FAQ

Life coaching can help you improve any aspect of your life. Maybe you struggle to stick to a diet, to learn a language, to be assertive and stand up for yourself, or simply to stretch your comfort zone in one way or another. Life coaching can help with these matters and many more.

Common aspects of life that you may consider life coaching in could include:

Your love life
Do you lack the confidence to make contact with someone you are interested in? Do you struggle with being who you are when you are in relationship? Are you staying in a relationship that is no longer fulfilling? Do you find it difficult to get back into life after separation or divorce?

Your professional life
Has your work taken over your whole life? Do you experience interpersonal issues at work? Are you stuck in your career? Do you dream of working with something that is truly fulfilling and meaningful?

Your personal life
Do you feel like you have more potential for happiness and contentment? Do you have the confidence to go full out for the life you really want? Are you struggling to find meaning and purpose with your life? Do you find it difficult to make new friends? Do you want to take your friendships to a deeper level of quality? Are you finding it difficult to be the parent you know you can be?

Your performance
Are you an athlete, artist, writer, musician, or any other kind of performer, and you know you have more potential than you have been able to demonstrate? Do your “nerves” get in the way when you are in high-pressure situations? Do you have a tendency to self-sabotage? Do you want to push past your limitations?

These are just some of the things that life coaching can help with. Feel free to contact me, to discuss how life coaching can help you!

We will first of all focus on those areas of your life where you already know that you want to improve. This would usually be your reason for having decided to find a good life coach in the first place.

Alternatively, if you have come to life coaching without a specific reason other than just knowing that you can do better in life. Then we will look at the different aspects of life, generally, and let you rate how satisfied you are in each one – by use of the Wheel of Life (on Personal Life Coaching page) or some other tool – and focus the life coaching on the areas that need improving the most.

Yes and No. Anything that you can achieve with regular life coaching, you can also achieve with Meaningful Life Coaching. However, Meaningful Life Coaching can also add perspectives that are explicitly designed to help you live a life that you experience as meaningful. IF that is what you want. If that is not (yet) something that matters to you, we simply don’t go there in your life coaching.

Read more about Meaningful Life Coaching.

Life Coaching and Counselling both aim at making your life more rewarding and fulfilling. But they tend to start from different positions. Counselling typically starts from a sense that something is wrong, you may call it “a problem.” Life Coaching, on the other hand, typically starts from a sense that your life is okay, but there is still more to reach for in your life.

Counselling commonly addresses experiences that have affected you in the past, and that are still affecting how you operate in the present. Life Coaching doesn’t focus much on the past, but rather looks at the present with an aim toward the future. However, this distinction is typically somewhat blurry both in Life Coaching and Counselling.

Read more about this in the article “Life Coaching vs. Counselling” (opens in a new window, on the main website for Integrating Awareness)

You don’t need to have that all worked out beforehand. If you are not sure, we will be able to work it out in your first session. And either way, I have training, skills, and many years of experience in both fields, so whether you need life coaching right away or counselling/psychotherapy first, I will be able to help.

You may also get some more clarity from reading this article: “Life Coaching vs. Counselling” (opens in a new window, on the main website for Integrating Awareness)

Regardless of what you are wanting to improve or address with life coaching, or who you choose to be your life coach, there are some fundamental principles for getting the most out of the process. I have written up these principles in a brief publication called “The 7 Secrets to Getting the Most out of Counselling and Life Coaching”, which you can download for free, by becoming a subscriber to Authentic Living! – the newsletter for Integrating Awareness (opens in a new window).

Life coaching is a pragmatic process; it takes the most efficient approach to the goals you want to achieve. What works for one person, may not be what works for another. And what one person find meaningful may not be meaningful to another.

So part of the life coaching process is to use questions and exercises to find out how you look at world, and how you see your own role in life – including what you see your potential as being. This way, your life coaching process can be tailored to the person that you are.

Yes, everything that is communicated in your life coaching will be treated with utmost professional confidentiality. I will disclose information about you only when; (a) you give me permission to tell someone else, or (b) failure to disclose the information would place you or another person at serious and imminent risk, or (c) it is required or authorised by law.

Other than my handwritten notes I do not record your life coaching sessions. Equally, I do not grant you permission to, other than your own handwritten notes, record your life coaching sessions, or any other conversations between us.

No. It is common that life coaches use an approach that demands of you to commit to 5, 10, or more sessions, and that you are required to pay for in advance. This is not my approach. I expect that you will continue your life coaching sessions with me because they provide immense value to your life, not because I hold your pre-paid fees ransom.

How many sessions you choose to have is entirely within your control and responsibility. While I recommend that you discuss it with me beforehand, you do have the right to end your work with me at any point you choose.

How long is a piece of string? The number of life coaching sessions you need fundamentally depends on two things. Where you are at in your life when you begin the life coaching process, and what you want to achieve in the process, i.e. where you want the life coaching to take you.

If your concern is a simple matter that only requires a bit of fine-tuning of habits and actions that you already have in place, then 2 or 3 sessions can be sufficient. If you are taking on a full life transformation, then you could need to have 15 or more sessions.

The most important thing is not the number of life coaching sessions you need to achieve your goals. More important is that the process is executed in such a way that your results are solid and lasting.

Your life coaching sessions will go for 1 hour or 2 hours, depending on your preference and on where you are at in the life coaching process.

At the beginning of the process the gap between sessions is usually shorter, and your sessions will typically only go for 1 hour. As you get further down the track and have picked up momentum in your process, the gap between sessions is usually longer, and your sessions typically go for 2 hours.

Like most of my coaching clients, you probably want to start seeing results quickly. For this reason, and also to make sure that you get into the grove of being coached regularly, the gap between sessions at the beginning of the life coaching process is usually 1 week (or 2 weeks if that works better in your life circumstances).

Once you have picked up a bit of momentum in the process, we space the next couple of sessions a bit further, and leave a gap of 2 weeks between sessions.

When you have settled into the life coaching process, and established a solid routine of being coached on your actions steps toward achieving your goals, we will settle into the long-distance pace of having monthly sessions.

So, the typical schedule looks something like this:

• Sessions 1, 2 & 3 are weekly sessions that go for one hour
• Sessions 4, 5 & 6 are fortnightly sessions that go for one hour
• Subsequent sessions are monthly sessions that go for two hours

If you have a brief question in relation to what we have discussed in a life coaching session, you can put it to me over the phone or in an email. If it is something that can be addressed this way in ten minutes, I will do that. But if it turns out to be a more complex matter, we may need to arrange to have a full coaching session to be able to address it in a meaningful way.

If things are moving along really fast in your life, and you feel a need for a coaching session before the next scheduled session, you can contact me to move it forward. Whatever works best for you.

I have appointment slots from 9/9:30 a.m. Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday.

My last appointment is scheduled to start at 3:30 on Thursday and Friday.

On Monday and Tuesday I also have after-hours appointment slots; starting at 5:30 p.m.

My office and clinic are located in the inner South-West Brisbane suburb of Sherwood (contact details and map), and this is where most of my sessions take place. In extraordinary circumstances I can meet with clients in their office, but that gets quite costly, since I will then also charge for my travel time.

If you are unable to come to my office, there is also the possibility of having life coaching online.

Yes, this is an option, if you are unable to come to my office. Read more about online life coaching.

Yes, absolutely! In fact, I recommend that you phone me for a chat, so you get a feel for what I am like to talk to. And so that I can get an idea of where you are at and where you are aiming to get to. Life coaching is a very personal thing, and you will want to at least have talked for a couple of minutes with the person who will be your life coach – I know that I would certainly want to do that!

The standard fee for a business-hours, 1 hour life coaching session is currently set at $155.

The standard fee for an after-hours, 1 hour life coaching session is currently set at $185.

All fees are charged for the time spent in a session, and are therefore the same for individuals as for couples.

If your life coaching is related to your work or business, you may be able to claim some or all of your life coaching costs as a tax deduction. Please consult your tax adviser about your particular circumstances.

My approach to life coaching does not involve prepayment for several sessions in advance. You simply pay for each session, one at a time.

The payment options are:

• Cash at the time of your session.
• PayPal or Bank Transfer prior to your session.

Your first session must be paid with cash (yes, you will receive a receipt!). I will then provide you with additional information for other payment options for subsequent sessions.

Yes, I can guarantee that if you guarantee to do your part of the work, the life coaching will help you achieve your goals. It is part of the life coaching process to set well-defined, achievable goals, as well as to identify the action steps that need to be taken to achieve them.

It is also part of the life coaching process that we monitor your progress, and refine your action steps when needed, to find the most effective approach for you to overcome any obstacles in the way. Your role in that part of the process is simply to be coachable, i.e. to be flexible and willing to explore action steps that may be somewhat outside of your habitual comfort zone.