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What's the story with Life Coaching?

Sounds like the introduction to 'Seinfeld" skit!.

Life Coaching: When did it become fashionable to acquire a life coach? There seems to have been a dramatic shift from the psycho-therapist's couch to the On-Line Life-Coach/Personal Planner in recent times.
Are we becoming less sane? Or are we becoming more self aware and sophisticated in our personal development?

In a mere few generations, society has moved from agrarian to urban. Family and village values that tied communities together became diluted as the pace of change increased and peer groups became less cohesive.

Back in the day, the Sunday pulpit served as a voice of reason and consolidation of values and meaning. The erosion of simple life philosophies through education bred cynicism, and questioning of ones place in the natural order. The problem with self awareness is that increasing introspection can leave a void. A sense of fuzziness as to our life's purpose.

This 'helter skelter' rushing around chasing work, home, social, education, health, sport and spiritual pursuits, in the hope of achieving a successful balance of sanity, happiness and meaning no longer seems so simple. Divorce rates have never been higher. Kids today are reared by biological and step parent/s. Their siblings are biological and step-'half-brothers and sisters'. Families relocate frequently. This dislocation can impact our our innate sense of balance and social calibration.

How do we define ourselves? Are we mothers, teachers, entrepreneurs, friends, or confidants?

This awareness that Life's no longer simple and predictable is producing generations of stressed out confused and uneasy individuals, assessing their life balance ratios.

What is life Coaching? Generally accepted as unregulated and non accredited, the Life Coach is often a mentor within the same social circle. Often a calm voice of non judgmental reason and sounding board. A motivator and listener. The main difference between a Life coach and certified therapist is that a therapist focuses on diagnosing the past. The LC however focuses on facilitating change in present and future behavior.

The main goal of most LC's is the inspiring of a more positive future vision. Identifying and inspiring goals. The two most important roles of the LC however is eliciting a conscious balancing of life goals to produce the highest degree of happiness, and uncovering the highest life goal, which is that of Life Purpose. There is very little in life that is more profound than the search for meaning. Life purpose may be defined as that which we would be willing to die for. Ironically, this life purpose can get lost in the head long rush toward insignificant accoutrement, and once lost, leave an empty feeling of pointlessness bereft of joy.

So what's your life purpose? A tad uncomfortable question to answer perhaps, but worth the effort maybe!

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