Life coaching is about where you are now and where you want to be. It is like driving your own car "life". You are sitting on the driver's seat, holding your steering-wheel. Your coach will be sitting next to you. Your coach will help you see better and decide where you want to go, what you want to do, and how you could reach your desired destination. Your coach will support you with various coaching tools and techniques until you achieve your goals and objectives. You meet on regular basis with your personal coach. You practice for excellence. In simple words; "You deepen the learning, forward the action & get real results", with the professional help of your life coach.
Coaching is art & craft
Definition
Coaching is defined by the International Coaching Federation as "an ongoing partnership that helps clients produce fulfilling results in their personal and professional lives.
Through the process of coaching, clients deepen their learning, improve their performance, and enhance their quality of life".
"Professional coaches are trained to listen and observe, to customize their approach to the individual client's needs, and to elicit solutions and strategies from the client".
ICF goes on to describe the coaching sessions, "In each meeting, the client chooses the focus of conversations, while the coach listens and contributes observations and questions. This interaction creates clarity and moves the client into action.
Coaching accelerates the client's progress by providing greater focus and awareness of choice. Coaching concentrates on where clients are today and what they are willing to do to get where they want to be tomorrow".
Coaching with NLP
(NLP) is thought to be one of the most effective and accessible self-help methods to come from modern psychology. Many life coaches use NLP techniques to help 'reprogramme' clients' patterns of thinking and behaving.
NLP stands for Neuro-Linguistic Programming. 'Neuro', Latin for nerve, refers to the way we gather information from the outside world with our five senses. 'Linguistic', the study of language, refers to the way we make sense of that information by organising it into the structure of language. 'Programming' is a way of controlling something.
In this case it refers to the way our interpretations of the world control our actions, choices and behaviours in day-to-day life. NLP teaches us that by changing how we make sense of the world, we can then adjust our behaviours and actions in order to make the most of ourselves and our lives.
By harnessing the power of language, NLP-trained life coaches can break down the mental barriers we all unknowingly create for ourselves over time and habit.
NLP can assist stress management, improve empathy and communication skills, resolve destructive relationship patterns and encourage clients to move out of their comfort zones towards fuller, happier, and infinitely more satisfying lives.
Main Characteristics
Important Distinctions
Professional coaching focuses on setting goals, creating outcomes and managing personal change. Sometimes it’s helpful to understand coaching by distinguishing it from other personal or organizational support professions.
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Therapy: Therapy deals with healing pain, dysfunction and conflict within an individual or in relationships. The focus is often on resolving difficulties arising from the past that hamper an individual's emotional functioning in the present, improving overall psychological functioning, and dealing with the present in more emotionally healthy ways. Coaching, on the other hand, supports personal and professional growth based on self-initiated change in pursuit of specific actionable outcomes. These outcomes are linked to personal or professional success. Coaching is future focused. While positive feelings/emotions may be a natural outcome of coaching, the primary focus is on creating actionable strategies for achieving specific goals in one's work or personal life. The emphases in a coaching relationship are on action, accountability, and follow through.
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Consulting: Individuals or organizations retain consultants for their expertise. While consulting approaches vary widely, the assumption is the consultant will diagnose problems and prescribe and, sometimes, implement solutions. With coaching, the assumption is that individuals or teams are capable of generating their own solutions, with the coach supplying supportive, discovery-based approaches and frameworks.
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Mentoring: A mentor is an expert who provides wisdom and guidance based on his or her own experience. Mentoring may include advising, counseling and coaching. The coaching process does not include advising or counseling, and focuses instead on individuals or groups setting and reaching their own objectives.
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Training: Training programs are based on objectives set out by the trainer or instructor. Though objectives are clarified in the coaching process, they are set by the individual or team being coached, with guidance provided by the coach. Training also assumes a linear learning path that coincides with an established curriculum. Coaching is less linear without a set curriculum.
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Athletic Development: Though sports metaphors are often used, professional coaching is different from sports coaching. The athletic coach is often seen as an expert who guides and directs the behavior of individuals or teams based on his or her greater experience and knowledge. Professional coaches possess these qualities, but their experience and knowledge of the individual or team determines the direction. Additionally, professional coaching, unlike athletic development, does not focus on behaviors that are being executed poorly or incorrectly. Instead, the focus is on identifying opportunity for development based on individual strengths and capabilities.
