Why you DO need a Life Coach

What life coaches are not

Before we consider what life coaches do and why you should seriously consider hiring the services of one, let’s briefly consider what they are not.

Not counsellors or therapists

Life coaches are not trained to offer counselling or psychotherapy or any form of treatment for people who require assistance in coming to terms with severe mental or emotional distress caused by trauma, anxiety, depression or some form of mental health condition.

Not mentors

Mentors rely on their superior wisdom and experience to help guide and advise people who want to advance in a chosen field or profession.

Life coaches, on the other hand, never enter into coaching relationships by positioning themselves as ‘experts’ in their clients lives.

Not consultants or advisors

Life coaches do not specialise in providing advice or designing specific solutions that they think will meet their clients’ needs.

Not ‘agony aunts’

Life coaches are not there to provide a shoulder to cry on for clients who simply wish to air their concerns, grievances and ills. Life coaches don’t help their clients by focusing on their problems.

Not motivational speakers

Life coaches are, indeed, experts in human motivation but they do not operate by imparting one-off, one-way motivational talks to groups of people who may or may not be inspired to act on their messages.

 

If not that then what?

In describing what life coaching is, and what life coaches do, it is often helpful to deal upfront with the common misperceptions about life coaches being a bit of this and a bit of that when it comes to the disciplines mentioned above.

In reality, apart from the fact that life coaches also operate in the field of human motivation, what they do is distinctly different.

Here are a series of statements that attempt to explain how and why:

Life coaching involves working with mentally well, effectively functioning people who simply want to achieve more or get more from life.

Life coaches work from the premise that their clients are the only true experts in their own lives.

The expertise of the life coach lies in his or her unique ability to relate to individual clients and to prescribe tools, techniques and processes to help those clients achieve specific goals and derive more joy and fulfilment from life.

Life coaches do not, as a general rule, offer advice to their clients. Rather, they help their clients to re-connect with the repository of their own best advice – their all-knowing inner beings.

Life coaching focuses, not on problems, but on solutions.

Life coaching recognises that the past does not have to dictate the future. However, the past holds valuable lessons and experiences that, if understood and applied, can have a powerful influence on extracting the best from the present and enhancing the future.

Life coaches respect the fact that every client is unique, and will tailor their coaching engagements accordingly. Although they may resort to common tools, techniques and processes, the application thereof will differ for each and every client.

Life coaches understand and appreciate that taking inspired and directed action is the only way to ensure that the change desired is the change achieved.

Life coaches will never do the work for their clients. They are expert facilitators, who inspire, empower, encourage and gently push their clients to do more, be more and have more.

Life coaches refuse to tolerate mediocrity. They hold their clients to the high standards they know their clients are capable of. They are masters of the art of challenging their clients … but with due compassion and integrity.

Life coaching is not a one-off event. To be effective, life coaching involves a number of in depth sessions. Change is a process that requires both time and commitment. That said, the power of life coaching is such that the effects of years of procrastination and postponement can be halted and reversed within just a few months.

 

The New Insights difference

Hopefully from the ‘sound bytes’ I have used to describe life coaching above, you are beginning to appreciate why almost anyone who wants to achieve a goal, aspiration or dream – or simply be more effective and fulfilled at what they do – can benefit, substantially, from life coaching.

New Insights certified and licensed coaches, who go through comprehensive and rigorous training, take the ‘art’ a big step further.

They are specially trained and equipped to offer coaching that is transactional in nature (less structured and more short-term goal driven) as well as that which is nothing less than transformational in nature.

Transformational life coaching is made possible with our amazing New Insights Life Coaching System that employs our proprietary INSIGHTS coaching model.

This System has been specifically designed and structured to move the client towards the clear identification of his or her life purpose. It also facilitates the alignment of the client’s values, goals, actions and behaviours with his or her reason for being.

Approximately six to seven months of coaching on a two-weekly basis can bring about a life changing shift that, while limited in cost, can prove truly priceless in value.

New Insights certified life coaches can be found all over the world. Some promote their practices on our Directories:

The Life Coach Directory in South Africa:
https://www.life-coach-directory.co.za

The Directory of Life Coaches in the UK (only recently launched): https://www.directory-of-life-coaches.co.uk