Interview with Karen Hirsch

Interview with Karen Hirsch
April 18, 2009 via phone

I first met Karen in 2007 in a coaching group facilitated by Zuno Kristal. Since then, we have also expanded our friendship. I am honored that Karen agreed to jump in on the ground floor of my blog for my first interview. The following comments were culled from a longer discussion and have been reviewed and approved by Karen.

Karen is currently working on building a professional and informal coaching practice for people in the arts and/or involved in social change work. To learn more about her practice please visit her website: http://www.karenhirschcoach.com.

Here is what was on Karen’s mind about a change process that she is currently experiencing:

I would say that a deeply profound change that I am in the midst of working on is attaining a more intense awareness of myself so that I can be fully in touch with others and all that I am grateful for.

Quality of connections is what I want in all my interactions. People really open up to me. They find it easy to talk to me and I can become quickly engaged.

What prompted your decision to focus on increasing your self-awareness?

After a very in-depth conversation with someone whose work I respected, I felt a renewed conviction to continue to explore my own self-awareness so that my coaching experience could more effectively contribute to his work. In a way the conversation was a catalyst to make me reexamine my own growth.

Was this a quick change or a gradual realization?

The interest in self-awareness is not new. What is new about my experience this time is to be more focused since I see how having greater self-awareness can really improve how I coach others in their important social work that I so respect.

I am crystal clear now what gives me the greatest joy in life -- to give help and support people I trust. By that I mean people who have integrity, capacity for learning and self-reflection. I want to leverage what I bring to a relationship with a person like that. More and more people are already doing so many wonderful things and I want to help them to maximize their potential.

How do you stay motivated?

I want to be a good coach for amazing human beings. A loop of positive reinforcement lets me know when I am present and clear. Magical things can happen between people. People actually go beyond what they have known when I am acting as a positive catalyst.

What inspires you?

I want to share a quote I saw on a downtown #1 train overhead. This is my guide for the next decade.

“I do not know what I may appear to the world; but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me.” Sir Isaac Newton