from what? Awaken from a fictitious mental illusion. Awaken to what we really are and, from that point, keeping it ever present in all our experiences in the world.
Awaken from the belief that we are separate, that we are imperfect and limited.
Life has, with its crisis, an infinite number of opportunities to awaken. They are windows that open every now and then, to allow to you leave the dream. They are mirrors in which we recognize ourselves. First it is a call, then a scream, and finally a kick where it hurts the most. And remember, there is only one end: to awaken. Everything else is a beautiful but inconsequential fairytale.
This book is one opportunity to awaken. You found it within your slumber to ensure that you could return to reality, and not lose yourself in the depths of slumber. To explain it better, please allow me an analogy: Imagine that you are dreaming, and in your dream, the phone rings. You have two choices: one, to integrate that call in your dream, and dream that you answer the phone; thus, the dream continues. The second choice is to assume that the call is from a place outside your dream (reality), and that you need to wake up to take the call. Your choice.
We are all called to wake up (not one, but multiple times); not all of us, however, opt to do so (not one, but multiple times). What is soothing is that the finale of this little theater is already decided. And it is a happy ending (better than that), because it could not be any other way.
The enlightened coach knows that we are all equally powerful, and exert our powers as a choice, that has to be respected. The enlightened coach does not undervalue or overvalue anyone, because he or she has specifically awakened, and remembers the feeling of non-separation. He or she knows that is the destiny of all human beings, sooner or later. He or she patiently awaits, in the knowledge that time is an irrelevant variable, there is no first or last.
What happens from now on depends on what you decide. This book may be a phone call within the dream, or a phone call from outside the dream. In the first case, you will read it and keep dreaming; in the second case, you will read it and awaken.
Lastly, let us look at the difference, if there is one, between awakening and enlightenment: enlightenment is produced when awakening does not relapse, when it is maintained and permanent. To simplify it:
Awakening: to remember who and what you are (what you have always been). Theory. Provisional state.
Enlightenment: to reflect that understanding in your everyday life. Practice. Permanent state.
When awakening takes place, the desire to be someone other than yourself ceases completely.
5
THE OBJECTIVELESS COACH
Can you imagine a coach without objectives?
Let me explain what this means, so you can understand the question. Surely you know that coaches and trainers are characterized by marking objectives for their clients, and encouraging them to work hard toward achieving them. Here, we will turn the world upside down because, in fact, that is the present state of things, so in fact, we are setting it straight.
If you let me, I will tell you something about me. There was a time when I took note of all the recipes for success that I could find. It was fun; a game to see how far I could go. I must acknowledge that many of those recipes worked toward the end for which they were designed: to be successful, to achieve goals and objectives.
I learned the science of achievement. I understood that success, the art of achieving what is desired, is an almost exact science if you follow a contrasting protocol.
Yes, success is predictable. It is the inevitable effect of a mentality and concrete habits.
To achieve what is desired is not that complicated when you follow models revealed a long time ago, yet still valid today. But, as with everything else, there is a price to pay for success; that price is effort, time and, sometimes, personal sacrifice. You achieve something at the cost of something. I am not interested in the kind of success, since you will achieve it at the cost of something else... it is bad business.
But since it works, and because results are actually evidenced, one ends up becoming a greyhound, always chasing a hare. The bad news is that there are many hares to chase, and they are faster every time.
One day, after having caught up with many hares, you suddenly stop. And question why you are running so much. Then, you decide to stop running and carry on, but this time, you decide to walk. If you have seen the movie “Forrest Gump,” you’ll remember that moment of profound revelation. Suddenly, you no longer feel like running; not because you are tired, but rather because it is something you’ve done before, and you want to pass on to something new. You’ve had enough. You start to think that there needs to be another way to act in life.
When you are a runner and you stop running, you become something else.
When you are a coach and you stop setting objectives, you become something else.
When you are an entrepreneur and stop focusing on your own interests, you become something else.
That is how I changed my profession in a heartbeat. Many of my clients did not understand. What was I going to do now? I had abandoned them. I self-proclaimed myself as an objectiveless coach. Was I reneging coaching? No, in fact, I was taking it to another level. I wanted to achieve the same thing, even more, but from another disposition: pure consciousness.
Spiritual ambition consists in not settling with a retread ego.
Since I did not expect immediate understanding, I apologized and closed my coaching firm, which by the way filled my schedule with client appointments, and was a very lucrative source of income. I decided that, when everything was going great, it was the ideal moment to pass on to something else, or my own success would devour me.
Yes, my dear reader, I concluded that a good coach cannot have goals. I understood that everything was simpler and that, at most, I could set a single objective for myself. And what could be that single and unique objective that would substitute the avalanche of goals which I and my clients had pursued so strenuously? It did not take long for me to discover that unique objective.
One single thing. The only thing.
I understood that not having objectives is, in itself, an objective. So I would adopt “the objective of not having objectives,” that was it. That way, I could continue to coach, but now as “an inverted coach,” with the sole objective of not having objectives.
One has to be consistent with their principles, or run the risk of losing one’s self. To lose yourself kicks you out of the game.
How I reached that conclusion is unimportant, but the reading of Buddhist texts had an influence in the process. As you know, Buddhism extols the cessation of desire as a key point of its philosophy. But, is that not a desire in and of itself? Of course, I thought, Buddhists desire to not desire. That, right there, is an objective. They affect themselves to disaffection! And they reject aversion! Very contradictory, in my opinion. They also have desires.
Deep down, both them and us, all of us, are deeply confounded. But
