If you are not coping too well with your life as it is, or you are thinking to yourself, ‘do I need a life coach?’ maybe its time to sit down and do some self-reflection and see whether or not this is the case.
Once, as the story goes, Buddha was on his rounds seeking alms when he was subjected to verbal abuse by someone. Buddha, enlightened as he was, simply smiled and moved on.
When a disciple of his asked him how he could keep himself from retaliating against the undeserved abuse, Buddha observed that the evil words did not touch him or his philosophy of life. They only exposed the ignorance of the person saying them.
Of course, although the Buddha did not have the benefit of NLP in those days, he demonstrated how, due to his mental perception of the offensive as the inoffensive, he remained unaffected by the abuse. However ancient the story, this is a prime example of how NLP can be applied to real-life situations.
What Is NLP?
NLP stands for Neuro-Linguistic Programming.
NLP can be used for personal development, phobias, and anxiety. NLP uses perceptual, behavioural, and communication techniques to make it easier for people to change their thoughts and actions.
NLP relies on language processing but should not be confused with natural language processing, which shares the same acronym.
Obviously, we rely on our sense perceptions in our effort to understand, interpret and interact with our environment. NLP assigns a lot of importance to eye-movements, to observing and reading others’ body language as well as to control our body language or gestures as a means of communicating with others.
Synchronizing your body language or non-verbal means of communication with the verbal means it enhances the effectiveness of your communication.
Your choice of words and sentence structures delivered using the right tone can a go long way in casting a spell on your audience, in convincing them and in bringing about desired outcomes through them. Your language, if used appropriately, can appeal to the subconscious mind of a hostile audience in order to obtain conscious compliance from them as a result.
Influencing others’ minds through a captivating speech so as to completely change moods and attitudes in favour of achieving your desired result is not new, but NLP puts considerable emphasis on the techniques involved in the process.
These techniques are concerned with using your head position, eye movements, gestures, breathing rhythms and language as well as visual and auditory senses.
Modelling Excellence
One of the applications of NLP is to do what is called “modelling excellence.” When you recognize a genius or exceptional person who has a great ability to accomplish certain things or is excellent in a particular field, you may wish to use this person as a model or a coach.
Through imitation, you can use these same factors or qualities that you admire in the person and apply them to yourself. NLP techniques aim at discovering the most important elements that contribute to the person’s excellence, and at transferring them to you so that you can replicate that excellence.
Therapeutic NLP
There are some therapeutic applications of NLP, which are mainly borrowed from the practice of hypnosis. These applications rely considerably on the terminology employed by an American psychiatrist, Milton H. Erickson, like hypnotic phenomena, therapeutic metaphor, story, rapport, age regression, conscious and unconscious communications etc.
Advocates of NLP hold that its techniques, especially, those dealing with communication, can very well be applied in business for its promotion. One has to first master the NLP techniques and then skillfully use them to see the results for themselves.
What Does A Life Coach Do?
If you would like to achieve more or enhance your life then you should consider getting advice from a life coach.
A life coach can be many things including your personal consultant, someone who listens or your manager.
A life coach can help to set you in the right direction in life, help you to get the most out of life and determine your goals in life and help you reach them.
How Will I Benefit From A Life Coach?
- A life coach will help you improve your relationship with others.
- He or she will help you to gain more control over your life.
- A life coach will assist you to make better strategies for managing your time
- Your stress will be reduced and your productivity will increase by simplifying your life.
- You will start to realize and maximize your potential.
- He will help you to prioritize tasks and meet deadlines more easily.
- He will assist you with the important decisions you have to make in life.
- A life coach can assist you with techniques to enable you to deal better in stressful situations.
- You will get help with balancing your work and social life.
- A life coach will help you to develop plans of action to make sure you reach your goals.
A life coach can help in both professional and personal life and are there to help you obtain better results and gain a better quality of life in all aspects. Life coaches have been trained to adapt to listening, observing and then developing individual strategies to help people get out of the rut they find themselves in.
Do I Need A Life Coach?
You need to ask yourself what you wish to accomplish with the use of a life coach? If you can answer this question, then a life coach should be able to work successfully with you to develop strategies to reach your goals.
You will need to develop a partnership between the two of you and you need to be open to advice and constructive criticism, if not then a life coach may not be the best option for you.
If you answer yes to any of the questions below, you probably need a life coach.
- Do you feel there is a lack of support in your life?
- Do you have problems with low self-esteem issues?
- Do you feel you could get more out of life?
- Do you feel you could better yourself?
- Do you feel everyone has a plan or goal in life but you?
- Do you feel you are going through a tough time and need a helping hand?
- Do you feel bogged down with deadlines and don’t know which way to turn?
- Do daily tasks make you feel overwhelmed?
- Do you feel as though the entire world is against you?
- Do you feel everyone knows the secret to be successful but you?
Signs That Indicate Your Life Coach Is Helping You
Perhaps the biggest sign that you are getting where you want to be in life is the deep feeling of utter contentment and happiness you feel. You should get out of bed in the morning looking forward to your day ahead.
However, there are many smaller signs that you are going in the right direction towards getting there, which can help us to stick with our plans for change and get us through those periods when we are uncertain or feel like giving up.
Here are just a few of the signs that tell you you are getting there.
- Every time you look into a mirror, the first thing you do is smile at yourself.
- You suddenly find that you have a whole lot more choices when it comes to buying clothes (this if you were trying to lose weight).
- You stop putting blame on the world or those around you for your mistakes.
- You jump out of bed full of energy looking forward to a new day, instead of pulling the covers around your head and going back to sleep.
- You find you no longer worry whether other people like you or not.
- You do what you want to do instead of what you think others want you to do.
- You get more comments about the big change in you.
- You find the word “no” is in your vocabulary for a change.
- Your teenager starts to borrow your clothes.
- You no longer fear making new friends.
- You actually feel proud of what you have accomplished.
- You can laugh and see the funny side when you make a mistake.
- You shrug off your mistakes and use them as a learning experience.
- You are able to reach the goals you set out for yourself more easily.
- You find that you are no longer putting things off, but looking forward to them instead.
- You make changes to your life naturally without even thinking about them.
- You can’t remember the last time you had a bad day.
- You just feel you are heading in the right direction.
Some Notes On Life
Sometimes life has the habit of kicking us in the teeth, perhaps through no fault of our own. Things get tough and we have periods of sorrow and hurt, this could be the death of a loved one, a breakup of relationships or sickness.
We have two options to deal with what life throws at us and these are to give up and go into depression or to accept whatever happens in life and then move on with our lives, if we make the right choice then we grieve of course, then pick ourselves up and move on with our life.
Bereavement
Bereavement comes to us all eventually in life, sometimes it comes cruelly and strikes the young while others are taken expectedly when they have lived out their years.
No matter when it happens, the death of a loved one is always heartbreaking for the ones left behind.
Grieving will, of course, vary from person to person and there isn’t any set limit on the amount of time which we should or shouldn’t grieve. There are many stages to grieving starting with shock, numbness, fear and unsettlement being just a few of the many feelings which can flow through a person during this time. 
Grieving however is a normal occurrence and an important one if we are to get over this time and eventually move on with our lives.
It is human natures way of letting go and you shouldn’t try to hide any feelings or thoughts during this time. Having someone you can turn to such as a family member or friend can help greatly during your greatest time of need and if you are lucky enough to have someone like this then it is essential that you take them up on their offer of being there for you.
Illness
Coping with severe or life-threatening illness can be devastating; it can bring a whole range of emotional problems along with physical disabilities.
Finding that we have or someone we love very much has a life-threatening or severe illness is devastating and brings feelings of fear, uncertainty and even denial before true acceptance. 
Denial to a degree is not necessarily a bad thing, if denial is used in a positive way, it can help to overcome problems to some degree and enable you to get back to living your life.
However total denial and not accepting at all is something entirely different and if this is the case then you might need to seek help.
Break up of Relationships
The break up of any relationship can be traumatic particularly if you have been together for many years and/or there are children involved in the relationship.
Again fear plays a big part, fear of what the future will bring, how you will cope, feelings of betrayal and desertion all play an important role.
Time usually plays a crucial factor in healing after a breakup and grieving to an extent over what is essentially a loss helps to get your thoughts and feelings out and enables you to move on with your life and take the next step forward into a new chapter.
I hope this article was able to help you decide ‘do I need a life coach.’ Please comment below if you have any questions.
