What is Coaching and Mentoring?

This is a big question in our society today. The reason for this is the growing number of coaches and mentors that have popped up, seemingly out of nowhere, around the world. They make affirmations that they are useful to improving your life and obtaining your dreams but it seems no one knows what they really do.

So people, including YOU ask the questions:
What is a life coach? What is a success coach? What is a happiness coach?

The questions keep changing slightly but essentially they are all asking the same thing. What is it that a coach can do for me?  Starting with the dictionary version will help so on Dictionary.com it says that a coach is:

-          a person who trains an athlete or a team of athletes.

-          a trainer or instructor

-          a tutor who prepares students for examinations

So whether you are talking about a speech coach, weight loss coach or sporting coach, it means that they are in a position to help, guide, teach, train and encourage the people they are working with.

The term coach has been around for a long time and has started being used in the realm of personal development a lot more in recent years. This is mainly down to the move from reactive self-development such as therapy and counselling, which focus mainly on resolving past issues, to a more proactive approach which aims to extract yourself from the sticky glue of the past and move you forward in life. As an example it sounds much more positive if you said you were getting coaching or mentoring rather than you were getting counselling or therapy, doesn’t it?

There is certainly nothing negative in getting coaching and a little known secret is that every successful person in every field has, or has had, a coach or mentor of some kind to help and guide them to get where they are today. We are only human after all and we can’t be on a high all the time or are able to have all the questions to every answer. That is why we need an outside, objective view, especially when it is about our own life. As it is very hard to be objective about yourself an outsider with experience better than yours will see the issue you are unable to see and guide and steer you along the correct path.

A coach won’t run the marathon of life for you, you still have to do it yourself. Yet a coach can help you plan the best approach, pick you up when you feel like quitting, they can help you find the right direction when you have made a wrong turn, they can cheer and motivate you onwards and congratulate you when you have crossed the finish line. They can truly help you make your dreams come true.

So now you know the answer to “What is a Coach?” – you should try a coaching session today and see what a difference it can make to your life. Anything is Possible.