Ministry

M I N I S T R Y
As I am called

More than a decade ago I got interested in Spiritual Direction as a ministry. However, I realised that many people were not ready to talk “God”. I researched and found “LifeCoaching”. I took studies in this because I believed that I could reach a wider group of people – people who generally are OK but needed that push and people who needed someone to affirm them in what they do, what they are planning to do, in their dreams and hopes.

Since coming to the studies of LifeCoaching and Spiritual Direction I’ve found them to be similar in many ways, the first of which is both these ministries are about serving people who are functional. Unlike psychotherapy or other mental therapies, a lifecoach and a spiritual director do not minister to a person who already has a problem that needed clinical work and/or counselling to make them better, or feel better.

LifeCoaching and Spiritual Direction are about being companions and confidante to people who have dreams and hopes and are forward looking.

A lifecoach and a spiritual director do not hold all the answers to a problem. In this helping relationship the coachee and directee hold the responsibility of working out the solutions and the accountability to follow the plans that are mapped out in order to pursue his/her dreams.

The difference I see in lifecoaching and spiritual direction is the absence of the holy in lifecoaching.

In spiritual direction, the Director is always sensitive to the leading of the holy in the directee’s life and the presence of the holy in the relationship.

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Spiritual direction studies were done through
(1) 2004 summer internship at Mercy Center, Burlingame, California, USA
(2) 2008 to 2010 2-year long distance (with 4 one-week intensives) through the Haden Institute at the Mount Carmel Spiritual Center, Toronto, Canada.

UPDATES:
Spiritual direction is sitting and listening attentively to another person to hear where God is in that person’s life events. As such, it is a ministry where two people come together on holy ground with the Holy Spirit as the Director of the spiritual direction session. With such a graced “soul friendship” it is important, therefore, for me to continue to listen to my own inner movements and to hone skills. I now have a Graduate Certificate in Ignatian Spirituality (2013) that was awarded by the Melbourne College of Divinity. However, studies for this graduate certificate was done through Campion Centre of Ignatian Spirituality in Melbourne, Australia.

Lifecoaching studies was done through the International Coach Academy.