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I apologize. I realize that I've been discussing many different subjects without really defining them. I want to do this blog post to define what Life Coaching really is.  So we're on the same page, and also audition for Jeff Sooey's article writing/movie-making creative team.

Definition

Life Coaching, to me, means to guide people to find the solutions to the problems looming in their personal lives. This is not to be confused with personal or sports training or sports. Instead of having physical from the neck down, you are more likely to have mental or emotional muscles from the neck up. It is a mental/emotional type of coaching, rather than a physical type.  If you're wanting help for yourself as a business owner or in your career as well as personal as a whole, life coaching may be just what you're looking for.  Taking care of ourselves before we can fully take care of others is a popular trend recently, as well as included in the law of attraction.  More individuals and business owners seek a way to be more effective personally and professionally.

Why People Might Use Life Coaching

There are many reasons people might seek life coaching. For one thing, if you can't figure out the solutions to your problems on your own, seeking a coach can be very beneficial. Also, you may want REAL solutions, instead of opinions of friends or family. You may also want to have something personally that you lack, like money, a fulfilling relationship, a healthy body, etc. You may have tried different things that haven't worked, so, you decide to search for life coaching instead of not finding a solution. 

Things may be working well personally or professionally in your life, but you're trying to think of a way to help them work even better, but you don't know how to go to the next level.  You may have a good business, good relationship, make good money, have good health, but you're stuck. You want more. You want greatness in your life. You want abundance. You want a great business, a great relationship, to make great money, have great health and to enjoy happiness more.

How We Can Help You

In life coaching, each professional is different, but the ideal scenario is finding a coach who can ask you questions until you figure out the solution to the problem yourself. Professionals become trained and often certified to know which questions to ask when to help you best.  In that case, they ask the right questions and can also know the best ways to get you to do what you may already know what you need to do but aren't doing currently.

Going back to being a business owner, life coaching can help you with what may hinder you from being the best business owner you can be. Maybe you lack the organization to turn your business from good into great. Maybe you lack leadership skills to know how to train your employees effectively.  Maybe you lack the self-esteem or motivation to get your business off the ground. We can help you understand, and do, what you need to understand and do in order to be most effective.

Where to Find a Life Coach

There are many places to look, but here are some ideas:

  • Look on this website

  • Do a Google search, or look for other qualified coaches, especially Jeffrey Sooey

  • Look in a local newspaper

  • Search in online classifieds

  • Networking with family or friends, you might be surprised who they know

  • Personal Development seminars- either the speakers are coaches or they can guide you to one

Basically, life coaching is to guide you to be better than you are, in many different areas of life. Many people are seeking these coaches to help them with relationships, health, money and other things.  Professional coaches, like myself, can help you solve your problems by asking you questions to help yourself, among other ways. You can find us in many ways. However you find one, help yourself by allowing us to help you.

Lisa Starr
Life/Corporate Coach
[email protected]


 
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Whether you have a start up company or are good and want to be great, there are some things to help.  Just to review from the last post, there are a couple of books that can help.  There are also some marketing tactics that can help.  We'll continue that discussion today.

For starting companies, what can you see in a year?  Write down how you want your business to be a year from now and, daily, live into that vision.  Act as if you already are where you want to be.  You'll get there if you do the effort it takes and believe.  Belief and work go hand in hand, no matter what your business is.

For good companies who want to become great, other than doing the same thing that got you where you are now, here are some more things you can try.  When you want to triumph over your competition, without being cutthroat, just add a little umph to that try.  What I mean is, what can you improve just a little bit?  Think about it, if your company only improves 1% a day, that adds up to 365-366% better in a YEAR!  A small change in customer service, attitude, getting orders correct, honesty, etc. can prove to be very profitable.

For both companies, it helps to treat your employees (even if it's just yourself) as individuals.  All of us have different strengths and weaknesses.  Do you know your employees' strengths and weaknesses?  Do you know how to overcome your employees' weaknesses, or which employees' strengths can overpower your employees' weaknesses?  Do you know what your employees are best at?  Are they being used in the best place in the company?  What could help them perform just a little bit better?

If you need help brainstorming, or figure out what would help most for YOUR company, please e-mail me.

Lisa Starr
Life/Corporate Coaching
[email protected]

 
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There are a few people I got e-mails from this week that were struggling with getting a business started, stable, or growing bigger and better than it already is.  Feel free to read whichever part of this blog post applies to you. This blog post will be some general advice and if you'd like more specific advice, feel free to e-mail me.

If you're simply starting a business and not sure either what to do or how to get a business going, I'd recommend starting by reading Monetize Your Passion by Rich German.  He really helps people make money doing what they love.  He asks for a donation to download the book, but the donation is not necessary, just recommended.  He is also a coach, so I can relate to him.

Next, I'd recommend being real in what you need, in terms of funding, space (is it a brick and mortar store, mobile business, online business, etc.), people (employees/partners, etc.), products (who would produce your books, business cards, or whatever it is you sell)/services. advertising.  Come up with a list of estimates of what resources and costs it would take.

Then, take stock of what you already have.  Do you have business skills?  Do you have practical skills that will help you be effective in your business?  Do you have any certifications to build credibility?  There may be a lot more that you have than things you really need.  Maybe you have a lot of time to build your business.

If you already have a successful business that you want to grow, take note of how you got there.  How long has it taken to get where you want to be?  What resources has it already taken?  Chances are, in order to grow, it may take a little more of the same to grow.  There is a book I know of that will help: From Good to Great by Jim Collins.  It is about companies that are good and how they can become great.  Another great book is All Business is Show Business about how to get raving customers who refer others to you. 

There are also many companies that are willing to fund projects or help other companies grow.  You could ask a company you already work with if they have a grant-maker.  You could also go to Grants.gov, grants.com or check out business grant now.  Many companies are non-profit companies for non-profit companies, but there are others as well. 

For anyone, the book Think and Grow Rich is essential.  There are many things inside this book that helps anyone with any company, but, mainly, it puts you in the right mindset to make the decisions you need and figure out the answers for yourself so you can be rich.  This book has probably made more millionaires than any other book.

Basically, if you're starting out a new business, you'll need to take stock of what you have and what you need.  If you are building a business, you will want to think back to how you got where you are and do more of the same.  You may also need to read and/or look for grant funding. 

Please let me know how I can specifically help you, whether this helps you or not.  I'm here to help.

Lisa Starr
Life/ Business Coaching
[email protected]



 
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I'm writing this for someone who asked about motivation - you know who you are.  I'm writing this as a blog post instead of simply an e-mail or a phone call because I think that more than one can use this information.  If this doesn't suit your needs and you need more specific information, please e-mail me.  This blog post is about what motivation is (so, we're all on the same page), why people don't have motivation and how they can get it. 

Motivation is the inner drive to get up and do what you need to do.  Motivation is individual, since we all have different goals and dreams.  Motivation is what makes the world go around.  Without motivation, we would not have the modern technologies we have, good or bad.  Everyone is motivated for some reason, to do something.

Many people lack motivation to do what it takes to make it to our dreams because we humans want what is most pleasurable.  Epicurius was a philosopher who taught people to do what was most pleasurable and enjoyable.  We still have a lot of that in our world today.  For motivation to be effective, you have to have a reason to do what you need to do.  For example, many of us get up and get ready to go to a job each day because we want to pay our bills, have a car, have an apartment/house, go out to have fun on the weekends, or basically do whatever we desire now.

There are a couple of different ways to get motivated to do what we want to do, either focus exclusively on a dream that will make it so compelling for us to do what we need to, or focus on the alternative, what would happen if we don't make our dreams come true.  The first technique was inspired by Bob Proctor and the second technique is inspired by Jeffrey Sooey.  Both techniques work, but, the question is, which technique will work best FOR YOU?  Try both techniques if you need to.  Whichever works best for you is the right technique for you.

There are SO many things that Bob Proctor teaches about dreams and goals, so I'll try to summarize the most important points for motivation.  It starts with a dream.  If you need help figuring out what you want the very most, do the following exercise.  If you already know, you can skip it.  Just sit and brainstorm for 5-10 minutes of all the things you'd do or have if time and money were no object, with NO JUDGEMENTS about if you'll ever have/do these.  Then, look through your list and choose what you want more than anything else on that list.  That's your dream. 

Then, write down a detailed description of your life, as if you had that dream in your life right now.  Then, every day, and many times a day, read that detailed description of your dream and life as if it were real now, while feeling how you'd feel if you had that dream now.  Change this description as often as you need to.  The more you feel as if the dream were real in the physical sense NOW, the more motivated you will be to do what you need to do to get to your dream.

Jeffrey Sooey has been coaching for 13 years and this is a technique that works for him.  He asks a lot of questions.  Some sample questions he asks is: What is your biggest struggle when it comes to motivation?  What do you think you need to do in order to turn your situation around?  What is preventing you from doing what you need to do?  Keep asking yourself those questions until you get to the heart of the problem - what's REALLY stopping you.  Once you come up with your truth that you want to change, think of what would happen if you DIDN'T get on a different path than the one you're on? 

The answer has to be painful enough for you that it will start giving you the motivation you need.  An example could be that if you don't change where you're going you won't become the person you'd like to be and after you die you'll look at the person you could have been and have that regret forever.  I don't know what that pain is for you, but, you do, if you think about it long enough.  At what point will you say, "OK, I've had it!  I'm not doing this anymore."  Remembering the pain of not acting, if painful enough, will give you the motivation to do what you need to do. 

After you've decided your pain, come up with an action plan.  What will keep you on this path, and not going back to your old ways?  Brainstorm, and write down, solutions to those distractions on the path toward your goal.  Maybe use those distractions as rewards.  Say that your distraction is Facebook and your goal is building a business.  Possibly after an hour of working toward your business, you can get on Facebook for 15 minutes.  Whatever you do, commit to it.  Even better to find someone you can be accountable to each day, to keep you on your new path.

To summarize, motivation is what gets us to do what we need to do.  There are a couple of techniques I'll share for motivation.  Bob Proctor's solution for lack of motivation is pick a dream, write a detailed description, read it daily and live as if it were real.  Jeffrey Sooey's solution to lack of motivation is choose a negative thing that causes pain if you think about not making your dreams.  Then you come up with an action plan to keep you on track, since old habits die hard.

Please let me know if this helps you, or if you need a little more help in carrying your favorite plan of action out.

Lisa Starr
Life/Corporate Coach
[email protected]

 
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There are many philosophers and inspirational people/companies, including Napolean Hill, Skip Ross, Nike, Robert Allen and J. Golden Kimball.  There are many others, but, you get the idea.  The concept of Doing It Now is very important for success.  In this article, you'll learn why people don't do it now, the cost of procrastination, and how doing it now can help you achieve.
 
When I mention doing it now - I'm talking about whatever you're afraid of.  Many people don't like to do what they're afraid of because of the consequences or perceived consequences.  Many people would rather simply do what's fun rather than what's necessary. 

Epicurius taught about doing what's most pleasurable in life and many people do just that.  Sometimes, people don't do what they need to because they just don't manage their priorities to include what they fear.  Those are most of the reasons people don't do what they need to do when they need to do it. 

For whatever the reason to procrastinate, there are costs to doing so.  In relationships, a significant other can become angry, disappointed and/or lose trust in you.  In health, procrastination can cause obesity, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, loss of mobility and general poor health. 

In self-esteem, it can lessen how you feel about yourself and your self-trust.  At work, you could get demoted since you're not as reliable.  WIth friends, you could lose them since they want someone they can rely upon.  WIth plants and animals, they could die or be seriously maimed.

On the other hand, if you learn to do it now, little by little, things will get better.  You will start feeling better about yourself.  Your friends and family will know on you they can depend.  Your boss will possibly give you promotion for being so responsible.

Basically, people don't do it now because they'd rather do what they want to do rather than what they HAVE to do.  In relationships, healthy, work, and self-esteem, NOT doing it now really can cause damage.  On the other hand, doing it now can slowly but surely improve your life.

It sounds too simple for your life to be that much better for simply doing it now.  It's not easy to keep all committments.  Yet, little by little, things will get better.  I'd love to hear how doing it now helps YOU.

Lisa Starr    
Life/ Corporate Coach
[email protected]


 
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Self-Esteem.  Is this a dreaded or a welcome phrase?  What does it mean to you?  In this blog post, I will give my definition, why it may be dreaded, what place it plays in your past, what part it plays in your present, and what part it can play in your future.

To me, self-esteem, is literally as it says: how you esteem yourself.  Another way to look at it is how you view yourself and what you're capable of.  It's not necessarily how you WANT to feel about yourself, though that can play a part in it, it's how you really FEEL about yourself.  How do you think about yourself, if you ever DO think about yourself.

Many people don't like this phrase because it's so illusive.  I mean, how do you really know how your self-esteem is?  It's also changing depending on new events in your life.  You may feel like a wonderful spouse and then you have a child and your self-esteem as a parent is different than the self-esteem as a spouse.  Also, many people don't like this phrase because they just really aren't sure how they think or feel about themselves.  Maybe you are more concerned about how others feel and what others think about you.

Self-esteem is measured differently as a child than it is as an adult.  As a child, your self-esteem may be high because you play ball well or are a good friend.  This doesn't really translate the same as an adult.  I mean, there are similarities, but it's not the same.  Self-esteem is often better before we are aware of how many mistakes we actually make.

In the present, you may be a good spouse or a good parent.  You may be a good sports player or seamstress.  You may simply realize that you are a human BEING instead of a human DOING and love yourself for that.  You may enjoy being by yourself or rather be by others, and not contemplating your owns self.  You may think the world of yourself, think that you're worse than dirt, or something in between. 

Your self-esteem can determine your success: financially, in relationships, career-wise, health-wise.  If you have a hard time loving yourself, maybe you subconsciously won't feel worthy of financial success and will never achieve it.  If you don't learn to love yourself, it may be hard for someone else to truly love you.  You may not really know who you are, and may choose the completely wrong career for yourself and not know how to change it.  If you don't believe in yourself, you may get in bad shape and have health problems that you can't get out of.  In fact, this may be your present, instead of your future.

The more you think and feel about yourself, the more you're able to be successful in all areas of life.  Self-esteem is actually a lot more a part of all of our lives than we realize.  You may not realize that your self-esteem may be blocking you from obtaining your dreams.  It may not be, but it may also be doing so.  Maybe that's why you keep hitting the wall - not able to get over it.

Basically, self-esteem is the way we look at ourselves.  It can be different in the past, present and future, but does ultimately effect us.  Having more self-esteem can mean more success in all areas of life.

If you need a little help with your self-esteem, I can help you understand you and hopefully raising your self-esteem.  Give me a try - I DARE YOU!

Lisa Starr
Life/Corporate Coach
[email protected]

 
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This is a paraphrase from Dale Carnegie in the How to Win Friends and Influence People book that's been around for almost a century.  In this post, I'll talk about what I mean and why it is the case as well as tell stories of the truthfulness of this.

Think about your name.  Your first, middle, last, maiden, married - whatever you like best.  Why do you like it most?  What does it mean to you?  What if someone pronounces or spells it incorrectly?

I know that we are all a little attached to our names.  Now, my name is my married name, but I think it's pretty cool to have a noun for a last name.  One time when a person heard my full name (oh, it was a radio game I played), they said it sounded l could be in adult videos.  Nonetheless, it's still my name and I plan on keeping it for the rest of my life.

Think about others' names.  I'm sure you've heard someone's name that has been hard for you to pronounce.  Many times, people living in a different country than they were born have nicknames, so people can call them something similar.  If YOU have one of those hard-to-pronounce names, how does it feel to have someone call you by your REAL name?  I bet pretty good.

I had a friend, OK, it was a guy I had a crush on in college, who always seemed to make it a point to learning peoples' hard to pronounce names.  I think he endeared himself to others by simply trying to learn someones' real name.  I admired that about him and have tried to do the same ever since.

I am an apartment manager as well as a coach, and there was one man who applied for an apartment who called himself George.  Turns out his real name was Jorge (pronounced "Horhe").  Think about those two names - they may be the same in two different languages, but they just don't feel the same when you say them.  Try it.

All I'm saying is that we all love to be called by our REAL names.  I think, just by other people trying to know us a little more, it makes us want to get to know them a little more.

I dare you - go up to someone who has a hard to pronounce name and ask them how to pronounce and spell their name.  Ask them its origin.  You will make a new best friend.

Lisa Starr
Life/ Corporate Coach
[email protected]

 
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This belief is from Bob Proctor, as well as other greats like James Allen, Napoleon Hill, Ernest Hemingway, Rhonda Bryne and others.  There are many things great philosophers of the past and present differ on, but the fact that "thoughts become things."  I know the book and movie The Secret mentions this this.  I've also heard it put like "when you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change."  There are so many ways to say the same thing. 

The premise behind this is that whatever you think about most often is what you become.  Not literally, like if you think about girls most often, you become a girl or if you think about cars most often, you become a car.  What I mean is that if you think about pleasing people most often, you become a people-pleaser.  If you think about work most often, you become a good employee.  I'm not saying these are bad things, but these may or may not be what you REALLY want. 

Other things that you may not think about is, if you think about debt most often, what do you remain?  A person in debt.  If you worry about death, what may happen to you?  You may die an early death.  On the other hand, if you obsess over being a millionaire, what are you more likely to become?  A millionaire.  This may sound weird, but it's true to some extent.

If you want a large house on the hill or a trip to Hawaii, start focusing on that.  I'd recommend that whenever you think about something you DON'T want, like debt or your current job, change your thoughts to something you want instead, like more money or a better house.  You know what you want and don't want, but you do.  Focus more on what you want rather than what you don't want, since the Law of Attraction works both ways.

If you need help with learning how to think most effectively, please shoot me an e-mail.

Lisa Starr
Life/Corporate Coach
[email protected]

 
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Many people talk about goal setting and goal achieving.  What is the best way to write goals?  Why do we write goals?  How do we achieve these goals?

First of all I want to state why Bob Proctor says we should make and achieve goals.  This surprised me when I first heard it.  We achieve goals to raise the consciousness.  The best goals set are the ones we have to work and stretch to achieve.  If we already know how to get the goal we are shooting for, there will be no growth or increase of awareness.  It is not to acquire more.  We can do THAT without goals.  I LOVE this quote by John Ruskin is "The highest reward for a person's toil is not what they get for it, but what they become by it.  THAT is the key in a nutshell!

Secondly, HOW do we achieve goals?  Well, for one thing, understand that all goals, or non-physical seeds, have a gestation period just like the physical seeds (like corn, potatoes, etc.).  Your goal will be achieved as soon as that gestational period has elapsed.  It's also important to NEVER change the goal, until you reach it.  You can change the plan to get there or the time it takes, but if you change goals, it will take longer.  For another thing, you have to SEE yourself already in possession of your goal and seriously want it.  That will give you the energy to do what needs to be done.  Also, picture your goal like stairs.  It takes many steps to get your goal and takes perseverance.  One of the most important things is to feel good during, before and after every step you take

There's SO much more to learn, but at least this is a start.  If you want more information, either go to Bob Proctor's website or e-mail me to explain.

Lisa Starr
Life and Corporate Coach
[email protected]

 
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One of the first things I remember hearing Bob Proctor say that really struck me was the phrase above.  He was stating this in relation to positive affirmations, or maybe it was in relation to your future gratitude list.  Either way, it could also be a way to help you feel better about life.

The gratitude list is a combination of what I learned from Bob and what I learned from The Greatest Gift (book & made into a movie).  What I do daily is write a list of 10 things that I am happy and grateful for in the future.  I then feel truly happy and grateful as if I have the things I want in physical form.

Yet, as Bob Proctor says, if I believe these dreams NOW, I HAVE them now emotionally and physically and it is only a matter of time until I get these goals in physical form.  From listening to Bob Proctor CDs often and thinking about them, his definition of thinking is thoughts that direct you toward your goal are REALLY thinking.

Yes, there are many things we all don't have.  There are many things we all want that many of us will never get/achieve.  Yet, there are MANY things that we all have that others don't that we can be grateful for. 

Some of the simple things I'm grateful for each day are: my hands, so I can type and touch; my eyes, so I can see the good in others and in myself; my legs, so I can walk and exercise to keep me healthy; my ears, so I can work on truly listening to those I love; my hair, so I can keep the cold off my head and ears more than if I didn't have hair; my computer, so I can reach out to the world and help people; my family, the people I love and want to be with forever; my mind, so I can continually get better and better and closer to my dreams.

What simple things are you happy and grateful for, whether personally or professionally?  I'd love to hear it.

Lisa Starr
Life and Corporate Coach
[email protected]