How Families Benefit From Coaching

What is Coaching?

It is well-known that successful athletes, actors, and executives have employed personal coaches to get them to be their absolute best by accessing and utilizing their deepest level of natural talents. People who use coaches achieve remarkable results in their professional lives and have a substantial advantage over those who don't. These same remarkable results hold true for life coaching - individuals who partner with coaches discover the resources they have within themselves and accelerate their success in any area of their lives, making their dreams become realities. A coach is a personal trainer for your life and champions you to achieve anything you desire.

The International Coach Federation (ICF) defines coaching as “partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that Inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential”. A coach provides an unbiased outside eye to help you clarify your visions, discover possibilities you may not have known, set and implement goals and work through any roadblocks along the way…all while cheering you on.

Coaching helps bring out the potential in a client, be it a person, couple, family, or corporation, moving them past their present level of success to where they want to be in their personal and/or professional lives. The Core Energy Coaching (TM) Process is done by emotionally connecting the client's inner purpose and passion to outer goals and strategies to bring about extraordinary and sustainable results. A coach provides a safe, confidential place for you to discover and speak the honest truth and empowers you to do more than you would have done on your own (and much more quickly). At the same time, a coach helps you identify your values, passions, and life purpose and then holds you true to these, while holding you accountable to your desired targets.

Coaching is an investment that you make in yourself. Coaching will inspire you to go beyond the ordinary, raise your standards, and live the life you desire and know you're truly capable of living. Take a few moments to imagine what your ideal life would look like. If those images are different from the life you are living today, coaching may be right for you.

To see if coaching is right for you, take this short quiz

While it is important to note that there are no "one size fits all" approaches, here are some examples of the types of work we do with our clients:

  • Coaching for inner peace in parenthood:making room for fulfillment and satisfaction
  • Coachingto practice extreme self-care: taking care of yourself, which also allows you to take better care of your family
  • Coaching for fun: bringing child-like joy back into your life
  • Coaching for balance: finding real balance through achieving an inner peace regardless of what's going on in your life (children, spouse, family, self,work,hundreds of volunteer opportunities at school, etc.)
  • Coaching to rediscover yourself: your values, your dreams, your passions, your purpose
  • Coaching for comfort with change: parenthood is constantly full of change - kids are always growing and changing
  • Coaching for decisions: finding harmony in family decisions
  • Coaching for improving relationships: strengthening the parent-child bond; keeping marriages strong, rejuvenating friendships, etc.
  • Coaching for attracting positive new relationships
  • Coaching for self-confidence: discovering strengths and building self esteem

How life coaching differs from therapy,sports coaching,consulting, etc.

Therapy. Therapists are experts in their field who often help clients fix problems, overcome issues, and sometimes manage mental illness. They often focus on a client's past wounds and strive to heal them so that the client can advance from a dysfunctional state to a normal, functional one. In contrast, the main focus of coaching is not on "healing emotional wounds" or fixing problems. In fact, coaches do not see anything as a problem, only as an opportunity. Coaches do not focus on the past or try to analyze behavior, but instead focus on taking the client from where he/she is currently to where he/she wants to be. Coaches help clients to progress from a normal state of being to an optimal one.

Sports Coaching. While there are many similarities to sports coaching, lifecoaching is not based on competition; the focus in not on win-or-lose scenarios. Coaches help clients to identify and utilize their strengths to create win-win scenarios for all involved.

Consulting.Consultants are generally hired to "fix" problems, or offer solutions, based on their expertise in a specific field.They arrive with an agenda and some possible answers, and typically are not involved in implementing the change. Coaches, on the other hand, have no agenda except to help the client get what they want. Coaches, rather than giving advice or answers, help the client to access the answers from within, and then support them throughout the growth and change process. A coach is a trusted advisor who provides a confidential and safe environment in which the client can explore his/her issues and concerns, and feel free to envision and create the life of their dreams.

Friendship. Friends and family can be a wonderful source of support and encouragement. But often these individuals are too close to the situation to remain impartial and refrain from giving advice. They often have their own agendas. It is difficult for someone close to client to push them beyond their limits and cause them to stretch and really grow. Additionally, friends may not point out various issues that a client should be addressing, for fear of hurting feelings. Coaches are trained professionals who are objective and nonjudgmental as they listen acutely and co-create solutions that are personalized for the client.

Mentor – A mentor provides advice based on his or her personal experience. A coach never gives advice or uses his/her personal experiences as the model for success for the client. A coach honors the individuality of every journey, and empowers the client to look for his or her own answers. A coach encourages the client to become his/her own model of success using a process that focuses on his/her experiences and strengths.

[Back to top]

Who Benefits and Why?

Most people who come to coaching have good lives and want them to be even better. Ideal clients are people who want to be proactive in their lives – not just to wait and see what happens to them, but actively decide what they want and make it happen. They typically value personal and professional development and desire to:

  • get more out of life than they are getting now, and start living their ideal life
  • achieve greater balance in their life
  • make a difference in their families, organizations and communities
  • get away from the craziness of everyday work and life and focus on making sustainable change
  • breakdestructive habits and create healthier ones

They understand that investing in themselves will result in a huge payoff, which benefits not only them, but their families and friends as well. While each person is completely unique, and therefore has a completely unique coaching experience, there are common outcomes reported by coaching clients:

  • I feel a sense of joy and confidence in my daily life.
  • I have enhanced relationships with my children, spouse, and friends.
  • I have greater self-confidence and self-esteem.
  • I enjoy less stress in my daily life.
  • I have more clarity about what is important to me and how I want to live my life.
  • I am better able to effect change and accomplish goals.
  • I am better able to manage the daily (often conflicting) demands of my life.
  • I feel satisfied and fulfilled, knowing that I am raising my children to be the best they can be.
  • I am happier, more at peace.

There are many reasons why so many people (more and more each year) are benefiting from coaching. As a team, client and coach focus on the client's goals, quickly and efficiently get to the essence of a matter, and accomplish much more (and much more quickly) than the client would alone. The coach creates a supportive environment where the client knows he/she is safe to explore new ideas, free from any kind of judgment. Direct questions from the coach help the client to gain clarity and see new possibilities. Clients are able to think bigger because conversations are focused on strengths and opportunities, rather than weaknesses and challenges.

Fresh ideas, insights, even epiphanies frequently come from this focused exchange. The coach helps the client keep his/her commitments in mind, and holds the client accountable, which encourages the client to take more action, and get the job done (and fast). Between sessions, the client agrees to continue the work by doing mutually agreed upon exercises or assignments. If the client shows signs of wavering, the coach helps the client determine how important the goal really is to them. Motivation is easy when things are going well, however when things get tough, motivation often declines. The coach helps the client remember the value of achieving their goals. This unconditional support and encouragement helps the keep client moving forward.

[Back to top]


© 2010 Cohesive Outcomes, LLC | info@cohesiveoutcomes.com