The Value of a Coaching Session

You do not have to figure yourself out before you ask for coaching.

You may think you need to understand your problem before you bring it to a coach. You need the right words, a clear explanation, maybe a Model that is already figured out. You want to be together enough to get the help you need.

But figuring out what is happening in your mind is part of the work of a coaching session. You do not have to do that work before you arrive.

You get to come and be you. The coach leads the session.

The coach does the heavy lifting

When I train coaches at The Life Coach School, I teach them to prepare for and manage the session. The client may not know what they need. They may not know why they feel the way they feel or why they cannot find motivation.

I do not want the client to have to solve those questions alone before they talk to a coach. The session is where we can explore them.

You can bring a topic, a question, or a Model. You can ask about a career change, weight loss, motivation, or a relationship. You can also come without knowing where to start. Our coaches ask questions, offer tools, and take you through processes that help you see your mind.

I cannot speak for every coaching relationship. This is the way I teach our coaches to take responsibility for a session. You do not have to entertain the coach. You do not have to arrive with a polished presentation of your life.

Understanding a concept is not the same as seeing your mind

You can understand the Model and still miss what is happening in your own thinking. I see this with people who have studied this work, and I experience it myself.

Some friends of mine joined my coaching program and loved it. When we were talking about something they wanted to work on, they told me they were going to take it to the Model. I asked what they would put in the circumstance line.

Their answer was a thought. They did not yet see the difference between what was happening in the world and their interpretation of it.

That distinction matters. If I look outside and think it is a gorgeous day, I am having a thought about the day. It does not become a fact simply because it feels obvious to me.

We are so used to our own observations that we treat them as reality. We are like fish in water. We do not notice the thinking we are swimming in.

A coach can show you the interpretation

I spoke with a colleague who was struggling after some business failures. The way he was thinking about himself, his finances, and his future was devastating to him.

He believed he was simply looking at what had happened. He was looking at his business and his bank account. To him, it seemed he was seeing reality.

What I wanted him to see was the interpretation he was adding. His thoughts about what had happened were creating his devastation and perpetuating the idea that he was a failure.

He was intelligent and familiar with personal development. That did not make his own thinking easy to recognize.

A coach who is not inside your life can help you see what you are treating as fact. That perspective gives you room to consider how your thoughts create your feelings, how those feelings drive your actions, and what results you are producing.

I need that perspective, too

I often call a close friend who is also a coach and tell her about my day. I think I am just conveying the facts. I do not think I am adding a spin.

Then she points out thoughts I am having about what happened. Some of those thoughts are causing me pain, and I have not recognized them as thoughts at all.

When she helps me see the difference, I have more freedom. I can change my thinking, my feelings, my actions, and my results.

Knowing how to coach yourself does not eliminate the value of being coached. Hearing your thoughts out loud and having someone reflect them back can open up possibilities you could not see from inside your own mind.

Take off your coaching hat

This is especially important if you are a coach or have done a lot of this work. You may think you already know what is happening. You may be able to justify your limited thinking very convincingly.

When you go to a session, take off your coaching hat. Do not try to coach yourself while someone else is coaching you. Do not edit what you say to sound evolved or clean-minded.

Let yourself be a hot mess.

Think of getting a massage. If you spend the whole time telling the person how to do it, you miss the experience you came for. In a coaching session, you can let the coach hold space without judgment while you look at your mind together.

Say the thoughts out loud

A thought download is one way to begin. Instead of writing your thoughts down alone, you say them to your coach. Sometimes I hear myself say something and realize I did not even know it was in my brain.

From there, we can take a few thoughts and work through Models. We can look at what you currently think and what you want to think. We can explore a decision with someone who has no vested interest in which option you choose.

You can also experience an emotion with a witness. Describing the vibration in your body to another person lets you hear your own description. Having someone listen while you feel can deepen your awareness in a different way than doing it alone.

Awareness makes the tools useful

The Model includes circumstances, thoughts, feelings, actions, and results. Whatever you bring to coaching, we can examine it through those five components.

I have had long sessions focused on one Model that changed everything. I have also had sessions with many Models that changed everything. The number is not the point. Seeing what is actually happening is the point.

You can bring a Model you have already completed and get help making it more effective for awareness and change. You can bring a concept you do not understand or something I teach that you disagree with. Exploring it may strengthen your perspective or give you another way to look at it.

A coaching session gives you time to work on your life instead of simply being in it. You have a witness, a place to hear your thinking, and someone to help you see yourself without judgment.

You do not have to arrive with yourself figured out. You arrive so you can become more aware of yourself.