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Welcome to the Wellness in Every Season podcast, where we explore what it means to achieve total wellness. Each week we take a deep dive into an area of wellness such as emotional, physical, spiritual, social, intellectual, environmental, occupational, and financial wellness to help you become your best self.
This is episode one. Welcome Wellness Wanderers. Today we are going to be discussing the difference between coaching, consulting, and therapy. When to work with each, if it is okay to work with more than one at a time and can a coach be all three for a client? This is an important place to start because it is a common point of confusion. As a bonus, I am including some of the questions I ask before a consultation call to give you an idea of what coaching looks like.
What is coaching, consulting, and therapy? All of these are services provided to help, but they differ in their goals, methods, and focus.
Coaches partner with clients, yes, clients, and not patients as insurance does not cover sessions at this time. To set and achieve goals, coaches focus mainly on the present and future. They ask a lot of deep questions, reflect client emotions and responses, and guide the client's self-discovery. Coaches help the client work through blocks that prevent the client from moving forward on their own.
Consultants provide expert advice on a specific area or problem, usually with customized solutions. They often work on on a project basis or for a certain timeframe.
Therapists help individuals deal with emotional and psychological issues that are impacting their mental health and wellbeing. Therapists work with clients to help them identify and understand their feelings, behaviors, and thought patterns, and provide them with the tools to help cope with or overcome these issues. Therapists usually work on a long-term basis and focus on addressing the underlying causes of the client's problems. The work generally focuses on past issues such as childhood.
Is it okay to work with a coach, consultant, and/or therapist? The short answer is yes, because they have different goals and approaches. In fact, it is not uncommon for people to work with a therapist, coach, and consultant at the same time. If it is okay for you specifically, depends on your individual needs and goals. If you feel that you could benefit from the expertise of all three professionals, it may be appropriate to work with them simultaneously.
However, it is important to communicate with each professional about your decision and ensure that they are all aware of the other's involvement to make sure that you as a client and patient for a therapist are not getting the same type of work with each professional.
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Can a coach also be a consultant and therapist? Yes, however, it is not recommended or common for someone to be all three. Several coaches offer consulting as well as coaching, such as a health coach or business coach. Coaches can also be therapists, but usually the focus is on coaching with some therapeutic techniques.
Each profession has its own specific training, certification, and ethical guidelines. Combining all three could create a conflict of interest and compromise the quality of service for the client.
With that said, a coach might use a cognitive behavioral approach, which is commonly used in therapy to help clients overcome limiting beliefs or negative thought patterns. Similarly, a coach might use a consulting approach to provide strategic advice to clients who are trying to achieve specific goals in their personal or professional lives.
Here are some general coaching questions to help you decide if you are ready to be coached.
What are three things you would like to change about your life in the next 3-12 months? These can be personal and/or business related.
How will your life be impacted when you have these wants and desires fulfilled?
How will you feel when you've manifested your desires?
What has kept you from already making these changes?
What will you miss out on if in a year from now nothing has changed? How will you feel about nothing changing?
To summarize, coaches focus on the future goals, motivation, blocks, patterns, fears, possibilities, life purpose, and powerful questioning. It is a lot. It's about letting the client explore possibilities and come up with the solution themselves, then the coach keeps them accountable. It is important that the client comes up with the solution themselves because they are more likely to stick with it. The time frame is incredibly flexible depending on the area of coaching.
Consultants give advice and suggestions and their time frame is usually short. Therapists focus on healing past issues, deep emotional trauma and addiction and their time frame is long-term. Next week we will be discussing the seven dimensions of wellness, how they create total wellness, and what happens when they are out of balance.
I will also add in a couple of questions for you to think deeply about next week. Following episode two we will take a deep dive into each specific dimension of wellness to give you an idea of what you can do to balance out that specific area and I will be providing questions to help you think about are you out of balance in that area and what you want to do to create balance in that specific area. I look forward to seeing you in future episodes.
Thank you for joining our wellness discussion this week. If you liked what you heard, follow me on Instagram at momswellnessineveryseason to keep up to date with wellness tips. Please share the podcast love with others by sharing, subscribing, and leaving a review wherever you listen to podcasts. If you want a topic covered in more detail or a free coaching consultation, please DM me on Instagram or send an email through my website wellnessandeveryseason.com. I look forward to connecting with you. Please join the discussion next week.
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