How To Be Your Own Life Coach: Ask Yourself These Questions
Today you’re going to find out how to be your own life coach.
Values and beliefs motivate us to act. If we live in harmony with them, they give us a sense of happiness and fulfillment. To reach deeper layers, you need to hear what’s playing in your soul. In this search, coaching is an effective and fast tool.
How we live, how we act, whether we achieve our goals with ease or on the contrary, in coaching we analyze on several levels, which Robert Dilts describes in his book “From Coach to Awakener” as neurological levels.
How To Be Your Own Life Coach
The most basic is the level of the environment, followed by: the level of behavior, skills, values and beliefs, identity and the highest – spiritual, also called the level of mission.
In personal and social development, we move from lower to higher levels. We get to know the environment, we are in feedback with it: it affects us, we affect it. From childhood, we learn to behave and continue to learn throughout our lives, using our resources and adapting to new situations. At the skills level, we look for an answer to the question: how to do this?
First, we find out how to do easy things, and over the years the tasks become tougher. They require more knowledge, but also skills. For example, a good manager not only needs to understand how to prepare a financial report or a business plan. He must also have the ability to talk with the team, stimulate people and avoid conflicts.
What’s invisible to the eyes
Everything that happens to us on the first three levels (environment, behaviour and skills) results from higher structures. At the level of beliefs and values we answer the questions “why?
For example, why am I easy to make contacts? Why do I want to be financially successful? Why do I care about harmonious cooperation? Why do I constantly make the same mistakes?
And also to the questions: what is my consent to? What is my motivation? What do I think about my work, about myself? What is important to me? What is difficult? What values do I consider as important: trust, honesty, respect, harmony, work-life balance, faith, loyalty, love, reliability, responsibility, etc.?
At the level of identity, we look for the answer to the question: Who am I? What is my mission in the world? But also: what am I like at work? Am I an expert, professional, mediator in conflict situations? And at the spirituality/mission level we try to see the superior truths controlling the universe, to meet the Absolute, God, Spiritual Guide. It is worth to think about what motto accompanies you and what is your leitmotif in life.
Usually we see the first three structures. The others are hidden in the depths of the self. We do not always look at them or even realize their existence. And it is precisely finding answers to questions about values, identity and mission in life that is the key to success in harmony with oneself.
It also allows us to understand why, despite all our efforts, we are unable to achieve something. A change at the level of skills is easier if we learn something that is consistent with our values and beliefs.
Little movement, big change.
To reach deeper decks, you need to hear what the soul is playing at. In this search, coaching is an effective and fast tool. During the session we can reach these levels, realize the values that guide us, and translate this knowledge into everyday life. Such a process brings deeper and more lasting changes than working only on the level of skills and behaviors.
When we feel that “we can do it”, we will tune in with this thought, we have a better chance of completing the task. Because to feel it’s more than simply knowing that it is feasible to do something. This is the advantage of coaching over training. It is like a lever, whose small movement brings a big change.
Values determine what we do and how we live. They define what is important to us, what we want to promote, what we want to share with others. They give meaning to our existence. Beliefs, on the other hand, support values. They speak about why a given value is important to us.
We feel values in our hearts. For people who have blocked access to feelings, they’re only words, abstract concepts. When you work with a coach, you can blaze the way to the heart and look for answers to the questions: what’s the determinant of my life? How do I know that my values are being realized? Am I contented with the tempo at which this happens? If, for example, honesty is a worth to me, it is nice to specify.
Discovering our most significant values and unifying our internal needs gives us strength and private power. When we are consistent, all our verbal and non-verbal behaviors support us in our pursuit of our goals. In this state, you can move forward with every chance of success. If, however, we devote our energy and time to things that aren’t part of our core values, we may feel uncomfortable and irritated.
In harmony with yourself and the world
Values and beliefs are created on the basis of our lifelong experience. They are shaped by the environment, friends, school and oldsters. We draw them from the culture in which we live. They are linked to our identity and form the elemental principles according to which we live. But they can change, evolve over the years.
They are the main source of internal motivation and are important points of reference. They are defined in abstract terms: security, impartiality, patience, perfection, dignity, honour, loyalty, wisdom, love, beauty, helping, truth, friendship, joy, fulfilment, cohesion, justice, happiness, creativity, honesty, knowledge, freedom, perseverance, cooperation, play, trust, health, etc.
Everyone understands values differently and translates them into behaviour, which is why they need to be discussed in both professional and personal relations. For everybody, these terms can mean something different. In a partnership, for example, closeness for one person can mean being together all the time, and for an additional it means making nice gestures every now and then during the day. If partners don’t tell one another about their expectations, how they understand closeness, they may be disappointed.
When our values aren’t realised, we feel it’s an absence of satisfaction and cohesion, and even violence. Someone who values harmonious cooperation shouldn’t choose to work with aggressive sales techniques. Even the best training won’t turn such a person into a super-seller, because the employer’s expectations will be in conflict with the values he’s guided by.
It is crucial to look at your values and to harmonise your actions with them. This gives the feeling that we are in the right place in life.
Be your own coach.
If you want to create a map of your values, try to observe yourself and your body’s reactions when something important happens, at least for a while. What gives you joy, what irritates you, what causes anxiety and discomfort? For example, fear of public speaking may mean that perfection is a worth to you. Are you contented when you manage to balance work and private life? You most likely value stability and balance.
It is also worth answering a few questions:
- What is important to you?
- What normally motivates you?
- How do you know that your values aren’t fulfilled?
- Is it easy to follow your value rules?
- How much do you control your rules?
- Do the criteria you apply come directly from you or from others?
