The Life-changing Benefits of
Transformational Coaching
Why Hiring a Life Coach Really Is Worth It
The impact of working with a life coach, particularly one trained in the transformational coaching approach, can be truly life-changing. But is it really worth the investment of your time and money? Speaking as a coach and as someone who is also a regular coachee (person being coached), I believe 100% that is.
In this post I share eight key benefits of transformational coaching (plus five more positive effects too good not to mention). I have witnessed or personally experienced them all, both in my own coaching clients and in my own life.
8 Key Benefits of Transformational Coaching
1. Greater Clarity
A cornerstone of the transformational coaching process is the dedicated time and space to think your best thoughts. As you give your mind this space, clarity appears. You begin to become crystal clear about what you really want in your personal life and career.
My clients also often talk about ‘becoming unstuck’, because as their thoughts become clearer, they are able to identify what they need to do to move forward.
I am a huge advocate of Nancy Kline’s work. Kline pioneered an approach to listening in order to help people think for themselves called the ‘Thinking Environment’. She believes that ‘thinking for yourself is still a radical act’. Transformational coaching encourages you to do just that: that is, think for yourself in order to gain clarity of vision and thought.
Ask yourself the following: When was the last time someone really listened to what you had to say, without interruption? With empathy and interest?
1:1 coaching is powerful because together with your coach you inhabit a safe space for an agreed length of time which is entirely yours, to be listened to and supported to think through the changes you want to happen.
2. Increased Confidence
Increased self-confidence goes hand in hand with clarity as one of the key benefits of transformational coaching. As a natural consequence of gaining clarity about your situation and taking action towards the changes you want to make, you are likely to experience a greater sense of confidence in yourself. You begin to trust in your innate abilities and judgement.
An important part of the transformational coaching approach is that you the client are considered by your coach to be creative, resourceful and whole. You do not need ‘fixing’. You already have all the answers you need inside you. My job and expertise as coach is to help you draw out these answers by the considered questions I ask. In this way I work with you to grow your sense of trust in yourself.
The ability to determine your goals and be internally driven to achieve them is called autonomous motivation.
Kori D. Miller describes the process as follows: “Autonomous motivation means the person controls the decision-making process. The coach provides resources and support and nudges as needed, but the coachee is in charge.” (Positive Psychology: 30 Proven Benefits of Life Coaching & Mentoring).
It is much more likely that you will stick to your goals if autonomous motivation is in place. Transformational coaching fosters the self-confidence and belief in yourself needed for you to effect real change.
3. Greater Sense of Life Purpose
As coaching continues and you begin to experience improved clarity and confidence, you may well begin to feel a greater sense of purpose. You find yourself more able to re-imagine what is possible in your life and career, now and in the future. This is because transformational coaching empowers you. It puts you back in control.
Some of my clients have had great AHA! moments about their larger purpose in life during our coaching sessions. This is what can happen when people are listened to with empathy and have the uninterrupted time and space to think out loud.
4. Relief from Negativity
Another life-changing benefit of transformational coaching lies in its deep work to identify and challenge the limiting beliefs, negative thoughts and assumptions that have been holding you back.
We all have these mental challenges. Often they stop us from living happy lives and reaching our goals. They manifest themselves in thoughts such as ‘I am never good enough’, or ‘Success never happens to me’ or ‘People won’t like me if I show them who I really am’.
In coaching we work to uncover what is really at the core of your negative assumptions and beliefs. Once identified, we can challenge their validity. In this way we can minimise their negative impact and replace them with a more positive mindset going forward. You can make powerful shifts of perspective and literally re-write the stories you might have been telling yourself for years.
Self-doubt, indecision and imposter syndrome are all frequent visitors in the coaching space. A good transformational life coach will help you to find ways past the limiters stopping you from fulfilling your wider life vision. The benefits can be exponential.
5. Unique Personal Toolkit
Over the course of a coaching programme, you will find that you are building a unique personal toolkit of techniques and strategies specific to your needs. These will arise naturally over your time with your coach. They could be new ways of solving problems, or dealing with anxieties, or personal checklists to remind you how to stay on track. We do this so that you can return to these strategies time and again, long after coaching has ended.
Depending on what you have worked on with your transformational coach, you could have anything in your personal toolkit from strategies for combating negative thoughts to creative visualisations of your future, to a five-year written plan with action steps to help you get there.
Typically your toolkit might include strategies and tools to help you to:
- build resilience
- increase productivity
- decrease negativity
- plan effectively
- know how to help yourself in challenging times
6. A Path to Your Goals
Perhaps one of the better-known benefits of transformational coaching is its ability to help you set goals and determine a path for you to achieve them.
There are many ways that coaching can help you move from A to B in the particular transformation you want to make. For people who are able to visualise, creative visualisation is an effective tool for imagining your ideal day/job/future. If words come more naturally to you, your coach might employ the coaching techniques of narrative coaching, asking you to star in your own story.
However you get there, forming an idea of your desired outcome/goal(s) and setting a path to get there is an important part of the transformational coaching journey.
Once you have the bigger picture, your coach will work with you to make a focused, detailed plan of action. You will name the action steps you need to take, know the order in which you need to take them, identify the obstacles that might hold you back and come up with solutions for surmounting them. The process is structured, creative and empowering. It can also move you forwards in a timeframe you never previously envisaged was possible.
Even if your desired outcome is more internal – working on the core assumptions holding you back in life, for example – the process of identifying and becoming clear about your ideal way of being and discovering a way to get there is the same.
7. Accountability
One of the most powerful and indispensible benefits of transformational coaching lies in the value of being held accountable.
Accountability combats procrastination because it keeps you focused on your goals & helps you to stay more successfully on track.
Most coaching sessions end with time spent reviewing intentions for the time in between sessions. My own approach is to ask clients to name the Action Steps they wish to take before we next see each other. Often these relate to the overarching goals we set together when we first meet. Naming the action steps alone allows the coachee to hold themselves accountable too. Coaching is a wonderfully collaborative process!
To help with accountability I also like to send over an email summary of every session soon after it is over. This helps the client to reflect on their work and on any insights they might have had.
It can be surprising to learn that much of the change that takes place over the course of a coaching program happens in between sessions. The unconscious mind is awakened by the conscious thinking that takes place in the coaching space. This is why I will offer clients additional accountability in the form of between-session e-mail check-ins to support this process, too.
8. Transformation
The final, truly life-changing benefit of transformational coaching is that of transformation itself: the successful reinvention of ourselves, our priorities and our lives.
Over time and with your commitment to the work, lasting life changes in your personal and professional life are entirely possible with the support and encouragement of a life coach. The process is creative and can be profound.
My own experience is that the key to successful change relies on two things:
- The quality of the relationship between coach and coachee
- The wholehearted commitment of both coach and client to the coaching journey
If these two factors are present, the sky is your limit and permanent, life-enhancing change is possible — at any age, or stage of life.
More Good Things that Transformational Coaching Brings
Increased Motivation in Other Areas of Your Life
Coaching seeks to grow in you a strong sense of motivation, autonomy and self-direction which will continue long after our sessions have ended. It tends to have a ‘knock-on’ effect on other areas in your life, even if you are not focusing on those areas in the sessions.
Case study: A client came to my sessions to achieve his goal of making a sound studio in his back garden. As the weeks of went by, he reported that he was having more success in other areas of his life. He felt more productive and able to take the action necessary to do things he had been putting off for months.
Enhanced Creativity
As previously mentioned, effective coaching conversations should aim to improve your thinking. And I have observed that improved thinking has a huge impact on creativity. Quite simply, coaching enables you to have more good ideas. And as more creative thoughts are generated, so is the permission to see a bigger picture for your life.
Case study: An online entrepreneur started her journey with me claiming that she did not think of herself as creative. Six months later, she outlined a plan for her life and business full of invention and creative solutions for the next two years. The plan was ambitious but attainable and she is already planning the action steps to get there.
Changed habits
In order to make changes, coaching encourages you to examine the habits that are holding you back. Once identified, we will work to change the habit and plan how to do that. My signature coaching programme is a minimum of three months for a reason. It gives you the opportunity to go through a process of change, which is not linear and may involve both relapse and re-thinking. However, it is necessary when you are tackling long-term habits and behaviours.
Self-awareness and Learning
When you focus on your own self-development, all kinds of wider learning takes place. As coach, I often offer resources to clients (relevant podcasts; blogs; book recommendations etc) which supports this learning.
Coaching conversations are creative: they intend to inspire deeper thinking and learning. Nothing is more satisfying than when a client sends me a link to a video they have found relevant to our last session, or a quote they find particularly inspiring. This is coaching in action.
Happiness
Finally, the net gift of all these coaching benefits is one that can be overlooked because it is hard to quantify. It is, of course, increased happiness.
Think for a moment about the things holding you back in life and how frustrated/angry/sad they make you feel. Now imagine that you have worked out how you want to live and work in this world; that you know your bigger vision and purpose and have the confidence and tools to get you there. Imagine the deep sense of happiness that comes with such self-knowledge.
Summary of the Life-changing Benefits of Transformational Coaching
- Increased Clarity
- Greater Confidence
- Sense of Purpose
- Relief from Negativity
- Emotional Toolkit
- Path to Your Goals
- Accountability
- Transformation
- Knock-on Motivation
- Enhanced Creativity
- Changed habits
- Self-awareness and Learning
- Happiness
Book a Free Call With No Obligation
Remember that no amount of describing coaching to you can replace the actual experience. Coaching is something that happens in a creative, non-judgemental 1:1 space dedicated entirely to you.
If you would like to experience the life-changing benefits of transformational coaching for yourself, with no obligation, please book a call with me today. I promise to work with you to create an experience of coaching that you won’t forget.
You can find details of my 12 Week Transformational Coaching Programme here. I recommend this length of time to ensure you get the full benefits that transformational coaching has to offer. However, if you have a contained project you would like to work us to work on, take a look at the Creative Breakthrough VIP day.
I look forward to our conversations.
Emma D.
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