Life is a long and winding path full of changes and forks in the road. It can be hard to navigate alone. It doesn’t matter what age you are or where you are on that road—we all need a little help and direction from time to time.
That’s where life coaches come in. Mentors, teachers, and cheerleaders all wrapped into one multifaceted profession, they’re the perfect resource for practical life advice.
Below, we’ll explain what exactly life coaches do and in what areas they can help you achieve success.
What Is a Life Coach?
A life coach is someone trained to walk you through life planning and help you overcome obstacles in matters of personal affairs, work, and interpersonal relations. You can find both in-person and online life coaches.
While this newly emerging field is somewhat unregulated, we recommend finding a life coach who has taken classes and attained a life coach certification from an organization such as the International Coach Federation (ICF).
Life Coach Vs. Therapist
From that description, you might be wondering what the difference is between a certified life coach and a therapist or counselor. For one, while a therapist or counselor has a background in psychology, a life coach’s expertise lies in practical life advice, whether that’s in finance, business, life planning, and more.
A counselor or therapist will help you work through past trauma and emotions, as well as heal from your experiences. They may also help you develop better coping skills, effective communication methods, and healthier habits. If you need a diagnosis, they can point you in the right direction and get you access to treatments that may be helpful.
Life coaches, on the other hand, take you through the specifics of life planning and achieving your goals. They can also do some emotional work with you, such as helping you find practical ways to build confidence and feel more satisfied in your relationships.
Another service many life coaches offer is teaching you new skills for success in work, creativity, and more. Some overlap with counselors includes offering helpful coping mechanisms for stress, helping you manage your relationships, and even delving into your spirituality.
How Can a Life Coach Help You?
Just as life itself is extremely complex and full of different layers, the term “life coach” can encompass a host of different services. We’ll go over all the most significant ways a life coach can help you below.
Self-Confidence
Half the battle of achieving your dreams is just having the self-confidence to chase after them.
A life coach can help you reassess yourself from an outside perspective and remind you of your progress and worth. If you’re a bit of a perfectionist or too hard on yourself, a life coach can also teach you to be kinder to your inner self.
Sometimes, we need a little help shedding our negative self-perception and developing a fresh mindset. As your self-confidence rises, you’ll be able to take on new challenges and break out of your comfort zone.
Business Coaching
If you own a business, the stress of making sure it stays afloat and keeping everyone happy can be too much to handle by yourself.
A business life coach can leverage their expertise to walk you through running a business correctly, point you toward helpful resources for business owners, offer best practices for managing your company and employees, and help you delegate responsibilities when necessary.
Most business life coaches also have a background in finance and can assist you with managing your money, paying employees, utilizing tax benefits, etc. They’ll act as an advisor to refer to whenever you’re struggling to see a way forward.
Financial Advice
As mentioned above, many life coaches are experts with finances and are there to pass on their knowledge to help you save money, take advantage of tax benefits, plan for you or your child’s financial future, look into buying a house, pay off debt, invest in the right projects or stocks, choose the right loans for you, and so much more.
Many of us get overwhelmed when faced with the complexities of money and math—so why not let a financial life coach lead the way?
Relationship Health and Healthy Communication
Your relationships, whether romantic, familial, or platonic, influence many other aspects of your life. When something isn’t right in your relationship, it can poison your contentment in all other arenas and result in lowered productivity, motivation, and energy.
A life coach who specializes in relationship health can help you define the issues you’re running into. They can act as an objective third party to see the situation with fresh eyes and offer solutions.
You’ll be given new tools to use when you face a disagreement so that you can overcome your differences without resorting to unhealthy habits or behaviors.
A life coach may also be able to utilize expertise in other fields to help you and a friend or partner reach agreements when it comes to disputes in finances, marriage, work, parenting, and more.
Achieving Goals and Accountability
We all set goals at the beginning of the year, but many of us don’t have the patience or self-discipline to keep up with them.
A life coach can be a fantastic source of accountability. They’ll check in with you to make sure you’re sticking to your promises and help you develop realistic milestones to measure progress.
If you have an addiction you’re trying to kick, for example, being open and honest with your life coach can help you overcome your addiction easier than depending on sheer force of will alone.
On top of accountability, a life coach can help you create a practical game plan for reaching your goals, whether big or small.
Purpose and Direction
We all need a little direction when we’re young, and a life coach can certainly help you find the right path when you’re just starting out in life and are overwhelmed by the choices.
But people change over time, as well. Much of that change is good—we’re maturing, gathering wisdom and experience. However, many people come to a point in their life when they realize that what they always wanted has either already been achieved or is no longer what they truly desire.
If that sounds like you, don’t freak out—this is an exciting opportunity to discover your new purpose. A life coach can assist you in reassessing your life and how your needs have changed over the years.
They can take what motivates you to point you in a direction toward a new career, community, travel plan, hobby, business, or lifestyle. Establishing new goals can help you gain your second wind and renew your passion for life.
Stress Management
If you’re overwhelmed by the stress of a busy life, a life coach may be just the resource for you.
Not only will they give you tips and tricks for coping with stress on the inside, but they’ll also offer practical advice for reorganizing your life to eliminate or lessen certain stressors in your environment.
Cultivating Creativity
The greatest plight of an artistic mind is the unpredictable ebb and flow of creativity.
Sometimes a dip in creativity is caused by outside factors: being overworked to exhaustion or criticized to the point of losing motivation. And sometimes it’s caused by inner factors: perfectionism, writer’s or artist’s block, losing your passion due to depression or anxiety.
Whatever the cause is, a life coach can equip you with best practices for reigniting the flames and bringing out the creative genius in you.
Skill Development
If there’s a practical life skill you’ve been wanting to pick up for a while, a life coach is a great place to start.
Whether you want to develop social skills, learn how to cook and meal prep, build a work ethic, become more organized, etc., they can set you on the right course and offer personalized tips and tricks for success.
Spirituality
Spiritual life coaches can help you connect to the innermost parts of yourself and consider your purpose, explore questions about the universe and your existence, get past damaging beliefs you may be holding onto, and learn how to achieve contentment and peace through practices like meditation, gratitude, and mindfulness.
Some spiritual life coaches have roots in specific religions, but many have a focus in general spirituality and the concept of existing past one’s physical self.
How to Find a Life Coach
Different life coaches possess expertise in different areas, which is why it’s important to ensure you choose the right one for the job.
Many life coaches have websites or bios where they explain their background and offer reviews from past clients. For the best experience, make sure their experience and values line up with your needs.
As we mentioned before, it’s best to choose someone who has gone through the necessary training to achieve certification, rather than someone who is a self-proclaimed life coach without the experience to back up their claims.
Like counselors, life coaches can offer their services online or in person. Decide which method works best for you. Are you more comfortable talking to someone from the comfort of your own home? Or do you connect best with people in the same room? The answers to these questions will help narrow down your candidates.
We hope this article has answered all your questions about life coaches and invite you to peruse our database to find qualified life coaches near you. Let us know how a life coach changed your life!
Connect with local life coaches in your area.
