Here’s the Darwinian secret I learned from 20 years in the advertising business: survival of the fittest belonged not to the best products, but the best stories.
Your product cleans 20% better than the competition? Snoozeville.
I see an attractive person cleaning quickly, having fun doing it, and their kids begging them to clean with your product?
You have my attention.
Stories can help us on an individual level, too. Tell ourselves the correct stories, and we can conquer mountains. Tell ourselves the wrong ones, however, and we impose limits on ourselves and what we can achieve.
The right story conquers fear; the wrong story prioritizes fear.
As I’ve worked with executives and other ambitious women in coaching, four of these “wrong” stories have stood out above the rest.
This may be “unconventional”, but I see personal trainers as a way to outsource your fitness discipline. Trainers receive an hourly rate to hold you accountable to your best both during and between sessions. They also apply structure based on their trained expertise through customized workout routines.
In my specialities, life and career balance for women, coaching operates the same way. Clients “outsource” their discipline to me, because I hold them to being the best selves they want to be. And when they have trouble, I help them identify their barriers and give them solutions based on my trained expertise.
Just like personal trainers, coaching isn’t for everyone. But those who embrace the push these services provide will reap the rewards.
First things first: I have plenty of experience with “real professions”.
In addition to my decades-long advertising career, I ran a brick-and-mortar business in Times Square, From Fortune 500 CEOs to construction workers, I’ve heard and seen it all.
Coaching has demanded just as much from me as my most challenging days as a business owner—and some days, even more. My personal accountability is intertwined with my clients’ success—if I don’t show up 110% during my sessions with them, I take it as a personal failure.
I agree, it certainly can be.
Folks, coaches aren’t gods. There are no magic wands, bullets, pills, or even a pit of coals to run over that will remove your barriers to success and life fulfillment. Any coach who tells you otherwise is lying to you.
The best coaches know to keep it simple. You tell me who you want to be. I help you take the fastest road there. Is it an easy path? Never. But coaches keep you going, one foot in front of the other, in the right direction.
Once upon a time, this was 100% accurate.
The early days of coaching, access was restricted to millionaires/billionaires, movie stars, and professional athletes.
Now, coaching is going to run more than a Netflix subscription, but it’s now actually within reach for many more ambitious people. Further, the growth of the profession has enabled more specialized coaching to thrive. Don’t tell anyone, but women have always secretly run the world—now, with female-specific coaching accessible to them, they can do so while enjoying much happier, fulfilled lives.
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