A Case Study By Maria Jose Heredia, Life and Career Coach, CANADA
The Action vs. Delay Case Study
This is a case study about Emilie (a fictional name used to preserve her anonymity), a fellow coaching peer. It sheds light on her ongoing battle with a prevalent challenge observed in various coaching sessions throughout my journey at ICA: procrastination, also referred to in ICA terminology as “delay.“
As the narrative unfolds, it emphasizes the pivotal role of reframing perspectives, identifying delay as a disempowering attitude, and transitioning to one of courageous action. In my perspective, this shift lies at the core of what coaching is about, as clients can only achieve their aspirations by taking tangible steps forward. The text further stresses the significance of applying acquired knowledge through action, asserting that true learning and growth happen in the realm of doing.
Emilie’s struggle with perfectionism traced back to familial influences, becomes a focal point, leading to a profound realization that imperfection is a prerequisite for mastery. The narrative navigates Emilie’s journey from paralyzing self-doubt to embracing courage, highlighting coaching’s transformative impact on dismantling internal barriers. Her decision to move from delay to action serves as a testament to the potential for growth, learning, and empowerment inherent in every individual.
Action vs. Delay: My Client Emilie
My client Emilie wanted to find the motivation and courage to launch her own business and become an entrepreneur. However, for a long time, she kept finding reasons to delay the process. She self-sabotaged her progress repeatedly.
To me, the concept of reframing perspectives is the most transformational skill a coach can share with their clients. In addition, in my opinion, moving the client from delay to action is at the core of what coaching is about. Clients will never be able to achieve what they want to achieve or become who they want to become if they don’t act.
Reflecting, analyzing, and exploring are definitely useful and necessary, especially in the early stages of a new project. Nonetheless, where the magic happens is when we start implementing everything we have learned in the action. One of my personal life mantras is that one can only fully live when one is acting and creating. Acting and creating is where the greatest potential for learning and growth lies. Emilie and I seemed to share this vision of the importance of action in order to attain our goals.
Nonetheless, we also know that this is easier said than done. Our ego doesn’t seem to like change. Anything new has the potential to scare us and depending on how new it is, the more threatening it appears. This is what my client Emilie was experiencing. Emilie was trying to fight her ego’s voice. This wasn’t an easy task since her ego’s voice was very loud according to her.
During our sessions together, Emilie would also reference her intuition’s voice. She said that instead of listening to her ego she wanted to listen to this other side of hers. She would describe her intuition’s voice as soft-spoken, but persistent. She called this voice: her higher self.
We have heard so many times how important it is to get out of our comfort zone to learn and grow. We also know that when we want to start a new project and get out of this famous “comfort zone” we can never be 100% “ready”. Many people including Emilie, think that being ready involves not being scared and feeling that one has full control over the end result of our plan.
Emilie wanted to feel ready. In contrast, during some of our conversations, Emilie mentioned that she knew that waiting for the fears to go away was naive since fear would always be there where unexplored territories lay.
It was difficult for me to understand if she seemed to have this conviction around the importance of moving forward even when scared, she remained paralyzed, in a reflection loop that seemed to never end.
I must admit that I was very puzzled by this. I could not understand how someone who had done so much work on herself, knew so much about these concepts and seemed to really want to act, could not manage to do it. What could possibly be standing in her way?
During our sessions together, I did my best to listen to Emilie very attentively and tried to mirror back everything I was hearing from her words. I also paid very close attention to her tone of voice, her silence, her body language, and her gaze. There was so much she would say without sharing a word.
Emilie and I had multiple sessions focussing on this same topic since this was the central focus of our coaching relationship. We would have some sessions where she appeared to be very motivated, optimistic, and excited. Other times, she would find every possible reason to delay any concrete action. She would very often talk about how delaying her dreams brought feelings of shame to her because she felt she was betraying her inner intuition voice which I knew was so important to her.
As I would notice these shifts, I would mention them to her in transparent and honest observations I would make during our conversation. One of the things I noticed was how perfectionistic Emilie seemed to be. Put in her own words, doing things right was a strong value for hers. She wanted everything she did to be above average and as perfect as possible. What she wasn’t seeing was that she was trying to be perfect at something that she had never done before. The mastery she was aiming for would only arrive with time and practice. I was noticing this, but tried very hard not to lead her. I tried to remain objective and simply share my observations with curiosity.
In one of our sessions, Emilie had a big breakthrough moment. She realized she had a belief that seemed to be one of her main setbacks. She believed that she would be mediocre or not good enough if she didn’t do everything perfectly from the get-go. We had to work a lot on this.
We started by examining where that belief came from. Emilie had a feeling her mother could have something to do with her thinking this way. According to Emilie, her mother was a very critical and perfectionistic person who would find flaws in everything and everyone. Emilie grew up with this model and even though, she admired her mother and really valued her approval and opinions, she knew there was something she needed to let go of.
This way of thinking or assessing things she had learned from her mother was rigid and judgemental in Emilie’s view. She felt it wasn’t serving her anymore since it was in conflict with other values of hers such as compassion and respect. She wanted things to change.
Emilie was a very kind and compassionate person with other people. However, she had become like her mother towards herself. She would always find that there was a better way of doing things and that she could not allow herself to fail. In Emilie’s eyes, failing would lead to her mother’s-disapproval. She felt that her mother’s love towards her was conditional on how “successful” she was. It was too painful for Emilie to imagine this. The sole thought of it would paralyze her. She had developed a belief that her mother’s judging voice was somewhat the voice of the world around her and everyone had these same expectations from her.
For Emilie, her head was her main enemy, but ironically, it was also the home for her wildest dreams and fantasies. From a very young age, Emilie used to daydream a lot. She used this as a soothing tool for escapism. In her positive daydreams, she could never fail. She was always the winner, she was perfect, she was eloquent and successful and everything she admired in others became her best traits. It was almost as if it was more beautiful to imagine her life than to live it.
It was as if she did not want to phase the reality of how things worked in reality. We knew that there was going to be a learning curve in creating her business that she needed to experience in order to become the best version of herself she was longing for.
During our sessions together, we realized that aside from “doing things well”, Emilie had another value that was very meaningful to her. It was the value of courage. She really admired courageous people and she wanted to embody this trait. She wanted to nurture this side of her more and more.
One of the questions I asked Emilie which I took from the Flip-it ICA learning readings was: What would you do if you were wearing a courageous hat right now? Emilie went on and on all the things she would do. As she was describing all of these actions, she would light up like a Christmas tree. Her eyes were bright, she was energized and would not stop smiling. I mirrored back what I was witnessing and explored with curiosity the feelings she was experiencing.
Another question I asked her was, what would your inner voice tell you if she was not judgemental? Here is where the courageous, empathetic, and compassionate Emilie blossomed.
She said, “…My <failures> don’t define me. I won’t be a failure if I <fail> at something or if I don’t get the result I was expecting. I have read enough. I have studied and analyzed enough this whole thing. I know all this reading has for sure helped, but I need to start actioning and I need to start somewhere. I know that I won’t be “perfect” or great at it right off the bat. It will take time and I am ok with it. I need to be willing to be mediocre for some time in order to become great one day.” This was a pivotal moment for Emilie.
Emilie felt much lighter knowing that she could do things even if she didn’t feel “ready.” Making mistakes was part of the process she needed to experience in order to become great at something new like starting her own business.
During our sessions together we talked about other times in her life where she showed courage. We looked in detail at what aspects of those experiences she could replicate in this scenario. That seemed to increase her confidence and move her closer to taking action.
We also discussed what was the worst thing that could happen if she opened her business vs what was the best thing that could happen. When we would compare these two scenarios, she would realize that the good things that would happen in the best scenario outweighed the things that would happen in the worst-case scenario.
Opening her business meant Emilie was offering herself the gift of following the voice of her higher self and living as the courageous woman she wanted to become. She was finally ready to move forward even if a part of her still felt“unready”.
The next action steps Emilie chose to take, was to speak to her husband and family about reducing her work hours in order to dedicate more time to her new business. She launched her website, registered her business, created her social media accounts, and started reaching out to potential clients. She went from using delay as an excuse to using action as a tool to become the great courageous entrepreneur she always wanted to be!
Case Study: Action vs. Delay
This case study shows an example of how transformational and empowering it can be to reframe one’s perspectives, in this case going from a perspective of delay into one of action. The exploration of Emilie’s struggles with perfectionism, rooted in familial influences, adds depth to the narrative, culminating in a pivotal realization that imperfection is a stepping stone to greatness.
The symbolic shift from Emilie’s paralyzing self-doubt to embracing courage emerged as a central theme, illustrating the profound impact of coaching on empowering individuals to overcome their internal barriers. Emilie’s decision to embrace imperfection, confront fears, and take tangible steps toward her entrepreneurial dreams exemplifies the essence of coaching—facilitating self-discovery and inspiring transformative action. This case study serves as a testament to the potential for growth, learning, and empowerment that lies within every individual, awaiting activation through courageous, intentional, and imperfect action.