Say, say, say

Every day we find ourselves having all kinds of conversations with all kinds of people. Sometimes they're deeply profound, sometimes they're pure templated small talk, sometimes they're just a shopping list of aches, pains and TV trivia. And a much of the time we're able to simply forget we've even had such conversations.

Well, the other day I bumped into a friend of mine, Kate. Some months ago I completed a part-time Executive Diploma in Corporate Coaching, and as part of my ongoing process of fine-tuning what I had learned I happily provided sessions for friends for a small fee of a glass of vino afterwards. "Wine 2 Whine" I called my sessions. Quite catchy I thought. Anyway, the last time I properly chatted with Kate was during one of these meet ups.

During our session we discussed a few work issues she had. The next day I got a polite thankyou email and we left it at that. So running into her at the weekend was quite refreshing when she said that something in our conversation had got her thinking a lot and she'd started to see and apply a few things differently. So much so that when she heard her brother was being overwhelmed by his own issues, she found a way to plant a similar idea in his mind to take action. He did. And he's much happier.

I'm not saying I've got all the answers, far from it, but Kate did find a grain of value in our discussion and paid it forward to her brother. It's true that our conversation was in the context of coaching, but in the bigger scheme of the world imagine what good could be done if we were all consciously offering a positive message that could be passed on to others.