As the name suggests, a life coach coaches their clients through the challenges that they may face in their lives. They suggest strategies that the client can use in order to overcome these hurdles and – if these strategies don’t work – they go on to help their clients find a strategy that works for them in their circumstance.
In this article, we’ll discuss several aspects that a life coach can help a client with, namely:
• Setting goals
• Relationship coaching
• Career planning
• Wellness coaching
Setting Goals
If you’re struggling to set realistic and achievable goals in your life, a life coach can help you overcome this stumbling block. How will they do this? First of all, they’ll teach you what the characteristics of great goals are:
• They are always stated positively, e.g. “I want to train at exercise daily” instead of “I want to stop being a couch potato”.
• Great goals are always aligned with your personal values. If your goals contradict your core beliefs, you might still be able to reach them, but it will be twice as hard and far less satisfying. The more a goal is in line with your personal value system the easier it will be to achieve.
• A goal that is great is outcomes focused. For example, “I want to exercise daily. The reason for this is so that I can become healthier and manage stress better”. Once you have established the ‘because’ (i.e. WHY? “So that I can become healthier and manager stress better”) you’re 90% on your way to becoming a living success story!
• Great goals are always S.M.A.R.T:
S: Specific: They need to be specific, so you know exactly what you’re trying to achieve.
M: Measurable: You need deadlines and specifics included in your goal setting so that you can see when you are moving closer to your ultimate goals.
A: Achievable: There needs to be an element of DOING in every goal you set otherwise it’s too abstract to realise. An action-oriented goal is a WINNING goal!)
R: Realistic: Only realistic goals are achievable and sustainable. If you decide, for instance, to do 60 sales calls in an hour it’s simply not realistic. Some of the people you call will not be available. You need to calculate the time in between calls to make notes on your calls. You need to estimate what time might be spent holding on for people who are on another call, etc. Aim for a realistic, doable goal and you’ll be far more likely to reach it.
T: Time-bound: All goals need to have deadlines.
Relationship coaching
Young people can acquire relationship skills through life coaching, such as:
• Learning how to handle life transitions
• Explore happiness and greater fulfilment
• Preparing people for relationships
• Negotiating new relationships
• Copying with problems that arise in relationships
• Resuscitating relationships
• Ending relationships.
Career planning
The ability to study well stretches far beyond the walls of your high school, college or university. The following are a few study skills that we could all do with improving. Going to an enlightened life coach has set many a client on the right path for career planning or school .
There are a couple of study skills that a life coach can assist a client to hone or acquire:
• The skill of choosing what to study
• Time management skills
• The skill of combatting procrastination
Wellness coaching
Wellness is an integral part of life coaching and a wonderful specialisation to gain insight into if you’re embracing a career in life coaching.
The concept of ‘wellness’ refers to a person’s maximum health potential. It is a holistic approach. An active lifestyle and fit life does not wait for something to go wrong before one does something about it. The assumption is that someone does not display signs or symptoms of health problems as healthy, but wellness goes far beyond the absence of symptoms and works towards achieving maximum potential and prevention of health problems.
If you have a certain challenge/set of challenges that you feel that a life coach can help you deal with then we recommend that you go to see one! Going to see a life coach doesn’t mean that there’s something ‘wrong’ with you. All it means is that you feel that you need a little assistance in dealing with what’s on your plate.
