Most people seem to have a pretty vague idea about what coaching is. I used to be the same way.
Even after receiving coaching for a while, and getting the results I wanted with it, I still couldn’t clearly explain exactly how or why it was working.
But after spending the last 2 years experiencing my own breakthroughs and helping others to do the same, I feel like I can finally explain why coaching is so effective.
Let’s face it, your life is the result of your habitual patterns of thought, and that makes sense. If you keep thinking the same thoughts, then you will likely take the same actions and get the same results.
The purpose of coaching is to support and empower you in learning and practicing to shift your thoughts and thus your actions intentionally instead of by default.
Through coaching you increasingly become aware of the thoughts you are paying attention to, while remaining focused on what you really want and how you want to feel instead of what’s in your way.
When you do this, all of your actions become easier, more efficient and effective and guarantee that not only will you get what you want, but you will enjoy the journey getting there.
Sounds simple.
So why does it seem so hard sometimes to make changes in your life?
Have you ever noticed that when you are learning a new physical skill, it seems to take most of your attention?
Driving is a great example. When you first learned how to drive, you were likely very present and focused on every movement (and mistake) you made.
After a while, you were able to operate your car effectively and efficiently without much effort or attention.
You body learned that driving from home to work became a series of actions and reactions that had been accomplished so often, that they were now taken without thought or question.
This effect is called “muscle memory,” and athletes intentionally train to accomplish this, so that their body can move quickly and precisely without thinking.
The exact same thing happens with your thoughts and emotions.
Think of your brain as the processor of a massive relational database.
Every time you observe something, your brain makes sense of it by relating it to something that you are already familiar with.
It then uses this relationship to interpret or assign meaning to whatever you are observing.
In the beginning, you might stop and question whether your interpretation of what you are observing is correct.
But just like muscle memory, if you come to the same conclusion and have the same response often enough, the entire thought / emotional pathway eventually becomes an unconscious thought pattern and is no longer questioned.
These unquestioned thought patterns become the assumptions used to then justify other interpretations.
So you can see how it is possible for an unquestioned false assumption to then lead to other false assumptions.
Coaching works by using various techniques and processes to help you slow down the thought pathway process, and create space between each of those steps, so that you can systematically identify and see the truth of any unconscious assumptions that are preventing you from living the life you want.
Real transformation occurs when you are then able to “see something” that you didn’t see before; a different but equally true perspective.
Not only that, but once you see it, it becomes so obvious that you can’t “unsee” it.
This shift in perspective creates clarity where there previously was confusion or doubt and is often described as the “AHA moment.”
Once you are able to see things differently, new options, ideas and actions become available to you, and you realize that you now have a choice as to what you focus on and how you respond.
And it is by changing your response to life, that you can then change your life.