You don’t need my coaching.
And that may be why you are my ideal client, and I, your ideal coach.
There is a paradox inherent to the business model I’ve chosen.
I choose to coach people who are emotionally and psychologically well, high performing by all regular human standards, and financially comfortable. They are extraordinary for a plethora of reasons, although they may not see that so clearly themselves.
I don’t scare my clients into this work by making them feel like they can’t do without it.
Just today, I asked this question of a powerful leader who is interested in exploring coaching with me:
“What keeps you up at night?”
He thought about it. And then he said, “I know how precious life is. There’s not much that keeps me up at night. Having said that, I think often about the future.”
Wait for it.
He’s 26!
I don’t know if this man and I will decide to work together but here’s what I do know.
He passed my initial test—my sneaky audition—with flying colors.
He already inspires me at least as much as I will inspire him. In his short life, he has stepped out of the victim mindset so many of us inhabit our entire lives to take on the mindset of an owner and creator.
The extraordinary humans I work with don’t need my coaching.
They have a mission. That mission is a version of the one Gay Hendricks expresses so eloquently in his Ultimate Success Mantra:
“I expand every day in abundance, success and love, while I inspire others to do the same.”
My clients are already on the path to doing this work.
And those who choose to partner with a skilled and committed professional coach know a secret others don’t.
1 + 1 = 11
I’ll admit something that used to embarrass me and now sets me free. I have never had an original idea in my life, including this one. Most of us were raised to believe that if we didn’t invent something from scratch, our offering had no worth, or worse, that we were stealing!
Are you watching Dancing With the Stars? I am, for the first time in my life, and for one specific reason. That reason is fast becoming known around the world by his first name alone, the way we say Madonna or Elvis. Ezra. Ezra Frech is a 21-year-old above-the-knee amputee. He was born with most of his left leg missing—no knee, no fibula—and with one finger on his left hand.
Think about the last time you called someone “ambitious”. Was it entirely a compliment? Or did a small shadow come with it, the sense that you were naming something a little grasping, a little too much? Most of us have learned to hear ambition as a warning. We picture the people who claw and accumulate and never seem satisfied, and we file ambition next to greed, as if they were the same appetite.
One of the most common requests I hear, especially from business leaders and parents, is some version of “How do I motivate my employee, my team, my kid?” I tell them I have good news and bad news. Most people want the bad news first. So here it is: based on my years as a business owner, a parent, and a coach, there is no such thing as motivating another person.
I worshipped Intensity for more decades than I care to admit. "Go big or go home" was my motto, and I lived it everywhere. Instead of eating well most days, I would overeat for a stretch and then starve myself for a day to even the books. Instead of running a few miles regularly, I would run sporadically and then try to make up the lost mileage in one punishing weekend.
If I were allowed to keep only one tool in my coaching toolbox, with every other system and framework taken away, I know which one I'd keep. It's the one I call GIGO. Garbage in, garbage out. It's a crude name for an idea that turns out to be ancient. There's a line in Proverbs I've been sitting with, chapter 4, verse 23. It's usually translated, "Above all else, guard your heart, for from it flow the springs of life."
I hear these words often from my clients, regardless of age or background. They express a universal wish for the three C’s—Clarity, Courage, and Confidence—that so many people hope to gain from professional coaching. But let me share a dirty little secret of the work. The problems we think we're facing because we lack clarity, courage, or confidence are rarely the actual problem.
I'm working with a client who was a colleague of mine when I was a fashion executive. Working together is putting it generously, because I ran a flagship and she ran an entire corporate department. She's younger than I am, but I looked up to her the way a child looks at an adult, as though they're invincible.
The agreements we make with each other shape the relationships we get. One of the most valuable relationships in my life is with the women in my private coaching group, The Wisdom Circle. By design, no one here is new to coaching, and the group's greatest value lies in the collective wisdom the women share with one another.
The Jewish New Year is almost upon us. And the recurring refrain in my mind is, "Phew. We made it!" I don't know what this year cost each of you, and I'm not going to pretend I do. But I know we're here. We took some dodgy turns and weren't sure we could handle the curves. We were scared and anxious and wanted to zone out with Netflix. We fell, got back up, and lived to tell.