I Guarantee You Won't Always Like Me

A potential client who was considering enrolling in a 6-month Private Coaching Container recently asked me today if I offered "starting sessions" or what the clause was on when she could cancel without penalty. She said "Just to make sure I like you"

I told her "I GUARANTEE you won't like me after a few sessions, so NO, there's no trial run, you're either in or you're out".

I also told her that if she needed more information about me, that's totally fair, and I suggested she follow me for a bit longer and engage with my content and free resources before making her decision.

"Why is that?" you may ask

Because as a coach, my job is to help my clients get what they want, with zero attachment on my part.

It requires challenging the client when they are stuck in their story, it requires asking difficult questions, and it requires holding space for that client through very uncomfortable and sometimes painful moments of facing truths about what needs to change.

A coach who's worried about whether their clients like them or not, is going to be held back from being in full service to their client. They are more concerned about themselves and their own emotional comfort than they are helping their client get what they desire.

If the coach is worried that the client's contract is dependent on being "likable", then it's going to affect how they show up for the client.

A coach cannot be concerned about their own comfort - emotional or financial.

If they prioritize being "liked" over the client's outcomes, it's a huge disservice to the client.

Transformation is never a comfortable journey. During that process, the coach is the one who will ask the questions that trigger the discomfort.

When clients don't like a coach, it's usually only in the moment, and it's never truly about the coach, it's about the journey, the tough questions, the mirror that gets held up.

However, that can sometimes look like "She's so uncaring". or "She doesn't get me" or "What have I done?"

Being challenged to see our truths, is definitely confronting because the obstacles our subconscious mind throws at us can start to sound like valid reasons to not take action or back out on ourselves.

A sympathetic & comforting coach may be likable "in the moment", but completely ineffective in the long run.

A coach is NOT a friend.

Of course, that doesn't mean coaches aren't caring or empathetic, and we certainly are a safe space, free from judgment.

Sometimes I'm the only person my clients feel free to just "let it all hang out" for a moment. If they need a place, a sounding board, some time to "feel all the feels" - of COURSE I'm there for that, and I encourage it.

If they need a pity party, then by all means have one

AND.....I put a timer on it.

In those moments when they feel defeated, clients need someone who'll hold the space for them to step into. They need someone who can hold them as whole, powerful, capable, and amazing, even in those moments they can't see it themselves.

They need someone who can see when they're slipping into the default patterns that don't serve them, and when they're shrinking back from who they truly are.

Usually at the start of a coaching container can sometimes be the most challenging emotionally for a client.

I once had a client get so triggered she ran out of our first VIP day and didn't come back. I think it was safe to say she didn't like me very much in that moment.

And that was not even the hardest questions I asked.....

However, I wasn't going to let her off the hook. I simply packed up her things left them at reception and had my assistant get her first call on the schedule. (Story for another day but this client had a lot to confront, it got a LOT more uncomfortable, and when she did, she blew the lid off her income goals it was amazing).

A coach who gives an "easy out" or a trial period isn't committed to their clients, at all.

A client who needs one isn't committed either, and trust me, there's nothing worse than working with a client who isn't committed to their goals.

That's why my approach is " you're in or you're out", and on my longer-term containers, while I offer payment plans, I always require a large deposit upfront.

I want to make sure it's uncomfortable right from the start, so that they have substantial skin in the game, and are committed right away to their transformation and the discomfort that's going to follow.

A coach cannot cultivate a client's desire.

They have to have that themselves. Their desire needs to be stronger than their discomfort. Otherwise, the discomfort will win. The client I mentioned above, her discomfort was definitely stronger in the moment, however, because of her commitment to her goals, her desire triumphed in the long run.

I believe that a coaching container set up with a "trial run" or another form of an "easy out" is a container that is set up with failure as an expectation.

It's also a coach who isn't comfortable navigating discomfort themselves.

That's just gross! I can't imagine ever hiring a coach who thought in the back of their mind that I might fail. And I will never take on a client whom I think might fail.

I'm here to help and serve.

While I'm not my client's "friend", my love for them and my commitment to their goals, is so strong that I am totally OK with them being angry at me.

It's not to say that I haven't had clients who have at one time or another have asked to quit. But I've never given up on them, and believe me - in those moments when I don't let them out of their commitment they REALLY don't like me.

I've had them scream, yell, cry, etc "Why can't you understand, this isn't working" and I don't give it to them.

Because while in the moment I can see their fear and uncertainty, I also see their power, their dreams still sparkling in their eyes.

That's what they hired me for. To help them break the cycle of feeling stuck between what they think they can do and what they really want. It's a pattern that's been showing up over and over and keeping them from creating what they want.

I also see the breakthrough that's waiting on the other side of whatever it is making them feel like they need to quit on themselves.

As we work through the real issue, and they come out the other side of what's been in their way, they're always glad I didn't care about me or about being liked.....they're grateful I held the discomfort and helped them break the patterns that were keeping them stuck.

I do understand firsthand what they are feeling or going through.

I've certainly had my own moments with my own coaches over the years where I've wanted to throttle them, got so angry I could have punched them, felt so "not understood" that I wanted to quit.

I'm eternally grateful that the last thing they were concerned about was what I thought about them.

I realized later, they DID understand everything I was feeling and going through. hence why they didn't buy the BS.

Without their fierce coaching, or if I quit after a few sessions because I didn't "like" them..... I wouldn't have the life, business, ranch & horses I have today.

If they let me give up on myself, I wouldn't have left my comfort zones. I would have stayed in the patterns that created mediocrity - OK life but not fulfilled. I would have stayed playing small and safe.

My coaches didn't let me quit.

It wasn't the coaching contract they were holding me to, even though it felt like it.

They were holding me accountable to my dreams and goals.

For that I truly love them and have a heart full of gratitude, they are with me long after I no longer work with them.

Coaches who care that deeply are the kinds of coaches I still work with.

Now that doesn't mean some clients don't quit. My coaches have had clients who quit. I've also certainly had some clients default over the years, but it wasn't because I made it easy for them to quit on themselves, it was because they really wanted.

Once a person is committed to something, even quitting, they will follow through.

And again, my job as a coach is to help them get what they really want, and if they put that much effort into quitting, then that IS what they really want. So I will honor it.

That's why my containers don't have an easy out. It definitely weeds out clients who are only half in.

Usually that initial commitment with "no way out", is the discomfort the client needs to get through and over all of the other discomfort that will show up along the way in their transformation.

The investment and commitment need to be much more uncomfortable than taking uncomfortable action.

Because that uncomfortable action is what gets them what they want.

So yeah - no trial period. You're either in or you're out