After more than 20 years of asking questions that made others uncomfortable and holding myself out as a problem solver, providing others with security and directing them on how to achieve this, I finally took the plunge of changing careers! In 2018 I made the radical change from corporate lawyer to mBIT certified coach focused on the inner life of my clients.
As an inner life coach, I ask questions that make my clients look authentically at their thoughts, feelings, deeply held beliefs, and habits. Sometimes, this is uncomfortable. But the questions lead to solving problems, providing them with inner wisdom, security and direction.
While the transition from lawyer to life coach has not been without its challenges, it wasn’t until I accepted that I had more than 20 years of experience of active listening, difficult conversations, and asking the questions that no one dares to ask, that I got over the “imposter syndrome” of thinking I might be a great coach!
Part of the challenge lay with preparation. See, for being a lawyer I had 5 years of law school in New Zealand, plus three more years of law school in Panama (in Spanish, with the Napoleonic system, rather than the Common Law legal system), and two Master’s Degrees! Overqualified? Perhaps a little. But confident in my knowledge.
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Imposter Syndrome
And what do I have that comes close in coaching?
Untold courses in leadership development, human resources and staff management, mentoring, and neuro-linguistic programming (which I studied for the purpose of using in negotiations as a lawyer, not for coaching).
Even when I started all my coaching courses, it was simply to be a better boss, a more empathic leader, and hone my skills in difficult conversations. I spent hours learning more about time management and organisation: mastering personal priorities and getting things done! I specialise in non-violent communication and other active listening skills. These were all under the misguided impression that they would help me overcome my irritability (exacerbated by Celiac Disease).
While it’s possibly true that I have spent much more time and money on my personal development and coaching than I probably did in my law degrees (or at least close to), I don’t have the post-graduate diplomas adorning the wall. I didn’t think they were significant at the time. There are countless courses that I threw the certifications in the trash when finished. I went to learn, not to get the piece of paper!
They were simply part of my self-development as a leader and lawyer.
What changed?
mBraining & mBIT – multiple brain integration techniques
I went to do another course in coaching and personal development. I had no idea what I signed up for! Of course, I flew to London to do it, but that was beside the point!
mBraining, however, was much more than just a coaching course. It far outshone all the work and study I had done in ontological coaching and even everything I knew about NLP.
mBraining is about reaching a place of total inner alignment – it’s not just about better planning or getting your mindset straight. mBraining is not therapy and healing your feelings. It’s not motivational talks or making vision boards.
mBraining 
takes you to a new place: it is generative inner wisdom. You take everything that you are: your thoughts, definitions, imagination – your feelings, values, priorities, desires, wants, and hopes – your fears, needs, self-preservation, motivation and deepest core identity – and align all of this within.
What deep inner wisdom and mastery evolves as you go through this process of inner life coaching?
When I discovered mBraining, everything fell into place!
All the time and money I had spent on self-development, coaching, NLP… was leading up to this moment! It wasn’t about becoming a better lawyer – it was about becoming more than I had ever been before.
Inner life coaching
After completing my mBraining Coach Certification, I found myself at a crossroads. I sat down with my head, heart and gut, and we had some serious conversations about creativity, compassion and courage. We talked about thoughts, feelings and needs. What did I imagine, what did I desire, and what did I identify with?
And the challenge was to release everything I knew and had done for the past 20 years and build something completely new. From scratch. In a new field. In a completely different era from the one where I had built my law firm and law practice!
I knew, without a doubt, that I wanted to focus on helping others transform their lives from the inside out!
Some might say that happiness is an inside job – I say that well-being is an inside job! It’s more than just happiness. It is genuinely well: thriving because you have achieved inner mastery. You truly know yourself and, therefore, can live authentically.
I want all my clients to find that place where their hearts, mind, body and soul meet.
mBIT, Ho’oponopono & EFT: some of the techniques I use
Transformation & change
If you want to change any part of your life, I know it will have its challenges.
Nonetheless, the only person that will change your life is you!
- What do you want?
- Why do you want it?
- How will you get it?
What do you want to have? be? do? create? Who are you becoming?
As I coach, my role is to provide you with wisdom, guidance, empowerment & accountability. I will provide tools to help you identify what is important to you. I ask uncomfortable questions that make you rethink what you believe.
I’ve taken the ten years of learning and training in coaching, mentoring, time management, meditation, mindfulness, leadership transformation, NLP, mBIT (multiple brain integration techniques), & spiritual growth – and turned it into a program that others can benefit from as well. Even the skills that I learned in Waikato law school (New Zealand), ADR (alternative dispute resolution) & active listening — learning how to ask the right questions — were 20 years of training grounds for sharpening my intuition and skills for helping others.
How can I help you realise your dreams with an authentic inner life?
How can you get in touch with me?
Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn
Contact me:
