I think I love coaching

The present use of the word “coach” came from the 1500’s when people used coaches to get from where they were to where they wanted to be. As a coach in your particular context, you are helping people to improve their skills to reach the goals they have so they can be where they want to be.

PSI, the graduate school that I am currently attending in has several different tracks that you can choose to emphasize in which is sort of like choosing a minor in undergrad. About two weeks ago I was able to take the Intro to Coaching class which is the first class in the “Leadership and Coaching” track at PSI.

The class was taught by a premiere Christian coach, Gary R Collins who’s written over 50 books and is a clinical psychologist who has also studied the coaching profession.

I learned rather quickly that coaching is different in counseling. Mainly, coaching focuses on the client’s personal goals and getting them to the next steps in their lives as opposed to digging in the past and doing more with diagnosis and pathology. It was neat to see though how counselors make the best coaches because of the vital listening and reflecting skills you learn along the way. So I can see how the two are connected for sure.

It would be neat for me to be able to use this degree with missionaries who are often faced with big decisions. There are also some exciting programs being developed with MTW mission fields in Europe that focus primarly on the younger generation and short-term missions with which I have a lot of experience. This summer in Kenya I saw myself in a coaching role many times as my teammates who were college-aged primarily worked through questions of what they wanted to do with their lives and how they wanted to change. There are also probably countless ways to use these skills on many different mission fields (including Kenya), which is really exciting.

I was especially intrigued by the questions that coaches often ask:
What are you passionate about?
What is something that you would die for?
What would you do to sabotage this process?
What are some of your core values?
What is something that you can't not do?

This pumps me up to be able to help someone think through these questions.

So, we'll see. The coaching track has five classes total I think so there is still much more to be explored. I'm loving my other counseling classes too so I have been so thankful lately for the opportunity to learn this stuff!