control your ego

I love these moments………..today L. arrived to our weekly meeting, she was SO happy.
These are the moments where you are so happy for your clients (and for you?), you see that they discover their passion, they new it all along the way but somewhere covered it with masks, with "the right thing to do", with:" what my mother will think of it"……..she thanked me so much for my wisdom/help/……..and THAT'S one of the most difficult thing as a coach……..control your EGO, yes I did something, yes I helped her discovering , but NO its not really me doing the hard job, she did it….i was there, I stepped next to her but she moved herself to a better position, she did the tough job and will carry on with the success or the failure.
As coaches we can get compliments, we can believe them , it can make us better coaches once we feel we are good but we should beware of getting into an ego trip that we are THE reason for changes, we are not!!!

Do we appreciate what we have?

When I was a teenager I use to spend most of my time playing football (or as the Americans call it soccer) and the rest was in the scouts.
I this fast, digital,virtual world that we are living today , it's amazign that Scouts are still kicking and running. My wonderful mead daughter Roni (her name means Joy, Fun and indeed she is)just left yesterday to a full week which they spent walking with backpacks with all their stuff in, sleep outside, cook their food alone and with no showers.
It’s the same girl that change her cloths twice a day , the one who says that Ramat-Aviv mall is her third house (mother, father…and mall), the one who put make-up and all the rest which I don't really know how you call them. This 15 years old that takes minimum of two showers a day will have to "survive" 5 days without shower, 5 days without her computer and mobile (well she took it but it will probably won't be in use due to battery life), and 5 days without her mother ,father or Tali taking care of her.
I am SO glad she can experience different life than her regular life, SO happy she can see ,you can get along with only two Tees, SO happy that she can appreciate her life and what she has back home, SO happy for her to go through some difficulties and appreciate what she don't have to go through on daily basis. Good luck my dear Roni!!
And back to us………..do we appreciate what we have on a daily basis? or only when we go out of our comfort zones?

Why do we do what we do?

I bought a motorcycle.
For long time I am struggling with my self on the issue should or shouldn't I buy a motorcycle. I know the text book about how dangerous it is , a specially in Israel when people don't "behave" on the road.
I hear people say…….oho…..he must be 40+…………that's what they do at their 40 tees…..buy a motorcycle, got divorced, going to India, learn Tantra………. Well I must say that beside divorce ,which I am not planning to go through any more (once is enough) ,I wish I can do all ………and why not do all? I can, so I will probably do……I am not sure about India but Albania sounds great and Laos is beautiful..any other suggestion?
Is it the 40tees? Or is it our passion for new things that we allowed our self to do only when we are very young (with no obligations) or when we go older (and have less obligations) ?
This bring me back to coaching………this is what I like about being a coach. let the imagination of your client run riot, allowed them to dream far than they ever dreamed on and support them when they start moving toward their dreams. And as they say: "put your money where your mouth is" !
I bought a motorcycle!! And when someone ask me why, my answer is: "because it was Orange"

My Dilemma

Part of my vision in business is: "doing business differently" and it comes from the "coach" part in me. it’s a long story to define what's "differently" but I don't feel that I want to explore it now but I do want to lighten part of it …………and my personal dilemma……..
The part which I want to explore now is the "Human Part" or How can a venture capital destroy (or build) the vision of entrepreneurs (people who built new companies) . we try to see the people behind the idea and not only D' idea. We try to give everybody a fair chance to present his/her idea and we do take them seriously. once a week we sit on our deal flow and review the meeting we've done and the decisions of " GO no GO" and apparently we say no to most of them (we can only invest in 8-10 companies during the next 2-3 years and we see around 5-10 New companies a WEEK!!!)) . it turn out that I am saying NO to more the 90% of the people I meet, those who built their vision, have passion to successes, those who left their job in order to built new companies, leave secured places or just follow their dream…………and for those talented ones we say no!, No, its not a good idea, NO, it doesn't suit our criteria. No……….no……………no…………

and these people are exactly the people which I work as their coach and encourage them to DREAM, think FAR, think BIG , think PASSION………………………
for all those whom we met and said no, don't get it personaly, don't let it get you off your track and vision - try to figure out what went worng,why you didn't succeed but if you belive in your idea keep on going..........

can you see my dilemma?

i love coaching and hate saying goodbye

I never mentioned the work I am doing in our Venture Capital Fund – Jerusalem Capital, I will do it some day in the future.
I want to talk about me as a coach or batter say what is the most difficult thing in coaching for me..…saying Good bye.
Since coaching is limited by means of number of meetings (usually 12-15 meetings) I found myself saying good bye to three of my trainees in the last two weeks.
I started w/them few months ago and we went through wonderful journey, each one was different, two of them were by phone only and one was face to face. We explored different ways, we touched plenty of good things, we touched few difficult places but with those three we got some interesting insight about their life and discover their lighthouse or vision. It wasn't the same with every one of them but it was magic with each one of them. I know why I love coaching………I love the intimately of being with people with almost no barriers, I love what I learn about myself during the work we do but I hate saying good bye – I might need a coach for me 
I don't know if they read my blog , but here is the time and place to tell you, K. K. and B. ,thank you for being so open with yourself and thank you for giving me the opportunity to escort you for a short time in your journey.
I took two weeks off from new clients but I feel I am ready for my next one………….

is your VISION connected to your values?

Yuval

once every few months we are meeting , our special group whom we studied together in the fundamental course of CTI.


Its a wonderful group and every time one of us contribute to the group in a lecture. tonight it was Yuval who explained us about vision and values and the connection between them, in a nut-shell

Your vision is connected to your values!!

is that so?

is your vision connected to your values??????

it was very refreshing to participate in this evening after few weeks of hard work selling a company which i am involved in to a very big software company, we signed the agreement but no closing yet - so update yet to come.

on the above pic on the right is Erela our host for the evening

more party pictures

Saturday night we did a party in my house, we were around 20 people who spent the last six months in a coaching course. beautiful people who took a journey into their hurts and soul. the food was great, the drinks were excellent and the karaoke was fun.

karyoke party

my dear friends , more later