Your greatest “adversary” as a coach is never the client but often the client’s beliefs or thought patterns (and your own, of course). No matter how much you prepare the client for resistance and distractions, it will never be enough. One of our most important services as coaches is to help the client deal with resistance as it comes up.

To do this skillfully, we must be well-versed in the ways resistance rears its head. This is where your own struggles, even your remaining doubts, will become helpful.

People who have had spontaneous insight, who gained non-dual understanding without any inquiry may not know how to guide others through these issues. You most likely do. See resistance from the client as a gift to you, allowing you to rediscover your own certainty again and again.

Here are some forms resistance can take:
● Not doing the exercises or homework, not corresponding with you if that was your agreement, sometimes making excuses for not showing up in sessions.
● Picking apart everything you say, questioning your approach, leaning heavily on rational argument or current common “knowledge”.
● Playing the victim: the client is convinced they are not good enough to see this, that they will never get it, that they don’t have what it takes. They are stuck in this belief.
● Playing the wise one: the client believes they’ve already “seen it”, they already know all there is to know – here they’ll quickly confirm they know what you’re pointing to but it is surface, intellectual knowledge not direct experience.
● Thinking about the inquiry but not actually doing it.
● Unfavorably comparing your input to other spiritual texts or approaches. (“But Eckhart Tolle says …”)
● Repeatedly moving into the past or the future trying to escape being here and now in the dance with you.
● Being stuck in their heads, going off on thought-streams, explaining, giving extensive examples from their lives – i.e. discussing the content.
● And many more …

Your only task is to notice resistance and bring the client back into the coaching dance, again and again, as often as necessary. I’ve found it helpful to discuss possible resistance at the start of work with the client but also to immediately name it and share what you’re noticing as soon as it comes up during the session. My personal style is to address this with humor and understanding but not tolerate it!

We deal with the resistance in the same way as we deal with other questions and struggles the client brings in. We address it at the meta-level, don’t go into the content at all, and see it clearly for what it is. That is almost always enough. It doesn’t matter whether it expresses as laziness (not doing homework for example) or as a very real, strong fear. The approach is always the same.

However, never push or pull on the client. Remember that this process is doing itself, you are not responsible, neither you nor the client is doing this work, it is being done. So as with everything else discussed here, resistance will appear (or not), it will be seen (or not), and it will disappear (or not).

Pushing or pulling the client into seeing something or dealing with it is not part of this approach. Let it happen, always.