We all need a sounding board.  It’s like the difference between humming a tune in your head and singing it out loud at the top of your lungs.  If your ideas, goals, dreams, and even struggles simply roll around in your head, that’s the only place in which they live. Nothing in your external world really changes.  With a sounding board, you gain clarity, perspective, reality, and a richness that may surprise you. From this stance, you can change your world.

You deserve to have your voice heard and understood.  Not only is our world filled with constant change, but it’s also filled with noise, distraction, and toxic competition.  Even individuals in the most intimate relationships can fall into the competition trap and struggle with being heard.  Most of us have been conditioned to focus on who is right; who can make the loudest case for having his or her needs met; who has the most control; who gets the most likes; who is the smartest, hardest-working, most ambitious, prettiest, most physically fit, and so on.  You get the idea.  In each of these scenarios, only one person gets heard and even she or he may be heard but not really understood. Yet, something magic happens when we feel like our voice matters, when we know we are heard, accepted and deeply known.

Sometimes a reality check is helpful.  As humans, we are endowed with a complex and intricate neurological system.  We are capable of amazing thoughts and ideas, discoveries, and inventions.  Every advance that makes our lives easier and more meaningful started as a thought or idea in someone’s head.  A downside to how our brains function is that, as the mind tries to make sense of the world, it’s not really interested in how realistically it’s made sense of things. So, checking our thinking and perspectives for reality is necessary to make effective changes.

Whether you are trying to create common ground in a relationship, maneuver through a life transition, live according to your values, or move forward on goals, sorting through thoughts and ideas and exploring various perspectives can be key to creating the life you want.

Listening to your heart is key.  The relationship with oneself is foundational, and an easy piece to ignore.  Here are a few of the things that pull us away from ourselves: relationships with others, jobs and career advancement, family commitments, social media, the internet, general stressors in life, and even our own coping mechanisms.  In addition, you may find that what you hear about yourself from others and your own self talk are hinderances to listening to that small inner voice that is meant to guide you towards being your best self, however you define best.  A coaching relationship is one place to tune out the distractions and other voices in your world and listen more deeply to what your heart is telling you.  Then you can build your life from a foundation that is congruent and stable. 

I am interested in your story, both where you are now and where you want to go.  My approach is collaborative, patient, and nonjudgmental.  Together, we’ll explore how best to make the changes you desire in your relationships and in life.

Here’s what I’ve found can create change and why working with me will help.