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Your Dreams Can Become Your Reality
By Making Them Your GOALS!
Your Dreams Can Become Your Reality
By Making Them Your GOALS!
“Coaching is an action-oriented partnership that, unlike psychotherapy, which delves into patterns of the past, concentrates on where you are today and how to reach your goals.”
Do you have a desire to change?
How many times have you had an instinct to make some changes in your life...but the motivation faded almost as quickly as it came? Perhaps you made a New Year's resolution to workout three times a week. Or maybe you observed a romantic couple and vowed to bring the spark back to your own relationship. Maybe you had a horrible day at work and declared “I’m not going to take it anymore!” How many times have you run into an old friend who was doing something exciting that you wanted to try too? Like maybe starting their own business or renovating their home. But then the next day when the motivation wasn’t as strong you thought, “I’ll start tomorrow.” Or “What was I thinking; I don’t have time for that!” Or conceivably you thought, “I wouldn’t even know where to begin!”
Or perhaps you are the kind of person who jumps on a new idea immediately with great enthusiasm. All goes well for a week or even a month, but then the excitement wanes and boredom sets in. Or something else sparks your interest and your focus turns to that, leaving a lot of unfinished projects.
It’s human nature to keep our patterns. It’s comfortable, even if we don’t like it. We stay in the relationship that’s not working; we keep doing the job we’re not stimulated by, and we live in the apartment or house that’s too small. We underachieve, stagnate and settle for less. We get impulses to change things all the time, but if not acted upon they become missed opportunities to make our lives better.
What does a Life Coach Do?
It’s a Life Coach’s job to ask you what you would like to accomplish and then listen for insights to what you really want to change. You are the expert in your own life. You do know what you want. You probably even know how to get it. You just probably haven’t set a goal and taken the actions to achieve it. It’s my job to walk you through it.
Coaching is about forwarding your thinking. It’s about taking a look at where you are now, and where you want to get to, setting a goal. I will ask you what we coaches call Wisdom Access Questions to spark new ideas; and to turn the ideas you already have into actions. To help you make your dreams your reality!
A coach is kind of like a personal trainer for your life. If you decide you want to get in shape you could go to the gym and do it yourself. But most likely you’ll lose the motivation and stop going. Or you won’t push yourself very hard so you won’t get the desired results. However, you know that if you hire a personal trainer you’ll have appointments to show up for and he or she will push you harder to reach your goal. In coaching we call that stretch. We stretch your thinking farther than you would have taken it yourself. It’s hard to keep your patterns and your life the same when you focus so much consistent attention on what you really want, and make promises to a third party.
Coaching is not advice, therapy, counseling or consulting. Coaching is a way to help people make the best use of their own resources. It is a way to bring out the best of people's capabilities. Coaching is goal and results oriented and can focus on virtually any area of life: dating, relationships, business, career, family, health, personal growth, spirituality, intimacy, simple living, and financial development. Other coaching services include value clarification, brainstorming, identifying plans of action, examining modes of operating in life, asking clarifying questions, and making empowering requests. We teach, explore alternatives, inspire, act as a sounding board, build confidence and capability, listen with compassion, develop skills, provide a challenge, act as a model, and explore potential. A coach often acts as a partner, providing clients with tools, support, and structure to achieve more than they might be able to do by themselves.
You can't get what you want until you know what you want.
How I Became A Coach:
I began my career as an actress. In acting there are two basic requirements. You have to know yourself, so you know where to draw from to play characters. And you have to actively listen to the other actor, and then respond to the subtext of what they are saying. I studied the Meisner technique, which is simply based on being in the moment (in coaching we call that being present) and then just listening and responding (coaches do a lot of mirroring back). In learning about myself I started to focus a lot on my relationships. Our romantic partners are the best stimulants of our issues. I believe that if you use your relationship problems as insights to the issues you need to heal, you’ll grow. I started reading every self help book I could get my hands on and found a great therapist.
In 2002 I was asked to co-host a local talk show called Naked New York. The topic was sex and relationships. They dubbed me the "Dating Expert" because of my years of experience as a single girl. With all the self imposed relationship knowledge I had gained, it fit. The show became a hit! Over its 205 episode run I got to sharpen my relationship expertise interviewing some of the country’s top experts.
When Naked New York ended I started pursuing other avenues for my dating expertise. I wrote a relationship advice column for New York Moves Magazine. And I’m in the process of writing a dating self-help book. But it wasn’t until I met a Life Coach at an audition that I found my true calling. She told me she had become certified through a program at NYU. I enrolled the next day!
I became Certified at The New York University School for Continuing and Professional Studies Personal & Life Coaching Program. It has changed my life! Having always been a glass half full kind of person I immediately accepted positive psychology and my acting training made me a natural at active listening and identifying insights. And while I was surprised to learn that coaching is not giving advice, my years of self-help allow me to offer some very helpful suggestions. Naturally my specialty has become dating and relationships. But I find it exhilarating to help clients forward their thinking and change their lives in all areas!
To learn more about my TV career please visit www.DonnaBarnes.com
Impulses for Change Do Not Last... Without Help
