Lifestyle coaches can help keep you on track
Most people are familiar with how a personal trainer or nutritionist can help them become healthier, but what about a lifestyle coach?
Lifestyle coaches help bridge the gap between promises made to yourself in a gym or mirror and how to achieve them in the real world.
Success comes from truly understanding someone’s motivation and readiness, and it’s why I always start with listening. Lifestyle coaching is really about bringing self-awareness to each person; and I work with clients to help them discover and create clarity to what they want to accomplish and why it’s important to them. When the client understands this, we can develop a plan that will work because it starts with the steps we have determined they are truly ready to take.
The first few lifestyle coaching sessions focus on gaining an understanding of the client’s motivation and readiness so that, together, we can create a wellness plan that the client feels good about and is specific and achievable.
Many people have negative experiences with goals they have set in the past and have not been able to achieve. If you think of goals as experiments, they can be very motivating and powerful in guiding you to a healthier lifestyle. Writing down goals and sharing them with someone can be very motivating and also helpful with accountability.
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Lee Memorial Health System’s Wellness Centers offer lifestyle coaching packages ranging from six to 15 sessions. The first few sessions are focused on creating a 30- or 90-day wellness vision that brings a mere statement or thought to life in writing or pictures.
After we create a long-term plan, we work to create smaller, actionable goals ranging from days to weeks, or even months. That might be walking for 10 minutes, three times a week, or it could be as simple as learning something new. Between sessions, we often set up weekly check-ins via text, email or quick phone calls.
Life doesn’t often happen as planned, and we have to figure out a way to work within it. These weekly check-ins are very important because it gives us a chance to work together to navigate obstacles, which are sure to arise in everyday life. Seeing clients grow to find ways to stay on track and continue working toward their goal, even if it’s not exactly how it was outlined, is very rewarding to the client and the coach.
A lifestyle coach is there to work with you—to listen and then, together, develop SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and timely) goals. Clients are ultimately responsible for achieving the goal; and it is that knowledge and confidence that often helps them stay the course long after sessions are complete. It’s also what creates a true lifestyle change for overall wellness, not just a fitness plan.
-- Sarah Mitchell is a certified life coach, and health and wellness coordinator at the Wellness Center – Cape Coral. For more information, call 239-424-3231 or email Media@LeeMemorial.org.