I stopped at my favourite spot at the north west end of the pond to look back at the sun rise and take in the scene, all that is here to pay attention to.

I breathed in deeply, feeling the cool air enter my body and the refreshment it brought me. Breathing out I felt my feet in my boots and my boots on the snow covered rocky sandy ground.

We swoosh along in the snow to get here. My goal beyond the joy of the walk was to walk around to check in on our RV parked here from the enjoyment of the summer. To check in and ensure all was well within and without. Start the engine and make sure no one unwanted had made their home there. Birds were flying here and there as I arrived and foraging underneath where the ground was exposed and seeds could still be found.

My colleague wrote a good piece on goal setting and recently I watched Andrew Huberman’s short piece on his morning routine 1. Get up, get moving, look up to the sun rise. I understand the physiology and importance of these moves as I too swooshed along the path to accomplish my mini-goals and both enjoy the success of them and the journey to get there.

So much stress is shared at times in my coaching practice about things being not what we expected, challenges with the complexities that people and projects are - and so we look to Breath In deeply to what is, find the small goals that can be our wins and remember what we enjoy about the journey that is now.

Breath in deeply, what do you notice?Breath out slowly, what now becomes available?

We’ve had a dumping of snow.

Layers cover everything

As a team we’ve been contemplating the skills of active listening. Many leaders we work with aren’t yet skilled in this critical element to effective dialogue, meetings and performance. So much can be glossed over, assumptions made without really hearing.

Our team practice is mindfulness - to be slow and spacious enough without agenda to hear what is being said and not said but indicated. So much in the layers

The snow is one note - cold coverage - and it is water, nourishment, light refraction, beauty and so much more. Layers.

What can you hear in the layers?

What I love about the snow covered path is what it reveals,

Rabbit, Coyote, field mouse, Deer - these are what I see.

They join me and I join them. I may have a different purpose at times, but we share the path none the less.

A seasoned People Ops leader, new to an organization is wondering about her executive team’s reaction to the Diversity & Inclusion initiatives they asked for. Her perspective is, this is not a single team initiative, it’s a leadership initiative. They say they are interested in engaging organizational DE&I but they don’t seem to see how they fit into the practice and ownership of it - she is left confused.

We are in this together - in order to encourage diversity in our organization and a sense of psychological safety that results in inclusion - we all must walk this path. Role model the behaviours that enable these outcomes. It’s not an effort led by a single team, and certainly not only People Operations. She has begun to wonder if this is the right fit for her skills and partnership. If they don’t understand that the effort is shared she’s no longer certain they understand how to partner strategically to achieve a shared outcome.

I took great joy in seeing the field mice tracks jump across the snow, and had mixed feelings about the dog-like Coyote tracks. Max-dog would not have stood for those! And certainly his nose would have been all over the deer.

It’s a wonder to share the path with this diversity of creatures. All of us making room for the other. No one left out of the benefit of the forest, the foraging and the water, and we all enjoy what’s left in the fields.

Steeped in the joy of sharing my steps are lighter and firmer on the land.

How do you share in your journey with others? How will you share in a path together?

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I’m always intrigued by the myriad of places squirrel will stash nuts and apples.

A while back Max-dog uncovered a giant stash in an old vehicle we hadn’t been using. My favourite is the random apples stuffed in trees. Each year I’m impressed at the placement, like a gift to ourselves for a future date of yet to be felt need.

Many of our farm friends have been creating their own stash - it’s a standard practice on the farm to have enough food to last you until it’s fresh again, plus enough for seed. Old time practices ensured you had 2 years worth.

Whatever your number a stash for a future need seems like a good idea, especially in these times.

Stash away my friends - it can’t hurt, and most certainly will help you or someone in need

How does having a stash feel to you?

I bit into the frozen broccoli fresh, delicious, and bitter. I chewed all the small florets popping with each bite. The bitterness surprised me, and it was good leaving a long finish.

A CEO I’m coaching has asked for support, first time in the role. The CEO has a blind spot - the dopamine hit of getting into the weeds to fix, or advise, or just do. In their mind they think they are helping, pushing to a goal, supporting the team. In the team’s mind - the CEO is telling them what to do.

One of the direct reports offered - at their last strategic planning offsite, I left the room for a moment only to return to find the CEO offering who should be retained or let go within another leader’s team, instead of the agreed to agenda to review the organization structure in service of their new goals. The direct report thought: “Doesn’t that leader know best? Don’t we have a process for performance reviews? How does it serve the team to operate at this granular level about people no one else works with? And without a plan or preparation for all of us to dive in“

The CEO thought they were helping and it felt good, the team thought the CEO was micro managing and it felt awful, dis-empowering and demotivating.

To see from the view point of the direct reports, the CEOs impact on them may leave a bitter taste but I will offer, if they are open, a long lasting and positive shift for the team,them and the organization.

Broccoli one of the cruciferous vegetables high in nutrients like vitamin K and C is incredibly good for us, especially if eaten raw. These were my thoughts as I appreciated the bitter taste at this time of year. I wondered if we’d all gotten too used to easy and sweet versus the walk to the garden to harvest and the bitter taste to savour.

It’s bitter and it’s good

Where might you be resisting bitter that if embraced can offer you so much good?

This morning brought several inches of snow. The second snow fall of the season, this one far more significant that the first dusting.

As I approached the compost near the green house I saw them — rabbit tracks — and they instantly made me happy. These wonderful resilient creatures that thrive in the thickets and leverage our compost all winter to survive. What a wonderful symbiosis. Have at it I think - the compost will still turn to sufficient nurturant dense earth for us to use in years to come and in the mean time enjoy enjoy enjoy.

Where do you see symbiotic joy in your life?

The birds rushed out of the snow covered asparagus as I walked by. One step ahead they moved in a pack out of hiding.

‘I am no threat to you’, but they felt differently. Hard wired to be certain they will survive, I took no offence.

When I engage in a new coaching relationship I offer, I am here to stand for your big “A” Agenda. We will uncover what your real topic is together and form the focus for our working relationship. I will hold fast to this as we collaborate together to learn about you, your values, your vision and the best ways you grow. And, I have been told, I am ‘the garlic’ of coaches. I am direct and while I balance empathy and compassion for your journey, I will not hold back to offer powerful questions and observations with curiosity. Sounds good right?

My clients self select in - they are ready for this. A very few think they are, but like the birds they get scared, and their ego in self preservation mode wants to fly away. This is the moment, the defining moment when we choose courage. Courage to move forward together with support and find the new way and the new shore.

Where are you wishing for greater courage? Where do you want to fly away?

I am enamoured with the tallest oldest maple on our land. She stands bare now of all her leaves, seeming smaller and yet up close she stands strong and true ready for whatever will come.

Her bark a thick layer of protection, I know her roots to be deep and strong. She has withstood all manner of weather - rain, snow, wind storm, ice storms. She’s lost a few branches over the years and through these storms but her trunk stands firm and each year she grows. Even imperceptibly so.

Yesterday we had the first snow fall of the year. Covering everything in a frosty clumpy layer and leaving the sky still grey for more to come over today.

A client is going through a major transition in his career. He has built the capacity for his organization to take on major growth and new clients. He runs the Delivery team a new function for this Enterprise SAAS company. Building from a small and mighty few into many teams that can handle their success. His original focus was context, alignment and teamwork. At this level of growth, he and the company have come to realize they will need to hire someone with deeper roots and experience at scale to manage the wave that’s coming and so my client is wondering what he will focus on. How he can play the strengths he has around innovation, architecture and team leadership to serve the next wave growth. A role is emerging - a new branch to serve the greater good.

The winter season, a time for many for hibernation, quiet contemplation, incubation of ideas getting ready for a Spring launch?. Many animals, like us on the farm, have been busy storing up their nuts and seeds to last them with hope to next Spring. Reflecting on this time for hibernation I looked again at the Maple. Standing underneath her and leaning against her trunk, feeling the thickness of her bark and the strength of her roots I feel into the healing that also comes with the quiet and the slow.

She has prepared herself for this coming season. Her inner growth capillaries to carry nutrients and stores of sugars that will last her through. And her outer growth - roots that will tap deep within the earth to find what she needs as the ground freezes over, her bark to protect her from all that comes and her branches to welcome the enlivening buds of Spring.

How have you grown in inner and outer ways?

It’s cold! It is, it just is. We have dropped into the minuses averaging around -3/-5C or the low 20’s F

Much as any of us may want to deny that winter is here and coming in fast each day tells a different story.

The greenhouse on the other hand is a different climate - the nasturtiums are still going strong, the cold weather plants are loving the range and the rest are still hanging on. We’ll be pulling all we can in the coming days - just waiting on a sunny day so we can experience the warmth and joy of the final hoorah!

Emmett the cat came to visit last night in the yurt. An independent and resilient soul we never know where he’ll choose to be for the night. And it was a joy to hear him purr the morning awake.

I still walk the path around the pond hearing Max-dog call to go further. I take the steps and am always grateful I’ve done so.

We embrace the cold, don our winter clothes and enjoy the brisk air inviting us fully into the next season

What is inviting you into the next season?

I watched the full moon rise - a beautiful bright angelic glow alighting everything, so much so, no flash lights were needed on tonight’s walk to the yurt. I felt instant gratitude to witness this rising and be bathed in its gift of light

In the early morning pre-dawn again we were graced again with the eclipsing moon setting. Before too many birds were up and about, very few animal sounds just the crunch of the frosty grass as I stepped closer to take it all in. A rose coloured shadowed moon setting beyond the trees. Framed in and hanging above the cow pasture on the other side of our fence. Again I felt gratitude and grace.

To be offered grace and a feeling of gratitude with which to start a day is a gift like none other. Steeping in this feeling I wish it to last me through whatever the day brings. We start our day with a feeling - let’s choose one that serves us best.

What feeling do you wish to start your day with?