Most of us are familiar with coaching, right? Your favourite sports stars and world-class athletes all have coaches. Some of the most successful business people in the world wouldn’t be where they are today without business coaching. But there’s one type of coaching that is still a bit of a mystery to many of us, and that’s life coaching.
Whether you’ve met someone who’s worked with a life coach before and swears by them, or are totally unfamiliar with what life coaching is all about – this article will uncover just how life coaching works and share some inspiring life coaching success stories to show you just how life-changing it can be.
What is a life coach?
We can’t dive into our life coaching success stories without first giving an overview for what life coaching is. The fact is, there are many self-proclaimed life coaches out there, many with little to no actual formal training or qualifications. At its heart, life coaching should be performed by someone who is professionally trained to help you reach your full potential. A life coach is like an unbiased confidante with whom you can share your fears, desires, and struggles, and who can take this information to help you uncover the best version of yourself.
Now, there is very little regulation in Australia around who can call themselves a life coach. That’s why it’s important to find out more about your life coach’s training, qualifications, and experience before committing to starting work with them. A good life coach knows how to ask the right questions and communicate well with all types of people. They should be able to meet you on your level and make you feel safe and comfortable in sharing with them. They should also have completed some form of life coaching training – so be sure to enquire about that.
Reading testimonials from previous clients they have helped is one way to get an idea of a life coach’s expertise, but you might also like to look out for other valuable qualifications such as counselling, psychology, and more – as counsellors and psychologists with life coaching services are highly qualified and experienced in working with people to tackle even the most challenging of obstacles.
How finding a coach changed my life: Meg’s story
Meg describes her circumstances, pre-life coaching as ‘floating through life’. Although she was educated and successful, she shied away from being called ‘ambitious’. She did all the things she felt she was supposed to do – go to university, get a degree, find a job, save money – and yet, she steered away from setting goals that were ‘too big’.
“I have always enjoyed goals, liked to be challenged, liked to learn and attain new skills. But upon reflection, everything I did feels like it was based on a script… written by someone else.”
“I had many limiting beliefs about what my career could be and what’s possible. I don’t remember setting goals that aligned to a big dream. I don’t remember tracking my progress and pursuing growth. I don’t remember thinking that I wanted to leave the world a better place than I found it. All of this changed though, when I found a coach.”
When Meg started seeing a life coach, she felt her whole perspective on life shifted. She started to think bigger, because her coach challenged her. She also started to confront her fears, because her coach asked her questions that encouraged her to think more deeply about herself and her life than she normally would. Because of the way her life coach challenged and inspired her to change her way of thinking, Meg started to ask herself ‘why not’ when it came to setting bigger goals, and rather than tell herself ‘I’ll try’ she started to say ‘I will’ – and that made all the difference.
“Without coaching, I wonder where I would be. I think I would still be contemplating the idea that one day I might want to be an author, and have let five years pass without taking action. I’d be reacting to the challenges thrown at me. Maybe I’d only just be surviving. I think fear would be in the driver’s seat. Don’t get me wrong: I am still scared. But I’m leaning into courage now, which is to take action despite the fear.
“I am learning how to tell the world what I want to do and feel comfortable in my ambition, in my desire and sense of duty to leave the world a better place than I found it. I feel comfortable in talking so strongly about my mission. I am here to reach out a helping hand to women to help them to unlock their ambition. “
Coaching changed things in ways I never expected: Yunzhe’s story
Yunzhe has always been a fan of personal development. She often received self-help books as gifts from friends and family, who understood her passion for personal growth. In a never-ending quest for building her perfect career, she would devour all of these books eagerly. What she didn’t realise for a long time, however, was that she was working herself into a productivity-fuelled burnout.
“I was tied to my calendar in 30 minute increment tasks that I assigned. I constantly thought I needed to fix myself, and measured my worth based on how many tasks I was able to check off. On the surface I was being efficient, but on the inside I was suffering beyond words.”
Coaching changed all of that for Yunzhe, which is why she’s an excellent inclusion in our life coaching success stories article; outwardly, no one would have suspected that the driven, efficient, and successful Yunzhe needed a life coach, but she was in fact, the perfect candidate.
As Yunzhe discovered, life coaching isn’t just for those finding themselves lost or directionless. Life coaching is a powerful and effective tool for anyone looking to lead a better life and become the best version of themselves – whatever that may be. In her case, she needed to realise that productivity for productivity’s sake was not working for her. She needed to balance rest, self-reflection, and working towards her goals equally. Realising this not only improved her work-life balance, it also propelled her business forward.
“I finally got coaching when I realized that what I was doing wasn’t working: I was buying endless courses out of desperation to get my business going, and felt so confused and unaligned. I realized that I couldn’t do it on my own anymore, because if I knew how, I would’ve done it already. It was time to get outside help and learn from those who’ve done it before.
“Fast forward to now, I’m the happiest I’ve ever been — my business feels fun and easeful, I’m working with amazing clients who inspire me, and I just had the biggest month ever, where I made more money in 30 days than I did during my first year of coaching. AND on top of that, I just came back from living abroad for 6 months with the love of my life.”
Life Coaching Gold Coast
We hope that these life coaching success stories have given you a better idea of just how impactful life coaching can be. Here at Integrated Health Specialists, we are not only qualified and experienced in neuro-linguistic programming, counselling and psychology, but also offer unique and highly successful life coaching programs. During these programs, we make use of the latest solution-focused mind techniques to help you reach your goals by helping you to clarify your goals, remove obstacles you didn’t even know you had, and significantly improve your quality of life. Find out more about our life coaching services here, or get in touch with us today for an appointment.
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