As you know, we often field questions from people who are thinking about getting their life coach certification.

One of the questions is…

“What if I want to be a speaker along with getting my life coach certification?”

It’s a great question… and it’s a great opportunity.

LIFE COACH CERTIFICATION + SPEAKING = GREAT OPPORTUNITY!

Personally, I do a lot of speaking and I find that with each paid speaking gig… I also have the opportunity to connect with potential life coaching clients. Plus… it’s always fun to go beyond the one-on-one work of life coaching… and get to impact a larger audience.

But I have to say that one of my favorite aspects of having a life coach certification and speaking is… you can utilize life coaching strategies as you speak. And that increases your impact dramatically.

Let me give you an example.

Recently, I had the opportunity to speak to the International Association of Administrative Professionals. It was a great group and we were digging into strategies that help you to overcome worry and stress. Really… the concepts were self-coaching strategies that allowed to them to be aware of their self-dialogue.

As we worked together… I landed on one specific concept that the group loved.

GRATITUDE

As you may know… studies have shown that you can not only cultivate gratitude… but as you do… your body starts to produce increased levels of dopamine and serotonin. Now these bad boys are your body’s natural anti-depressants. They’ve also been shown to increase your ability to retain information and think more clearly.

For example, one study published in American Psychologist found that if participants in a study wrote down three good things each day for a week… they would be happier and less depressed.

In fact, this study continued on and found that if participants continued to look for three good things a day… they continued to be happier and less depressed at one-month, three-months and six-months!

The longer the person continued… the longer the effect. Even when the group stopped the daily exercise, researchers found that the “Gratitude Group” stayed happier and less depressed than the control group.

The conclusion from the study: Researchers found that the study group had trained their brains to look for things to be grateful for and that started to change the way they looked at the world. So this little exercise of writing down three good things… changed them on the inside (increased levels of dopamine and serotonin) and changed them on the outside (their view of the world).

COACHING STRATEGY AND SPEAKING:

I challenged them to think of three to five things that they are grateful for every day.

In other words… I asked them to ask themselves a coaching question every day.

What are three things that I’m grateful for… today?

I clarified that they don’t have to be HUGE things like trips to Disney World. And they don’t have to be wildly profound either. They can be simple things like a really good meal… a really good laugh with friends… or a really nice convo with a friend.

I told them that the key is they have to be specific.

You can’t just say… “I’m grateful for my family, my friends and my dog.”

You need to think about something specific. Like… “I’m grateful for my walk with my dog this morning. That made me laugh and feel good.”

But that’s it. Just three things.

Happy Furry Friday, folks! (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

That’s right… coach yourself to find…

Three specific things… daily.

And when they look for the good stuff… science says they start to pump their body full of the “good stuff.”

Plus, their brain will begin to get in the habit of looking for more good stuff… which will not only help them to feel happier… but it will also have a positive effect on their ability to perform, stay focused and remember stuff.

And heck… who doesn’t want more of that?

So… see how I did that?

I simply used a good coaching question and a specific strategy… and then equipped them to coach themselves.

It sounds simple… but in other ways it was revolutionary for them.

Plus, it really set up the opportunity to be able to talk about how I work with individuals one-on-one with the same types of strategies to help them to break through to new levels of performance, clarity and engagement.

Keep dreaming BIG and helping others to do the same,

Mitch Matthews