WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A LIFE COACH AND A LIFE INTERPRETER?

MANY PEOPLE ARE FAMILIAR WITH THE CONCEPT OF A LIFE COACH - BUT WHAT IS A LIFE INTERPRETER?

When Janice used to try to describe herself to people, she would often say she was a life coach with a twist. Eventually, she settled on life interpreter rather than life coach, as the techniques she used in helping people to change their lives was more akin to teaching them to speak a new language than it was in training them for a big game. This metaphor is of course somewhat imprecise, but the take away should be that there is a lot more going on with a session with Janice than there is with a typical life coach. This has to do with her specific perspective and training.

A life coach is a supporter, a confidante, someone who you can feel open with. They are someone who can act as an objective observer in your life. Isn't it true that we can often see what other people should do but it's hard to tell for ourselves what we should do? A life coach can be trained, or untrained, depending on the person. It is not completely unrealistic to think that some people are just better at being objective observers, supporters, and confidantes, and perhaps they wouldn't require training. Others will have a smattering of certificates and trainings. Certainly, licensed psychologists and psychiatrists abound and are well trained. So what makes life interpretation so different from what other people are doing? And what, exactly, are we interpreting?

The easiest answer to this is that we are interpreting your own thoughts, actions and reactions so that you can better understand yourself. Why do you act the way you act? What do you have this job, this sort of relationship? It's deep questioning with often startling answers.  Some people might understand their own motivations and know why they think the way that they think, but surprisingly, most people aren't really sure why they do what they do. Imagine that! Where are you on that spectrum? For most of us, we're operating from our habits, learned behaviors, and false beliefs. It's pretty fascinating when you start to see how you are creating your world from your understanding of it.

You may be surprised to find out that most traditionally trained mental health professionals aren't focusing at all on helping you to re-write your core beliefs. What!? you might be thinking, and I was surprised to learn this too. This idea just hasn't yet made it's way into the mainstream, although it's been very popular in alternative methods and Eastern philosophies for a long time.

The way that Janice has helped people to gain understanding into their programs is typically three fold.

First, to get the hang of this, you need to learn first how to de-stress (most people are way too stressed to even begin to think about changing the way their mind works!).

After people begin to learn how to relax and gain some space in their day to learn about other things, she will talk to them about how energy works. Many studies are coming out about just how interconnected and affected by each other we really are. If someone you don't even know, like a friend's friend, or a neighbor down the street has a bad day, why would that affect you? The answer lies in energy. People are so much more attuned and aware than we give ourselves credit for. The reason for that is that our subconscious is doing much of the processing of the stimulus around us and not letting on to the conscious mind. Surprisingly, even though we aren't consciously aware of it, these stimuli processed by the sub-conscious still affect how we are feeling. In one study done by Cornell University in tandem with Facebook found the following: 

"Over a one-week period in 2012, they changed the content of news feeds for a random sample of Facebook users. For one group of users they removed content that contained positive words, for another group they removed content that contained negative words. They then measured whether subtly biasing the emotional content in this way changed the emotional content of status updates by the users. Sure enough it did. Making feeds more negative led to more negative behaviour, and vice versa."  Source

The good news about this is that as we are learning more about how much we are affected by each other and the subtle subconscious cues we are receiving. We are also learning how to protect ourselves and become more aware so that we can limit the amount of noise triggering emotional responses from our brains. This is the second tier of Janice's work with her clients: she teaches them to protect themselves from unwanted emotional contagions.

Lastly, we talk about beliefs. Learning to control our stress level and the energetic signals we are receiving is really about understanding what exactly is affecting us and sort of wiping off that extra muck that makes it hard for our wheels to spin. While you are really talking about beliefs the whole time you are working with Janice, beliefs become the main focus at some point when you start to master energetic messages and stress. What things are you creating and why? This is by no means the easiest part of your learning, either. Beliefs exist for a reason, typically to protect us. The road to self-awareness isn't necessarily straight. My own journey has had many detours, re-routes (haven't I seen this tree before?) and breakdowns, but it certainly has left me in a much more livened state than when I started. So, will you take this journey with us? Will you learn to interpret your life and in so doing truly awaken to your potential?

This is a BIG learning curve, and an exciting one. Just imagine, if you knew you were creating your life, what you could create differently? I can think of a few things for myself!

That, in summation, is pretty much the difference, from what I can tell, between a life coach and a life interpreter. Let us hear your thoughts!