For the majority of my career I have worked as a Qualified General Nurse and throughout the many areas of nursing that I worked I loved the people. I loved caring for people and I quickly discovered that I really wanted to help my patients to feel heard and genuinely cared for. Being a Nurse is a demanding role and multi-tasking, writing copious notes, liaising with members of the multi-disciplinary team, assessing, planning and evaluating care ~ not to mention all the practical aspects of wound care, PEG feeds, medication administration, catheterisation, stoma care, supporting activities of daily living etc. My shifts were full and overflowing with ‘nursing activities’ and all I wanted to do was get back to my patients ~ to people! I wanted to connect. I wanted them to know that I truly cared and wanted to hear about their lives. In the 1st year as a Qualified Nurse I almost ended my career because the nursing activities seemed more important than the actual people and I couldn’t reconcile that chasm of disparity. In fact it wounded my heart! In the end I worked as a Nurse for over 20yrs so I must have worked that out. I learned that every second I was with a patient I connected and listened. It may have been brief but it made a difference to how they felt, and peoples feelings matter.

As I worked as a Nurse I was drawn to people and the obvious link between mental, emotional, spiritual & physical health and I began to steer my life more in that direction, learning all that I could to support people to heal, to grow and to flourish. Flourishing doesn’t have to mean 100% physical, emotional and mental health. I’ve known many people who have disease or physical challenges who are flourishing mentally, spiritually and emotionally. I’ve also known people who are physically well and no obvious physical challenges who are debilitated by their mental and emotional issues. There’s no judgement here. It’s about YOU and what you understand about yourself and what YOU value in life and whether these values are being compromised or fulfilled in your daily expression. It’s also about knowing that it’s ok to NOT be ok!

Throughout my years as a Nurse as well as studying the myriad of courses expected of me I also studied and qualified in therapies and life coaching. I KNEW this was where I needed to be. I always felt stuck in the middle some how as the therapy I was involved in seemed to focus on healing the past and the life coaching was about creating a future. I tried to separate the two as the general word on the streets (now I’m showing my age ~ who even says that nowadays?), was that therapy is very different from life coaching and you can’t mix the two. WRONG!!!

WRONG, WRONG, WRONG!!

Sorry … for anyone who knows me I’m not usual that confident or vocal, but it’s my experience that therapy and life coaching together are essential in some situations.

I’ve had life coaching sessions with people who could not move forward because of issues that were related to the past and were deeply connected to their emotional health. You can throw as much NLP and other change modalities that you have at your disposal and they simply won’t or CAN’T change!! It’s demoralising for them (and you as the practitioner) and something or someone is to blame, right?? Usually…

1. The client
2. The Practitioner
3. The approach

Therapeutic Life Coaching is all about the people! It’s all about YOU and your uniqueness. It’s about listening, hearing, understanding, healing the past and creating the future. BUT, it’s also about living in the present, acknowledging the past and still having hope for a brighter future.

Your past doesn’t determine your future

Unless it does! The past is determining your future if secondary gain is present and keeping you locked into certain patterns of behaviour and repetitive thought processes. That’s where Therapeutic Life Coaching comes in. It supports and plans for your future and STOPS to hear and honour your past, whilst living in the present. With gentle but powerful techniques such as Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) Tapping, hypnotherapy and mindfulness, I can hold a safe space for you to pause and breathe and connect you to your authentic self. Allowing you to be (without judgement);

who you are, when you are, where you are

But remember the journey IS the thing. Not the end product. I’ve struggled all of my life with crippling and debilitating negative beliefs about myself and in the end you have to surrender to the fact that you are who you are (with all your imperfections and struggles) and that is someone pretty darned wonderful, in my book!!!

And then supporting you to the next stage of your life, and sometimes, free from what was holding you back. “Is it that simple Sam?” I hear you cry!!! I didn’t say it was simple! Although for some, it can be. Becoming aligned and shifting perspectives and beliefs can absolutely bring freedom. I do believe that we were created to be far more resilient than we actually are at times and we have been created with incredible internal resources that we often don’t fully know or understand how to process and deal with life’s challenges. Often we hold beliefs that hardships shouldn’t happen to us, so when they do we’re so shocked we can be stuck for years. At some stage wouldn’t it be great to become free of that, and often, you can!

So, I’ll leave it there this week ~ but do know that I’m here for YOU! Just get in touch and let’s have your first FREE Therapeutic Life Coaching introductory session and you can decide from there, ok? What have you got to lose?

Have a great week,

Love & blessings, Sam ❤