The Spiritual Pumpkin Carriage
or, how I stopped worrying and became a habit coach.
It’s taken me a while to warm up to the term “coach.” Sports have always made me incredibly uncomfortable, and I shudder at the idea of wearing shoes that squeak on a gym floor and a whistle around my neck. That’s why, though I’m living my dream of being a women’s spiritual habit coach, I prefer to think of myself as a pumpkin coach in a fairy tale, delivering women to their joyful and empowered destinies amidst sparkles, poofs of smoke, and harp strings.
Because of *reasons*, I’ve had a bumpy road in life. I can “yada yada yada” this now, because I’ve dealt with my shadow side and written about these things a lot. The shorthand version is that my abusive father, when combined with my inherited mental illness & other congenital physical and mental issues (including autism that went undiagnosed until this year), resulted in me developing coping mechanisms that nearly killed me.
Suffice it to say that I’m so, so much better today than I ever thought I would be. So good, in fact, that I began thinking that my whole *getting better extravaganza* could be helpful to other people — particularly women — who had also experienced some bumps along their own road.
But, because I’ve learned lately not to insist on my own timeline, I decided to instead stay open and follow the watercourse, the flow of life. The way I could be of use would appear if I didn’t rush it.
Meanwhile, I wrote, as I always do, and published work on Medium, as I’ve been doing for a while. But my subject matter started to change. I started writing about things I’d learned as I was getting well. I wrote about how developing a solid set of good habits had become the skeleton on which I was hanging my new, revamped life.
Also, I was having the major realization that finding another full-time marketing job after I was unfairly fired in the last days of 2021 was not the best use of my time and energy.
In addition to working on my book, Taliswomen, I knew that I should be sharing my experience: I came back from the deepest despair imaginable to become a joyful, empowered, badass woman.
How could I use my experience to help other women? What would that look like? That part I wasn’t really sure about.
In searching for Medium publications that would be a good fit for my work, I happened upon Better Humans. From there, I discovered Coach.me, and was immediately intrigued.
My Initial Experience with Coach.me
Having spent years in the digital marketing industry, I did notice pretty quickly that the UX (user experience) of Coach.me wasn’t great. It’s a bit clunky and hard to navigate, but I generally liked what I was reading. Personally, I’d prefer an authentic, just-functional site to a bunch of fakery underscored by smoke and mirrors any day.
I liked the approach, and the ideas behind them — small habits, built over time. Accountability. A community of people with shared goals. But I still didn’t really understand what, exactly, Coach.me was.
Just a Little Faith
The fact of the matter is that Coach.me appeared to offer a relatively low-commitment way into coaching — both for the prospective coach (me) and the prospective client. So I signed up with the site at the $5 monthly community level, still unsure if I was going to go through the Habit Coaching program.
While exploring my options, I discovered that most of the other coach training programs which interested me were literally ten times — or more — the price of the Coach.me program. The other programs were also much longer and much more intensive. I can see the appeal of those, but right now, I’m not looking to make that sort of investment. I was beginning to warm to the idea of starting a very specific sort of coaching business under the auspices of the platform, then seeing what developed.
As I deliberated, I learned that it was recommended that I sign up for a “concierge” program through Coach.me in order to learn how it operated. I didn’t really understand why I needed to do that, but it cost literally $1 to sign up, so I did.
In retrospect, I’m so glad I did the odd little concierge program, because it let me have the experience of being a client through the program before I decided whether I wanted to enroll in the habit coaching course. The ease of the concierge program, the friendliness of everyone I talked to, and the low-key feel gave my anxious, autistic soul ease. I could do this.
Certification — the process.
I enrolled early enough in the habit certification program to get the early enrollment discount — and early enough to get a little nervous.
But here’s another place where the program really rocked. I knew exactly what to expect. Being an anxious person who’s on the spectrum, I can get really nervous and talk myself out of something that could be positive way before it even starts. But the whole plan of the program was laid out in such a way that I understood what would be expected of me, minimizing my anxiety.
My cohort of students in the program was a good size — roughly 20 people — and interestingly there was little or no overlap in our niches, so we didn’t feel competitive with one another. For instance, while my focus is on good spiritual habits that empower women, another student focused on helping clients eliminate sugar from their diet. Another focused on non-procrastination, etc.
The teacher, Kendra, was sensational. The material was matter-of-fact and well-presented. Not a lot of theory, but I appreciated that. as my goal was (and is) to get to work helping women. To that end, a significant portion of the program consisted of working with a few volunteer clients just as I would with paying clients.
My five practice clients were so great, and I was able to really craft my messaging to them with the help and encouragement of Kendra and the other students in my cohort.
Working with my volunteer clients while in the training program felt like high-quality training wheels. I wouldn’t have had the courage to start down this path without the support of the training program, but because I knew the platform — and my cohort — was there to support me, I was able to face my fears.
So, what exactly is habit coaching through Coach.me?
Simply put, it’s asynchronous “coaching” (or motivating conversations, if you like) over the app or online platform. The asynchronous nature is unexpectedly positive, firstly because it neatly circumvents scheduling issues.
For instance, one of my clients is in the UK. We’re working on Magical Morning Habits, so she does her habits and checks in on the platform when it’s morning in the UK. Later, when I wake up, I read her check-in and notes and message her back. When it’s time to introduce a new concept or habit, I’ll make a video for her and/or send her supporting literature. She writes back with any questions, and we’re off.
It takes a lot of pressure off the coach/client relationship, I’ve found, because we’re able to correspond (within reason) when we’re able to be attentive, rather than at a predetermined time when one or both of us may be distracted.
A Happy Accident
Becoming a certified habit coach was not something I expected to do this year (or ever, really). But because such an accommodating, relatively low-pressure training program fell into my world and fit so completely with my goals of helping women empower themselves spiritually, I would’ve been foolish to resist.
And in this, at least, I’m no fool.
No, I’m a happy pumpkin coach.
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