The Best Person to Seek Advice From

The shocking discovery that my clients come to when they work with me?

That they often already know exactly what they need and want. They’re just a little overwhelmed by it.

“The biggest payoff was realizing what I wanted - and that what I wanted was okay. It’s okay to focus on work life balance. It’s okay to expect more from my career in terms of making me happier.” - Jeff S said after working with me

We spend a lot of time asking others for advice, input, perspective, and that’s not because we’re going to take it at face value.

Oh ho ho!

When was the last time you took someone’s advice and said, oh yes, will immediately put that into place!

Nope.

Most of the time when we’re asking outwardly, it’s because we’re trying to figure out what the fuck is going on inward. The inward gaze is cloudy with noise.

I had this experience recently when I was partnering with the wonderful Katrin Lepik, who I met while wrapping up 104 hours (!) of Coactive coach training this year.

“Who am I as a thought leader? What do I care about? What is my unique positioning in the world? Who am I to have an opinion on anything?!”

I had just spent three hours going deep in a thought spiral with my friend who had the brilliant idea to feed my entire blog into ChatGPT and ask it just those questions, rather than freaking out about it. It was a really good idea.

Normally, my favorite way of using AI is to help shift away from a blank page.

The result? A canned, cheesy, overview of years of research, writing, rewriting. It read like, well, an AI-generated list of thought leadership ideas.

I dutifully copy-pasted into my notion, and then, glared at it.

The spiral continued.

And then Katrin helped me figure something out that AI didn’t. That advice from my mentor coach, my friends, my past clients didn’t.

This wasn’t a moment where I had to ask everyone for their perspective or their advice.

I had spent a decade in the design world, learning human-centered service design techniques to better understand themes.

I didn’t need someone (named Claude) to tell me who I was based on my blog posts.

I needed post-its. I needed some double-diamond design energy. IYKYK, friends.

So I chugged coffee, turned the music up loud and wrote a gazillion (possibly inaccurate representation) post-its, pulling on all the topics I’ve covered in coaching hundreds of people over five years - and even going back to my years of managing teams as a consultant and product marketing director.

Then I moved them all over, finding patterns, finding the 10-15 main things I talk about, online, in sessions, loudly to my boo thang.

Done.

It was the 10-15 things that I already knew I liked to write about, but I was so caught up on how to compete with Brene Brown - it’s like, a friendly competition - that I was overwhelmed.

But I knew what to do. I knew how to do it.

So often with my clients, I’ll say something to them and they’ll respond one of two ways:

“Wow, that’s SO right!”

“No no, that’s wrong.”

The best part? Is when I reveal that’s not my opinion/advice/thought, “I’m actually reflecting back to you what you just said to me.”

Mic drop. This actually might be one of the best parts of coaching? When we reach outward, babbling along, taking in ideas from others - we really struggle to actually hear ourselves.

Some ideas to listen to your own advice and tune up your intuition and self-knowledge?

• Journaling - Write down your thoughts and learnings, marinate on them! Often we’re stuck in the thought spiral, and forcing yourself to slow down, write things down can get out of that wild, loud, inner voice.

• Friend Yourself - Ask yourself, what you tell a friend who came to you with the same question? What guidance would you give them? Then, you’ll probably hate your own guidance because it’s like, hard, ugh.

• Nature Walk - Get outside. Experience nature. Touch some grass okay?! It can help to get out of your head and into the world.

• Hit Record - Take out your phone, and record all of your thoughts. And then listen to it. It’ll feel silly, but, did you know that we’re worse at recalling what we say to others versus what others say to us?! Truth! It’s why you can’t always remember if you told someone a story before, or who you even told the story to! It’s because our brains are wired to spout nonsense without really listening. So, go ahead and listen to your own brain. You can even use a tool to transcribe it and read it out loud!

• Use an AI Partner - I may have dissed AI a bit here, but, you’ll also note, it was a good tool to get started. So you can ask AI to pretend to be a coach or consultant, and say, “ask me questions that will help me better understand [this topic]” and utilize that as thought fodder!

• Take a Buzzfeed Quiz - Just kidding. But also like, yeah, why not. You may find it helpful to pull a tarot card. Flip a coin. Read your star chart. As silly as those things are, sometimes they offer up something that you can easily say NO (or yes!) to!

• Work with a coach - Had to. Because like, it does work! Because as the founder Jake K who worked with me said,
  

  “Before working with Rikki, I felt very uncertain, uncommitted, scattered, and frankly even confused. My biggest concerns were that I don't know what I'm doing and I'm not sure I'm doing it right. After working with Rikki, I feel calm and clear on my direction and next steps. Also, like amazed and relieved at what 35 minutes with Rikki can do.

  
  I would recommend Rikki to anyone who is looking to reignite the confidence in themselves that they know what they're doing and find clarity in the messy, foggy path of their career. Rikki's superpower is tough love, pushing me to be honest about what I want and helping me find my way to being more authentic with my choices.”

Looking to partner with someone who will mic drop for ya? That’s what I’m here for.