365 Ways to Be Your Own Life Coach: A Programme for Personal and Professional Growth - in Just a Few Minutes a Day

241 Pages·2010·0.8 MB·English

by  David Lawrence Preston

365WAYS TO
BE YOUR OWN
LIFE COACH
A programme for personal and professional
growth – in just a few minutes a day
SECOND EDITION
David Lawrence Preston
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Dedication
This book is dedicated to all those friends and colleagues from whom I have learned so
much, and the many great teachers who have guided me on my journey (especially the
greatest teacher of all – life itself).
Testimonials
On behalf of all the students on the Life Coaching course, I would like to place on
record our sincere appreciation of David’s skill and professionalism together with his
teaching abilities. He is a fine example of your service.
(JAE – one of David Lawrence Preston’s students)
I feel I have been very privileged to have been able to receive such professional, first
class coaching. You were highly professional, have a wealth of expertise and knowledge
and yet you still made me feel as though I had just found my best friend. I am so excited
because I know you have given me the tools to start living life to the full. All you have
taught me in these few weeks I will now pass on to my own children. What fantastic
value. Oh and one last thing – you told me to think with my heart sometimes. That made
me realise I have not done that for years – how liberating. Thank you from the bottom
of my heart (and my head!).
JR, Poole
Thank you so much for your encouragement and advice. I can say hand on heart that
you have been the single most inspirational person with regards to my confidence and
personal development, which are very important to me. I cannot thank you enough for
the help you have given me.
JH, Bournemouth
iii
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Contents
Welcome to 365 ways to be your own life coach 1
How to be your own life coach – an overview 3
The TGROW method 3
What is life coaching? 11
Self-coaching 13
Eight steps to success 21
Step one: clear intentions – choosing your goals 24
Why goals matter 24
Benefits of setting goals 31
Your mission 34
Setting your goals 37
Work-life balance 48
Step one: summing up 50
Step two: using the awesome power of your mind 51
The Law of Attraction 52
The ITIA formula 52
The power of thought 54
Watch your language 65
Ask the right questions 68
Beliefs 74
Developing a positive mental attitude 84
Great expectations 87
Use your intuition 89
Use your imagination 99
Getting the most from creative imagery 103
The ‘as if’ principle 111
Motivating yourself 112
Step two: summing up 118
Step three: building desirable personal qualities into yourself 119
Who do you think you are (and who would you like to be)? 120
The qualities of success 126
Three ways to build new qualities into yourself 132
Step three: summing up 135
Step four: evaluating your current situation 136
Step four: summing up 140
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365 WAYS TO BE YOUR OWN LIFE COACH
Step five: considering your options 141
Step five: summing up 142
Step six: action – what you must do to succeed 143
The Law of Giving 144
Time management 158
Taking good care of yourself 163
Step six: summing up 168
Step seven: monitoring your progress 169
Step seven: summing up 173
Step eight: plugging into the power of persistence 174
Step eight: summing up 176
The art of relating 177
Communication skills 188
Active listening 191
Rapport 204
Conversational skills 206
Assertiveness 211
Eight ways to become more assertive 214
Happiness: the point of it all 221
Seven keys to happiness 224
Appendix 229
References and further reading 230
vi
Welcome to 365 ways
to be your own life coach
Since you’re reading this, I imagine you want to make some changes to your life, but
you’re not entirely sure how to go about it. You’re not alone. That’s why there’s been
such a phenomenal growth in life coaching in Britain and many other countries in the
past few years.
The first time I heard the term was in a talk by the inspirational motivational speaker and
author, Anthony Robbins, ten years ago. ‘Some people call me a guru,’ he said, ‘but that’s
not true. I’m not a guru, I’m a coach. I coach people to get the best out of themselves.’
Since then, life coaching has become big business. Training, diplomas and certificates
are offered not only by a profusion of private schools and ‘institutes’ worldwide, but
also educational institutes accredited by officially-recognised statutory bodies. For
example, in the UK, coaching and its closest cousin, mentoring, form part of the
training for teachers, managers and certain health practitioners. In a relatively short
time, life coaching has come of age!
Life coaches offer their services to individuals, groups and businesses, often at
exorbitant rates. A friend of mine recently paid £375 for three, 55 minute, four-way
telephone conversations with a life coach. That’s over £9 for every minute of his share
of attention from the coach! He claims to have benefited from the sessions, but
obviously many of those who need help can’t afford to pay that sort of money.
Hopefully everyone can afford to invest in this book.
What do life coaches aim to do? Simply to support and encourage their clients in their
personal and professional growth by helping them to identify and achieve their goals.
They use a variety of conversational and written techniques to help them find the best
way forward, strengthen their motivation and take action. Good coaches don’t give
advice, but help the client to find the answer for themselves.
It occurs to me that I have been a life coach for over 30 years, although I have only
recently begun to refer to myself as such. I have unwittingly coached my children,
friends, colleagues and students. I have also been a life coach to my clients (I have been
a hypnotherapist for nearly 20 years), and often found life coaching to be more useful
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365 WAYS TO BE YOUR OWN LIFE COACH
to them than therapy. That’s one of the reasons I developed my internet-based ‘Life
Enrichment Programme’.
Some of my ‘coachees’ completely turned their lives around and went on to great
success in their chosen fields. None paid anything like £9 per minute, and neither need
you. If you follow the tried and tested methods offered in this book, you can transform
your life with no financial outlay other than the cover price.
I base my methods on three simple ideas. You will become very familiar with these in
the weeks ahead:
■ The TGROW method.
■ Eight Steps to Success.
■ The ITIA formula.
I believe the best coach for you is you, and I aim to give free rein to him or her. This
book will show you exactly what you need to do to turn yourself into your own life
coach. There are 365 priceless ideas, exercises and skills to learn from and apply.
I want you to get more from this book than a warm feeling. I want you to put these
principles and techniques into practice so you will reap the rewards. But you won’t gain
full benefit if you merely read my words. That would be like expecting to get better by
gazing at the label on the bottle without actually taking the medicine.
I guarantee: if you read the material carefully and use what you learn, big changes will
take place. A year from now you’ll look back with amazement on all you’ve achieved.
So let’s get started.
David Lawrence Preston
How To Be Your Own
1
Life Coach – An Overview
The TGROW method
The TGROW method is widely used in life coaching sessions. In each session life
coaches take their clients through five steps, although not necessarily in sequence.
The letters stand for:
Theme
Goals
Reality
Options
Will
Theme
What’s on your mind right now? Where do your priorities lie? Are there any problems
in any particular area of your life which you feel need attention? Which features of your
life are you most keen to change?
■ Health: do you have sufficient energy to carry you through each day, and, if not,
what are you going to do about it?
■ Career: are there any issues in your working life or business activities which need
attending to?
■ Money: have you any financial problems that need dealing with?
■ Home life: is everything OK with the people you live with, your
husband/wife/partner, your children and wider family?
■ Social relationships: are you getting pleasure from an active, varied and fulfilling
social life?
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