The (first) problem with lived experience.

Conversations get had repeatedly about the importance of lived experience. Many individuals I have spoken with produce this as a qualification within their work as a coach as a piece of paramount importance. It truly is important; I believe it to be one of the core tenets underneath the coaching role but it’s also not really enough.

Put quite simply, if everyone who had lived experience, had the ability, capacity and insight to use it for the benefit of those around them we would live in a utopian society. They don’t and we don’t.

It isn’t, or should not be, a state of existence, or simply the accumulation of parts. Lived experience is a narrative, action-based toolkit for considering choice and change.

The problem is, lived experience can be incredibly alienating, have you ever heard someone describe an event they experienced that left you speechless? Have you ever found yourself saying the phrase , I can’t imagine what you must be going through?’ – (incidentally I think one of the truest statements a human being can make, much truer than ‘I understand you, and can prove it by sharing similar personal experience’).

So, if I believe that is one of the truest statements a human being can make, why do I talk about lived experience as such an important element of a coaches’ work?