With Life Coaching be Better Than Ok
“Are you Ok?”
We all Hear this A Lot And Often Respond With, “I’m Ok” Or “I’m fine.”
While It Is Ok To Be Ok, There Is So Much More In The Scope Of Well-Being Than Just feeling being ok. You can thrive.
With the support of a life coach, you can be better than just Ok.
Answer these questions for yourself:
Are you excited to wake up and start a new day? Do you look forward to moving closer to your most important milestones? Are you confident in your next steps in life (or at least excited to explore your opportunities)? Do you have a good handle on what is on your plate tomorrow, next month, next year? Are you organized and attentive in your daily preparation?
If these things don’t wring true for you, life coaching might be just what you need. I will help you forge ahead in your personal development to become more focused, connected, thoughtful and flourishing.
Click the blue button to schedule a complimentary life coaching consultation via my scheduling site or contact me directly using the chat bubble at the bottom.
I invite you to explore more below.
enLiven Core Value
As my client, these don’t need to be your core values or even top strengths of your character. But what they do need to be is something you’re willing to commit to, in synergy with your innate values and strengths, to achieve the goals you set in life coaching. Commit to and embrace these values with me to engage in an experience that will change your life.
“I persist toward my goals despite obstacles, discouragements, or disappointments.”
Perseverance is sticking with things. It means being hardworking and finishing what is started, despite barriers and obstacles that arise. There is pleasure received from completing tasks and projects. Sometimes we must dig deep and muster the will to overcome thoughts of giving up. Perseverance involves organizing oneself to support activities (e.g., scheduling breaks and sticking to them, rewarding in small ways along the way), but when all else fails, this strength helps the person to barrel through until the project is done. This helps build further confidence for future successes and goal accomplishment. Perseverance involves the voluntary continuation of a goal-directed action despite the presence of challenges, difficulties, and discouragement. There are two vectors of perseverance. It requires both effort for a task and duration to keep the task up.
“I seek out situations where I gain new experiences without getting in my own or other people’s way.”
Curious individuals are interested in exploring new ideas, activities and experiences, and they also have a strong desire to increase their own personal knowledge.
“I am realistic and also full of optimism about the future, believing in my actions and feeling confident things will turn out well.”
The character strength of hope has to do with positive expectations about the future. It involves optimistic thinking and focusing on good things to come. Hope is more than a feel-good emotion. It is an action-oriented strength involving agency, the motivation and confidence that goals can be reached, and also that many effective pathways can be devised in order to get to that desired future. Optimism is closely linked with having a particular explanatory style (how we explain the causes of bad events). People using an optimistic explanatory style interpret events as external, unstable and specific. Those using a pessimistic explanatory style interpret events as internal, stable and global.
“I am aware of and understand my feelings and thoughts, as well as the feelings of those around me.”
When a person knows what makes other people tick, he or she is displaying social intelligence. They’re aware of the motives and feelings of themselves and others. They can feel comfortable and say the right thing whether they’re in the boardroom or the janitorial room, in a school setting or at a construction site. Social intelligence involves two general components:
- Social awareness: what we sense about others
- Social facility: what we do with our awareness
“I take charge and guide groups to meaningful goals, and ensure good relations among group members.”
Leadership can take on many forms. For our purposes, leadership refers to the tendency to bring people together and encourage cooperation, while maintaining good relations within the group. Like teamwork, leadership involves being committed to the goals beyond ourselves, Leadership involves setting goals and accomplishing them, enlisting effective help, building coalitions, and smoothing ruffled feathers. Effective leaders are able to provide a positive vision or message that inspires dedicated followers who feel empowered and perhaps even inspired.
“I manage my feelings and actions and am disciplined and self-controlled.”
Self-Regulation is a complex character strength. It has to do with controlling your appetites and emotions and regulating what you do. Demonstrating self-regulation facilitates effectiveness in pursuing and achieving goals by controlling reactions to disappointment and insecurities. Self-regulation helps keep a sense of balance, order, and progress in life. Self-Regulation can be viewed as a resource that can be depleted and fatigued. A useful metaphor can be that self-regulation acts like a muscle, which can be exhausted through over-exertion or strengthened through regular practice.
The core values described above are taken from the work of the VIA Institute. Learn more about VIA Character Strengths from The Power of Character Strengths by Ryan Niemiec.
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Case Studies
Case studies presented here are composites of real processes and outcomes experienced by clients of enLiven Wellness Life Coaching. Names and specifics of their lives have been altered to protect their confidentiality. Click on a tab above to read more.
Background
Ryan is a 24 year old married young professional with a preschool aged son. He manages older professionals in an engineering field with more education and experience. When Ryan began coaching, he was concerned about how much time he was spending at work on non-work activities (scrolling Facebook, watching YouTube). His lack of productivity led him to the concerns that he would be fired due to his lack of performance. He’d received no indication that his job was in jeopardy or that his supervisors noticed his work habits.
Ryan reports that he experienced difficulties with attention and focus throughout his high school years. While his grades were sufficient, he noted that it was hard to stick to things and often second guessed his decisions. He noted that he was an athlete and in good physical condition in those days. He lived with his mom, stepdad, and an older brother. He noted that he has a good relationship with his stepfather and his father is marginally involved in his life. Ryan was hired into his current organization at 20 years of age without a college degree and quickly moved into a management position despite his education and experience.
Ryan requested support to improve his work habits as well as improving his daily health and wellness habits. His bigger picture goal is to learn skills to implement life-long personal growth in all areas of life.
Goals & Plan
After specifically identifying Ryan’s presenting issues, he was asked to flip his “problems” and describe what it was that he would prefer to see instead. Regarding his habit of using social media to avoid difficult tasks, he indicated that he would prefer to deal with those tasks in a structured manner, completing more work responsibilities each day as well as interacting more with his employees and supervisors. Of course, saying what he wants does not make it so, therefore, Ryan has taken this further to identify the triggers of his undesired behaviors. He recognized that anxiety about difficult tasks caused him to seek activities that calmed him in the short term, which were avoidance activities such as watching YouTube (especially personal development videos). Long-term, these activities caused further anxiety due to a mounting workload and his concerns about losing his job from a lack of productivity.
Ryan identified the need to resolve his immediate stress and anxiety in more functional ways. He learned skills to manage this (meditation/breathwork and other techniques to moderate his nervous system). In addition, he created tools to manage his task priority and daily schedule.
As he began to feel more in control of his life, Ryan was better able to address habits and routines outside of work. He established bedtime habits conducive to better sleep, such as putting his phone in another room before bed to reduce screen time and blue light at critical night time hours. He also implemented exercise and eating habits to address body composition issues contributing to fatigue and unhealthy blood pressure.
Ryan’s journey has been a challenging one, falling off of the wagon several times. Despite these setbacks, noticeable improvements have been made on each subsequent return to coaching. Ryan reports that he has a very heroic vision for himself and is noticing that now sees a path forward to his ideal life rather than his pessimistic view of himself as a representation of his problems. He has enjoyed significant success in his productivity and is now expanding his vision to be what he admires honest, caring and successful people.
Background
Melani is a married 37 year old mom of 3 working in the real estate industry. She has been with her partner since they were teenagers.
Melani sought life coaching due to her reconciliation of a very restrictive religious upbringing that does not now match how her values have emerged. She also struggled with an outward expression of confidence that did not match her inner sense. Addition challenges arose as work progressed, including struggles to open up to new social relationships
Unlike traditional therapy, there are no mental health diagnoses in life coaching though clients sometimes come to coaching with previous diagnoses or even self diagnoses. When clients present with such things, we draw back from the label and describe behavioral ways in which this manifests in their lives. In addition to the negative characteristics, we also identify positive attributes of the behaviors.
Goals & Plan
Melani’s goals were to come to terms with her past, accepting it for what it was and identifying the ways in which it has influenced all that she appreciates in her life. She also sought to improve the dynamic in her marriage, clearly communicating her needs to her husband in a manner that would maintain and build intimacy.
Melani took her challenges, identifying the feelings, actions and circumstances in her life that she did not want and turning that into a narrative about her life preferences and desires. In particular, she desired improved communication with her husband. Understanding that she could not change his behavior in these situations, she addressed how she approached communication, mentally preparing her tone to be less confrontational and changing her expectations for conversations from adversarial to resolution focused and lighter. She no longer took on every responsibility just to avoid conflict (which created significant resentment toward her spouse). This shift in perspective created extraordinary changes in their relationship and how her husband showed up as a partner and a father. Also in terms of family dynamics, Melani no longer shied away telling her husband what she needed and encouraged the same from him.
Outside of her immediate family, Melani wished for more social engagement and friendship, knowing that she could not fully count on her husband and a very small (and mostly logistically distant) friend circle to fulfill her relationship needs. She challenged her inner voice that told her people were not interested in getting to know her and went out of her way to join groups of interest and initiate new relationships.
Melani found great success from life coaching, challenging old ways of thinking and gaining new perspectives. It was not always easy. Old thinking patterns tried to creep back in causing her to question the improvements she experienced. We often objectively brought it back to what she was experiencing, not where her thoughts about her experiences were taking her.
Details Coming Soon
Details Coming Soon
Who We Are
Todd M. Smith, M.Ed., Ed.S.
Welcome, I’m glad you stopped by. My name is Todd Smith founder of enLiven Wellness Life Coaching. I am a former school psychologist turned life coach. I thought about starting you off with my LinkedIn style introduction. You know, the braggadocios one that tells you about my INCREDIBLE skills and experience… but then I realized that my life coaching profile isn’t the Me that you will get to know when you sit across from me with a coffee (whether in person or connected via technology of some sort). You are certainly welcome to see that version but I warned you! Here’s what I really want you to know about me (and likely what you’re actually looking for on this page anyway).
To be brief, I spent about 14 years in education where I got my first taste of coaching working with educational teams. I later recognized how vital those skills were and how I could use them to make an impact. After a few years of searching, I finally recognized how I could best serve my community, founding enLiven Wellness Life Coaching in 2015. Since then I have logged thousands of hours of coaching, helping people develop into better and better versions of themselves.
I’ve been through my own tough times as you probably have too. Because of that, I value the power of facing and overcoming challenges. This is where I am at my best, helping people navigate their obstacles, catalysing them into resilience, grit, and a mindset primed for personal growth.
I invite you to join me in a conversation to see how I can help you grow into an even better you;.
Hope L. Resendez
I am excited to welcome Esperanza (Hope) Resendez on board as enLiven’s newest coach. Esperanza is one of the kindest and most growth oriented people I know. She is truly one of the most beautiful souls I know.
Coach Hope’s profile is coming soon!
What to Expect
The descriptions below provide a general idea of the scope and sequence, though we will always make room for anything important that may pop up. For example, we may be focused on a given goal but when something pops up that needs to be addressed before it takes you off track, we will make space to keep you progressing.
We will work through the following three major phases, then repeat each time we set new goals (but condensed each time since we will already have established a strong base of trust and rapport):
Generally conducted via telephone, this free 30 minute session is designed to check for fit and feel. It is important to determine whether our styles and expectations match. I will openly share whether I feel the match is conducive to your goals and will offer referrals if I believe you would be better served by another professional. During this conversation, we will lay out your preliminary goals and identify some of your key strengths and assets. Prior to the consultation, you will have to opportunity to complete surveys that identify your top character strengths, your most important personal values, and a third that provides you with an overview of your well-being.
This is the first session primarily designed to explore your goals and learn about your experiences, both good and bad to bring light to your amazing resilience, strengths and resources so you can capitalize on that wisdom. This session, like all sessions will be organized around your priorities. I am here as a guide on your journey, you are the one that makes it all happen. This session will end with an action plan aligned to your preliminary goals so you can immediately experience success.
Following the enVisioning Session, I allow you the flexibility to use your time in a way that best fits your needs. We put systems in place and determine how to best utilize coaching supports. The typical monthly subscription provides you 4 hours of coaching support per month. The focus of these sessions will be to dream up the possibilities, design a plan to bring that vision to life and then take decisive action upon that plan, following up regularly with brief and effective evaluation and course revision as needed.