Those of you who had the opportunity to make use of the services of a life coach, may have heard some of the following phrases:
“Visualize the best for yourself, and you will become the best”
“Think positive thoughts and you will reap the awards”
“Positive thoughts equal a positive lifestyle”
“If you focus on what you want, you will get what you want”
These are only a handful of phrases commonly used by life coaches whose job it is to coach clients to become the best they can be. Many times, visiting a life coach can be like sitting in the audience of a motivational speaker – you feel the energy and become consumed by the positive vibes and high-level vibrations. These individuals are literally charged with positive energy and can spike your dopamine levels to an unknown high. Motivating and keeping clients’ energy levels at an all-time high is often seen as one of the duties of a life coach. Many expectations are built around this perception. I do understand, and as a transformation and life coach myself, I do acknowledge the importance of positive thinking, visualization, and high frequency emotions. The challenge, however, is to maintain such high frequency emotions all the time.
Setting the Record Straight
When clients visit me for their initial appointment, one of the first aspects of my coaching process that I clarify is that it is not my job to coach them to be happy all the time. The amount of happiness they will experience, will depend on them – what they take from the sessions and how they apply it in their daily lives. Even if they follow the teachings religiously, there is no guarantee that they will not, at some point, experience challenging emotions again. However, if they apply what I coach, they will have the tools to deal with these emotions more effectively and quicker, and they will be able to move on sooner than usual.
Control Equals Power
We all know that life happens and, as Mark Manson puts it, we all get served a ‘shit sandwich’. The sandwich can be in the form of a colleague or boss that is unreasonable or discriminating, a spouse that demands what you cannot provide in that specific moment, challenging children, a flat tire on the highway, financial hardship, or just a very blue Monday. According to me the power lies in how we perceive this sandwich and how we react to it. We can run screaming, we can protest, we can become anxious, angry, tearful, or even throw up. We can do all that, or we can eat the sandwich and get it over and done with. The victory therefore does not lie in feeling good all the time, but to take control of challenging situations and be resilient.
Dealing with Limiting Beliefs
During sessions I coach clients how to manage their inner conflict and deal with negative emotions. One way of dealing with the emotions is to go to the core, finding the limiting belief behind the emotion. Once they can identify the limiting belief, they become aware of why they react the way they do. This awareness is crucial, because once the client identifies the limiting belief behind the behaviour, a new belief can be constructed, a belief that empowers, and will ultimately become a tool to manifest new and healthy behaviour.
Taking Control
It is unrealistic to expect good and happy feelings all the time. Such expectations only make it worse. Clients can feel despondent because they cannot maintain such blissful feelings and they see themselves as failures. The moment clients realize that it is okay to feel disheartened at times, they become less judgemental of themselves and others. They learn that the most important aspect is not to avoid such feelings, but to identify the limiting belief behind the feeling, to reflect on it, and to decide how to respond. This is a process, from where the clients respond to the environment in an impulsive, emotional manner, to where they respond in a way that makes them feel empowered. This is an important realization in the coaching process, where clients know that they decide how to respond. Even if they do not have control over the environment, they have control over the way they behave. Within that realization the client steps out of the victim shoes and takes control.
