As coaches, we help our clients with difficult emotions.

But in wanting the best for our clients, it can be hard not to want to SAVE them from the emotional pain and get them to the other side.

When seeing someone in pain, it’s only natural to want them to be okay.

This is the slippery slope of going from coach to savior.

Coach
“I’m here for you.”

Savior
“I’m here to save you.”

I want to share with you a powerful story of what it looks like to have clear boundaries and not buy into people-pleasing and be of service as a result.

A friend of mine hired a $50,000 coach.

He’s a conscious guy, but he one day sent his coach a looooooong email about how hard things were in his life and was really stuck in a victim mindset.

His coach stayed out of being over-responsible and helped my friend own his stuff by sending a one-liner email back, 9 words total…

“I have compassion for what you are putting yourself through.”

Mic drop… LOL ?

This type of coaching is mastery level.

It’s not my style but it was a powerful response.

How you do something like this needs to come from a clean place, meaning no ego or trigger in you, so they can feel you’re in service to them.

If you said from a triggered place, “Oh my god, my client’s not happy, are they ok?”

Or, “Why does my client email me long emails? What a drain!”, then do your own work before responding since that can be hurtful + not helpful.

Part of your professional responsibility is to do your own work first - it’s super important so that you hold a clear space for your clients.   

Don’t tie your worth to your clients FEELING GOOD and GETTING RESULTS.

Your clients aren’t always going to feel good, you’re coaching them to move past their fears and do something completely different.

And feeling big emotions can be messy, but it’s also where the magic is… on the other side. ?

When we try to save our clients from these big emotions, we deprive them.

? We deprive them of empowerment.

? We deprive them of knowing their own strength.

? We deprive them of the self-esteem of knowing, “Hey, I moved through that emotion and I was fine on the other side”.

? We deprive them of the confidence they can have in the future when they deal with the same emotion.

As a coach, we can guide our clients to move through emotions and show them they’re SAFE to feel and it’s okay to feel… and in doing that, they’re free.

There’s no better way to empower your clients to deal with future challenges than by facing what’s here… and to help them see their personal power and potential as a result.