Frank’s Coaching Blog

We had a discussion in our Mastermind Mind Group (MMG) recently about how to handle / motivate ourselves best in order to get results. Carrot or Stick?
One member argued that setting up punishments for himself works best. The fear of feeling humiliated, or the prospect of having something to do he doesn’t like is his favourite way of getting things done.
My own take on this is a bit different. I’ve changed in this respect during the last months. The new direction has been enforced by my studies with the ICA, but it began before.

But maybe it’s based on the personality type of a specific person. When you study NLP you learn that there are Towards-To and Away-From personalities. I suspect that you really find these types, like in my MMG, but it could be a learned trait that can be unlearned. Just as I have changed, maybe everybody can in principle.

First I want to make a difference between Tough Love and simple Toughness. Tough Love is being (seemingly) hard on somebody but with the intention to help and support. Like the mother who trains her child to respect cars and the road, and she uses scare tatics. It’s a good thing that a toddler who doesn’t understand traffic and the power of vehicles just fears the road. This is certainly preferrable to having the child explore and play on the road while risking a sudden death.
We can use Tough Love in coaching to help people break through a barrier and earn a new reference about what they are capable to do.
Toughness as I define it here is based on a lack of appreciation of the other person. People who are tough towards others can only be tough to themselves as well.

I’m going to talk on this in my next posts, because this topic is at the heart of being able to help people get to new places. It deserves quite a bit of attention.

Frank