What is coaching?

If we are to take it the academic way, coaching is... well, allow me to be rude, but you can really google that, and I am sure that you are not here just to read yet another definition :))
For me, coaching is magic. Why magic? (c'mon, what's with those kind of words here, on a professional page?:))
I will get to the magic of it in a bit.
I have seen coaching from both perspectives, as a client and as a coach. Hopefully, one day I will see it also from the perspective of a trainer and mentor.
As a client, at the beginning I thought I had a pretty good idea how the conversation will go - yes, coaching is a conversation, amongst others. And then, surprise, surprise. The coach always seemed to have a way of asking me questions, sometimes hard ones, inviting for introspection, inviting me to allow my real answers to come to surface, allowing me to put aside any kind of social mask I've come with, and get to the bottom of it. Hmmm, it's really challenging to put it into words.
It's difficult for me to be a client. I tend to imagine that I will lead the process. And then, I make a choice, a conscious one, to allow the coach to do that. Because there is only so much I can do by myself, in my mind and heart, but permitting the coach to take me even a little further, now that's the real value of the process. And I get amazing results - sometimes I call them epiphanies :)) or AHA moments - and I am stunned about how easy and clear it all becomes.
As a coach, really listening, with all my senses, to the client (I must say that I don't really like this wording, I prefer human instead of client) asking those right questions, allowing the process to unfold, and seeing the results (as mentioned above), it is a ongoing awe. This is the magic of coaching.
Coaching is like looking in a mirror. But this is a special mirror. One that reflects back different perspectives of you. Of the real you. And then you get to decide where you want to go, how you want to do things, why you want them and who will you become.
Coaching is something you need to experiment in order to understand if and how it fits you. Beyond any words and definitions, beyond my personal perception of it, beyond anything that anybody has ever told you about it.
If you haven't worked with me before, let's have a 30 minutes meeting, free of charge. To experiment. And then decide. You decide if you want to work with me, if this is what you need. I decide if I can work with you, if I will be able to serve you best. Together we decide for how long we want to work together, at what pace, and what will be your investment in this. It's a partnership.
So, go ahead, experiment!
Note: although I trust you already googled the definition of coaching, I just want to make another note: coaching is not therapy nor is consulting, mentoring, training, etc for that matter. Unlike other professions, in coaching we don’t spend time in the past. Why? Because we can not change it. The only 2 things we can do about it is letting go and learning from it. That’s it.
Let’s just focus on the present and what we can do now and from now on!
For me, coaching is magic. Why magic? (c'mon, what's with those kind of words here, on a professional page?:))
I will get to the magic of it in a bit.
I have seen coaching from both perspectives, as a client and as a coach. Hopefully, one day I will see it also from the perspective of a trainer and mentor.
As a client, at the beginning I thought I had a pretty good idea how the conversation will go - yes, coaching is a conversation, amongst others. And then, surprise, surprise. The coach always seemed to have a way of asking me questions, sometimes hard ones, inviting for introspection, inviting me to allow my real answers to come to surface, allowing me to put aside any kind of social mask I've come with, and get to the bottom of it. Hmmm, it's really challenging to put it into words.
It's difficult for me to be a client. I tend to imagine that I will lead the process. And then, I make a choice, a conscious one, to allow the coach to do that. Because there is only so much I can do by myself, in my mind and heart, but permitting the coach to take me even a little further, now that's the real value of the process. And I get amazing results - sometimes I call them epiphanies :)) or AHA moments - and I am stunned about how easy and clear it all becomes.
As a coach, really listening, with all my senses, to the client (I must say that I don't really like this wording, I prefer human instead of client) asking those right questions, allowing the process to unfold, and seeing the results (as mentioned above), it is a ongoing awe. This is the magic of coaching.
Coaching is like looking in a mirror. But this is a special mirror. One that reflects back different perspectives of you. Of the real you. And then you get to decide where you want to go, how you want to do things, why you want them and who will you become.
Coaching is something you need to experiment in order to understand if and how it fits you. Beyond any words and definitions, beyond my personal perception of it, beyond anything that anybody has ever told you about it.
If you haven't worked with me before, let's have a 30 minutes meeting, free of charge. To experiment. And then decide. You decide if you want to work with me, if this is what you need. I decide if I can work with you, if I will be able to serve you best. Together we decide for how long we want to work together, at what pace, and what will be your investment in this. It's a partnership.
So, go ahead, experiment!
Note: although I trust you already googled the definition of coaching, I just want to make another note: coaching is not therapy nor is consulting, mentoring, training, etc for that matter. Unlike other professions, in coaching we don’t spend time in the past. Why? Because we can not change it. The only 2 things we can do about it is letting go and learning from it. That’s it.
Let’s just focus on the present and what we can do now and from now on!