THINKING ABOUT BECOMING A LIFE COACH?

Life coaching involves assisting the client set personal and professional goals and establishing a workable strategy to attain them within a given time frame. For clients, a life coach can provide a life-changing experience, an invaluable opportunity to take control over their lives and fulfil their dreams.

Like the coach of elite athletes, the life coach is results oriented, and his or her main tasks are to help clients recognise, overcome or remove barriers to personal growth and development, and develop strategies for achieving goals that will enable the individual to develop his or her full potential. Again like the sports coach, the life coach will be required to accurately assess the client’s aptitudes, strengths, weaknesses, needs and goals in order to arrive at a program that is specifically tailored to that individual. Unlike a sports coach, however, life coaches may also have to manage clients’ reluctance, lack of motivation, inaccurate perceptions and other psychological barriers to effective self-management. Life coaching is primarily about helping clients develop the skills and attitudes that will enable them to manage themselves and their own lives.

People may contact a life coach for very different reasons: to help them make better financial or career decisions; to get them motivated; to help them overcome feelings of frustration, helplessness, or lack of confidence; to help them manage personal relationships; to help them develop practical life skills. However, the reasons for contacting a life coach may not be the primary issues that are causing the client distress or dissatisfaction, and much of the life coach’s work will be to lead the client on a journey of self-discovery.

Like all inner journeys, life coaching must begin with the client’s present situation and the many internal and external influences upon it. Life coaching begins with working with the client to understand where the person is at, psychologically, physically, financially and interpersonally. Only after obtaining a more accurate, clear picture of the client’s Present can both client and life coach identify elements in the client’s Past that may be hindering growth in any particular area, and plan strategies for the client’s Future that will encourage and nurture progress.

Some areas in which a life coach may be asked to provide assistance and support are:

-interpersonal relations -self-esteem and confidence -development of physical wellbeing -public and professional image -personal finances or business -career development -practical life skills, such as time management.

Because every client is different, and no life coach can be everything to everybody, many life coaches will develop special areas of expertise and refer clients needing assistance in other areas to experts in those areas. For instance, clients who appear to have psychological disorders such as depression may be referred to a counsellor, while the life coach may refer a client needing sound nutritional advice to a nutritionist. This does not in any way diminish the role of the life coach, and will, in fact, ensure that the client receives the best possible assistance in all matters.

Therefore, a life coach may either choose to develop his or her expertise in several areas, such as finances, careers counselling, relationships counselling or health and fitness leadership, or focus on a motivational and supporting role as he or she helps the client identify and overcome existing barriers to personal development and success. In the end, however, life coaching is also a learning experience for the coach, and sensitive, responsive life coaches will gradually develop an approach and an orientation that is most relevant and useful to both them and their clients.

www.acsedu.co.uk for a range of life coaching and psychology courses.



THINKING ABOUT BECOMING A LIFE COACH? - To learn more about this author, visit Tracey Jones's Website.

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