My Coaching Journey

New Awareness • New Choices • Personal Power

Let me tell you a short story...

In 2014, I was experiencing some challenges in my job, a growing sense of anxiety and paranoia which led me to worrying a lot, particularly on Sunday night. My manager at the time suggested I could investigate coaching as a means of exploring the root causes. I was fortunate to have access to an internal coaching bank in my organisation. After a short while of researching what coaching was and how it might be able to help, I took the plunge. I spent time looking at various coach's profiles and having a couple of 'chemistry' sessions, trying to find the 'right' coach for me. Eventually, I found a coach who understood how I felt and would be a good fit for me.

Over 6 sessions across 4 months, my coach helped me explore what I was feeling, but more importantly, why. What were the root causes, what was within my gift to challenge and change and what choices did I have? Throughout these sessions I started thinking in a whole new way, I was challenged and supported in a way that felt useful. I could start to see a light at the end of the tunnel I could see where my energy was best spent instead of worrying.

Coaching provided time and space and was different to any other conversation I could have with friends, family, peers or my manager. It supported me in building a new awareness of my situation, helped me to see what new choices I had and enabled me to take back my personal power from the worry, anxiety and paranoia.

One of the best things I took from these sessions that I still use today, is writing things down and then talking them through with a listening ear. This has helped me to get out of my own head and think about things from a number of different perspectives, often changing the way I view my own challenges.

So, why am I telling you all this?

Experiencing coaching and seeing the impact it had on my personal and professional wellbeing, became the linchpin for wanting to become a coach myself. How amazing would it be to support others in the way that my coach supported me? Since this initial exposure to the power of coaching, my mind was made up to become a coach, I wanted to help other people to build new awareness, see new choices and regain their personal power, just as my coach had supported me to do exactly that.

What have I done about it?

In June 2016, I started my coaching journey by undertaking an internal coaching program with the John Lewis Partnership. This Associating For Coaching accredited course lasted 18 months. Since 2016, I've invested over 1000 hours in coach specific training, NLP, Transactional Analysis, a Psychology Masters degree, continuous professional development, delivering learning to other coaches and of course coaching. Learning is a life long passion and one of my core values, meaning I am continually striving to stretch my thinking, increase my knowledge and put that learning into practice, adding value to my client's experience of me as a coach.

Please see below my qualification and memberships, CLICK the icons to be taken to the learning provider if you wish to know more about the organisation and qualification. Please get in contact with me if you'd like to chat about any of the qualifications I hold and how my learning manifests and supports my coaching practice.