What is a Life Coach and Why is it like Taking a Walk in the Forest?

Psst, let's get going. Something beautiful is waiting just around the corner!

That's what coaching feels like to me. The opportunity to dig in and explore the areas of our mind that we don't pay much attention to. The place where all of our hopes and dreams and hurts and habits hideout. When you work with a coach, it feels like having a guide that walks beside you as you explore your inner thinking. Always encouraging you to look a little deeper, always asking questions out of curiosity. 

Happy 2018!!

I hope this message finds you motivated and ready to move into the new year in a new and better way. Growth is the name of the game. It's the guaranteed way to ensure that you are living your best life possible.

2017 was incredible for me. I worked with some truly amazing people as a coach and enjoyed seeing the huge results and wins that came out of that!

Coaching has the ability to do so much for us. For me personally, it helped to shape who I am today. 

It's helped me to: 

• understand and see when I was ready to leave a job that was no longer serving me

• move through the process of helping my dad downsize from a home, 60+ years worth of stuff and onto a boat (after 6 months of living with my husband and I.)

• deal with the anxiety that I sometimes experience being the mom of two young adults, who now get to make their own decisions (I had no idea how much I liked to be in control!)

• believe in myself enough to land a p/t job with one of my favorite podcasters! (I love a good side hustle)

In addition, I watched as coaching transformed the lives of my clients. I witnessed people transform into braver, newer versions of themselves.

In some of their words they:

“...took an hour of coaching and translated it directly into picking up a brand new client the very same day! Where I had been feeling stuck, coaching helped by allowing me to verbally process, get out of my head and ask for the sale. It reminded me of my value, which increased my confidence in that moment.”

“Coaching helped me to better understand what Shaun refers to as ADHD Tendencies, revealing traits that I had experienced my entire life, but never fully understood. Shaun related to me in a way that only someone who has experienced some of the very same things could. Always encouraging, never judging.”

“My weekly sessions were instrumental in my accomplishment of so many of my goals this past year! I surprised myself with all that I had done by year-end.”

If you have been considering coaching I want to invite you to schedule a free 15-minute consultation with me. 

Let me ask you, What would you most like to accomplish this year? What has always been a dream of yours that you'd like to make happen? What has held you back in the past? What have you tolerated for far too long? What is missing from your life? If you could improve one area of your life what would it be?

Coaching can help. I have proof. I've seen it work. I would love to talk to you.

Deciding to See ADHD Tendencies in a Positive Light

Back in 2016, fresh off of a Danielle LaPorte exercise, I determined my top 5 Core Desired Feelings, or CDFs. I spent a chunk of time doing the work to figure out exactly how I wanted to feel most of the time. Once I settled on 5, I set them as my intention for the year and went off on my merry way. 

Fast forward to the end of 2017 and as I reflect back on my accomplishments and growth these past few years, I can't help but take another look at my CDFs from 2 years ago. They have not steered me wrong.

In fact, if I were to choose all over again, I would pick the same feelings. What this tells me is that while my circumstances have changed quite a bit, I'm still choosing things that help me feel Genuine, Eclectic, Adventuresome, Resourceful and Captivated. 

As someone with ADHD tendencies, I believe tendencies themselves are neutral. Not positive or negative. These tendencies are not positive or negative until I have a thought about them. (A lot of that has to do with the thought work that I've done in Brooke Castillo's Self Coaching Scholars program.)

Oftentimes, people that don't understand ADHD or ADHD tendencies, how the brain is wired, and how brain chemicals play a part in our everyday actions, will see these tendencies as negative and label them as such. I chose instead to embrace some of my tendencies and flip them on their head.

To think of them as positive qualities.

Here's what I mean: 

Tendency

Direct/No filter

Many interests

Risk Taker

Jack of All Trades

Hyper-focus

Negative Version

Insensitive/Awkward

Flighty/Scattered

Wild

Know-it-all

Selfish
 

Positive Version

Genuine

Eclectic

Adventuresome

Resourceful

Captivated

I had always viewed my "tendencies" through a negative lens. If only I could change them!

Instead, in 2016 I looked at each of those neutral tendencies and searched for ways that they contributed to my life. I paid attention to how I wanted to feel when those tendencies were happening. I chose positive descriptors and claimed them like badges of honors.

I also decided that I didn't want to wait for some big occurance to happen or my circumstances to change in order to feel my desired feelings. I wanted to make choices daily that allowed me to feel genuine, eclectic, adventuresome, resourceful and captivated.

I'm not waiting for one big adventure to occur to make me feel adventuresome, I choose a little bit of adventure each day and feel it now. I won't wait for a client or boss to tell me I'm resourceful in order to feel resourceful, I do and think things every day that make me feel it now. I don't need proof from others that they believe I am genuine, I think of myself as genuine now. I don't need a personality quiz to tell me that I'm eclectic, my interests are varied and I choose to think that makes me eclectic (not scattered) and I feel eclectic now. When I truly love and enjoy something I can stay focused on it for hours (sometimes at the detriment of other things), I choose to see this as a positive quality, and feel captivated by whatever it is that currently has my attention.

Tell me about you. How do you want to feel this year? What tendencies do you have? What negative labels do you want to shake? 

Knowing these things can help you set your goals.  

2018 is on it's way. There's no time like the present!

Rewritten Story

and so it begins...

Past job. Past relationship. What happened? Drama. What’s your drama?

All I know is…

It felt like I sold my soul. I was the living version of The Devil Wears Prada.

My bosses even said so. Laughed about it.

For a long time, my thoughts were: She just doesn’t trust me yet. See me yet. Know me yet. I am different. I am loyal. I am committed. I am ride or die. How dare he?

I know how to do tough things. I will rise above. I will be the bigger person. I will not let this get to me. Who does this? How can someone be so unaware? Are they unaware? Is this malicious? Why is it familiar? Why does it have the same vibration of a dysfunctional relationship? Why do I stay? What do I get from this?

Approval. Proof.

That I am tough and can withstand anything. I can do the impossible.

I’ll show them…why? What do I need to prove?

If I can do this, I can do anything.

How is this good for me?

I am stubborn. I don’t like to be wrong.

It’s ok to be wrong. It’s ok to be wrong, even when you’re not. People are allowed to think and believe whatever they want to about me.

I know my heart. I know my intentions.

Expectations were high, I thrived. Expectations were impossible, I died. Inside.

I made it mean I was weak. I was a quitter.

Was I?

I was questioned “Are you sure? You’ve tried to leave before.”

Victim blaming. Was I a victim? In my mind, at the time, yes.

Lightweight.

Now I have rewritten the story.

And so it begins. A new day, a new thought.

Past job. Past relationship. What happened? Drama, lots of it. But now it’s math, just math.

What’s my drama? Indulging in confusion.

It’s a thing of the past.

I choose clarity. I choose truth.

What I know now is…

I was an emotional child. I was a people pleaser, a liar.

I looked outside of myself for validation. I looked up for validation.

I didn’t look within for validation.

I did the best I could with what I knew at the time.

I stepped in line and filled my role. Beyond filled my role.

I am trustworthy.

I am loyal.

I am committed.

I am all ride, no die!

I know how to do tough things.

I will rise up.

I will make room for all thoughts…theirs, mine. Ours.

I will allow others to be who they are, because they are beautiful too. Oh yeah, also because it’s not in my control to do otherwise. I will choose to see the bits of beauty. It’s always there.

Something doesn’t feel good. That’s ok.

What is it?

I stayed because I was supposed to. It was a stepping stone towards a better me.

What did I get?

All that I needed, and then I left. Peacefully.

What did I give? All that I had, and then learned I will always have more.

I can do anything. No proof needed.

How was it good for me?

It must’ve been, because it happened.

I can be wrong. I am wrong. Often.

What is wrong?

High expectations felt like growth. Impossible expectations felt like fire. But are fine.

Until they’re not.

I’m free to choose where I want to spend my time and with whom.

I am strong and chose to stop…

…the drama.

No victim here.

Someone who chose to stay and then to go.

That is all.

So what happened you ask?

I worked and grew and left and grew some more.

What’s my drama you ask?

Yesterday was money, today is lack of time and tomorrow, who knows.

All I know is…

I’m getting better at math.

Are you a recovering people pleaser? Book a free 45 minute mini-session to get a feel for how coaching can help support your efforts.