Author: Jess Levasseur

Posts by Jess Levasseur

Racism isn’t personal

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Racism hurts—it hurts bodies, minds, and spirits. Racism kills people—it provides a justification for dehumanization. Racism has shattered families, communities, and continents. Racism exists because of the ideology of white supremacy—the belief that white people are superior. This ideology began as a way to justify the transatlantic slave trade and has been institutionalized for over 500 years in the United States and in white settler societies. It manifests in a myriad of forms and impacts everyone in the world in innumerable ways. […]

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Episode 155: How to Build Your Team’s EQ

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If you want a team that can engage in healthy conflict, one that experiences high levels of investment and low levels of resistance, you need to focus on emotional intelligence (EQ). The first step is to grow an awareness of your own emotional landscape.  Today’s episode provides you with the knowledge and tools to get started. […]

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Episode 154: ​​How to Close Your Coaching Conversations

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How our conversations end matters. A lot. In this episode, Elena provides 5 tips that will allow you to close your coaching conversations in a way that elicits positive emotions, allows your coachee to tap into their sense of power, and cultivates resilience. […]

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Episode 153: ​​How to Determine Your Coaching Conversation Area of Focus

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What do you do when a coaching client doesn’t know what to focus on during your time together? 

If you want to feel confident in answering that question, this is an episode you won’t want to miss! Elena shares four tips for guiding the conversation when your client has many priorities, maybe even competing priorities that will not only help them figure out where to start, but will also build their decision-making capacity in the long term. If you’re a coach, leader, parent, or anyone who wants to take a coaching stance, this episode is for you! […]

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Who do you want to be? Who are you being?

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It’s almost officially spring and a great time to start new habits. I hope you’ve heard me say this many times: Transformational Coaching starts with you paying attention to you. You working on yourself. You developing your self-awareness and skills. I can teach you lots of coaching sentence stems and strategies, but when you sit down for that coaching session, you are who you are. Who do you want to be? Who are you being?  […]

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Episode 152: Transformational PD: Part 3 – Responding to Resistance

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Have you ever faced resistance while facilitating? Us too! In this final episode of our Transformational PD mini-series, Elena is joined by Bright Morning teammate, Maria Dyslin, to discuss and demonstrate how you can navigate resistance as a facilitator before, during, and after your meetings and PD sessions. […]

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“Resilience” can be used to oppress

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Like most concepts, “resilience” can be used to oppress. I’ve heard messages that shift the burden of ending systemic injustice onto marginalized people, such as If you were more resilient, then racism wouldn’t really bother you. People wielding these types of messages have corrupted a powerful tool. One that educators, in particular, are in need of. […]

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Excavating my beliefs about emotions

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I’m often surprised by how many limiting beliefs I operate from, in spite of having done a lot to surface and shift beliefs. But the limiting ones are masters at camouflaging themselves. That’s how they survive. I’ve recently been excavating my beliefs about emotions and realizing that some that aren’t helpful. These include the beliefs […]

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