What is Coaching?
To see if coaching might be right for you contact chris@chrisbalsley.com .
Coaching is a profession that focuses on how we approach emerging issues and concerns. It has arisen in response to a social need: the current solutions we have in place are not meeting our emerging issues (for more on this see the "Why Coaching" section). Professional coaching serves many different populations:
- Individuals
- Couples
- Teams
- Organizations
Each population has is own specific needs. In some cases, the emerging concern can be seen as a drive for more meaning in one’s life or the drive to find balance in the midst of a chaotic relationship. In organizations and teams it can focus on shifting a corporate mood, reducing turnover or improving the bottom line.
To quote Sigmund Freud the father of modern psychology: “Humans run from pain and towards pleasure and in doing so cement their chronic unhappiness". We strive for a life free from pain and suffering and yet as a country we rank 27th in measured happiness and satisfaction when compared to the rest of the planet.
I was working with a CEO who put it very succinctly: He said: “I have the trophy job, a corner office with windows, a great six figure salary, a fantastic home, a car, a beautiful wife and kids, a month’s paid vacation a year. I have climbed the corporate ladder just like I was supposed to do and yet here I am; more miserable than I have ever been in my life and ready to throw it all away and go live in the mountains in a cabin and raise tofu." Staying at his miserable job seemed like the only option open to him because in this ragged economy, quitting seemed like professional suicide. Coaching had him take a hard look at what he was creating at work through his belief system. His resentment was affecting those around him. The work he did as a coachee helped him stay at his job and to find the basic things that were missing in all aspects of his life: gratitude, happiness and a deep sense of purpose.
Professional coaching teaches us how to recognize old limiting belief systems and to create new belief systems. In doing so, we learn to think out of the box and to redefine what success, growth and happiness mean to us. As we redefine what we know to be true, our ability to act, to deliver and to execute, increase in direct relationship to these new beliefs.
