Chronic disease epidemic is reaching staggering heights, but did you know that many of those illnesses are driven by our behaviour and environment, not our genes? That means we all have the power to prevent or reverse chronic illness just by adopting healthier habits. Working with a Health Coach can help you to develop healthier habits.

Here are the top 5 things you should know about Health Coaching.

1. Help shift your perspective

Health & Wellness Coaches help clients to focus on WHAT’S POSSIBLE not WHAT’S NOT POSSIBLE. The approach being client-centred focuses on assisting you to elicit and clarify your values, gain insights into your lifestyle practices, and develop a deeper understanding of possibilities.

2. Draw on your own resources to make lasting change

Instead of the coach being the expert in the coaching relationship, the client takes the role of expert. You know your body, your life, and what’s worked well (or not worked well) for you in the past.

Coaches are likely to find that sharing information as an expert doesn’t serve you as well as using coaching techniques to help you research and discover what works best. If you come to conclusions on your own you will have greater success than information given to you.

With a client-centered approach to coaching, you own the insights, the actions steps, the work, and the success. This creates a very powerful environment for you to make significant and sustainable changes in your health.

3. Empower the client

Coaches aren’t there to lecture, direct, or prescribe. They are there to empower you to make healthier choices. Health Coaching is a partnership between coaches and clients that guides you toward the changes you want to make. Coaches develop a relationship built on trust and respect. They walk alongside you as you make positive changes. 

4. Bridging the gap between intention and action

Coaching is a journey of self-discovery that ultimately leads you to setting goals, accepting a level of self–responsibility and experiencing positive self-determination. The self–awareness and knowledge inspire and motivates you to bridge the gap between intention and action. Health coaches are experts on human behaviour, motivation, and health. They are “change agents” who help you set and achieve health goals and build new habits.

5. Focusing on strengths

The Health Coaching process encourages self-reflection, self-awareness, self- regulation and positivity. You are supported whilst building confidence, focusing on your strengths as you learn from past failures and successes to overcome barriers and increase facilitators for change.

Major behavioural changes require a lot of motivation, support from others, a clear vision of where you want to be, and reliance on strengths and values.  It takes drive, motivation, and strategy to change your habits—especially if we’ve been doing things a certain way for a long, long time. Most of all, it takes support—and that’s where a health coaches role is and where they excel.