Why I Joined The Life Coach School Certification with Brooke Castillo
In 2016 I took my first steps into the world of life coaching. Just four years later, I joined Brooke Castillo as a guest on the podcast that inspired me to take those first steps. How did I get here? In this article, I explain why I took the leap and joined the Life Coach School Certification with Brooke Castillo – and how it changed my life.
I’ve completed a lot of training in my lifetime. This is proven by the fact that I earned a Ph.D. in 2013! But even since earning a doctoral degree, you may be surprised to hear that The Life Coach School Certification process is the certificate I’m most proud of. It’s the first one that I earned simply because I wanted to. I didn’t do it for external validation or praise. I did it for me.
Let me take you back to the beginning of the story. In 2016, I was going through a career crisis. I was finishing up my third year as an assistant professor in my dream job, but it had been a difficult year for me. I was struggling with teaching. Our university president had just resigned. And a project I was emotionally invested in came to a screeching halt.
I was devastated. I found myself searching for what was next.
Getting Started with Life Coaching
So I dipped my toes into coaching that summer and into the fall. I found Brooke Castillo’s podcast in a random search and started listening. I proceeded to complete a foundational course in an ICF accredited program and then got to work coaching. My first paid coaching client started in January 2017.
I was thrilled to be doing something that I felt connected to. I started coaching more clients, but then I started to run into a wall. While some of my clients were taking actions and getting results, some of them weren’t and I didn’t know why. I wanted to help them.
As I continued listening to Brooke’s podcast, I absorbed more of her wisdom. (Honestly, I was very suspicious of the fake nails and eyelashes. That’s not how we typically roll in academia! I wanted to see authentic evidence.) As reticent as I was, the more I read the books she recommended, the more I realized she really knew what she was talking about.
In the summer of 2018, I began wondering about my business. I questioned whether I should keep moving forward with it. If I should continue spending my free time coaching. But then it happened, as if by magic: Brooke revealed her first online certification cohort.
Something inside of me screamed YES. You have to do this! You must make this happen. I had heard the siren call when she first opened up Self-Coaching Scholars and ignored it. Now was my time and I wouldn’t let the opportunity pass me by.
But I was PETRIFIED of spending that kind of money. I had spent less money on my car than this program cost. I had never paid for tuition in school as I was always on scholarship or fully funded in graduate school. (I took out loans for living expenses, for sure.) But this? This was a huge deal. I was on a mission to get out of debt and this felt like moving in the opposite direction.
The Life Coach School Certification
Even so, I took the leap and signed up. That’s also when I had my first experience with quality coaching for myself. I hired someone to help me work on my money beliefs (fortuitously, she’s now my accountant). A Life Coach School certified coach helped me to process through my thoughts and fears as we geared up for the program starting in October 2018. I had so many thoughts to manage but, through that coaching, I overcame my constant worrying.
And then I became unstoppable!
Learning all of the tools and techniques from Brooke, I knew exactly how to help my clients get results. Now I have the model and I can understand what keeps a person from taking action. It’s because of the feelings that drive them. Circumstances are neutral. But it’s thoughts that create feelings. And the good news? I get to choose my thoughts.
I couldn’t have anticipated the monumental results I got simply from showing up for myself. Just from being coached, I was able to:
Become a time ninja as I balanced coaching and being a professor.
Figure out with my husband how to reconnect after years of him traveling and me “being busy.”
Become a confident mom when we adopted out of foster care.
Reconnect with my own mother after years of not talking.
Earn back all of the money I invested in certification (and more) within 6 months.
Give myself permission to trust myself and make decisions for myself instead of asking everyone else around me what I should do.
Stop outrunning myself.
Deal with my emotions (boredom, worry, overwhelmedness, etc).
Realize I wasn’t supposed to be happy all of the time. (100% happiness is a myth.)
And then I created an amazing result. Brooke asked me to be on the podcast.
Brooke Castillo’s Life Coach Podcast
Her podcast is regularly in the top 250 list of all podcasts. This was huge. If you had asked me in 2016, when I started listening to her, “Do you know you’ll be on a future episode?” I would have looked at you quizzically. In 2018, I might have said, “Yeah, maybe in 2025?”
But here I am, on one of Brooke’s episodes in 2020, sharing my enthusiasm with the world!
Related to that experience, I was also flown out to Dallas for a photo/video shoot to talk about my experience in Coach Certification. It all happened in the same week and I only had about two weeks to prepare. You know your true priorities when an event like this happens - I could have easily said my schedule was full or I was too busy. But I dropped everything!
In order from top left to bottom right - Andrea Scalici, Lauren Cash, Elizabeth Salazar, Lisa Hatlestad, Lindsay Dotzlaf, Janet Archer, myself, and Carrie Marshall
I was privileged to spend the day in Dallas surrounded by other incredible women. The conversations in between videos (and in such a fancy house!) were mind-blowing. I saw the evidence of what it’s like to put yourself in the room with smart people. These women were mirrors for myself and what I had also accomplished.
As I soaked everything in, I heard earth-shattering statements just casually mentioned on the car ride or at dinner. We all helped each other to shine brighter. That trip gave me so much energy to move forward.
Although Dallas was magical, I did need to come back home. But after being surrounded by these encouraging women, I am more trusting of myself now. I used this experience to anchor myself, to remember how far I’ve come and where I’m headed.
Is Life Coaching for You?
I want the same kind of energy and motivation for you to accomplish your dreams. I want you to “trust your knowing”, as Glennon Doyle puts it. When an opportunity taps you on the shoulder and you feel pulled to it - you go for it. That’s what certification was about for me. Listening to and acting on something I truly wanted to do, just for myself.
You probably have things like this too. Are you pushing them away or leaning into them? Even if it’s scary. It’s time to take the leap!
How to Find Out All the Details About That Potential Career
Did you know there is a free website where you can explore all the details about occupations?
Do you ever find yourself wondering about the salary of a career you're considering? Or what a person actually does, day to day in that career? There are lots of questions you might have about that career title.
The U.S. Department of Labor collects all of this data and shares it for free on an easy to use website:
The O*Net Online website is what I consider an under utilized treasure trove. Most young adults I work with have never heard of it before. But it contains all of these wonderful details!
Here's one of my favorite examples - genetic counselors. Did you know this is currently a career with a "bright outlook" (careers that have openings, room for growth, etc)?
Apparently all genetic counselors have their master's degree and their median wage in 2015 was $72,090. I can even click "local salary info" to learn more about salaries broken down by region and state. Their work values include "relationships" and "achievement." They use both email and face-to-face discussions every day. Genetic counselors are good at reading comprehension and critical thinking.
That whole paragraph was just from a quick scan of the O*Net website.
I don't even know any genetic counselors personally, but reading the details on O*Net gives me a clearer picture of that occupation.
If you don't have a particular occupation title in mind, you can search by categories. There are thousands of occupation titles I didn't even know existed! I bet you could find the same thing to be true if you explored the website yourself. Or if you're in a current occupation, read the details about that position to make comparisons across the United States. There are many ways to use the O*Net Online website. I'm just on a mission to share it with all young adults!
So tell us in the comments - what's something new you learned from the O*NET Website?
Why It's Difficult to be Around People who are on a Clear Path
Do you have people in your life who seem to know exactly what they are doing, why, and how to make it happen? But you don't? You're not alone. Check out this post.
It can be really difficult to be around people who know exactly what they are doing with their lives.
When you ask for advice or talk about your own path, they make a lot of vague statements:
"You just have to find your passion!"
"You'll figure it out in time."
"Everything happens for a reason."
"Just believe in yourself."
Ever heard those cliches before? They are everywhere. And the people that say them intend all the best.
But when you're struggling to find your path, hearing cliches is difficult.
Instead, I like to delve into learning more about other people and their stories. I'd rather hear the details of your story than ask for direct advice. Especially because most people don't know how to give direct advice - they give cliches instead. But they do know how to tell their own story. And we can learn from it.
Think about someone famous that you admire.
Where did they start? Did they always have success? What was their journey? For example, one of my favorite 'famous' people is Gretchen Rubin. She is well known now for her books and podcast about happiness, but before that - she was a lawyer. And she was someone who I started following right after she wrote her first book about happiness. Before she was a household name and inspiring millions. I have watched her journey and can admire her passion and focus. Because she shares so many personal stories in her writing, I feel like I know she hasn't always had a 'clear path' and linear focus. But it's only through reading her material that I've learned this about her.
We don't always have the chance to really learn more about 'famous people.'
So let's think about the unsung heroes in our every day lives that are on a clear path with passion and focus. Maybe it is a friend, a coworker, or a relative.
This week, try asking the people in your life some specific questions about their journey and see where the conversation takes you:
Tell me about a time you struggled at work.
What would you say are your top three priorities in life?
What's the best thing that has happened to you in the past year?
What's the worst thing that has happened to you in the past year?
Where do you want to be in five years (or ten years, etc) from now?
Through these conversations, it just might be easier to relate and learn something from their path that can help your own.
Asking deeper questions just might help prevent you from hearing a standard cliche.
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