Holding Space for Imperfection: A reflection on my coaching evolution

On dealing with impostor syndrome, getting more comfortable with where I am today, and embracing who I am becoming on my coaching journey

In the beginning, there was imperfection, which became the source of all things. Anomalies and asymmetries caused planets to take shape from the bubbling void and sent light into darkness. Life on earth is a catalog of accidents, alternatives, and errors that turned out to work quite well. Life on our planet has flourished and survived not because of its perfection but despite (and perhaps because of) its imperfection.
- from Imperfection: A Natural History by Telmo Pievani

If you’d asked me 11 or 12 years ago if I thought I would eventually become a coach today, I would have probably said no. I felt like I was so out of sorts and had so much figuring out to do. How could I help others when I felt like I needed so much guidance and direction myself?

Three years (!) into my journey as a coach (among other things) now, and I feel like it’s only been in the past six months that I’m embracing more of this dimension of me.

Shrinking away with impostor syndrome

While I’ve posted about coaching here and there, I think I’ve been mostly (relatively) shy about it. When I would post about my work in the coaching space, I mostly talked about producing The Imaginable Workplace podcast¹, and occasionally, the organizational transformation work² I do with Haraya Coaching’s culture-building, leadership and team development programs.

And when it came to my personal coaching practice, I would stay mostly quiet except when I needed to get my hours in for certification programs, offering free 1:1 coaching sessions in my Instagram stories. I would shy away from really promoting myself as a coach that people could book and pay.

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In the past three years, I usually struggled in introducing myself when meeting new people. Ugh, the what-do-you-do introductions. The easiest response I could give was say I’m a facilitator and coach.

“Like a life coach?”, most people would ask.

I’m sure my face would make a lot of interesting shapes that could barely conceal my cringe or hesitation with the label. 😅😓🫠🥴

I felt like it brought with it some expectations of how I was a person, and the kind of life I was leading. It felt to me that there was this expectation of being sorted and “put together” or constantly “living my best life”.

And if I felt like I wasn’t fully there, how could I help other people navigate their own things?

So when people asked about my coach-ness, I would resort to saying that I do “organizational transformation work, leadership, team development and culture-building, that sort of thing”. It felt easier to say that, even as that task seems even bigger than working with one individual.

Why I got into coaching

The way I usually spoke about or downplayed my work didn’t really encompass the work that I do. I played small. I wouldn’t get around to explaining why I did it and how it creates impact.

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In 2018, my curiosity with coaching had me joining some of ICF Philippines’ events, one of which offered attendees the chance to experience a 1:1 coaching session. Stars aligned to pair me with Cecilia Schrijver, one of the partners of Haraya Coaching.

I was struggling with my own leadership and motivation at the time. I found myself easily opening up to Cecilia, and surprisingly tearing up in the middle of the cafe where the event was hosted. She created a safe space for my emotions while challenging me to confront things I would normally avoid on my own.

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I was curious about the pursuing coaching that year (2018), but I was also preparing to take my Masters in Sustainable Development in the UK. I thought that by the end of my time in the UK, I might join a sustainability strategy firm as a consultant.

My time abroad only highlighted the value of coaching to me.

My dissertation interviews with sustainability leaders I met through Muni highlighted their need for a space for grounding in their purpose, and connection with a community of support. The long game for these leaders is not one of technical know-how (though I won’t discount the importance of learning how to do things better) but of co-creating a collective mindset shift towards a more mindful, equitable and livable world, and seeing pathways for hope in individual and collective action.

The value of coaching for me is in being held through a reflective and empowering thinking process that allows a person or team to come to their creative insight and action.

Coaching recognizes that we are naturally creative, resourceful and whole, and that we know our own life journey, values, strengths, and aspirations best. This makes us the best poised to come up with our ways through whatever keeps us feeling stuck or stagnant, restricted or inhibited.

And even though each of us is naturally creative, resourceful and whole on our own³, there’s something about having someone who believes in you, and a community that embraces you as you are while supporting you towards your aspirations and potential.

I wanted to be that person for others. 🙌

Gotta have some Ted Lasso here, of course. Source photo.

Getting comfortable with imperfection sucking

In writing this post, I remembered a piece I wrote on Impostor Syndrome in 2019⁴ while in the UK for my Masters. I reflected on what I was learning there about sustainable development, which I’m also relating to my coaching journey today:

In Big Magic, Elizabeth Gilbert says: "Perfectionists decide in advance that the end product is never going to be satisfactory, so they don't even bother trying to be creative in the first place". She goes on to say: "Your fear will always be triggered by your creativity, because creativity asks you to enter into realms of uncertain outcome, and fear hates uncertain outcome."

We don't need to get everything down perfectly.

When we challenge ourselves to go for something outside of our comfort zone, we just need to be good enough to take the next step.

We'll figure it out as we actually do the work.

It’s uncomfortable to try new things, because learning new things likely means having to suck at it first. You’ll make mistakes and fumble. It’ll be awkward. Sometimes you backslide. Sometimes it will take you longer to figure things out than you thought.

And man did I make mistakes and fumbles. I slogged my way through two coach certification programs in 2023: an Advanced Training for Coaching Development with Coach Masters Academy earlier in the year, and a Human-Centered Coaching (HCC) Certification with Haraya Coaching later in the year⁵.

I had to record a lot more coaching conversations than I thought I needed to, just so I could satisfactorily hit the markers or indicators that were expected of me in those respective programs. And because you had to transcribe those recordings for review with your mentor coach, you’d hear yourself making those mistakes over and over. I had so much frustration and self-doubt in that whole experience. 😅

But as Jackie Cañiza, Haraya’s founding partner and one the main facilitators of HCC would say that recognizing mistakes helps our brains rewire or form new neural pathways so we work towards correcting those errors the next time.⁶

And there is celebration in the pursuit and trust in the process. I recognize with more grace now, that all of that dis-ease and discomfort would dissipate once I let go of thinking of my own performance, and instead, embraced the opportunity to be of use to someone in the way they needed. In choosing to show up time and again, I could see all that as compost in my becoming. 🌱

I did feel like quitting at certain points, if not for the support system in peers, facilitators and personal tibay ng loob or the belief that I could make it through. 💪💪💪

Discomfort is the price of admission to a meaningful life.
- Susan David

When you get out of your head, you know and feel the conversations where you were in sync with with your client, more attuned to their needs, and less self conscious about your insecurities. It’s in these moments flow that you could feel the reward of your training — the conversations where you knew you did good by your client.

Embracing my pagbubuo

At the heart of the work I’ve done over the years, it’s clear to me that I come alive when I live in alignment with my personal purpose:

To cultivate connection with myself, others and the world⁷ to unblock courageous and joyful flow towards a more mindful, authentically expressed life.

I’m grateful for the spaces that have graciously held me in my imperfection, that helped me find courage and joy in this process of becoming, that guided me out of my own head and out of my own way. ✨

I’m grateful to my Balay Haraya family in more recent years (special shoutout to my work wife Mia for being my voice of reason, and to Jackie for taking a risk on me), as well as my Muni community in the years before (special shoutout to Team Muni folks, Kar, Thea, Den and Wanna, who patiently or impatiently worked with me as I worked my things out).

I continue to think about how I can best integrate this capability in ways that serve the causes and communities I care about; in ways that build on my previous body of work. What new forms can this learning take? What needs are present now in the community/ies I hope to serve?

Live the questions, says Rilke. Imperfect experiments are being conducted as we speak.

There will be a series of mistakes, but I also trust that there will be spots of light. And while it won’t be perfect (and I don’t aspire for perfection anyway), my hope is that it’s enough to be a source of new possibilities.

You’ll hear about upcoming experiments soon enough on this public playground, Pagbubuo. 😊

1. Listen to The Imaginable Workplace on Spotify here.

2. Learn more about Haraya’s organizational transformation work here.

3. This is one of the principles or coaching mindsets that ICF itself espouses. :)

4. Changing Moods and Motivation, Impostor Syndrome, and Big (and Small) Magic

5. You can check out the certification programs of Coach Masters Academy and Haraya Coaching. I personally recommend going for the certification with Haraya Coaching, which they’re offering again this March 2024.

I’d been waiting for the opportunity to learn directly from the Haraya Coaching partners, and I felt that Haraya has a way of doing things that challenges you to grow, while compassionately meeting you where you are. I was so happy when I found out that Haraya was finally offering its own certification. 

The program affirmed the ways I knew they would do things differently. The content and delivery is grounded in strong human-centered principles and neuroscience, and has a proudly Filipino heart. The facilitators embraced students as our whole, authentic selves -- preparing us to become competent coaches, but in our own unique ways. 

I feel like the choice to go through this program didn’t just give me another credential under my belt, but also created space for an enriching personal evolution journey.

6. Neuroplasticity refers to the lifelong capacity of the brain to change and rewire itself in response to intrinsic or extrinsic stimuli, learning or experience.

7. A trifecta also stated in Ugnayan Cards’ sadya statement: “para magsilbing kasama sa paglinang ng mas makabuluhan at mapagpalayang pakikipag-ugnayan sa sarili, sa kapwa at sa mundo sa pamamagitan ng pagmumuni-muni at pakikipagkwentuhan”.