If you enjoy helping people make the most out of their lives, whether personally or on the job, then becoming a life coach may interest you. While you may supervise or mentor colleagues at work, being a life coach allows you to solely focus on helping others. Life coaches get to know their clients personally, as well as professionally, in order to help them succeed in every aspect of their lives.
Becoming a Life Coach
To work as a life coach, the first step is to receive life coaching certification. Being certified gives you more credibility with clients because it means you took the time to learn how to be an effective life coach. Becoming certified involves taking training in how to work with clients, help them figure out their goals, find out their weaknesses and show them ways to overcome obstacles and succeed.
Where to Learn Life Coaching
There are many private institutions that will help train you for life coaching certification. However, it is important that the institution where you are training has accreditation for teaching life coaching courses. There are two organizations that give institutions accreditation for life coach training.
The International Coach Federation and the International Association of Coaching provide accreditation to institutions that provide life coaching certification. When you are ready for training, look for those schools associated with either the IAC or ICF.
Levels of Certification
As you grow in your career, you can take more training to achieve a higher level of life coaching certification. Some institutions provide certification as an associate certified coach, a professional certified coach or master level life coaching certification. The more training you receive, the better you are able to help your clients succeed in their lives.
Coaching Specialties
While you can choose to be a life coach generalist, there are several coaching specialties to choose to go into as well.
* Stress Management
* Career Planning and Development
* Time Management and Motivation
* Health and Wellness
* Relationships
* Corporate Coaching
There are several more specialties that you can choose from, but their availability will vary among institutions.
Long Distance Training
If you don’t live near an institution offering life coaching certification, many institutions allow you to take courses online. If you still need to work while training for your certification or if you have a family you need to be home for, you can take courses when you have the time on your computer. This prevents you from missing time with your children or leaving work early to make it to class.
Life coaching certification not only allows you to help others, it will help change your life too.
