Matt Watkins is completing his final master’s project to fulfill the requirements for a Master’s Degree in Saybrook University’s Mind-Body Medicine. For his culminating project he is combining his love of professional coaching with mind-body skills to develop a coaching model. The direction of his project is currently unfolding; however, the main focus is how mindful and presence-based coaching, informed by the principles of Health Realization, facilitates the development of self-determined values and actions.
Matt has chosen higher education to invest in himself, with the end goal of using his skills to serve his community. When asked about the essential elements of his personal coaching style, Matt reflected that personal presence and slowing down are two of the essential characteristics that he cultivates while conducting a coaching session. Personal presence of the coach is the characteristic that he feels allows the client to be vulnerable, and that vulnerability begins the process of transformation that enables the client to identify and realize their true life’s desires. Matt also provides ample time for his clients to reflect during their session. The combination of a coach that is fully present and time facilitates the process of reflection that may lead to transformation.
Matt believes that the magic of coaching happens between the thoughts, in the slow and comfortable silence of a safe place. Once clients are able to articulate their true desires they can then begin to work toward realizing their full potential. In essence, “changes happen by themselves.”
Matt places a high priority on service to his community. His commitment and love of his community have informed his life’s choices. Matt attended high school and college in the same geographical area and is continuing to invest in himself with the goal of using his expertise to give back to his community. Matt’s calling to serve his community is a unique attribute because instead of wanting to gain skills just to achieve specific professional goals, his desire is to serve his community. Matt describes the Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania area where he grew up as an area with great potential, yet one that has tended toward remaining in the status quo. Matt’s goal is to mindfully integrate mind body coaching skills into the community to allow people to open up to a larger vision and step into their true potential.
Matt’s interest in having a real impact in life developed early in his life. He recalls being part of a team of middle school children selected to work with NASA scientists. While he chuckled that he doesn’t remember the details of the experiment that he worked on, he remembers the opportunity to interact with world-renowned scientists via teleconference. That experience opened him to a world of possibilities that lay ahead of him.
Matt’s balanced energetic entrepreneurial spirit is contagious, and it is easy to envision a prosperous future for someone with such passion. To learn more about Matt visit his website, www.colossuscoaching.com (which he created), and learn more about his style and why he wants to be the coach for people that want to achieve the unrealistic!