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Successful individuals use coaching and mentorship to
help them unlock their potential. Not all

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coaches are created equal, and that's
why we work with the top five percent

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of coaches at IDEMICS. Welcome to
Coaches You Need brought to you by Idemics.

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Welcome to Coaches to Know a podcast
short by IDEMX Radio. This brief

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podcast is designed to demystify coaching and
help you our audience, understand what coaching

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is and how it can help you. I'm your host, Jamie, and

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today I'm here with Coach Rachel.
Coach Rachel has a background in coaching,

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particularly in soccer and scuba diving,
which she is an expert at helping people

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overcome their fears, and she is
well versed in education and has a patent

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ployer. She's well versed in education
and has an m A and positive psychology

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coaching. She has one for three
years as a career fulfillment and leadership coach.

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In addition to her deep background and
education, her clients are people seeking

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a meaningful career transition growth in their
current industry where they work on gaining confidence

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and leadership skills. So welcome Coach
Rachel, and thank you for joining us.

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Here today. Thank you so much, Jamie, and thank you for

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that introduction. So today we're briefly
going to discuss what is positive psychology coaching.

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So let's open up with that question
and if you could define for us

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in our audience today, what is
positive psychology coaching? Yes, thank you.

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So I always like to kind of
give a definition to a positive psychology

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beforehand. A lot of people aren't
as familiar with that science, and it

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is fairly new and it's applied science. Excuse me. With the history with

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positive psychology or psychology in general,
it used to have three main missions,

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which was helping the lives of people
seek more fulfillment in their life, and

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then identify and nurture higher talent,
and then treat and cure mental illness.

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So those were the three main missions
of psychology prior to World War Two.

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And then after World War two,
with PTSD and other issues we have with

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veterans association, psychology just started shifting
to mainly focusing on mental illness and curing

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people, and we's kind of stepped
away from looking at what people already do

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well how to make people thrive.
So positive psychology and it's the founder with

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Martin Seligmann. He wanted to bring
that back because we were kind of missing

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that in a lot of the psychology
practice. And so positive psychology coaching is

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a way to help people work toward
their goals, looking at their lives in

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a holistic way, but looking at
what people do well already. So it's

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a scientific study of what gives meaning
and purpose to life and studying people's strengths

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in virtues so that it enables individuals
and communities to thrive. So what that

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means is when I'm coaching somebody is
positive psychology coaching, I'm incorporating that science

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and those tools into my coaching practice. And I would say the biggest example

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would be when I'm working with a
client, rather than trying to focus on

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things they need to improve that they
don't do well, that maybe they've been

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told they need to improve over the
years from being socialized or just at work

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demands with their job. Instead with
my coaching in positive psychology coaching, it's

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looking at what people already do well
and focusing on that and then finding ways

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to educate them on those strengths strengthening
them. So focusing on how can we

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take steps to start incorporating them in
to their lives professionally and personally. And

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then positive psychology also focuses on things
like gratitude, enriching positive emotions, aligning

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your goals, motives, and values, and then working towards goals that are

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important to you, but not just
important, they're meaningful and satisfying. Thank

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you, Rachel. A lot of
good, good information there, So it's

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quite interesting. First, I just
want to recap the history, which psychology

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used to have a much broader FOT
or three focuses that we're not just focused

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on problems, Yeah, but we're
focused on an individual and sort of mental

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space generally speaking, and the human
generally. And then because of World War

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two and PTSD, the the definition
or practice narrowed. Maybe maybe also because

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of specialization and how we've increasingly specialized, maybe that had something to do as

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well. Yeah, but you know
that's that's that's quite interesting. And so

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now your practice, particularly as I
understand it, focuses on helping people figure

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out what they're really strong at and
then using that knowledge or self awareness to

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then excel from a leadership perspective or
excel in your career or maybe in your

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life. Is that correct? Yeah, exactly. Yeah, okay, and

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so could you speak a little bit
further about sort of given you know,

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provide us with a little bit of
a concrete example of you know, a

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client, what why when they come
to you? Is there a trigger moment

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that normally happens that that they sort
of come to you with or is there

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a typical example of why a client
comes to you? Yeah, and I

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that's why I like using the term
career fulfillment, not just career coaching or

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career transition, because positive psychology is
not just looking at, okay, what

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are your goals, but it's also
looking at okay, what are your goals

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but with a purpose, and then
how does that bring meaning to your life?

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Because those are all attached to positive
emotion, increased happiness, and so

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a typically, you know, somebody's
coming to me, they're for a career

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change, but they're looking for or
you know, leveling up in their own

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career with leadership development, but they're
looking for more meaning and purpose. And

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so a lot of times what we'll
do is looking kind of get the clarity

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on what are your interests, what
are your values, and then take it

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a step further and then what are
trains and how can we kind of combine

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the two. Where's the where can
we align your you know, what your

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natural skill set are with what your
interests and what you feel like maybe a

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higher purpose is in your life.
That's amazing. That's a very approach to

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helping. Helping. I feel like
people find that fulfillment in life and in

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work like more and more. You
know, you read about how people are

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leading jobs or they feel and fulfilled
or they feel burned out. Yeah.

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I believe a lot of that is
connected to the fact that people, you

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know, they work in a job, maybe they have goals without thinking about

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that additional layer of purpose and which
provides them with the meaning in working towards

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those goals. Yes, exactly how
long do you normally work with clients and

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sort of how long does the does
it usually take to refine you know,

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what the goals and purpose is for
a client? Yeah, And I think

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it depends too on obviously what the
clients end goal is if they're looking to

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step up in a leadership position.
A lot of times there's we do want

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to look at the strengths, because
how can when we talk about strengths too,

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it's also a source of sustainable energy. So oftentimes when we feel burned

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out, when we feel like at
the end of the day we just don't

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feel satisfied or very tired and drained, it's often because we're working outside of

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our strengths. And so if you're
stepping up in a leadership position, there's

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also going to be more demands,
more hours potentially, and you really need

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to be operating with those natural strengths
as much as you can so that you're

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getting that fuel. It's sort of
like a sustainable energy that you can tap

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into. So that's kind of like
what I like to say to people.

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And then the other the other aspect
with people who are looking for career transitions,

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just yeah, how to look at
like I said before, how to

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align the with their interests and then
so for something like a leadership would I

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would say usually the sessions can be
anywhere from six to eight sessions, and

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then with career transition it might be
a little longer. Are there's that time

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of okay, maybe they want to
change industries. Oftentimes people do kind of

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hitting a roadblock. I feel stuck, not satisfied, I think, and

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in particular with the pandemic, I
had clients who. It really was a

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time for self reflection, I think
for a lot of us, but especially

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people who may have lost their jobs
or we're like, this is not what

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I want to be doing with my
life. And so there's that added clarity

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piece. And so people who are
looking for career change and might be anywhere

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from eight to twelve sessions just so
we kind of developed that clarity, the

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strengths aspect, the confidence piece,
and then getting an action plan to help

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them move toward their goals, because
you know, are a career change can

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be a big it can be a
big change in your in your life.

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So not making it this quick process
really thinking about it, especially if people

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who want to make it an intentional
change or they want more satisfaction and fulfillment

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in their career. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think that you know,

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change takes time, and yeah,
mentality particularly, I would even say

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that, you know, I personally
grew up where you know, if you

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weren't good at something, you just
try harder to be good at, right

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and the whole Yeah, work hard
at the things you're not good at and

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you will get good at them.
Sort of that was the formula at least,

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you know, when I was young, and and I think that when

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you lean into your strengths and you
use that, as you said, as

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the sustainable fuel, you can actually
probably then accelerate change a little more quickly

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than if you're trying to perfect out
everything, right. Yeah, exactly.

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That's a great example. I think, like I was saying earlier, with

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being socialized, you need to do
this better. You need to do this

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better. And if it just doesn't
feel like you, it's not who you

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are, and you're trying and trying
the science of positive psychology, he says,

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actually you'll reach thriving and flourishing faster
and more when you're operating in the

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things that you that come easy to
you and that you enjoy. So that's

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kind of the basic definition of a
strength is something you enjoy doing that you

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are also good at naturally. Yeah, that's a very very interesting. Um.

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Just one final question before we reap
Okay, you know, one of

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the things that you had highlighted is
that positive psychology coaching is directly connected to

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well well being, and I would
love to for you to unpack sort of

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that connection, which I think we've
already done a bit um more explicitly,

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and our final question here. Yeah, so there's I mean, that's kind

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of the essence of positive psychology.
It's to help increase positive emotions, UM

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and sense of meeting in people's lives, increase confidence, boost mood, increased

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happiness. So it's very overlapping with
this idea of well being coaching or well

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increased well being in general. UM. You know, I like to think

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of as when people are making these
changing changes, they're making it an a

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sustainable way that's looking at them holistically. So it's not just Okay, how

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can I get to my goals?
It's not just how can I get to

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my goals? But am I going
to enjoy those goals? Am I going

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to enjoy this process? And is
that doesn't fit me? Well? Is

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this going to be something that I'm
going to enjoy doing for a while?

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And I like, for instance,
one example, an exercise I might offer

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to a client rather than a gratitude
journal where you know you're writing down things

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you're thankful for. I always like
to say that sometimes I can get it

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can get I mean, for me
at least personally, can get old because

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it's sort of sometimes becomes repetitive.
The same thing. What you can actually

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do is a different exercise and at
the end of each day write three things

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that went well and can be really
simple like someone complimented my hair or I

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got a free cup of coffee or
things like that, because sometimes we tend

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to at the end of the day
focus on, oh this this issue came

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up, this problem came up,
like I did you know this driver cut

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me off? And so if you
can pick out those three things, and

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I suggest to people try it for
a week and see see if you notice

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any changes and that kind of thing, can you know again boost your mood

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emotions. And then the other piece
with you know, with the career fulfillment

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coaching and the coaching that I like
to do is helping people find I think

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a lot of people are yearning for
this sense of purpose and meaning in their

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lives. And if anyone's read that
the book May and Search for Meeting by

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Frankel kind of excuse me. Victor
Frankel, the Holocaust survivor who went on

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to teach about this stuff. Afterwards, he noticed in the concentration camps,

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you know, obviously going through very
inhumane conditions, he noticed people who found

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a source of meeting or purpose larger
than the experience they were having. For

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him, for example, he had
this vision that he would teach about this

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after he got out of the camps. So he kind of held on to

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that, Okay, this concentration camp, even though it's completely awful and terrible,

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it's serving like it's going to serve
a purpose for me later. And

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he saw that people who had that
tie to a purpose had more hope and

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it kind of boosted their overall well
being, like they were able to endure

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those conditions more. And that's a
very like oversimplified explanation of his book,

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so but just an example. Thank
you for that recommendation and on that hopeful

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note. Yeah, thank you today
for your time, and you know that

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we appreciate your insight and we look
forward to connecting with you again. Yes,

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thank you so much Jamie for having
me on. Thanks for listening.

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Please subscribe wherever you listen and leave
us a review. Find your ideal Coach

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at www dot vidmx dot com.
Special thanks to our producer Martin Maluski and

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singer songwriter Doug Allen