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Ever use a life coach?
I am 39, in a great relationship, making good money (100+), but professionally totally unfulfilled. I want to open a B&B but don't know where to begin. I feel like I need a mentor? What do you think.
Brandon Chambers asked in Midlife crisis | on 13 Nov. 2009
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Yeah, these so-called "life coaches" are a rip-off. I have a friend who paid a life coach to talk to her over the phone once a week. When my friend ran to a hard time with her teenaged son, she wanted to talk to the life coach about it. The life coach said, "I'm not a therapist. I only deal with winners, not losers."
Save your money. Look into business start-up classes at Open University and such.Alice Lesage answered on 13 Nov. 2009
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There are clueless and/or unscrupulous therapists out there with degrees and certification; there are many more who may mean well, but are woefully unqualified to offer career or practical advice.
You want a mentor. Find someone who has made a similar career move, or currently works in your field of interest. Go to THEM for advice.Maya Carter answered on 13 Nov. 2009
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Dear Brandon,
As a senior consultant and as an Executive Coach for over 25 years I am very surprised by the negative comments of Alice and Maya.
Also, you are all confusing the roles of therapists, Coach and Mentors.
Basically FYI, there are three types of help apart from a therapist:
1. Consulting: Creating, improving, or re engineering a process.
2. Mentoring: Teaching somebody more junior or less experienced, transferring knowledge.
3. Coaching: Getting a person from point A in life to point B. Actually the word Coach in English is a vehicle and this is where the word coach comes from. The coach is the vehicle but you are the driver.
I have coached hundreds of executives from all over the world and the results are usually very good. I do very little advertising and so most of my clients are happy because they send me more clients. So labeling the whole profession because of one bad experience is like saying all hotels are bad because you had a one bad night sleep.
As for your situation Brandon, B&B is one option but this search for a change can be the symptom of something much more profound that you have in you. When people talk they usually use what we call surface structure but there is almost always what we call the deep structure, example, an executive that says "My Manager doesn't like me" may actually mean "I had a very bad experience with another manager" and I think, actually I am doing "mind reading" which can be false that this manager does not like me either because his behavior resembles that of the other manager (=deep structure).
When you say that you are professionally unfulfilled, you first need to understand what are your values, what is your purpose in life and balance all or some parts of your life to be happy. There can be issues in Love, Work, Spirituality, Social, Physical, Fun, Learning, Helping Others etc You can be happy in love and work as you seem to say but unhappy because you like helping others for example.
This is where a great coach can help.
With my kindest regards,
Willy DANENBERG
willy.danenberg@bestexecutivecoach.comWilly DANENBERG answered on 21 Dec. 2009
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Dear Brandon,
This is a great news you're asking yourself questions!
Few comments:
1. the coach market is totally unstructurred. As there is no norm, you can call yourself a coach tomorrow if you want. It is so difficult to understand which coach will be good to you, and how to start. It is normal you 'll hear very good and very bad experiences.
I have a very good experience with coaching. I was coached during 5 years in my previous job. A tremendous experience. All were good, some were really compliant with me.
The result of this coaching: I understood to identify my dreams, my values, my competencies, to trust my intuition and to give sense to my actions.Finally, I decided (alone) to leave a confortable position to fulfill my dreams (and take risks!) and creat a company.
2. Your title is not in relation with the description.
You ask for a life coach, but explain that you need a business coach... The immediate question that pops-up: do you really want to open a B&B? ;-)
-> if you need help to create your B&B, find someone that already did it and question him.
-> if you really need a personnal coach, I could help you in Brussels...but not in the UK. Use your network!
So my advice: Always choose someone you're confortable with, you trust;this is the key for a successful coaching
Good luck!
ArikArik Azoulay answered on 30 Dec. 2009
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