Done with Dieting Episode #131: From Start to Success: The Coaching Process

Have you ever found yourself stuck in life and wondering, I wonder what it would be like to have a coach guiding me through this. Or maybe you’ve just wondered, what the whole coaching experience is about? I talk about it a lot in this podcast, but perhaps you’re curious about the journey of transformation that happens with the help of a coach.

If that’s you, then this episode is custom tailored exactly for you. Today, we’re going to unlock the secrets of life and health coaching and how it can empower you to become the best version of yourself. We’re going to dive into the mystical world of coaching, like what happens in those sessions. And discuss how to choose the right coach, how to navigate common obstacles on the way, and all the other things that are going to happen to you on your journey.

Ready to turn your dreams into a reality? Join me, as we explore this amazing journey towards your best self.

You are listening to the done with dieting podcast. The podcast for women who are experiencing perimenopause and menopause symptoms and want to feel better – like they did before their body started changing.

I am your host, Elizabeth Sherman, Master Certified health, and life coach for women in menopause and peri menopause. I’ve helped thousands of women manage their symptoms, get off the diet roller coaster, and change their relationship with food, exercise, and stop fighting with their bodies. And I do it through a feminist lens – which means exploring how we are socialized as young women has a huge impact on our current relationship with food & exercise, our bodies, health, and ourselves.

What’s different about this podcast is that we’re exploring your health from all sides, not just food and exercise. We also address the mindset shifts that will make you happier and lead to better health.

My goal in this podcast is to illustrate that the reason diets don’t work long term is because your health doesn’t exist in a silo. Your health and your weight are a symptom of the OTHER parts of your life and how you show up. I want to help you to feel good and live the life you desire from a 360 degree approach: body, mind, and soul.

Welcome. Let’s get started.

Hey there, welcome to today’s podcast, the Done with Dieting podcast and we are at episode number 131. And as I say that number, I just need to take a minute and take it all in that I have recorded 131 episodes. How is that possible?

Again, like I said in episode 100, you don’t just record a hundred episodes, you record one episode at a time. And the same thing is true with your health. You just keep going, put one foot in front of the other.

At one some point, you are going to have reached your goal. You cannot look at the entire number. I mean, 131 is just, wow. And that’s not even a big number. I mean, it is a big number, but it’s not one of like the cornerstone numbers. But anyway, let me move on.

So, I want to share with you about life and health coaching. And for some of my listeners, you may have been listening to my episodes for a while now. For some, this may be your very first introduction to me.

And so, I think one of the questions that people have a lot is what is a life and health coach. What do you do? And so, a lot of people think about personal training, they think about nutrition coaching, and I can do those things. In fact, I started out that way because people weren’t really familiar with what coaching was at the time.

People weren’t familiar with what coaching was when I started coaching, and that’s why I started out in personal training and doing nutrition because coaching wasn’t something that people did.

But now, today, coaching is way more mainstream, it’s more popular. However, there are still a lot of people who don’t necessarily understand what a coach can do. And how a coach is different than someone who just gives you a meal plan, or someone who just gives you an exercise program.

And so, sometimes we get stuck, right? We find ourselves at a crossroads, unsure of what we should do. And again, going back to my personal training and nutritionist days, I found it really challenging to help people when other parts of their lives would get in the way of their success in their health. And so, it’s these times when we are at a crossroads with maybe our relationship.

For many women who are listening to me right now, maybe this is you. You are in midlife and all of these things are coming at you. You feel like life is happening at you and you don’t know what to do. You are having trouble navigating this journey. And for some, what that means is that you are looking for someone who has absolutely no investment in your decision making process.

Because oftentimes, when we talk to our friends, when we talk to our family, that they all tell us what they think that we should do. But they are all invested in us making the decision that helps them feel good. Right?

So anyway, I know that some of you might be thinking or asking the question, what is a life and health coach? And more importantly, why would I need one? And these are really great questions to have. And I encourage you to lean into this curiosity. A life and health coach is a lot like having your own personal navigator on your life’s journey. They’re there to help you to find your path, to guide you, and to cheer you on every step of the way.

Imagine, having someone who truly listens to you, who truly sees you as a person. A person who believes in your potential, and even when you’re having trouble believing in the potential yourself. That’s what a life and health coach does or at least that’s what I do as a health and life coach.

So, they help you peel back the layers of doubt, fear, and uncertainty, and really reveal your authentic, radiant self. Now, if you’ve ever wondered what would it be like to have a coach, I’m going to go through that in today’s episode. But let me start out by telling you, it’s like having a key to a door that you didn’t even know that was there. A door leading to a healthier, happier, more fulfilled version of yourself.

Working with a life and health coach helps you to identify and overcome obstacles, set goals, and take tangible action steps towards whatever it is that you want in life. The beauty of coaching as it’s not all one size fits all. And no one gets to make the decisions except for you. It’s all about what you want.

It’s uniquely tailored to you, your needs, your dreams, your goals, and your coach, I will be there guiding you as you take those brave steps towards your better self and help set you up for success.

And let me tell you something. If you’ve ever felt stuck, if you’ve ever felt like there must be more to life, or if you’ve ever dreamed of living a healthier, more joyous life. Then, coaching might be for you, and we’re going to talk about that in today’s episode.

It’s your chance to turn your curiosity into action and transform your dreams into a reality. So, I’m going to invite you to keep listening and step into this new possibility to discover the power of having a life and a health coach by your side. You’re here, you’re listening to this, which means there’s a part of you that’s ready, and a part of you that’s curious.

And so, let me tell you, that’s where it all starts. That’s where the magic happens. And to that end, I have one question. Are you ready to explore the possibilities that life and health coaching can offer? If the answer is yes, then keep listening.

I think that for a lot of people, there’s a lot of uncertainty. There’s a lot of uncertainty in terms of life coaching and what it’s all about and who I am, Elizabeth, and who I work with.

And so, again, my goal in today’s episode is to just demystify some of those things. So, some of the questions you might have are, who do I work with? What problems do I help her solve? What does working with a coach look like? How is it different than therapy? And am I really ready to work with a coach? So, I’m going to answer all of those.

As you listen to today’s episode, I want you to think in the back of your head. Okay, what other questions do I have? What questions do I have that Elizabeth hasn’t answered in this episode? So, first what I want to do is I want to start with who I work with and who I don’t.

The people that I work with are women who are done with dieting, who are in midlife. And a lot of people will ask, well, what does midlife mean? And we can look at midlife a couple different ways. I generally, suggest that midlife is somewhere between 45 and 60.

However, if you’re starting to experience perimenopause or menopause symptoms, if you think that there’s something going on with your body that just isn’t right and you suspect that it’s hormonal, then I will work with you. Because these are things that are so common. Like perimenopause and menopause can happen in a woman’s thirties and can go through someone’s sixties.

And so, the range of midlife, the range of the person that I work with, the woman that I work with is actually longer than just 45 to 60. So, you get to self-select of ” am I in this midlife squeeze?”

Now, the other thing, when I just said midlife squeeze, it reminded me that there are so many things going on in midlife for women that will affect our health. So, not only is it perimenopause and menopause, but our bodies are changing, we’re aging. And so, what are the things that we are doing as women that is resisting that aging possibility? Like, I help women get over that hump of aging.

So, how we feel about it. And what’s so interesting about that is that we all have internalized oppression about aging. What I mean by that is if you’ve ever thought to yourself, oh, I’m getting old, or I need to look younger, I need to appear younger, I need to dress younger, or I need to dye my hair because I need to appear younger because of what it means to be my age. If you’ve ever lied about your age, that might be a good indication that you are resisting aging. So, that’s one type of person that I work with.

If you want to stop weighing yourself and you want to be guided by how food makes you feel, as opposed to a strict set of rules. Okay?

I work with women who are interested in the intuitive eating approach. Who are no longer interested in following a strict set of rules. Who want to be able to eat ice cream, or cake, or cookies, or pasta, or pizza, or burgers on occasion. And they know that the bulk of their meals are going to be vegetables. They know conceptually, what it means to eat like an adult, and they want that. And they don’t want to be burdened by the inner critic that tells us that we are bad for whatever it is that we’re eating.

So, if you want to stop beating yourself up for eating or when you stand on the scale. If you want that inner critic to go away and to just stop the negative self-talk. You are a perfect candidate.

I also work with people who weight is not your primary driver for change. And so, this is actually really important. Recently, I’ve changed what I call myself from a weight loss coach to a health coach. And the reason for that is because I am no longer working with women who are only simply interested in losing weight no matter the cost.

I will only work with women who are interested in becoming healthier. And if weight loss is a side benefit, great. And I’ll talk about why that is in just a minute. But that’s actually really super important also. So, you are a good candidate for coaching if your primary goal is to be healthier, not to lose weight.

Because what that does is it puts pressure on you, and me, and your body to perform. And unfortunately, we cannot. No one can guarantee weight loss without doing something extreme and without doing something that’s not sustainable. I am all about sustainability.

If you’ve been listening to this podcast, you know that sustainability is one of my core principles. That if we cannot sustain the behavior that we’re doing, then there’s no point in doing the behavior to start with. Right?

Another quality of the person that I work with is that you understand that you’ve prioritized career or family and now it’s your turn. So, it’s your turn to prioritize your health. And so, you’ve done the career thing, you’ve done the family thing, and you understand that that has not served you. And now, you’re ready to prioritize your health. And you’re tired of doing it on your own. You realize that maybe some of the messages that you’ve received from society haven’t necessarily been serving you. So, you’re ready and open to learn a new way.

Now, who I don’t work with? I don’t work with people who want me to tell you what to do or give you a meal plan. It just doesn’t work. There are tons of people out there on the inter-webs who are a lot less expensive than I am who will do that.

I don’t work with people who don’t believe in talk therapy. So, if you don’t want to talk to me about the other things that are going on in your life, about why it is that you are unable to commit to yourself. Then, that is not a right fit.

If you aren’t ready to ditch everything you know and try something new. And what I mean by that is we’ve been fed a bunch of lies. We’ve been fed a lot of information over the course of our years that is unhelpful. And it leads to a poor relationship with food, it leads to a poor relationship with our bodies, and it leads to a poor relationship with exercise. And so, for those reasons, we need to stop all of the thoughts that we thought that we knew and learn something completely new.

I don’t work with people who aren’t fully sold on the idea that the inner critic isn’t serving its purpose. So, this is actually a really super important concept. Because so many of us believe that if we stop criticizing ourselves, if we have more compassion and self-love, then it won’t create change.

And we are so deeply unsatisfied with our bodies and the shape that our bodies are in, that we think that the only way to get the results that we want is to self criticize. And so, what I want to tell you is that if you are dead set on that being true, we are not a good match.

I don’t work with people who are not sold on the belief that your thoughts create your feelings. That your feelings drive your actions, and that your thoughts are changeable. Because we can change our thoughts about certain things. It’s not always easy, and it’s not just like, oh, change your thoughts. But it’s being open to the fact that maybe like for example, your weight. You could think other things about it other than this weight is unacceptable and bad. And if I gain weight, it’s terrible. There are other options available for us.

I don’t work with people who believe that you just have to try harder or that I, Elizabeth, am the magic pill. And that if you just pay me, that all of a sudden, your results are going to happen. And that if you do not get the results, that it’s my fault. So, all of those things.

People will often hire someone, go in on a diet, and then put all the responsibility onto the diet to do the work. Same thing with coaching. If you have the belief that, oh, Elizabeth’s going to solve my problems, and I don’t have to do anything. Then, this is not a right fit.

And finally, I don’t work with people who believe that everything will be fine once the scale says whatever that magic number is on the scale, and then they can stop. Because we know that once the scale says whatever number that you think you want it to say, that a whole host of other issues and problems and ideas are going to creep up in your brain. Like, oh my God, how do I keep this number? And I’m going to fail. And what happens, “if.”

So, just be aware that if these are the things that you’re thinking, right now isn’t a right time for you to hire a life and health coach or me.

It’s really important to talk about who I work with and who I don’t work with because there are a lot of coaches who will align with you. And so, finding the right coach who aligns with your thoughts and what you believe is actually going to be really super important. Because you will do really well with someone who aligns with your same thought process.

One of the questions you might be asking yourself is, how do I, Elizabeth, support you different than the other programs that you might have been on or the other coaches that you may have hired in the past.

So, first of all, you know what to do. I have not met one woman who has not been on a myriad of diets and who has not known exactly what steps they’re supposed to take in order to become healthier.

So, the big question is, why aren’t you doing it? And if you’ve been a loyal listener of this podcast, you’ve heard all of the podcast episodes that have tangential things to do with health but aren’t directly related to “eat this, don’t eat this, do this, don’t do this” when it comes to exercise, eating, sleep, and stress management. Right?

So, the things that get in, in the way of us taking care of our health, of us prioritizing our eating and our exercise habits are things like work or people pleasing. Needing to prove ourselves at work or that we are a good friend. Having good time management. Having good stress management. So, what I mean by that is that when things get stressful, what am I doing other than running to the pantry or the liquor cabinet in order to manage my stress?

Perfectionism. Having to follow a diet or a way of eating perfectly. Because one thing that I know about the human experience is that there is no perfect. And so, if you are looking for the perfect plan or the perfect diet that’s ready made for you, and that you need to be perfect on it, that is all or nothing thinking, and that’s immediately going to sabotage you. So, you know that this isn’t working for you.

One other thing that gets in the way of us taking care of ourselves is being able to not only set boundaries, but then enforcing the boundaries when someone tries to step over them. So, what that might look like is you’ve decided that you are no longer going to check email from work on the weekends.

Now, it’s totally okay that your boss and coworkers will message you, Slack you, send you email on the weekend. It’s your job as setting the boundary and enforcing the boundary not to respond. And if they have a problem with that, then they get to deal with that.

So, boundaries, self-care, and being able to have downtime and protect your time and what it is that you need. And also prioritizing your needs to be equal or above the needs and wants. And wants is especially true of other people around you.

Not eating your feelings. So, boredom, tiredness, stress, and anxiety. Those are all of the reasons why we all know what we should be doing to be healthy, but we don’t do it. So, once we can fix those, once we can address those, then we can actually become healthier.

Now, those are the things though that other trainers and coaches don’t do. They just give you a meal plan, and then expect you to follow it. And when you don’t follow it or when you fall off or something happens, they tell you, well, you just need to try harder. And that’s not helpful.

Now, this is one reason why within my one-on-one coaching program, I have a six-month contract. And that’s actually really important. Now, many of you are probably thinking six months. Wow, that’s longer than any other diet that I’ve been on. And that’s why I do not do diets because we are no longer dieting. You can do diets for eight weeks, six weeks, twelve weeks. You can white knuckle it. But what six months gives you is the staying power.

And I’ve heard this from client, after client, after client that they were really tentative about signing the six month program with me. But after they were in it, they were like, oh, Elizabeth, now I totally get it. Because there are times when you are going to want to give up like you have on every other program that you’ve done.

And so, having the six months, gives you the staying power that you need in order to keep going. And if there’s one thing that’s actually going to make you successful, no matter what the program is, it’s keeping going and not giving up when things get difficult.

So, when you are doing a six month program with me, life is not going to be perfect. That’s why it’s designed this way. Because within the six months life is going to happen. You cannot be perfect for six months. Life is going to get in the way. And so, when life gets in the way, I am there to help you get through those troubled spots. I’m going to be there to help you navigate, you, wanting to give up on yourself.

So, it prevents you, again, from giving up on yourself. It helps support you through life. And it allows you to make mistakes. And I know that this sounds crazy, but I love it when my clients make mistakes. We all hate it when we make mistakes, right? Because when we make mistakes, that inner critic comes out and it’s like, you suck.

But I love it when my clients make mistakes. Because when my clients make mistakes, it allows me to help them through it. What the inner critic does is the inner critic prevents us from getting curious. The inner critic is judgment. Judgment will block curiosity every single time.

And so, when I work with my clients, when they make a mistake, we get to ask the question, okay, why did that happen? And not doing it from a judgmental point of view, but rather being able to do that from a curiosity standpoint.

Have you ever noticed that when you start a new program, that all of a sudden lots of things just start to get in the way? All of a sudden, like work gets busy, or your kid breaks, their ankle, or your partner needs you, or something happens. It seems like it’s always the perfect storm.

And what I think is that these things aren’t just magically happening. I think that it’s just part of life and it’s just amplified when we start this program because we think that we need to be perfect. And all of a sudden, these other things, we shine a light on those other areas where before we didn’t.

What the six months does is it allows me to support my client through life and teach you how to support yourself, how to work through problems so that you can be self-sustaining when and after we work together.

But the other aspect of it is maintenance. As I mentioned before, we often think that when we get to the end of our goal, that we will automatically be self-sustaining, right? That we’re just going to ride off into the sunset. It’s kind of like when we get married, we all plan for the wedding, but we don’t plan for the marriage.

The same thing is true with health. That we actually need to plan for maintenance. And so, that’s all built into my program because I never want any one of my clients to ever go on another diet ever again. Because you don’t have to.

So, what we do is we focus on the skills that you need to maintain not just to lose, and we start there. You might be wondering, okay, so what is the process of hiring you?

The first thing you do is you will go to elizabethsherman.com and at elizabethsherman.com, you can go to the “Work with Me” menu and choose private coaching, one-on-one coaching. Or you can go to the link directly either in the show notes or go to elizabethsherman.com/private-coaching.

And there, you will be brought to a page. And on that page, on that landing page, you will get all of the information that you need about how much it costs, what’s the investment of working with me. You’ll see testimonials from past clients who have worked with me, who’ve been one-on-one clients. You will understand the process. And a lot of what I’m talking about right now is written out in long form, what happens.

But there are also these large buttons that allow you to schedule a consult with me. And once you click one of those buttons, what you’ll do is you will choose a time, you will fill out a questionnaire, and you will write out a few questions. And I’m gonna talk about that actually more what happens on the consult in our next episode.

But just to go over it briefly. What the questionnaire does is it helps me to prepare for the consult and it also helps me to gauge the readiness that you are at within your journey. And decide before hopping on the call whether this is actually a good use of both of our time.

The questions are there to help you start the process of self-reflection. And it helps you to reflect on your readiness and get ready for the consult yourself. Again, I’m going to be talking about that a lot more next week, but one of the questions is what have you done in the past? What’s going well? What are your expectations for coaching? And do you have any other questions?

Once you fill out the questionnaire, then the next thing that will happen is you will get an email from my scheduler saying, hey, just to let you know, this is a confirmation for our appointment on whatever date and time you’ve chosen.

And in case you didn’t go through my webpage to get to the consult, it will actually give you two links. One to the private coaching landing page and one to the group coaching landing page so that you can see what the two offers that I currently have as I’m recording this are and how to work with me. So, pricing is on both of those pages.

So, after you create your appointment and you receive your confirmation, I will generally email you to confirm and ask you if you have other questions. 24 hours in advance of our meeting, you will also get another reminder that is automatic from the system. And in that email, you will also get the zoom link where we will meet.

The consults are free at time of this recording and there are one hour in length. In that, we will talk about your goals. I also want to find out your history. Your history of health, what’s going on, why you decided to book this appointment now, what’s happening. And I also want to gather as much information about you and what’s going on in your life, what goals you have, what your vision of the future looks like, why me, all of that information.

And I will answer any and all questions that you have. And I will generally map out a process for our work together. Any topics that we’ll address, any gaps in skills, habits, et cetera. Now, at the end of our appointment, I will ask, do you want to coach with me?

Now, here’s something that I shouldn’t have to say, but I’m going to say it because I identify as a people pleaser. If you’ve been listening to the podcast, you know this. And one thing that people pleasers do is we want to make sure that other people are not disappointed in us.

So, what I find is that when I ask this question, most people will say, yes. I want to work with you, Elizabeth, but I can’t say yes right now. And the reason that they’re saying that is to defer the discomfort of saying no and disappointing me. And I also recognize that so many women have some sort of trauma from past sales relationships. Where other coaches, or maybe gyms, or whatever it is have tried to manipulate you into doing something that you don’t feel comfortable doing.

And I want to let you know right now that that is not ever my job. I never, ever, ever want someone to feel like they are obligated to coach with me. And so, it is my goal on the consultation to help you come to a decision. But it’s not the best decision for me. It is the best decision for you. Just like everything else in your health and in your life. I don’t know what the best decision is for you. Only you know what the best decision is.

Now, that being said, a lot of times we will make excuses about why something isn’t the right decision. When the decision is really just fear. Fear of change. So, we’ll say things like, well, I need to talk to my partner. Which I totally get, and that is 100% a valid reason to defer committing. or will say, I just don’t know that I have the money. I need to figure that out. And again, 100% valid.

However, what it does is it masks us not having belief in ourselves because of all of our past weight loss attempts. Because of our dieting history and all of the other stuff that’s getting in the way of us being successful in the future. We’re just like, I don’t know that I can do this. I don’t know that I can do it for six months because it’s a lot of money and I don’t have belief in myself.

And so, if that’s the case, I can totally have belief for both of us because I’m that good of a coach. But if you don’t believe in me, be aware that you can tell me that. And I understand that that has 100% nothing to do with me, and it has everything to do with everyone else in the diet industry who has made promises and not been able to keep those promises. That you are never going to hurt my feelings. And I think that that’s actually really super important to talk about right now because I want you to be able to say, no, to me on a consult and have that be it.

The other reason that you might say no is because you don’t believe in my process. Which would be like the talk therapy, right? You don’t believe that letting go of the inner critic is going to help you have a better relationship with food in your body. That you don’t believe that shaming yourself is actually going to allow you to create a better relationship with food. And therefore, not eat all of the chocolates. I get it.

We’ve been conditioned for so long that we should be mean to ourselves. So, my approach is radical. Those are the three main reasons that we would have objections to this process. And I want you to leave the consult with a decision in mind. That you know that this is a right fit or that it’s not.

Now, here’s the thing. I do not invite everyone to work with me. So, as I mentioned, there are people who do not do well in my container. Now, if I do invite you to work with me and you decide, yes, Elizabeth, this is something that I want to do too. I think that this is actually going to help me with my goals of being a healthier person. And moving into midlife and solving some of these aches and pains and processes that I haven’t been able to figure out on my own.

So, after the consult, I will send you an email a few hours later, a summary from my note taker. I will send you a contract. And what the contract is about is what you can expect from me and all the cancellation policies and things like that. An overview of what you will get. So, you will have all the information there.

You will also understand that with private coaching, you get text and email access between calls. You will gain access to a private client only website, which has all of the Feel Good Sisterhood materials, my small group coaching program. All of the exercises and workouts. I have recipes there, as well as tons of worksheets and journals that allow you to go deeper into the information that we’re going to be working on together.

I have over like 150 different worksheets and workbooks. And I have tons of videos, master classes and trainings that may or may not be relevant to our work together. But as we go through the six months together, I will disseminate the information as it’s necessary.

So, at the end of our consult, we will schedule our first appointment. In that email, I will also send you a payment link. And after the payment link and the contract are signed, then I will follow up with you with a welcome email saying, “welcome to coaching,” and all of the links that you need in order to get started. And I always recommend that you save that first email because it’s got all of the things that you need in order to be successful moving forward.

Now, some of the commonly asked questions that I get on consult are, what happens week to week? Now, here’s my answer. I do call myself a habit based coach. And what I mean by that is if you’re familiar with the eight basic habits that healthy people do, one of the assets that I have that you may have been introduced to already. The eight basic habits are the foundation of the work that I do with my clients one-on-one as well as the Feel Good Sisterhood.

And so, what we do is with the eight basic habits, every week, we will decide what habit you are going to work on. And all of the habits build on one another. And so, every single week, we will create habits and skills that you need in order to be successful long term.

So, here’s an example. Let’s say that one week you and I get together and we decide that this week you are going to work on eating vegetables. Your goal for the week is to eat three servings of vegetables every single day until we meet again.

So, the following week when we get together, I will ask you, how did you do on eating your three servings of vegetables? And you’ll come back, and you’ll say one of two different things. You will say, Elizabeth, I nailed it. It was no problem. It was easier than I thought. At which point we will say, great. Okay. What do we need to do next week?

Or more than likely, you’ll come back, and you’ll say, well, I did okay, the first day. I really struggled the second, third, and fourth days. And then, one day I didn’t even have any, but a few days I only had two.

And so, then we get to get curious. We get to understand. Okay, why is it that you didn’t reach your goal? Was the goal too aggressive? Okay, so we definitely don’t want to do that. We want to set goals that are 80% achievable. Meaning that on a scale from one to 10, you feel like you’re at an eight. So, just a little challenging, but not so much that you’re going to fail.

Did we set a goal that was too aggressive? Or was it that you needed some systems in place? Did you not have the vegetables? Did something happen where you went on vacation and vegetables just weren’t available to you when you were at restaurants? What really happened? Or which happens to all of us, were you just being a petulant child saying, I don’t want to eat vegetables. Because that happens to us all the freaking time. We’re like, well, there’s my broccoli, but I really don’t freaking feel like eating it.

And so, if that’s the case, in any of those situations, we get to figure out, okay, what systems do we need to put in place so that you have vegetables in your refrigerator so that you can eat them? What do we need to do so that you do want to eat your vegetables? Is it that we need to put cheese on it? Do we need to put butter on it? What’s going on? Why is your brain resisting doing this when you said that you wanted to do it? So, these are the questions that we address within coaching.

Now, one of the other questions that I get is about appointments. So, typically, what I do with my clients is we schedule a recurring appointment at the same time, on the same day of the week, every single week. Of course, if you need to change or reschedule, that’s not a problem. And I do have a 24 hour cancellation policy, and I ask my clients to honor that because I honor your time and I just honor my own time at the same time. And so, that’s all in place as well.

Now, on our initial appointment on our very first call. One of the questions that I get is what’s going to happen. And so, on our very first call, I love to get to know you. What makes you tick? Who are the active people in your life? So, who are the people in your life, who are helping you make decisions, who you depend on, and all of that great stuff.

So, what does a day in your life look like? What does work life look like? What does home life look like? What does your sleep look like? I’m going to get into all of the nitty gritty details. What do you eat on a regular basis?

I will ask you to create a three day food recall for me so that I can understand what types of foods and how you eat on a regular basis. Do you only eat one meal a day? Do you like to eat six meals a day? Do you eat most of your meals out? Because if you eat all of your meals out, I’m not going to make you start making all of your meals. We want to start where you are and go to a place where you want to go. So, what is your lifestyle? How do we make health fit into that?

At the end of our appointment, I will assign you homework on our first call. It’s usually going back to those eight basic habits, the eight basic habits checklist. So, finding out. Okay, what is it that you’re doing right now? How many classes of water are you drinking? How many servings of vegetables are you eating? How often are you being active? How much are you sleeping? All of that really great stuff, we need to know where you are so that we can inch you slowly to better health.

Now, at the end of our call, I will also give you homework probably of doing what’s called “a body scan.” I talked about it in one of my very first episodes. What’s it mean to listen to your body? So, doing a body scan so that we can start to understand those messages that our body gives us so that we can answer it.

And then, I’m also going to ask you questions about coaching. These questions are, what are the results that I want to get from coaching with Elizabeth? It’s kind of a difficult question when we have to write it out. But it’s really important to be aware of what it is that I’m expecting so that you can communicate that with me, and I can honor that, right?

Number two is how will I measure my results? How will I know if coaching is working? So, do I want to use the scale? Do I want to use pictures, a measuring tape? Do I want to use an article of clothing, strength, speed, or test results? A lot of people do blood tests and know that coaching is working because their numbers are better.

How can I take responsibility for creating my own results? This is a hard one, right? Because we want someone else to take responsibility for us.

And the fourth question is, what beliefs do I need to have or create about myself in order to get what I came for? These are hard questions. And they’re questions that you’ve probably never thought about before, especially when it comes to you and your health.

Now, after every single call, I follow up with each meeting with a note summary from our call. I will follow up with any homework, or action items, or resources. Some of those resources might be podcast episodes, videos, articles, worksheets that are designed to explore your own mind in the coaching that we did within the session, meditations, or reflections.

Because here’s the thing. We only spend an hour together every week. Of course, you have text and email access to me between sessions. However, coaching actually works its magic between sessions. I don’t know how many times I have been coached. And it really lands the next day or even sometimes a month or two later. Sometimes even six months later. It’s so interesting how often I’ll be like, oh, that’s what my coach was talking about. Like even after we’ve stopped working together.

And so, coaching works its magic outside of the time that we spend together. And so, being able to carve out some time in your day, so that you can really reflect and be still and understand how all of this is coming together for you.

As I mentioned, all of my work is based on the eight basic habits. And we use that as the foundation of our work together. Now, it’s totally not sexy and flashy, but health rarely is. And so, what I like to do is I like to build the habits so super close together so that you don’t make the mistakes of falling off into what I call the “river of misery.”

So, when we pull off more than we can chew, that is a situation that’s setting ourselves up for failure. And I don’t want to do that to you. What I try to do is I try to make it so super simple, so that you have progress, but you don’t realize that it’s actually happening. When we can measure backwards and see how far we’ve come and be like, oh my gosh, I didn’t realize that I was progressing like that. That’s when we will see success.

But you will see results. Some of those results that you will see from working with me are better energy, better sleep. Being able to keep a commitment to yourself. Having self-trust, less binging and overeating. You will have fewer cravings. You will have better digestion. Your relationships will be better with friends, with family, with your partner, with your children. All of these benefits will help you.

You will have better self-management, better time management, less procrastination. You will feel more disciplined and more in control of your life. You will have less of the inner critic and more peace. You will feel more relaxed. You’ll have less over drinking and less regret. You’ll be more aware and intentional and have more follow through. And you will be better at planning and being able to foresee problems, and then pivot when those problems occur. Like these are all the benefits that you have from coaching.

It’s been said that knowledge is power. We’re inundated with information, tips, and advice on health and habits every single day. But let me pose a question to you. If knowledge is power, then why are so many of us feeling powerless when it comes to our health and our habits? You see, knowing what to do and actually doing it are two completely different things entirely.

It’s like standing on the edge of the pool, knowing how to swim, but hesitating to jump in. You can read all of the books that you want to about swimming, but you won’t be able to do it until you actually get in the pool. Knowledge alone can leave us on the edge, paralyzed by the fear of the unknown. The fear of failure, and sometimes the fear of success.

We often know what we should be doing. I say that in quotes. We know that we should eat more vegetables, exercise regularly, drink more water. But why is it so hard to put those things into practice? The answer lies in our connection with our habits, our emotions, and most importantly, our courage to be vulnerable.

I love Brene Brown. And she says, that “vulnerability is not winning or losing. It’s having the courage to show up and be seen when we have no control over the outcome.” So, stepping into the arena of our health and habits means being ready to be seen even in our failures, even when we stumble, and even when the outcomes aren’t instantly visible.

I understand that coaching can be daunting. Taking this step can be daunting. And it’s so much safer to stand on the sidelines and say, oh, I couldn’t possibly do that. But what I want you to know is that you don’t have to jump in alone.

Imagine having someone by your side, a trusted guide. Someone who not only provides you with the knowledge, but also supports you as you take the plunge into changing your habits and improving your health. This is your moment to choose courage over comfort. To show up for yourself in a way that you may not have done before.

I want to encourage you to take the next step forward in your journey by scheduling a consult if this is the next step for you. And together, we can navigate through the complexities of your unique situation. The consult isn’t about me telling you what to do. It’s about us discovering your capacity for change and identifying the roadblocks that have kept you on the edge.

It’s about empowering you to dive into the pool of self-care and swim with strength and confidence. So, yes, knowledge isn’t enough, but it’s the starting point. And what we need is the courage to act on that knowledge, to be seen in our struggle, and to celebrate our triumphs no matter how small.

It’s not about being perfect. It’s about having the courage to jump in. So, I want to invite you to schedule your consult today. Go to elizabethsherman.com/consults. You can also go to the show notes, the link will be in there. And let’s replace the fear of the unknown with the excitement of possibility.

I know that whenever I’ve hired a coach, I have been so freaking excited for what’s going to happen next. Because in the end, you are the expert on your life. And you have what it takes to create the health and habits that serve you the best.

Alright, that’s all I have for you today. Let’s do this together. Have a great day, everyone. And I’ll talk to you next time. Bye-bye.

Hey, if you enjoy listening to this podcast, you have to come check out the Feel Good Sisterhood. It’s my small group coaching program where we take all this material, and we apply it. We figure out what works for us, and we don’t ever look at another diet ever again.

Join me over at elizabethsherman.com/groupcoaching. I’d love to have you join me in the Feel Good Sisterhood. See you there.