You are listening to My Freedom Grove podcast with Gretchen Hernandez, episode 64

Welcome to My Freedom Grove podcast. The all inclusive podcast that teaches mindset and business tools. We'll help you rise as your authentic self. Be unshakable with your emotional freedom and unstoppable in achieving any goal and living your purpose. I'm your host, Gretchen Hernandez. If you want to put your mental health first in life, relationships and business, you've come to the right place.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Hi, my strong friends. Today I want to talk with you about the coach's journey. So I don't know if you've ever heard the phrase a hero's journey.

 

So a hero's journey is something we're very familiar with because we've watched movies a lot in our lives. So in movies we'll always see the hero's journey laid out. You start off with a likable character, they go through a lot of rough stuff and some obstacles and there for a while, we think there's no possible way that this hero is going to win. We're on the edge of our seat. Holding on, like, no, we really want this person to be able to have the girl or have the job or just, you know, for people to be nice to them. Whatever it might be. So at the end of the movie, they always end up winning. They have overcome all of the stuff in between. All that mucky stuff and they win at the end. And so then we get to leave the movie theater, or our couch, feeling really great that this hero has won.

 

It helps us to think that we have that shot in our lives, too, right? Because as humans, all of us go through some type of a challenge. We're all heroes in our own right. We all have our journey that we're going through. That there are times we think we're not going to get through it, but in the end, the good guy always wins.

 

Now coach's journey is similar to that, but they've gone through the whole hero's journey and they have decided that they had such a huge breakthrough, whatever it was that they went through, that they survived. They found their way through it. They found a new way of living or thinking about things that they want to turn around and help the next hero through their journey.

 

They want to do this because they know how hard it was when they were going through it. And they know that if they had had someone there to help them through that journey, it would have been faster. It wouldn't have been as uncomfortable or painful. So the coaches want to turn around and help.

 

And the coaches are different than people that want to give advice. Coaches will develop themselves to learn some skills, some psychology so that they can help people to get through that journey even faster.

 

So a coach develops themselves and then they decide, where are they going to be a coach in life. They can either be:

 

1. An informal coach

 

1. Professional coach

 

INFORMAL COACH

 

Informal coaches walk amongst us. They can learn all of these tools and be able to help people in their lives. It could be in their family, their friends, maybe coworkers, but they're doing it. It's not their job. It's just a passion of theirs to try to help people.

 

PROFESSIONAL COACH

 

And then there's the professional coaches. So people that have decided they love this so much, they want this to be their job. And there's three different ways that coaches can become professional coaches, where it can be their job.

 

1. Be a coach at current workplace

 

So one is to talk with their employer to see, is it possible to evolve their job, to include coaching responsibilities, or if they have a coaching spot that's already open at that company, they can apply for it.

 

2. Be a coach at a coaching company

 

There are companies that are coaching companies. They hire a whole bunch of coaches, and then they bring in a whole bunch of clients for those coaches to be able to help.

 

3. Entrepreneur coach - start a business.

 

And then there's the entrepreneur coaches. So these are the ones that have decided to start their own business so that they can bring in their own clients and be able to help them.

 

The Coach's Journey

 

So I decided today to talk a little bit more in depth about the coaching journey of developing into a coach and especially an entrepreneur coach. Because one of my clients actually asked me for this. And so I always want to help people. If someone has a question for me or they need some more clarity, I want to be able to help provide that.

 

I decided it would be great to put this as a podcast episode because a lot of my clients are coaches. They're either informal coaches, they're starting to develop into informal coaches, or they have decided to be professional coaches. So they're starting to develop their skills. And some of them will be employees of other companies as a coach and some are starting their entrepreneurial journey.

 

So I wanted to go into the details of what exactly is that path. And the reason why is because I'm finding that coaches start at different spots along this 10 step journey. And it's quite possible that any point during that 10 step journey, you might have to go back to the first couple of steps because there might be something that's getting in the way of the later steps.

 

So I don't want to confuse you guys by talking about steps without laying them out first. So you'll also find for this episode in the download section, there's going to be a PDF downloadable so that you can see what these 10 steps are. I know having a visual and seeing it is so much easier than just listening to it. So go ahead and go print that out so that you can take a look at it or just look at it on your computer. Either way is fine.

 

The 10 step journey coach's journey

 

1. Emotional Pain

 

Having some type of emotional pain. And this happens anytime in your life. It could start off from when you were a kid. This could start off when you were a teenager, when you were an adult, at some point you had some type of emotional pain and you didn't know how to get through it.

 

2. Manage it on Your Own

 

So step two is that you try to figure out how to do this on your own, how to get over the emotional pain. We all have our different ways of doing this.

 

3. Get Profession Help

 

Step three is then to get some type of professional help. So a lot of people don't go and get professional help, but they might start off with, you know, just doing some Google searches and trying to find it that way. They might look into books. They might eventually go to a therapist or they might go to some type of a healing professional. Like we might not even really consider it, but going to someone that does massage or meditation, they're also a type of coach because they are trying to help us to get out of that emotional pain. We might end up going to a life coach or a business coach or a therapist, somebody to help us get through whatever pain it was that we were experiencing.

 

4. Breakthrough

 

Then we have the breakthrough. So the professional help has helped us in some way that all of a sudden we feel all of this relief and that breakthrough can be pretty substantial.

 

5. Want to help others.

 

So we start looking around in the world to see: are there other people out there suffering like how we did? And it's really interesting. It's almost like when you're searching for a car and like you're buying a new car for yourself. And before you buy that car, you might see a couple of those models out on the road. But once you buy the car, you see your car everywhere. Same thing happens once you have had help with your problem. Now you're so aware of it. That when you look out in the world, you see all of the other people that have that same problem. So then you decide you'd really like to help them because you can see how much they're struggling.

 

6. Develop capabilities and skills.

 

This is when people might turn to professional training. They might turn to books and videos to try to learn how to do things. Some people will get into certification programs so that they can learn these different skills.

 

7. Practice.

 

They take whatever it is that they've learned. And they go out in the world and they start practicing with people. And they're trying to see, can they actually get results for the person? Can they get some type of relief for them?

 

8. Get their first paid client

 

So if you have gone the employee route of being a coach, this is that you actually have been hired as a coach. And now you have your first client. That feels incredible.

 

If you're an entrepreneur, this is when you have found your first client who has also paid you for the services. And that feels pretty incredible that someone would want to pay you for your services.

 

9. Learn how to start a business

 

This is if you're going through the entrepreneurial track. You're learning how to start a business. And there's a lot to learn when starting a business. So this is almost puts the coaching part on pause for a second so that you can go and learn all of the nuts and bolts on how to run a business.

 

10. Build & run a business to help others and make an income

 

Then step number 10 is building and running that business because businesses are something that you do have to build. There's different pieces of it. And then experimenting to find the things that actually work. And then how do you create all of your systems so that this actually runs smoothly as a new day to day routine. Once you have that built and it's running now, you can help other people and make an income.

 

Starting the Journey at Any Step

 

Okay. So those are the 10 different steps. And I wanted to lay that out because people come to me at every stage of that journey. There are some people that come to me that don't even realize that they would eventually want to become a coach, either informal or formally. And they don't know that they'd want to run a business. And maybe that isn't the steps that they want to go through. Maybe they're just in the emotional pain and they want to get some help and I'm there to be able to help them.

 

I also have people that come in at step six, where they want to develop their capabilities. So I have three different courses that teach people all of the different tools that they can use so that they can help to coach other people.

 

I have some people that have come because they have gone through some other coach certification program, and now they're getting ready to build their business. But what happens is that some folks haven't actually started at step number one.

 

They haven't gone all the way through step four, where they have a breakthrough.

 

Because some people will think, Oh, coaching industry... Here is another opportunity for having my own business. So they'll go and they'll get the training and then they'll want to start a business. And then they start to lose their fire for doing it because it's just another job to them.

 

Now, building a business takes a lot. There's a lot of energy that goes into it. A lot of blood, sweat, and tears. So if you don't have that strong, compelling, "why" after a while, you'll start to fizzle out and not necessarily want to do it anymore.

 

So that's why it's so important that people have gone through steps 1-4.

 

If you have had that breakthrough in your life, it will be so significant that that becomes your "Driving Why" on why you want to start a coaching business.

 

So when folks come to me and they've just thought I'm going to start a business as a coach, they'll eventually find themselves going back to step number one. And we're coaching through some of the stuff that they never worked through because everybody's gone through some struggles in their life. And a lot of times we pack it all away so that we can function in the world and we can have jobs out in the world.

 

But if we haven't actually resolved it and had the breakthrough, then having that coaching journey is not going to be as meaningful and you'll lose your pazzaz.

 

So when I have folks that come in that way to me, when I have those three courses, it teaches all of the tools and techniques. But they really need to go through those courses for themselves first. So they're going to be learning all of the tools, but they need to go in and apply it to themselves and whatever stuff that they haven't resolved in their life. It's time to bring that stuff up. And they may not want to. But again, if they're starting to lose their pazaaz for having this coaching business, it's because they haven't had the breakthrough.

 

So if they go through, they take the courses and everything's laid out for their own personal journey, then they're going to have those breakthroughs once they do. Oh my gosh, they want to shout it from the mountain tops about how great this is. And all of a sudden it helps them get very clear on what their purpose is.

 

But if they come in just thinking, I just want to build a business. I just want to work on my processes, my systems, and my metrics. Then they're not going to have the right heart to be able to help their clients. They need to be able to connect to clients at that heart level. To have that empathy. To have that deeper understanding, and to also understand all of the mindset shifts that happened along the way.

 

Because it's really hard to coach someone on their mindset. If the whole time you're having these thoughts of why are they even thinking that? That is stupid that they even have it. But if you get it, if you've gone through it yourself, you're going to recognize, Oh yeah. I remember when I used to think that way too. I know how painful it was to think about it that way. And I know how many different switches in my mindset, how many little iterations of different thoughts I had to go through to get to the other side and how great it felt once you were at the other side.

 

So there's mindset shifts, there's capability shifts, but understanding that journey thoroughly, knowing what it was to go through it all, that's how you're going to be able to connect with the clients that you're working with. So if you've never had that, then of course, when you start coaching someone, it's going to fall really flat because you're not gonna know how to actually coach them through the stuff. It's not going to make any sense. It's just, you know, paper and words at that point, there's no emotions to it.

 

So you have to have had your own hero's journey before you can actually be a coach for someone else's hero's journey.

 

Step 1 Happens Repeatedly

 

So when someone comes into my program, they may not understand that. So that's why it's really important that now I'm laying this all out. Again, there's going to be that downloadable PDF so that you can look at that to see what are these different steps to know, where are you along this journey? Because most of us don't even realize it. And it's quite possible that you have multiple hero's journeys that you're going on. You might have already resolved a few. And so you can help other people with those types of journeys.

 

But as you're going through, and you're learning these tools, new things might pop up for you. Or if you're in a group coaching program, you might hear someone else sharing something, and that's going to trigger things for you. So all of a sudden you realize I've got more work to do on myself.

 

So I'm going to share something that I was going through recently. So I am definitely at the building and running my business portion. And one of the things that we have to do as entrepreneurs is all of the book keeping. Yay fun.

Entrepreneur Example - Triggers during Bookkeeping

So I mentioned a couple episodes back, that I had been like an ostrich sticking my head in the sand over doing any of the bookkeeping. But I knew from a previous entrepreneur who also was doing the ostrich thing, that she didn't do any of the bookkeeping for three years, even though she was making revenue. And this ended up really backfiring in the IRS coming down hard and even claiming her bank accounts. So all of a sudden she had no money because the IRS came and drained everything. So then she couldn't pay her house payment. She couldn't pay her car payment. She had no money for food. That was not a position that I ever wanted to find myself in.

 

So as much as I didn't want to deal with the triggers of bookkeeping, I had to face it. And it's interesting because then I was in a group coaching session where someone else was talking about how she didn't want to face her bookkeeping because of all of the triggering stuff. I thought, Oh, I've been there. I could help you through that now.

 

So over the last weekend I sat down and I did the bookkeeping. Now, when you're early stages entrepreneur, you might not know when are you supposed to do any of this bookkeeping stuff. So for me, I started this business in 2017, just like dabbling. Like it wasn't serious. In 2017, I was just starting to blog and just dip my toe into things just to see. Would people even be interested in what it was that I had to say?

 

Now, in 2018, I had my very first private paying client. And that was pretty exciting. And I had a lot of business expenses that year because I was still working in my corporate job. But I needed to be able to have office space so that I could coach someone privately. So I actually built an office in my backyard. I had a tough shed installed, and then I had it retrofitted in order to be an office. So it was finished. It was so beautiful. Chandelier and like wood siding on the inside. It was really, really pretty. So I had big expenses that year, but I only had revenue from one client. So I thought, okay, well, I probably don't need to do taxes for this year because that was such a small amount of revenue, but I had a huge business expense.

 

So then come around 2019. That's when I went all in on my business, September, 2019. But at that point it was going into step number nine on the coach's journey. I was learning how to start a business. So I wasn't getting any revenue yet because I had to learn all of the different pieces, but I definitely had business expenses.

 

So then 2020 happened. There's more business expenses, but I also started to have revenue. That was so great.

 

So here we are 2021, I to file my taxes. It's finally time for me to do the bookkeeping because I know that I've had enough revenue that, it's time. So I am actually taking a tax class this Wednesday so that I can learn all of the business taxes and how to do all of that. There's so much to learn as an entrepreneur.

 

So, I'm really excited about this now, but let me tell you, going through and doing all of the bookkeeping, so just pulling out all of the different expenses that I've done and then all of the different revenue, such a triggering thing.

 

So in the very beginning, I really didn't want to do it. Because I knew I had invested more money in my business than I had made in revenue so far. So we know that the first year of business, or maybe even the first couple of years of business, we're going to be negative on our return on investment. And how I know this, is that I have met plenty of other entrepreneurs. I've listened to other entrepreneurs' podcasts, and they've shared it too. So that's why I also wanted to share it with you. Because if you're someone that's an entrepreneur, or you're thinking about it, know that the first couple of years, you're not going to even break even, much less, make a profit.

 

And one of the things that was really interesting to me, that I learned through a bookkeeping class that I started, was that there's a difference between income and profit.

 

So when we were employees, we were used to getting a paycheck. And then when we are getting paid by our clients as an entrepreneur, there's that thought of, okay, that's income right? Cause in my mind, because I wasn't trained, I didn't learn all this stuff yet, I was thinking, Oh, okay, that's income. But it's not.

 

As an entrepreneur, It's revenue, but not income. So there's a difference there. So income is if you've decided to have a paycheck built into your business expenses. And then profit is after you have all of your expenses, including that income, minus your revenue, then you have your profits.

 

Expenses - Revenue = Profit

 

So not going to go into a whole economic teaching thing here. Because I'm still a novice at this part.

 

But some of the triggers that were coming up for me was.

 

1. Didn't break even yet

 

I had not broken even yet. I've invested quite a lot and not broken even.

 

2. Expense of failed experiments.

 

And then the things that I have actually spent money on, there's a lot of failed experiments along the way.

 

Coaches' Face Failed Experiments

 

One (example), it was great to go through it, because at first it was painful when I looked at it and then started to turn into something full of self love.

 

So if you've been listening to my podcast for a while... In the very beginning, so let's say January through February of 2020, I did an experiment with in-person classes in Point Arena. So that's close here on the Mendocino coast. I found this really cute new studio that had opened up that would rent out their studio space so that you could do any types of classes that you wanted. So they were focusing on the different healing arts. And so I was doing the Emotional Freedom course or a small snippet of it. So it definitely went into the healing part because we're looking at mindset and how to switch some of the painful thoughts and beliefs in our mindset. And that definitely gives us healing.

 

So as I'm looking at all of my expenses, I see all of the material expenses like my portable dry erase easel, my little utility bag to carry everything, the cost of renting the space, the cost of cardstock and a printer and ink. Because to do an in-person class, the advertising is so much different than doing online classes. And out here on the coast, it was quite a shock to my system. When I first moved out here, they don't really believe in using the internet that much. Or at least they didn't at the beginning of 2020. So the way that people would find out about classes was through flyers. So I had to make a lot of flyers and go post them up at all of the different messaging boards along highway one.

 

So people will actually go to the post office because there's a huge bulletin board so that they can see all the flyers for what's happening in the area. So this could be dinners at different places or dances that are happening, social events or classes. So different! Because I grew up in larger cities. I would never think to go to the post office, to look to see what were things that I could do to entertain myself. But out here on the coast, that's what people do. Some of the other ways are newspapers. Well, newspapers have kind of gone out of style in most places, but out here at the coast, it's like going back in time by a couple of decades. So people will rely on newspapers to find out about what they do. And then there's also a local radio station. So those were the three ways that I could advertise. And that was something new to me because that's not what I was used to where I lived before in a larger town or larger area anyway.

 

So I had to learn all of the new ways of advertising. And so I invested quite a bit of money. And then I went to this studio and I did three different times. And I was trying to think of a time where people got off after work so they could come in the evening. So I get there and I have my little tote bag full of supplies. I have my easel and I have all of my printed packets and it's super dark outside.

 

This particular studio didn't have any outside lighting. So as people are driving by, the only way that they would know that something was happening was because they could see the light coming through the windows. Now the light on the inside was this warm light, but it was kind of dim. So it definitely would set a mood. It was very comfortable to be in there, but from the outside, it's not very bright.

 

So again, not what I'm used to. I'm used to lit up parking lots, maybe a light on the outside of the building, that lights up to tell you the name of the studio or the name of the business that you're going to. So got in there, got everything all set up. The very first time, nobody came. Oh my gosh, so much effort.

 

So then I thought, okay, I need to try another way of doing this. So I was looking for even more ways of advertising, or maybe it was something about the signs that I made. So I cranked out a whole new set of signs with using different colors and fonts and different wording. Got there again, it's all dark. So now I'm thinking about investing in lights for the outside of the studio so that people would be able to see that this was happening. And so there would be a little bit of foot traffic and, um, and they would stop and they'd stare and I'd wave at them through the window. And second course, nobody showed up.

 

So by the time that the third time rolled around, I had a bunch more experiments that I had done. And then I get there, I walk into the studio and in the beginning they had the studio owner, or one of the owners, come and unlock everything. Well, by the time I did the third class, they decided they didn't even want to show up to do that. So they gave me all of the combination codes and it was really funky how I had to get into this area.

 

But I get into it. And they had had a previous course come in that was teaching like outdoor wilderness survival, right? Because we've got the ocean, we've got Redwood forest. So inside there's all of these scuba tanks and scuba clothes and there's climbing gear and toolboxes and mats and everything. And I'm thinking, Oh my gosh! This is not the environment for people to come in and talk about their emotional pain and their mindset. There's stuff everywhere. Because this had been a gorgeous studio that was very clean. It had hardwood floors, these beautiful white walls and some nice plants and everything was very cozy. Now it was just full of all of this stuff. I mean, it almost looked like it was a storage room and I was so embarrassed. And so I'm trying to figure out how am I going to move all of this stuff and hide it. So when my clients come in, they have a clean place that feels very comfortable. So needless to say, nobody came to that class either. So we're three classes into it. And I had been doing all of this effort and moving things around.

 

So doing the books, doing all of the bookkeeping, and I'm seeing all of the expenses, it's bringing up all of that. And I, so at first it's like kind of a triggering thing of how much work and effort went into it. How much money went into it. And again, that nobody was showing up for it.

 

So I had learned quite a bit from that. I learned about different ways of marketing. I learned about the different audiences. Like, do I even have my right customers out here along the coast? Were they even interested in this topic? Was it about price? Was it about technology? What was it? So I had a lot to learn.

 

It was like this trip down memory lane. So I also had all of this self-love that started to kick in. So it's like, you're going through all of the different emotions. So first it's like all the, frustration and then the heartbreak. But then I felt all of this self love for myself of what I had gone through. All this stuff that I had learned and how things have changed quite a bit in one year's time.

 

Now, everything that I do is online. I actually have paying clients. I have ways of advertising that works. Where people actually come to my workshops.And things are going so much better. But I had to go through those experiments in the early days so that I could learn how to do all of this stuff.

 

So it's interesting how something as simple as bookkeeping can kick up all of this stuff.

 

And so, because I had all of the mindset tools, everything that got triggered while I was doing that bookkeeping, I was to coach myself through.

 

The Benefit of all of the Step 1's in the Journey

 

So when I am developing coaches that come to me and entrepreneurs that come to me, we're going through everything. And I am so grateful that I have experienced it myself. Because if someone came to me and they don't want to do the bookkeeping, they're getting triggered by it, now I know exactly how to connect with them. Because I've gone through it myself.

 

So when I was in that group coaching session, where now all of a sudden a woman is talking about bookkeeping and how she doesn't want to do it. All of a sudden I knew, Oh, you know, like I could raise my hand. I've been there. I could totally help you. It was such an interesting experience.

 

So when you're going through these 10 steps of the coach's journey, know that you're going to end up going back to step one. That emotional pain. Throughout your life, there's going to be new things that come up all of the time. And if you're a coach, it might be a new set of experiences, a new set of tools that you're adding into your toolbox. That then you'd be able to help people with. Because when you're a coach, people are going to have all sorts of things that come up for them.

 

So you might be there, coaching someone on productivity. And the thing that comes in sideways might have something to do with bookkeeping, like what I just experienced. But now you would be able to connect with that person. Because you understand all of the mindset challenges that they had to go through in order to get to a good place where now they actually love bookkeeping. They're so grateful that they've done it because you've gone through that yourself.

 

Where are you in The Coach's Journey?

So I want to ask you, where do you see yourself along that 10 step journey?

 

Where are you today?

 

Where you are today, might be different than where you were three weeks ago. You might have found yourself slipping back to step number one, or step number two, or maybe you're looking forward to step number 10. And you're like, How do I get there?

 

So all of that, I can help you with all of those different steps.

 

But also having you be aware of what step you're at. And knowing that you can bounce back and forth between the steps. That's super helpful.

 

I've mentioned that I'm going through life coach certification. So I've already been a business certified coach for years, but the life coach certification is something new. Now I'm already at step 10 of building and running a business. And so building capabilities and skills is step number six. So there's multiple reasons why someone might want to go back to a previous step.

 

So there might be just refining some skills. But it also might be to have access to more people that have learned that methodology. Because having more people that can help you, especially in my case.

 

So this is mindset coaching. I haven't found a whole lot of people out in the world that know how to do the mindset coaching. And I found that I could really use some extra support because sometimes we can't see our own mind at work. We can't see our own thoughts. So if we can find other people that also know the same methodology, then they might be able to help us when we're having a hard time.

 

So I'm definitely finding that in this certification group. We do peer coaching. So we're helping each other. So I have a few things that I would take that were real current things that I was going through, and they would be able to help me through it. And then also once we graduate, we're now part of the club, so to speak, of everybody that has learned this particular methodology. So at any time I know these people know how to do it. And everybody is a coach for a different type of industry or serving a different type of problem. So if I ever have that specific type of problem, I know this is the person that I go to, to help me with this thing that's going on. And they know this extra methodology.

 

Because one thing that you'll learn as you're going through your coaching journey is that you might learn one methodology, but you're going to incorporate that into all of the other things that you have learned or developed for yourself throughout your whole life.

 

So what you have to offer to people is going to be unique for you and different from all of the other coaches out there. If you're just trying to take tools from one place that you learned, and just use those and nothing else, you're going to miss out on being unique and also being able to deeply connect with people. You need to use your experiences from your own life to be able to connect with people.

 

So there you have it. The Coach's Journey 10 step process., And that you bounce back and forth, and that's okay. That's part of it.

 

Keep records of what it is that you try along your way. If you journal, this is great. Being able to go back and look at what you were writing a couple of years ago, or even six months ago, you're going to see your own evolution, Who you are today is different than who you were a year ago. And you can be full of that self love to see all of the growth that you've had along the way.

 

All right, my strong friends. I hope that you got some great inspiration out of that. Maybe some extra clarity. I hope you have a great week. I'll talk with you soon. Bye bye.

 

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thank you for listening to My Freedom Grove podcast. I can't wait to work with you directly. I'll help you to be your authentic self, to have amazing relationships and to live your purpose. I invite you to check out unshakable men and unshakable women. The unshakable programs will give you all of the tools, the coaching and the community to help you rise in life, relationships, and business. To learn more, go to myfreedomgrove.com/work with me. I can't wait to see you there.