I do not want to develop any more. In my experience however, the darkest hour really is just before dawn.

When I am in my own pre-dawn panic, I can forget that the darkness bodes well. The thing I do find reassuring is that I see this breakthrough process time and time again in my client base. When a client is stuck I think at times both of us can leave the session questioning ‘what next?’ . When a client is really stuck, often as a coach, I can feel really stuck too. When as the coach I feel really stuck I can begin to question my own skills and capabilities. Dissolution of stuck-ness is a paradoxical process however. What happens as a result of acknowledging that stuck-ness, is that the stuck-ness begins to dissolve.

I never have any guarantees that the dissolution of the stuck-ness will happen. Experience begins to evidence that a shift does place.  Inevitably a chink of light will have appeared, in the intervening days between our coaching sessions. Sometimes, in the acknowledgement of that stuckness, the outcome is a totally transformed individual returns to me for our next session. As the coach, I acknowledge that I do not have anyone else’s answers. I do have the ability to ask the right questions. When the right questions are asked, the blocks can dissolve so swiftly that the sun rises on an entirely new career landscape. With hindsight you can see that the threads of this new day were latent in the work that went before. It takes the ability to name, and sit with, that stuck-ness, before the metamorphosis can begin. Even if it merely a chink of light that shows when the client returns, that I can work with, together we can gently prise open that chink until the daylight shines right in.

Sometimes the ‘continiuous’ element of professional development can be exhilarating and exciting. This is the place where anything and everything is possible. Sometimes the continuous element of CPD can feel dreadful! This dark and dreadful place is where ‘holding strong’ is really important! This dark place is the cocoon of metamorphosis. This is the sign that that the new day begins……. It is my coaching clients and my supervises who remind me of the purpose of this continuity. CPD is continuous it rarely stays still. Once we have arrived at our destination, without too much warning, things can go dark once again. Either we have grown out of our so sought-after role, or the context in which we work has been amended beyond recognition…. and we are called to ‘develop’ once again.

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