Glimmers of Purpose: 3 Emotional Intelligence Tips for Coaching on Purpose in a Short-Term World 🌱

When someone starts connecting with purpose, I can feel it. How about you? It’s not one of the basic feeling words from the emotion wheel – but it’s palpable. Practicing coaching with emotional intelligence, for me, includes honing this instinct to notice the glimmers. To notice someone’s eyes getting brighter. To feel the warmth in my own heart that tells me to listen deeper. To hear the timbre in my client’s voice that signals a new level of insight.

Sometimes you can also hear the glimmers in your client’s words. It might sound like, “I wish I could be more clear where this was going in the long-term” or “How do I decide what to prioritize,” or even, “Sometimes I can feel a fire inside…” These are all an invitation to tap into purpose.

In some ways, this is the least-practical of the three tips because it’s intangible, yet it’s the most powerful. When you tune into the glimmers of purpose, your clients will as well. Your attention and presence brighten the sparks.

The Six Seconds Model of Emotional Intelligence is an action process with three parts: 

Tune in to be more aware. We call this ‘Know Yourself,’ and it helps us see WHAT is going on.
Pause to be more intentional. This is ‘Choose Yourself,’ which helps with HOW to respond.
Connect to be more purposeful. ‘Give Yourself,’ which supports us to connect with WHY.

In the EQ Coach Certification, sometimes we look at these as three interlocking rings, shown below. As you listen to your client, listen from these perspectives.

WHAT is about words and actions. What they did and didn’t do. 
HOW is about the impact. How those words & actions affected them and others.
WHY is about the meaning. Why the words+actions+impact matters.

As you hear these three perspectives, you’ll also notice how they’re aligned or not. We’re all often in a state where WHAT we’re doing and HOW we’re showing up isn’t leading to the desired WHY. Once you start to notice these misalignments, you can ask simply powerful questions such as: “I think you said you want more X, to get there, what might you do differently?” (or “How might you do that differently?”)

In my short story, above, I asked about my son’s past experiences as a way to build toward the future. This helped me learn from him, and helped him clarify what he’s looking for. This is akin to ‘positive psychology’ pioneer Barbara Fredrickson’s Broaden-and-Build theory, where we amplify the power of past successes.

We can ‘feed the fire of purpose’ by remembering times when purpose was more vivid. This might sound like, “You talked earlier about being clear about the long-term. Was there a moment in your life when you felt some of that clarity? … At that time, what helped make it more clear?”

As coaches grounded in emotional intelligence, we know that emotions catalyze growth and change. So ‘feeding the fire of purpose’ works even better when we can tap into the emotions that brighten purpose. This can sound like, “What were some of your feelings in that time that were helping you?” or, “When you had that sense of connection, what did it feel like?” We can also ask this in an imaginary way: “I hear you describing this future vision – if you imagine yourself there, what are some feelings that would be supporting you?”