7 Good Reasons to hire a Life Coach

We hear a great deal about the benefits of life coaching these days. Here are a few.

Change your life

Your life will change. Probably for the better. Remember change can be difficult because humans like to remain in homeostasis. Coaching will give you the best result when you are ready to dive in without reservation.

Face the truth

Good coaches tell you the truth. This is important because often no one else will do so. Change requires we acknowledge reality.

Drop your story

You will have to drop your story. We often create ourselves as victims in our lives. A coach will challenge you to own your life, and take responsibility for it.

Show up

You will have to show up. Coaching requires you to show up, do the work, and keep coming back even when it gets tough. I rarely take anyone for coaching at less than a six-month commitment. True transformation takes time, and most people want to quit when things get tough at about the 8 to 12-week mark. Be prepared to stay the course.

Drop the ego

You will come face to face with your humanity, and you will have to let go of your ego. Face your true self. find self-compassion and self-love.  For many this is the greatest struggle of all but necessary for building intimate and supportive relationships.

Letting go

You will have to learn to love what is, and what is not, and come to trust that the world is unfolding as it should without you directing the process.

Find Peace

You will find peace in this moment, and then in the next, and what starts as a challenge will become a positive habit.

Want to hire life coach?

Yes! Congratulations. You are on your way to a better more fulfilling life.

Self-Reflection through Loving Compassion

First learn to see yourself, then learn to see others, last help them to see themselves.

Mme Ehrenfried

Humans are amazing. Yet we can be absurdly unaware of ourselves. There are times when other’s can see us more clearly than we can see our own behavior. In a profession such as mine we spend a great deal of time getting clear about ourselves, our history, and our reactions to the world around us. We develop skills to effectively manage and cope in the world with choice, and deliberation. We do this so that we can learn to see others clearly, and then help them to see themselves more accurately. This is no easy task for us or them. It is an ongoing work of self-discovery, unfolding the layers, and serving so others can more effectively help themselves and others. It is for this reason that we take this humbling journey so that we can with love and compassion assist others to be more loving and compassionate with themselves, and others. In this way we pass goodness and love from person to person into the world and we make it a kinder more loving place to be.

Care to increase the kindness in your world? Contact me.

Transformation: Eight Reasons You Don’t Want a Coach

Transformation is a process, and as life happens there are tons of ups and downs. It’s a journey of discovery – there are moments on mountaintops and moments in deep valleys of despair.

Rick Warren

This may seem like a strange blog for a coach to write but I find truth telling immensely rewarding. I find it interesting that most people respond so well to truths. So here are a few regarding why you do not want to hire a coach.

Life Changing

  1. Your life will change. Probably for the better. But change can be difficult, and honestly, we humans like to remain in homeostasis.

Truth Telling

  1. They will tell you the truth. If you don’t like to hear the truth even when delivered in a kind way. Don’t hire a coach.

Drop Your Story

  1. You will have to drop your story. We often create ourselves as victims in our life. A coach will challenge you to own your life, and take responsibility for it. And well that just sucks sometimes.

There’s a Cost

  1. It will cost you money. Good coaching rarely comes cheap. And we rarely invest fully unless we put some skin in the game. Coaches want individuals that want to change and are willing to put their money on the table to prove it.

Showing Up

  1. You will have to show up. Coaching requires you show up, do the work, and keep coming back even when it gets tough. I rarely take anyone for coaching at less than a six-month commitment because true transformation takes time and most people want to quite when things get tough at 8-12 weeks.

Humanity

  1. You will come face to face with your humanity, and you will have to let go of your ego. Face your true self, and find self-compassion and love. For many of us this is the greatest struggle of all.

Trust

  1. You will have to learn to love what is, and what is not, and come to trust that the world is unfolding as it should without you directing the process.

Peace

  1. You will find peace in this moment, and then in the next, and it will be a challenge each day to stay in this moment, not in the past, or in the future.

Transformation

It would seem the things we desire are also they things we run from. It takes immense courage to go for things we desire but more than that it takes grit and tenacity. The start of the journey is easy. It is staying the course that remains the true challenge for most of us. A coach is a sojourner through the tough times. A coach helps you through those times with a perspective that is unattached to the outcome yet loving and compassionate. Take a coach on your next journey but only if you want to reach the finish line.

Still don’t want a coach? Great contact me let’s talk!

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What if You are Perfect?

q 214x300 - What if You are Perfect?I mean perfect as you are…that you did not need to change anything about yourself.

What if you knew that at the very core of yourself that you were not flawed but whole, and wise? That no matter what anyone said, or did past, or present, you did not question the wonder of who you are? You did not question what you knew to be true for you, and that it was okay for it not to be true for everyone.

What if you trusted your own choices?

What if it is perfect for you to change your mind? To make another choice?

What if it is perfectly okay to create the life you wanted?

And it is perfectly okay to ask for assistance, if it would be helpful to you!

 

The Space Between

Life is lived in the expansion and contraction of the breath. Life is lived between the seconds, between the cells in the moments of presence to what is now in this moment…the moment inside me, the moment outside me, the moment in the connection to all that is greater than me. Expansion to see beyond me, Contraction to see within me. To be me, here, now before it becomes next. Life lived in this very breath, moment, space is where you find love and peace.
Expand, Contract, Breathe between your cells, the seconds, and find peace in the now.
No peace? Contact me to find peace.

Numb to the Possibilities

I am in the midst of reading, Steve Chandler’s newest book, Death Wish about recovery from addiction. In it he mentions a conversation between publisher Maurice Bassett and blogger Adam Adams. Adams was quoted as saying, “the greatest addiction is familiarity addiction”. Steve quotes Maurice as writing, “It does seem that familiarity is a powerful yet subtle addiction. Staying in our comfort zones, not risking… Going numb to our own possibilities.”

Upon reading this I yelled, “Yes, that’s it!” It is this complacency I experience all around me. When I ask others, “How are you? What is going on in your world? ” I am met with fine, good, okay. Life is the status quo. Ugh, I’d rather hear awful, terrible, hard, or awesome, incredible, exciting, or at the very least interesting.

Why, because at least I know those in the latter category are growing, learning, and alive to their own possibilities. It may not be of their own making. Life may be delivering them a large nudge to grow, learn, and change, or they may be creating the circumstances to do that themselves. Either way there is hope! They are alive!

By choice or circumstance they are awake, and in being awake we are able to create an incredible life.

Are you numbing out with the familiar or something else? Are you curled up in your comfort zone? Where might you stretch 1-5% beyond your comfort zone? Where might you re-awaken, and become alive?

Email me, I would love to about your possibilities!

Who are You Selling Out?

If you limit your choices only to what seems possible or reasonable, you disconnect yourself from what you truly want, and all that is left is compromise. 
Robert Fritz 
 
Never marry someone that doesn’t fall in love with your dreams!
Nathanial Brandon 
Compromise is an interesting word. It is an agreement or action that requires concessions and settlements on the part of both parties. It is about both parties ending up with less than they truly want. So don’t compromise…because it costs you and the other.
Negotiate the win-win. Be creative. Figure out how each of you can win. How does everyone benefit without compromise? Compromise is the easy way, you give up this, and then I give up that and then we are both less than thrilled with the outcome.
If we however take more time to be creative, then we can create the win-win. We both get what we want. Where can you create a win-win? Where are you stuck compromising? Email me if it would assist you, I have some ideas on how to get you unstuck!

 

Are You Soaring?

The white winged dove, a bird made famous by the song “On the Edge of seventeen” written and performed by Stevie Nicks. Nicks said the white winged dove symbolized the spirit leaving the body. The white winged dove plentiful in the southwest is not an especially auspicious bird when viewed at the top of a Saguaro where they imbibe on the fruit of this cactus that lives in the Sonoran Desert.
The white doves have a soft grey taupe coat with a bit of white016cb5a5 112c 4d02 b915 0d5911dd005b - Are You Soaring? trim at the bottom of their wings. If you look closely enough, they have a beautiful blue eye shadow framing their orange colored eyes. Their subtle beauty is magnified 100 fold when they fly, the white edge of the wing becomes a distinctive white band midway up the wings and a white tail band appears.
Like the white winged dove my clients are often unassuming until they take off and soar into the lives they want to create for themselves. I get the pleasure of dafa7204 7641 45e1 990b 74ac7df4b647 - Are You Soaring?watching them soar, and their true beauty is revealed, as they open their wings and take flight. Perhaps as Nicks said, the dove is a symbolization of the spirit leaving the body. I’d like to believe that the white winged dove represents the beauty of the flight of the spirit within all of us as we soar toward the life we want to create for ourselves. As my clients learn to create the lives they want they soar, and their beauty touches many lives, and I am blessed to know them.
Where in your life is your spirit soaring?

Be the Moon!

When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.
Alexander Graham Bell

When plan A, B, C, D, and, E fail, what then?

Plan F of course!

We all know that plans rarely if ever go as expected. In fact, I am always somewhat amazed anymore when a challenge doesn’t come into play. When I was younger this would upset me, and I would focus on what didn’t go right, and why it didn’t go right, but what I didn’t realize was that by not focusing on, what was next, or the opportunity that was presenting itself, I became stuck in quagmire of the past, not in the solution focused present.

I am not saying that it isn’t good to reflect on what happened so we do not make similar mistakes over and over again but let’s not stand there staring so long we miss the open door in front of us!

Be creative! Keep moving! Don’t stop! Pause and consider “maybe” but don’t meander around stirring the old muck. Life’s too short for second guessing, and if we wait too long the opportunity that awaits us may pass us by, as does our lives, if we do this too much, and for too long. Walk through the open door, and grab the next opportunity! Think how interesting life will be! Consider what there is to learn! Find out how creative you can become by looking at what is, not at what could have been!

What opportunity is before you now?

49d0fb77016642608f6ff9d3e8fdf49d - Be the Moon!
A Star is Born!

Stop Toe Dipping, Take the Plunge!

One hot AZ morning this week the beautiful blue pool was calling to me. As I sat on the edge of the pool and did some toe dipping the water felt cool and refreshing. The water felt great on my feet, ankles, and calves yet the rest of me baked in the sun. So another step deeper was needed, and “Oh,” it was a bit cooler but within less than a minute it felt good as my knees bobbed just below the surface, and my legs quickly adjusted to the new temperature. Despite the heat I was hesitant to take the next step. This step was much deeper, over my waist. “Did I want to cool off that badly?” “Maybe I should get out now!” Although that seemed a bit foolish since the sun was hot, and the pool refreshing, and well, I was half in all ready. I mean didn’t that defeat the idea of cooling off in the pool getting out while still half baked? And who knew how many chances I would get to enjoy this pool. So I took the plunge and for a moment I did regret taking that next step, “Oh, it was cold!” Yet the strangest thing happened. In a few moments I adjusted to it. Wow! Interesting! Next I decided to do some edge testing so I began to wade slowly toward the deep end, but that became almost torturous, so I decided to take the plunge. I held my breath and dropped to the bottom, and “Ah,” it was cold, but I survived, and well, you guessed it, in a few seconds I was refreshed! The water felt great! Viola, I had created a refreshing reality!

As I noted my approach to adapting to the temperature of the pool I observed the similarities with life. Each step into the refreshing pool created a challenge, a decision, to go back, stay put, or move forward. Each moved forward required facing the uncomfortable certainty of change, the adaptation to the change, and the joy of having reached this new place. The toe dipping, and knee bobbing were easy, and fun but as I moved toward the moment of totally being cooled and refreshed the biggest challenge came as I grew closest to realizing my momentary vision of being refreshed because the edge testing became torturous, and I had to choose, once and for all to take the plunge, or back away from the dream of that cool refreshing water.

Consider your life, your relationships, your work, your children, your education, your dreams, where are you toe dipping, knee bobbing, half baked, or edge testing? Where are you ready to take the plunge?