Episode 201: Confronting Meta-Change with Courage and Compassion with guest, DJ Mitsch

Chaos can feel like whitewater: loud, fast, destabilizing, and impossible to control. That’s why I invited award-winning change agent and master coach DJ Mitsch back to Beyond the Page to talk about what it really takes to find peace amid chaos and lead through meta change with courage and compassion. We explore a practical metaphor that sticks: change as a river, where rapids test us, quiet pools integrate us, and the goal is not perfect control, but conscious navigation. 

We also go straight at the modern stressors leaders and coaches face every day: emotional contagion, the way negativity multiplies online, and the growing problem of AI-generated content shaping what people believe. DJ shares why what we “hold” in thought and feeling becomes part of our experience, and why leaders can’t ask teams to be calm if they’re bringing frantic energy into the room. From grounding practices like breathing, visualization, Tai Chi, and barefoot grounding, to heart-led courage and intuitive sensing, we outline how coaching presence becomes a leadership advantage. 

From an ontological and meta-relational leadership lens, we look at the wider field: resources, systems, and uncertainty that no single person can “fix.” The work is to create steadiness, invite contribution, and listen for the second conversation in every room: the underlying energy. If you care about executive coaching, change management, team coaching, and building leader-as-coach cultures, you’ll walk away with language, questions, and next steps you can use immediately. Subscribe, share this with a fellow coach or leader, and leave a review with the one idea you’re taking into your next conversation.

Watch the full interview by clicking here. 

Read the full article here.

Learn more about DJ here. 

**Please note this correction on the book mentioned in the interview.**
This book by Gloria D. Karpinski has been a go-to for me over the years.  It is a study of the seven levels of consciousness and offers rituals and exercises throughout …the Guided Imagery mentioned in this interview can be found on pages 274-278, but read the entire work before guiding someone through this visualization, so you understand the context and power! Copyright 1990 Ballantine Books, NYC. https://a.co/d/0ciEE1u6

A Gift for our listeners: The meta-relational handout : https://drive.google.com/file/d/100n2LLAvd16RPdMs9nDmvtiAjGuBb3vZ/view?usp=drive_link 

Grab your free issue of choice Magazine here - https://choice-online.com/

Transcript

Welcome And Who DJ Mitsch Is

Garry Schleifer 0:07

Welcome to Beyond the Page, the official podcast of choice, the magazine of professional coaching, where we bring you amazing insights and in-depth features that you just won't find anywhere else. I'm your host, Garry Schleifer, and I'm excited to expand your learning as we dive into the latest article, have a chat with this brilliant author I have waiting here, and uncover the learnings that are transforming the coaching world. When you get a chance, join our vibrant community of coaching professionals as we explore groundbreaking ideas, share expert tips and techniques, and make a real difference in our clients' lives. In today's episode, I'm speaking with change agent DJ Mitsch, who is the author of an article in our latest issue, Coaching in Chaos. Her article is entitled Finding Peace Amid Chaos: Confronting Meta Change with Courage and Compassion. I just feel lighter even saying it. A little bit about DJ. She holds a CMC, she's an MCC, an award-winning change agent, thought leader in the business coaching field, founding ICF member, and one of the first 25 MCCs in the world. Well done. As the sixth president of ICF Global, like that wasn't enough to be an MCC, she's also done that. She led chapter development efforts beyond the US, like here in Canada. As CEO of an award-winning coaching company and founder of Pyramids Leadership and Health Care Coaching Institute, DJ's core belief is that coaching has the power to change the global conversation. One leader, one team, and one company at a time. She created the Team Advantage, the original team coaching program in 1995 and has certified thousands of professional coaches throughout the world. DJ, welcome back and thank you for.

DJ Mitsch 1:57

Thank you, pal. It's so good to be with you here.

Garry Schleifer 2:00

There's so much more that you've done. So, you know, look her up. She is just amazing. Can't say enough, and a dear friend to me and choice. So thank you for being here.

DJ Mitsch 2:13

Thank you for having me. I love writing for this magazine, and I because I'm always challenged to think of something in a different way. And so it's great that we get to create with you and to explore concepts here. And I love reading what everybody else is contributing. It's really, really special. This is a great question. Yeah, really.

Meta Change And The Chaos Lens

Garry Schleifer 2:35

Yeah. And so, why this, you know, you've written for us before. Thank you. And I know you'll write for us again. Thank you in advance. What called you to chaos?

DJ Mitsch 2:47

There's so much to say about that. Before we came into the room, when we were in a green room preparing for you all, as listeners and viewers, you know, we've been looking at chaos for a long time and the edge of complexity, right? And what it looks like inside of the client organizations that we work in, and even inside of your clients. It's like what's going on when people feel really scattered and energies now around the world are really , I think chaos captures it, right? But I think about it in a meta-relational term, which I brought online in this article, meaning that we're looking at everything through this lens of it's all connected. And we create from chaos, you know, if you believe in creation theory or chaos theory or any of the theories you can study over time, uh, you know, it's all there's always been a creation out of chaos.

Garry Schleifer 3:48

Right.

DJ Mitsch 3:48

It's like you dive into that field of unknown and then you look at how are we in relationship to this? What is wanting to be born? What is asking um asking us to pay attention? And I think more and more we've we're going back there. And honestly, I think coaching was part of the origins of coaching came out of that same conversation, Garry. You know, it was like things were beginning to feel messy for people and you know, career jumping, nobody went to work for 30 years for a company anymore. It was like, yeah, everybody was in transition and change. And so, you know, as we looked at change for this, it's um change is just it's different now. It's not like climbing a hill anymore, it's more like getting into the river and flowing. And as the Hopi Nation says here, get into the river and look around and see who's in there with you. This could be a good time, right? Let go of the angst of the flow of the river or the chaos and just move in.

Navigating Change Like A River

Garry Schleifer 4:48

So well, I will speak in a river as we were talking about your trip to Colorado and your husband fishing on the Colorado River. And no coincidence, in your article, you had a wonderful metaphor. A river moves with force and flow, it's it has rapids and stillness, it requires awareness to ride its currents consciously. Chaos feels like white water, fast, loud, destabilizing. But there are also quiet pools where integration happens. Learning to navigate change as a dynamic river rather than resisting it allows leaders to move from reaction to responsiveness.

DJ Mitsch 5:32

Yeah. You know, I watched a PBS, a public broadcasting system for those of you outside the US interview with Bruce Springsteen, one of my favorite lyricist of my life, right? But he said this I'm just a link in the chain. That I look at all those who've come before me and all those who are taking ideas from our music and taking them forward in innovative ways. And I feel like a link in the chain. And the reason I'm saying that is that river flowing analogy or metaphor came from Barbara Masignac (please see show notes for correct author), who wrote Where Two Worlds Touch. She was a North Carolina author and a mystic. And in that book she put a river journey, and it takes you through seven levels of consciousness. And I have used that in retreats and other places. I've used it in taking people through the experience of starting in a small stream, the top of a mountain, and moving through whitewater rapids as the river increases in volume, moving through cities or behind cities where you pick up sludge, you know, and it's like moving through all those stages, but the cul-de-sac and the rapids are the things that people remember most about that experience, which takes about 16, 17 minutes to go through. But always you're going home. Always the ocean is there going, welcome home. I've been waiting for you, right? So it's a beautiful metaphor. And that book's out of print, but if anybody wants it, well, I will try to copy that with credit and put that in one of our gifts for everybody. Because I think it's important that we remember our relationship to all things and the metaphors we use in coaching, you know, it's not just a skill, it is a part of us paying attention to how do we become steady in the midst of this white water that we're in right now, because we are in it.

Garry Schleifer 7:37

Well, or and is it being steady or being with it?

DJ Mitsch 7:42

Well, I think I'll take it to two levels. I think it's being in it and not consumed by it, but I also think when we're talking to leaders, that might not work, right? To say be in it. You know, you are participating, you are in it. But your job now, our job as leaders in this industry is to create a steadiness. Uh, when we look at finding peace in the middle of this kind of chaos and change, it starts with us always. What are we embodying? Because we're all contagions. We are. You are, I am, and our enthusiasm for life and for this profession shows, right? But it's um, yeah.

What You Put Out Returns

Garry Schleifer 8:28

Truly. And you said it wonderfully in the article. What we hold in thought and feeling becomes manifest in experience. If we hold anger, fear, and disgust, we see more of it reflected back. We are a microcosm of the whole, and we are feeding the macrocosm in every moment. That's basically what the social media is doing. If you put out negative juju, you get negative juju back. If you put out positive juju, you get positive juju back.

DJ Mitsch 8:59

Yes, said as only you can. I love that, Garry. And it's, you know, people are paying attention to um their phones, their devices, as if that's the gospel. And what I'm gonna caution everybody to do is to look at what's generated by AI and what what's not, because even in our world, um, you said Barry, my fisherman husband, and I come down, he used to read the newspaper cover to cover before he spoke to anybody in our house. Now he reads his online news sources, and what we're finding is there's so many of them that are just not true. It's AI generated, but it's what you've attracted into your space by what you post or put out there. And so let's use that as a metaphor, right? Even as coaches, what we're paying attention to, what we're putting out in social media is generative. And you know, I have opinions about what's going on in the world, but my opinion just piles on to those who feel like I do, yeah, right, who see the world like I do. And we talk about heart, you know, I was paying attention to the heart this morning, and I was so heartbroken about and I'll just say this specifically, about the images in social and in other places of us bombing another country in my lifetime, at this stage in my lifetime, that it really was something I had a hard time with. I ended up in the hospital with what looked like a heart attack, and it wasn't. It was how I had put the energy, stuffed the energy down, trying so hard to maintain a different face than what I was feeling. And so we have to find ways to navigate back. You know, I'm not spending another 24 hours in a hospital to somebody charge me a lot of money and tell me I didn't have a heart attack. But what's true for me, and the reason I'm paying attention to our student and and the amazing cardiologist Jonathan Fisher, Dr. Fisher, in this article on some of his practices is that he's captured in a way that has everybody see the energy of the heart in a way I think everybody can relate to. He's got great reviews, it's a great book, and I mentioned it here in the just one heart. But to move from the heartbreak to the heart waking space. So when we find ourselves, I think finding peace is about catching, you know, that we're in Whitewater.

Garry Schleifer 11:33

Yeah.

Practices To Find Your Center

DJ Mitsch 11:34

And kind of waiting it out a minute or two and seeing where we can find our center. Like right before this call, I went outside barefoot and grounded myself uh for just a few minutes. I move with some Tai Chi just to move energy through my body to come back into the space. And I do that before I teach. When we bring people into our classrooms, we start with a guided visualization, we start with breathing together. You and I did that before we line today. And what I've noticed is that it gives me a clarity of energy and construct that I can sit in. Because when I'm not when I'm scattered, y'all don't want to be around me.

Garry Schleifer 12:15

Yeah, yeah. Well, it's frenetic, and like you said earlier, what you manifest manifests more. What you you know, what generate brings more of the same into your life. And so , yeah, so perfect way to reset, recalibrate, and come in almost new.

DJ Mitsch 12:36

Yeah, you can't give what you don't have. You can't you can't wish other people peace if you don't have peace. If you're always angry, right?

Garry Schleifer 12:46

Yes, right, right, I totally

Meta-Relational Leadership Without Certainty

Garry Schleifer 12:48

agree. Yeah, well, one of the topics that you discussed in the article was a conversation or a term meta-relational field. So, what does that mean?

DJ Mitsch 12:59

Yeah, so coaching came out of a lot of disciplines. One of those was ontology, right?

Garry Schleifer 13:05

Right.

DJ Mitsch 13:05

Meta-relational is ontological, it is taking a look at the field of being. And in the field of being, we are a participant, we don't control it. It's not about the top down, it's not about how we man, you know, I love all the work around how you manifest things. And there is the magnet, there is that, right, which we've just talked about. But in the space of being, you look at everything through a lens of what am I doing that impacts that? When we were in Colorado last over the weekend, we went out, we were staying in Breckenridge and we went out to one of the reservoirs and it was completely dry. The boats were all dry docked. Um, and I started looking around. We have we have drought here in North Carolina on the you know, the east coast too. But this is in the middle of the country, it's you know, not enough snow from the mountains, not enough um snow melt. And the reason I'm saying that is we're not paying attention. I didn't know how severe it was there. And then I start reading about what's going on at home. My son lives at the beach, and the wells of some of his friends' homes, they've gone into these old houses, 1970 houses, and you know, they're redoing them and they're all beautiful. They're on well water, the wells are dry. And so in a meta-relational field, what we've got to look at is what's our impact, right? Because these wars today are about mineral rights, they're about land and power, you know, they're the control, it's who's controlling the resources. It's who's controlling the resources. And if you look at our how we're showing up as leaders, and each of us leads self and others, we're looking at how we show up in this space and what we're paying attention to. And then it becomes a broader field, right? So, from a leadership perspective, you know, what leaders carry into the day, if you're not steady, then what you're gonna see is a lot of unsteadiness, right? Um I actually was walking through the airport and I heard these two young guys waiting in line for food who were talking about, well, I'd really like to offer the you know my company this idea, but nobody's gonna listen to me. And, you know, that's not a new conversation, but that's what's it's happening more and more and more. Why would I bother? And I listened to the idea he was explaining to this guy, and it was a technology idea, and it was simple and it sounded beautiful. And I thought, why? You know, why would he not have a contribution at 26 years old or whatever he was?

Garry Schleifer 15:52

Yeah.

DJ Mitsch 15:52

So the I think the greater leadership courage today is it's not having the answer. That's going to take courage, but it's you know, really creating the space that you ground safety and possibility in a way that others feel that they can contribute because each of us signed up for this time. Those who follow us, the link that we are has a certain standard, right? A certain place that we hold in the energy in the meta-relational field. But those 26-year-old-year-olds signed up too. They're here to help us. And we can't we can't see them as oh well, you know, there's somebody I can manage. Oh, bless their hearts. They don't know. They do know, listen to them, they come in, and our babies are coming in wise, but wise. I got a little grand baby now.

Garry Schleifer 16:47

Congratulations.

DJ Mitsch 16:49

Yeah, thank you. It's so fun to watch everybody come on, but I think the courage that we're gonna all have to sit in is the steadiness and the curiosity.

Garry Schleifer 17:01

Stay curious, stay steady.

DJ Mitsch 17:04

Yes, because in a meta-relational field, there's no certainty, yeah. And so leadership probably is more about how do you lead through the uncertainty instead of feeling like you have an have to have an answer, but you hold the uncertainty as the field.

Garry Schleifer 17:21

Yeah. And so what does that mean to us coaches? How do we how do we walk that path with our clients? How do we unfold what needs to be unfolded? What you know, sorry, I really I'm just picturing myself with these people who require that that groundedness and that curiosity.

Coaching Courage And Reading The Room

DJ Mitsch 17:44

I think we're gonna have to become braver. Um, one of the things that Jonathan mentions in in the book, Just When Heart, is he goes back to that definition of courage, which we've all heard, right, which is it comes from heart, right? Is to drop into heart space and to really begin to listen. What is not being said in the field that we are inhabiting together? What am I sensing? And we talk a lot about intuition, but what am I sensing in the space that is off? Because there are two conversations in every room. One is the one that is audible, and the other is the energy that's underlying everything. And so I think for all of us, we've got to get really clear as coaches to bring the energy online to say, how are people experiencing the energy in the space that you're in now, right? How are they experiencing? How would you label it? How are you experiencing it? Because often the leaders that we work with as coaches, and many of us work at the CEO level, but even they have a board they report to and they have mandates. And so everybody's in a state of transition and transformation. Everybody is lacking courage at some point, and so maybe what we do is we prop people up with the courage conversation. We ask them, you know, where do you need to have more courage? Where do you need to be brave?

Garry Schleifer 19:09

Right.

DJ Mitsch 19:09

And what would you do differently if you didn't feel you had a there was a risk here, right? And I'm not trying to program in questions to ask, you know.

Garry Schleifer 19:21

Oh, heavens no, I'm not hearing that at all.

DJ Mitsch 19:23

Yeah, but I am inviting.

Garry Schleifer 19:26

Just an energy.

DJ Mitsch 19:30

Yeah, it really is that, you know, when we're teaching, we pay attention to energy and emotion. Those are the keys to the kingdom. If you can go into that conversation, all the other competencies will come online. And I think that's been one of the one of the the hardest things for people to get. Is it's easy for us to say, and you and I can nod like we understand what that is, but even when we're practicing it ourselves, it's um you know, it's it's difficult sometimes to say what you what we see or sense, and for fear of losing a contract or whatever. I'm over that because now I've been at this long enough.

Garry Schleifer 20:10

Oh, I remember in in my certification training 25 years ago, yeah. Coach risking to be fired.

DJ Mitsch 20:18

Exactly, that kind of conversation.

Garry Schleifer 20:20

I'm not serving people if I'm worried about exactly where my next client's coming from. And I remind myself that regularly because you do slip into a a groove of of um of scarcity sometimes and worry, and you have to do like you said, grab the energy and the emotion of yourself, yeah, kick yourself in the butt and get courageous, and then like we said earlier, what you are manifests in others.

DJ Mitsch 20:50

Yeah, we are contagious, yeah.

Garry Schleifer 20:53

In a good way, in a good way.

DJ Mitsch 20:55

Well, you know, when I was the President of the International Coach Federation, it was that's what I said at the conference is you know that we're living in a time where I have a vision that every leader will be a coach, every leader will be a coach, and um that everybody has access to a coach, you know. But if we just stayed curious about each other, if we were courageous and deeply human in the middle of all this uncertainty, um what would that make possible? You know, that's a question I'm living with.

Garry Schleifer 21:33

Well, and you can sit in the knowledge that the ripple effect of the work that you've done for all the years that you've been doing it has more than likely touched millions of people.

DJ Mitsch 21:49

I know that's a little breathtaking, isn't it?

Garry Schleifer 21:51

Right? And I don't I don't say that without full confidence that that's true. I don't have the proof, but I'm pretty sure that especially you with coach training with the healthcare industry that you work with, and them you just the amount of people that you've one-on-one with and they've rippled to others. Like the commercial used to go, and they told two people, and they told two people.

DJ Mitsch 22:21

Right, right.

Garry Schleifer 22:22

We need a mathematician on our call.

DJ Mitsch 22:24

Go ahead, we'll make more. Yeah, you know, it's really it's been the conundrum for me, particularly at this stage, because I'm like probably a lot of your listeners who are still seeking to grow and learn. And I just had my 70th birthday last year, just turned 71.

Garry Schleifer 22:39

Congratulations.

DJ Mitsch 22:40

Oh, thank you. And I don't see myself stopping oh no, not at all. Any of this, even though I have my first grandbaby, and I love the energy and time with her. It's like I am still as committed to this as I was when we first started, and that's a little scary for me.

Garry Schleifer 23:06

Oh, why?

DJ Mitsch 23:08

Because there are times when I'm teaching people, and we just graduated a class of 28 amazing physician leaders and administrators and from the the healthcare coaching institute, and and I look back at them and they have a love affair with each other, which they always do at the end of it. And so they've created a community, and now I'm on the outside looking in, and I'm going, Oh, we trained you well, darn it. You don't need us anymore, darn it. Um, but I'm so grateful for having traveled with them the time that I and so you know, I had one client for 11 years when I first started coaching. He was someone who had worked for me, with me in broadcasting. And he really just it wasn't a crutch for him, he really wanted the partnership, and I really I wasn't his boss anymore, but really looked at everything he was building through a different lens. And those are rare, right? Most of our engagements are six months to a year, yeah, and then we say goodbye, but I fall in love with people, you know.

Garry Schleifer 24:18

It doesn't mean I don't kidding, no kidding.

DJ Mitsch 24:22

I fall in love with people, and so I just want more people to fall in love with.

Garry Schleifer 24:26

Yeah. Well, and you've just sent those on their way to leave a space for the next ones to love on.

DJ Mitsch 24:33

Exactly, exactly. But all of that in the response to the people, the numbers of people that you touch it is for all, I would say this for all of you who are coaches and listening to this. Um, you know, becoming a masterful change agent, which we are at some point, isn't so much about the mastery, it's about recognizing that coaches are not adjacent to change. We're in the middle of it and we're holding the space for it. And in that way we are change agents because we're catalyzing a different level of consciousness and we're going back to that was the conversation we were in 30, three, 34 years ago. This is about the ontological view of life. This is about the study of being, it's about the study of behavior, but it is really uh looking at leveling up of consciousness so that when we get to the mass of that, the rest of the world that we're impacting because we're contagions will look different. And that's why every leader needs to be a coach and needs to have a coach, needs to be thinking about you know the impact that they have on the people around

Scaling Impact Through Leader-Coach Culture

DJ Mitsch 25:49

us.

Garry Schleifer 25:49

It's interesting you say that a lot of the coaching platforms I work with are offering programs called manager's coach.

DJ Mitsch 25:58

Yeah. And I we do a leader's coach, which we've done for 33 years.

Garry Schleifer 26:01

Yeah.

DJ Mitsch 26:02

The first leader's coach that we did, we called the coaching zone, and it's been that name's been taken by somebody else, but it's fine. Like I said, link in the chain. But in doing that, this is our first piece of research, or one of them was GTE before they became Verizon in the merchant.

Garry Schleifer 26:20

Oh, okay, right, right. Oh right, right.

DJ Mitsch 26:22

We worked in that, we actually worked around that space, and I was in the room when they named the company Verizon. That was that's a different story. But um, in watching the people, we trained 5,500 managers and supervisors in the leaders coach or coaching zone program. And um the impact was moving from on a five-point scale from 1.4 to 4.7 employee satisfaction, which was the measure that we were being we were all looking at, right? Is finding the one thing that you can track whenever you are looking at the impact. So there's a lot to be said about that.

Garry Schleifer 27:02

Yeah, there's a lot, there's a huge case study right there.

DJ Mitsch 27:07

But going, but but just going back to where coaching came from, um, and I've said this in three articles I know that I've written for you, but it wasn't something we we didn't make it up. It it needed, it was gonna happen.

Garry Schleifer 27:20

It was called in.

DJ Mitsch 27:21

It was called in, and some of us were just at the right place in the right time. It was the work we signed up for.

Garry Schleifer 27:28

Yeah. That makes sense. Oh, it I was it, I was one of those people who in the 90s I was running my own company, and I was doing something different for a personal reason. I wanted to go on vacation, not be asked a million times, what do I do? What do I do? What do I do? So I was that leader that was the problem. I was broke, I was the broken link or the bottleneck, if you will. And then it dawned on me that I wanted to go on vacation, and I started to ask open-ended questions and empower people through questions and listening to uh and support to have helping them find the answers so that I didn't have to provide it. And uh that was that was the beginnings for me. And then then I heard about the actual uh actual coaching and took a training course. And like you say, we all say uh that my friends is history.

DJ Mitsch 28:23

One of our students in uh a while ago, one of our first year uh cohorts said, Oh, I get it now. The coaching thing is like a lazy person's sport. I was like, that's a great way of capturing it. Yeah. So for all you leaders out there, if you're listening, it's it's stop working so hard.

Garry Schleifer 28:48

Yeah, right.

DJ Mitsch 28:49

Think about what is heart, I'll use Jonathan's language here. What's heart waking for you and bring that online and be a little lazier? It's not about solving problems anymore, it's not about productivity anymore. That's not gonna come from the places it came from before. If we don't have a meta-relational field where we see our impact as leaders on everything, uh then we're gonna end up with the same story we're living in right now.

Garry Schleifer 29:20

Well, and that's heart rate. We've gone through this 30 years and we're still at it.

DJ Mitsch 29:24

So we're still at it because we're changing. Well, and that that's one of the things that I've said in a recent Substack article is that I have podcaster asked me, um, what's changed in leadership? Expecting my answer, I think, would be you know, coaching has changed leadership. And coaching has, for those who have really actively engaged with a coach, it's changed who they are, how they see the world. That's I have no question about that. But leadership is a construct and in organizations that are still functioning pretty much the way they have always, and acquisitions and mergers, and yeah, you know, all the things, uh, system breakdowns, all the things that we know that we go in and help uh look at whenever we're coaching that level leader. Um that's it's a different game now. Yeah, you know, it's so the system hasn't changed. That's slower going. Leaders are changing, but my answer to him was it hasn't changed. Leadership hasn't changed. Overall, it hasn't. Look around. You know, the meta the meta story right now, globally, politically, hasn't changed. It hasn't changed. So we're looking at who are we inside of a system that isn't that's slow to change. I will I will say that it's not we can't change it, but that's slow to change.

Garry Schleifer 30:54

Thank you. Yeah, who are we? What part do we play in that meta-relational field? Wow. Okay, a lot to think about. All good news, I think. Understanding, grounding, and just the joy of being a coach and being a part of it.

DJ Mitsch 31:12

Yeah, and to remember, we signed up for this, you know, on the days that it feels hard to remember this is a calling, too. It's it is significant, symbolic work, and it matters. And it's about, you know, the courage to stay grounded when no one has the answer.

Garry Schleifer 31:32

Oh, no kidding. I still bring when I bring on new clients, they look at me kind of strange. Yesterday I I started with a new client and I was I was just sitting there listening. He said, and he said to me, and he's talking and talking and talking. He goes, Did you freeze? And I said, No, I'm just right, I'm right here listening. They're just not used to it. And I love seeing that and that remembering too. Right. I also have to remember that how many people in their lives are dedicated listeners?

DJ Mitsch 32:03

Nobody, yeah, everybody has an agenda. Families have an agenda, you know. If your dad or mom, people have an agenda around you. There's an expectation of how you show up, and and so if if the closest people in your life are not really listening fully to you, where do you go for that? Right?

Garry Schleifer 32:22

I'm over here. Right.

DJ Mitsch 32:24

Right, coaching game online.

Garry Schleifer 32:26

I love the I love the job because it's not job, it's a labor of love, you know, there is that word love again.

DJ Mitsch 32:33

So well, and I think labor is not something to step over. You know, we you said something about me being one of the first 25 MCCs, and when we went through that, we were told because we were going to be reviewing all the applicants for PCC, we were told that we would be grandfathered in. Well, that was not true, and so I have renewed that credential with probably close to 100 hours of continuing education every three years. So 10 times, 10 times I have renewed it. And I don't say that with any regret. I say it as um the continuous education and learning that happens here, that's a natural part of what we do, it's really important to hold as you know, a truth of coaching and always learning, always you know, pushing the edges.

Garry Schleifer 33:27

Or okay, and that's another acronym that my husband uses, always be coaching and don't be coaching me today.

DJ Mitsch 33:34

Always be coaching and don't be coaching me today. That's funny.

Checklist Books Programs And Farewell

Garry Schleifer 33:40

DJ, what would you like our audience to do as a result of the article in this conversation?

DJ Mitsch 33:45

That's a great one. I think just hold the capacity to stay open and to be courageous, as you are also the connective tissue of what it looks like to be deeply human right now. I think our best gift yes, it's gonna be our questions and our skills, but it's really to be bring our presence and our full capacity to love people into this space and know that this is about us too, right? It's not just about the client in front of us, but the space between us is sacred. And to keep looking in that space together and know that that has impact. It does have a ripple effect.

Garry Schleifer 34:28

Yeah, we are part of the meta-relational field.

DJ Mitsch 34:31

We are part of the meta-relational field.

Garry Schleifer 34:34

Uh, DJ, you said you have something to offer our listeners and viewers.

DJ Mitsch 34:38

Yeah, I'm putting into the space with the article just a quick, I think it's a five-point checklist of things for you to think about, questions. So that's coming your way. And as you read the article, if you're prompted to do some other things, I'll also make sure that you've got some other things to look up. And I'm also recommending every coach reads this book, Just One Heart.

Garry Schleifer 35:04

And I have it handy. Happen to have it right there. Well, you said it's out of print.

DJ Mitsch 35:11

No, this one's not. A cardiologist's guide to healing, health, and happiness. It's a new one, and it's gotten great reviews from Ariana Huffington and from lots and lots of uh different publications. It's a best-selling book now. No, the one that's out of print is called Where Two Worlds Touch. And I will see if I can find uh the author. If not, I will with all attribution, I'll make sure that I have covered all the bases. Yes, of course. Put that into integrity, yeah, but put that into a connection for everybody to download as well. And it's called the River Journey, and it is taking folks through the seven levels of consciousness, and it's beautiful.

Garry Schleifer 35:49

And I remind our listeners that if you are on your journey looking for , I don't want to say more learning, but value for your coaching development. Don't forget to check out Pyramid Resources Team Advantage, the coaching program, and everything that DJ and her team have to offer. Um, they really they'll love on you.

DJ Mitsch 36:14

No way, we'll love on you. The team, the team advantage. I've got that book almost done now. Companion book to the material. So go through that program. We've got one coming up in the fall, actually. Yeah, in September, late September start. So we'd love to see you there if you're a coach looking for a toolkit. You got all the stuff you need in yeah, one place.

Garry Schleifer 36:34

Thank you. What's the best way to reach you, DJ?

DJ Mitsch 36:37

Yeah, DJ@ pyramidresource.com, and that is Pyramid Resource with no s on the end.

Garry Schleifer 36:43

Okay, I was gonna say I was clear.

DJ Mitsch 36:46

Yeah, so yeah, so that's the best way is email or look me up on LinkedIn. And if you do look me on on LinkedIn, just add a note so that I see you. I look up at everything.

Garry Schleifer 36:55

And tell her where you heard her choice beyond the page. DJ, thank you again for joining us for this Beyond the Page episodes. Always a treat. No, and the the the conversations always go way beyond the article, which is exactly why we do this. So thank you for your commitment, your love, your generosity, everything. Everything that you are. Big heart.

DJ Mitsch 37:22

Big heart, big heart. Thank you. Thank you for bringing this all online and going beyond.

Garry Schleifer 37:30

Thanks.

DJ Mitsch 37:31

Appreciate you, buddy. Thanks.

Garry Schleifer 37:32

That's it for this beyond episode of Beyond the Page. For more episodes, subscribe via your favorite podcast app. If you're watching the video and you're not a subscriber to Choice Magazine, you can see all the articles by signing up for your free digital issue. Scan the QR code in the top right hand corner of my screen. If you're in audio mode and you're driving or on a treadmill or riding a bike, when you stop and pull over, go to choice- online.com and click the sign up now button, and you'll get that digital copy. I'm Garry Schleifer. Enjoy the journey of mastery.