Discover the Secrets of me...
Marenn Maúne Sagar
The way out is in
Zen Coaching showed me a path to discover myself in new ways.
Discovering the Lotus in the Mud
Resurfacing the hidden gems of my natural beauty as a human being.
I have come to find that that inside of me (and most of us) remains a child. A spontaneous and vulnerable child. My child not only wants to play, it wants to be heard, seen and held. My inner child feels like a gateway to parts of myself long forgotten. I am learning to listen, heal and transform these parts so I can live fully in every moment. So I can embrace the unknown, FEEL ALIVE & THRIVE!
A doorway to the freedom to dream. The freedom to fail. The value of simply being. Nothing to prove, just opportunities to open to the mystery and enjoy the adventure of life.
Over the last 4-5 years since discovering Zen Coaching (ZC) I have been learning the challenges of staying with uncomfortable thoughts and emotions. I have needed to develop new ways of allowing and processing my emotions and fears. I have released frustration, anger and sorrow I didn’t know existed like I never have before! In the allowing of all these parts layers have been shed and new space created for authentic self love and compassion.
My Journey to Zen Coaching
After finishing my masters in Cairns and spending 6 months back where I grew up on the Sapphire Coast, NSW I felt the pull to Scandinavia. I journeyed to Sweden and fell in love with Zen Coaching at the No Mind Festival in June 2019. I decided to stay at Ängsbacka for the summer of festivals and support my opportunity to expand inwards. Next thing I was travelling to Poland on an adventure to the Module 1 training intensive… Instead of continuing to eastern Europe as planned I spent a week with some lead coaches afterwards and then returned to Sweden to jump into module 2 and complete the year long Zen Coaching training. After hitching around Norway I returned to Ängsbacka, the working community, course and festival Centre where I first discovered ZC and tasted these new parts of myself. It was time to start integrating these new ways of being…
Practicing intensely with a international network of coaches and my own training cohort fundamentally changed the way relate to myself; my emotions, needs, boundaries and essential inner qualities. My closest personal relationships have dished me up my holes and triggers to grow from as if they were a hearty feast! Finding space in myself to stay with the immediate experience of emotional upheaval and notice what happens. I have come to know my patterns of doubting, wanting to avoid or run away, deflecting and blaming others for problems rather than looking for answers within. At times I have thought “there is no way I can continue this”. “I don’t want this”. “I want to escape”. “Life was better before and I can make it better again if I just leave this situation”. Actually it was all me trying to escape feeling my emotions. The reaction in me was so automatic, so ingrained in my behaviour I hadn’t even noticed it.
The problem was, that this pattern would take me away from the reality of the present moment. I would either be acting from what I had learnt in the past or be fantasising about the future. I realised my actions could be seriously self sabotaging and destroy things in my life I actually loved. In these moments of automatic triggered reaction I was not connected with my essential qualities. For example imagine the difference if I was connected to my self worth, solidness, self compassion, trust and surrender.
Truth seeker & self enquiry
Truth seeking is something I, and maybe you, have always loved, way back to our early years. What is important for me about truth seeking shows up in me in three key ways. One is in the quality of innocent curiosity to discover. The second way is a sharper quality of intuitive discrimination – the ability to separate; like a blade that cuts the untrue away. The third is including compassion and acceptance for all that arises in me. I find truth to have qualities of clarity, stillness, peace.
Meditative partner enquiry is a practice used in the Zen Coaching training as a tool for deep self-discovery. I love sharing the practice of enquiry in workshops, retreats and as a self-discovery tool.
Shedding layers and discovering dynamism
A dynamic ebb and flow of self discovery on the one hand, and shedding old conceptions, beliefs and attachments on the other. Discovering Who, and how I am is not a stagnant, fixed, rigid or unchanging identity. I am a holding space for a dynamic collective of different parts (with their own needs and vulnerabilities) that are ever evolving.
As I let go of the carefully crafted and built up over my whole life I discover almost miraculously that the less of me I hold onto the more expansive, spacious, and liberated I feel!
Exposing old habits, and preconceived conceptions of who I should be – such as: harsh self judgements and criticisms pushing me to be different, do more, telling me I’m not good enough; has led me on a path of letting go of my ‘should’s’ and following my ‘could’s’ which has reduced my inner conflict/ suffering. The second result is more freedom and possibility to follow my creativity and what I wholeheartedly want to do in life! What happens when I do this!? I experience more compassion, creativity, joy, relationships deepening in authenticity, dreams manifesting, feeling I am offering a meaningful contribution to the whole.
I become free from being a victim of circumstance. I am empowered with a sense of inner dynamism to be myself and share my gifts with the world. More and more I make conscious choices that support my life to be in flow state!
WHAT DO I LONG FOR?
My experience receiving Coaching
I am always blown away by what happens when I gift myself a coaching session. I know its the right time, sometimes I’m excited, often I feel a little bit of resistance before hand. Its like feeling the tension before a thunder storm and then the fresh clear spaciousness afterwards. To receive the complete compassionate presence of another supports me to include and nurture all the parts of myself.
Once I had experienced this and learnt the approach there was no going back because even when there is a moment that I’m out of touch with myself I always know there is a way back to presence.
I have personally benefited a great deal from being supported, guided and collaborating with others who are also on a path of transformation. Feeling connected with and being part of a community of people interested in self discovery is hugely inspiring for me.
Receiving coaching has been what got me to untangle the root of the challenges in my life. To have the confidence in my inner resources to navigate hardship and also connect with a more open curiosity to see what lies beneath the surface of my patterns, triggers, fears and longings. Challenges have become an opportunity to compassionately evolve myself, a red flag to bring me back in alignment with some part of myself I have been neglecting.
Exploring these areas within myself makes it easier for me to feel compassion for the suffering of others. As a coach I regularly engage with some of the universal struggles of being human. Seeing that underneath the surface we are all beautiful, kind and creative people that essentially long to love and be loved.
If you are reading this I am sure you are already aware that ‘the way out is in!’ That deep inner connection gives us the foundation for living a fulfilling happy healthy life!
How beautiful it is that to contribute value to the world, we must be in touch with ourselves. When we accept and nourish who we are, with wakeful loving kindness, we cultivate our beautiful potential to contribute authentically to the world.
Child of Illusion
I am a bird on the wind,
An abundant coral cay full of intricacy,
As expansive as the ocean,
As rich as the soil,
I am a conscious creator of my own life,
Not a victim to it,
I am not in a rush to go anywhere,
My time is infinite,
I manifest all that I long for with ease and grace,
My heart holds joy and pain equally without discrimination,
My curiosity untangles my fears like cat and wool,
I have no need to dam life,
As life is dynamic and ever changing,
All experiences flow through me caressing my being with the gentle touch of love.
Marenn Maúne Sagar, 2021
