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Today’s expert is David Wetmore, a life coach with years of experience. David takes an “inside out” approach to coaching. With inside-out we are guided by our internal feelings rather than outside events. One of David’s biggest rewards is seeing a client have that “Aha” moment where they gain clarity and see something that previously was way beyond their reach.
David starts by talking about how change and coaching go hand-in-hand. People get stuck when it comes to change and need help. This is especially true when wanting to start their own business. The fear of leaving stability can be too much.
It can take some work to figure out what people really want to do. Doing a deeper dive can be stressful.
Sometimes David will ask the client do a faux resignation and just write the resignation letter and see how it feels. Then imagine how it feels walking through the resignation process. Don’t have to take action on it, just start stepping into those feelings.
Once they do that he walks them through the feelings of moving forward from the resignation.
The coaching process, itself, is just a conversation. If David listens long enough the client starts saying things of which they weren’t consciously aware but are quite important to them. It takes time for the insights to come up.
Stories and examples are often used as well as asking clients to relate situations to where they are in life. He then asks them to re-tell the story if something different would have happened in their life.
One of the first things David talks about with clients is slow down their thinking to become more aware which leads to greater productivity.
He goes on to talk about how the words “need” and “should” are very disempowering and need to be rooted out of one’s vocabulary. Substitute “want.”
The conversation turned to having to stop working with clients because the trauma/concern they are addressing is just too deep to be brought to the surface at the time. This led to discussing expectations and how they are set initially in the relationship. In addition to getting rid of the “needs” and “should,” slowing down is discussed, and the third element is dropping expectations.
Now, it is good to have goals and intentions, which work best when they provide direction rather than being the destination (an expectation).
There can be a time during the coaching process where the client has to dig deep in order to progress. Working to generate enthusiasm in terms of the desired end-goal can be required. It’s the achievement of results that counts when it comes to keeping energy up.
For some clients keeping a daily journal of progress helps them change their thinking. Dave offers a personal insight how it became true for him. Progress is not about “the calendar” nor is it about comparison to others.
Sometimes the discoveries that surface can be disorienting for the client and time is needed to re-equilibrate. For some clients they see that where they are in life and the goals that have been set really aren’t for them. Relieve can eventually set in since they discover they were going down a dead-end road.
David talks about trust and what one should look for in a life coach along with self-checks a life coach must perform to work ethically and responsibly.
The conversation then moves to cost vs value – which can be a challenge. The best way to find a balance is for the client to ask themselves, “What is this final state I want to get to worth to me?” The relationship continues only when the client can see the value.
David then discusses the contractual nature of the relationship – usually 3-6 months, initially. Once into the relationship the duration can be revisited based on progress, challenges, difficulties, etc. Some clients progress so quickly that the time needed shortens. From there period calls are made to touch base to see if additional coaching is needed. This is all based on desired goals the client has.
I ask David to go a little deeper into his literature, specifically, “I’m successful but not fulfilled and want to find out why.” It could be staying on the job for the money or security. They are just trudging along.
“Successful but stressed out.” David has a program for addressing that. Events and circumstances in life don’t cause our feelings about a situation, in this case stress. It’s our thinking about the events and circumstances that causes our feelings. This can be one of the most challenging aspects. We talked about the repercussions on-the-job when unable to deal with that stress, which brings the conversation back around to the damaging aspect of expectations. The solution David works with clients on is building agreements with those around the client. Leaving space for others can have a very positive effect leading to having a sense of joy rather than duress.
Being stuck is another topic. Simply starting to take action can resolve the issue — work in smaller chunks.
With the final topic David addresses the difference between a therapist and a life coach. Simply put, a therapist will tell you how you got to where you are and a life coach focuses on where you want to go. There are times when the client needs to be in therapy in order to get to the point they can be coached.
For more information you can contact David at:
(c) 513 543 6596
dave@davidwetmore.com
For more information on the “8 Steps From Chaos To Clarity and Calm: CEO Advanced Training” go to
https://www.ctrchg.com/ceo-advanced-training/
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