Reflective Essay: Moments of Aliveness

A program director at a nonprofit has been in the same organization for nine years. She's effective and well-regarded, but describes herself as going through the motions. She can't identify what's missing because she's been in motion too long to remember what aliveness actually feels like. The work is present-state diagnosis before any goal-setting happens.

Assign as pre-session writing, not an in-session exercise. 'I want you to write something this week - not about your career or your goals, but about the moments in your life when you felt most alive. Describe them specifically. What were you doing, who were you with, what was the quality of your attention? Write for at least ten minutes. Don't edit.' Clients like this one tend to produce rich material when the permission to step outside work is explicit.

Pay attention to whether the moments she writes about are all from the past - college, early career, a specific project years ago - with nothing from the last two to three years. That temporal pattern is diagnostic. Also notice whether the aliveness moments share a structural element: autonomy, creative problem-solving, relational depth, external recognition. The pattern across moments is more telling than any single example.

Start with: 'Read me the moment you wrote about most vividly.' Not the most important one - the most vivid. Then: 'When did you last have that quality in your day?' The distance between the vividness of the writing and the recency of the experience tells you something about the scale of the gap. Then work backward: 'What would need to exist in your current role for even a partial version of that to be present?'

A director of business development who has built a strong track record is starting coaching because he got the promotion he wanted and feels nothing. He's articulate about what he's accomplished and unclear about what he actually wants. The goal-setting frameworks he's used throughout his career don't seem to reach the question he's actually asking.

Frame it as a calibration exercise, not a values assessment: 'There's a question I want you to sit with before our next session: when have you felt most alive? Not most successful, not most productive - most alive. Write about it specifically. What were the conditions? I want to understand what you're actually building toward.' This framing matters for achievement-oriented clients - it positions the exercise as strategic rather than introspective.

Watch for aliveness moments that are all accomplishment-based - closing a deal, finishing a race, getting the offer. If none of the moments involve connection, learning for its own sake, or experiences outside of performance contexts, the client's intrinsic motivation structure may be thin. He may be optimized for external validation in a way that now has nowhere to land.

Start with: 'What surprised you in the writing?' Then: 'Among the moments you wrote about, which one involved the least pressure to perform?' That question targets a different category than what he typically accesses. If moments without performance pressure don't appear in the essay or produce a blank reaction, name that observation directly: 'I notice all the moments involve a performance context. What would it take for aliveness to not require an audience?'

Three sessions in, a senior engineer says she doesn't feel like the coaching is doing anything. She came in with a defined goal (get promoted to principal) and the work has been productive on paper. But something about the engagement feels thin to both parties. The reflective essay gives access to a different kind of data than the goal-work has been producing.

Be direct about the purpose: 'I want to try something different. Not goal-focused. I'm going to ask you to write about moments in your life when you felt most engaged and alive - before we meet again. I want to understand what you're actually reaching for underneath the promotion goal.' This reframe positions the exercise as a course correction, not an admission that prior work was wrong.

If the moments she writes about have nothing to do with engineering or technical work - they're about teaching, mentoring a junior colleague, leading a cross-functional project - the promotion goal may be attached to the wrong thing. The aliveness data can reveal whether the stated goal is actually aligned with what drives her, or whether it's an inherited ambition.

Read the essay as a probe into what's actually energizing. Start with the structural elements across moments. Then: 'How much of that is present in your current day?' Then: 'How much of it would be present if you got the promotion?' The essay can reveal that the client is pursuing a goal that would actually reduce access to what makes her feel most alive - which is important information before she invests more in the pursuit.