Your Remote Life Coach

A number of requests for life coaching come in everyday from parents seeking coaching for their late teen and early twenties children. This seems to be a growing trend. The reason this is happening is a subject for another post, and would be filled with more opinion than fact. What I want to deal with in this post is the reality of seeking help for others.

One of the golden rules of life coaching is that you can’t help a client who doesn’t really want to help themselves. As parents we all want to help our children succeed, but if the life coaching wasn’t initiated by your son or daughter, it probably isn’t going to be a successful engagement. At a minimum they really need to be on board with the idea. If you are a parent seeking life coaching for your son or daughter, maybe consider the following before you make the request for life coaching on their behalf. There are things that you can do as a parent that may get your son or daughter on the right track. There is one factor more than all others that allows a life coach to facilitate the successful achievement of goals with their clients. When a person feels heard, understood, and doesn’t feel judged it opens the doors for a successful coaching relationship. As parents we often listen to our children briefly, and then immediately tell them what they should do. If you are seeking life coaching for your son or daughter and they didn’t initiate it, you have already made a judgement that something with them needs to change. You are probably right about about that, but if they feel judged it makes it much more unlikely that your efforts will succeed.

Before you consider life coaching for your son or daughter. Commit to engage with them without any judgement. Ask questions and really seek to understand what they are thinking. Don’t assume that you already know, even though that may turn out to be true. The real goal is to sincerely make them feel heard and understood. I am not judging anyone here, I have had the same struggle with my daughters. Our goal as parents should be to hear and understand our children.

If you have had the thought to get life coaching for your son or daughter, and want to talk further about things, you can use your free thirty minute consult to discuss this. I don’t take on any clients where the request comes from anyone but the client, but I am happy to talk through your situation.