How I got into Life Coaching

From a young age, I knew I wanted to help people. It’s a cliché, but it’s true. Having my children young meant that I didn’t have time to think about my future career, until I started a psychology degree with the Open University, and graduated in 2015. I had considered furthering my psychology training, qualifying as a counsellor, getting a PGCE to teach, but ended up putting it all on hold whilst I removed my children from mainstream education to home educate them myself.

Having experienced housing difficulties my entire adult life, I moved 300 miles across the country to Cornwall, where I knew nobody, and it soon became apparent that there were cracks in my marriage. On top of that, I became disabled and chronically ill with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, POTS, and Fibromyalgia, and started to rely on a wheelchair to get me out and about. A while later, my husband left and I came out as lesbian- something I’d been trying to squash & deny my whole life. Of course, this revelation, and the break down of my marriage caused huge personal, emotional and financial changes and I decided to hire a life coach to get my life in some sort of order.

I was in two minds as money was now tight, being a disabled single parent, but hiring Maria was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made- the fog began to clear and I could see things with new eyes, and realised that this was exactly the sort of thing I was good at and had passion to do. I trained as a life coach myself and have been working hard since, helping others to achieve their dreams and turn their lives around.

As a result of 12 coaching sessions, I am so much happier, I feel grounded and secure, I’m excited for the future and I am LOVING helping others and rooting for them through their own adversities and challenges. My health has also started to improve and I need the wheelchair a lot less, which goes to show the enormous impact our state of mind can have on our physical wellbeing!

It seems that life was always gearing me up to become a life coach, and whilst my challenges have been, well, challenging, I realise now how useful they have been, giving me the experiences, skills, compassion, and foresight to enable me to guide others through the chaos and uncertainty that life inevitably brings.