Life coaching as a concept can traced back to the 1970s summarized by the following quote from Timothy Gallwey’s 1974 book, The Inner Game of Tennis:

“The thoughts, feelings, and motivations within us may be invisible, even to ourselves, but have great impact on how we see ourselves, the choices we make, how we see and treat others which in turn create much of the external conditions in which we live.” - Timothy Gallwey

This quote refers to how coaching reflects a client’s internal processes and mindset and provides a framework to support moving a client toward desired changes externally.

Coaching was cultivated into a profession further in the 1980s by Sir John Whitmore, moving from sports performance coaching to business and leadership coaching and then, based on results, began to be applied to other areas of life.

Today, the International Coaching Federation (ICF), which was founded in 1995 and is the foremost governing body in the coaching industry, defines coaching as "partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential."

Through powerful question asking, active listening, reframing perspective, goal setting and action planning, coaching helps extract inner wisdom and resourcefulness from within clients and provides the structure and support to make tangible progress against goals.

Benefits of investing in coaching may include; gaining a greater sense of agency and direction, increased self and situational awareness, outside accountability for taking action, and ultimately, implementation of highly impactful and desired changes in clients’ lives.

Although coaches may use similar approaches that derive from studies in the field of psychology (particularly from positive psychology), coaching does not take a clinical approach, does not utilize the DSM, and would not be appropriate for acute psychological crises. Coaches are not licensed medical professionals, do not make diagnoses or offer prescriptive/directive advice.

Coaching may place more focus on action planning and be more future oriented rather than processing the past, though coaching facilitates learning from the past. Therapy is often more appropriate for supporting people move from a suffering state to baseline state, where coaching can support moving people from baseline functioning to a thriving state.

Someone can be in both therapy and coaching simultaneously if they have the capacity to do so as there can be a synergistic effect in multiple areas of their lives.

Yes, anything shared within the coaching relationship is confidential. Even the fact that you have inquired about services or have begun working with me as a coach is confidential (of course you are free to share this information, but I would never without your permission).

Please note that there are conditions that may require breach of confidentiality, namely if I’m subpoenaed by court of law, if you confess you have committed a serious crime while working with me, or if you are at imminent risk of hurting others or yourself. There will be no surprises as confidentiality impacting issues will be discussed with you prior to breach. This typically is not a concern for anyone who works with me as we evaluate alignment of values and needs during the initial connection/discovery call up front. Communicating this policy protects both coach and client.

Before jumping into coaching, we’ll connect to ensure coaching with me is a good fit and agree on terms and logistics. As a professional coaching practice, we will work off a coaching contract. The contract is always amendable, but it serves as a basis of understanding and reference point and must be signed before we start actual coaching sessions.

Logistics will be discussed during initial connection call. Video call links are included in meeting invitations for appointments. After enrollment, you will have access to my appointment scheduler, allowing you to select a time slot(s) that works for you.

If we happen to be co-located, we can attempt to meet in person. Otherwise, video calls are completely effective for both verbal and non-verbal communication. Phone calls can also absolutely work, especially after rhythm of relationship has been established.

Complete a coaching certification program. I graduated from Lumia’s Signature program, an ICF (International Coaching Federation) level 2 accredited program.

See the ICF’s core competencies that coaches are typically well versed in and the code of ethics that ICF-aligned professional coaches abide by.

If you are facing financial hardship, support may be available, assuming we are otherwise a good fit.

I also offer discounts for multi-session up front purchases to save money on price per session (multi-session packages must be used within timeframe).

I very much appreciate referrals, introductions and word of mouth promotion. Please feel free to share my website and encourage them to explore!

However, a prerequisite for working with people is that someone has recognized a need/desire for change within themselves, and they are ready to invest in a coaching engagement. The internal motivation ideally is there already to do the work. We can’t force people into engaging in personal development work, no matter how obvious it may appear that they would benefit. Similarly, we can’t impose goals or values on others. Intrinsic motivation is an important part of coaching and sets a coach-client relationship up for success.

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