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What is Life Coaching?
A coach is someone who is more of a partner than an expert, who gets you to find your own answers instead of providing them for you.
A life coach helps his/her clients to :
- Set performance targets.
- Cope with pressure and stress.
- Develop and maintain vision.
- Deal with negative beliefs that might effect performance.
- Maintain motivation.
- Analyze performance.
- Stay focused.
So coaches are as much trainers of the mind as they are of the body. They can't play the sport of life for you, but they can help you set goals, assess your performance objectively, take action to improve your performance, and keep you motivated and on track.
Hiring a coach helps you get results in your life because he or she helps you to develop the knowledge, skill, confidence and motivation you need.
How does coaching happens?
Conversations
Coaching is all about "powerful conversations" between you and your coach. Sure, we have conversations all the time, but many of these are based on cementing social ties, passing the time or conveying information. Coaching conversations are powerful because both the coach and client concentrate fully during the discussion, and direct their energies in a very focused way.
Questions
These conversations are different from our regular talk in another way. They involve the coach asking questions of the client.
The Socratic method of question-asking certainly has a long tradition. In the 5th century BC, Socrates used the power of the question to prompt his conversation partners to discover their beliefs and uncover logical errors.
Why do coaches tend to ask Socratic questions instead of dispensing wisdom or issuing commands? Such questions are "irresistible": "Whether clients agree or disagree, answer 'yes' or 'no', they have to think. A question is a searchlight that the coach shines into the dark places of their clients' mind."
Questions force us to think for ourselves, think about what is being asked, think about where we want to be headed. They foster awareness of the current reality around us, and self-awareness of what is happening inside us.