[00:00] Isn’t life coaching just glorified therapy? Aren’t life coaches just for people who are living in their parents basement? Well, no and no. There are important revelations that I’m going to share with you in today’s episode that are going to uncover the truth about why the most successful people have coaches and why you should do it.

[00:20] Welcome to another episode of success. Through failure, the show for successful people. And for those who want to become successful, the only show that reveals the true nature of success. This is your host, Jim Harshaw, Jr. And today we’re talking about the myths around. Coaching specifically life coaching or executive coaching.

[00:41] There’s so many myths out there. So many people think that life coaching is maybe just like, uh, having a paid friend who like nods at you and everything you say, well, spoiler alert. We do more than just nod. We also point and sometimes we wave our arms around. Uh, but today I really want to demystify coaching and help you understand why it could be this.

[01:02] Unfair advantage that you have or this game changer for you and your career and in your personal life. So we’re going to go full myth busters on this today. All right. We won’t have the fancy gadgets or the explosions. I don’t have the insurance for that, but we’re going to keep it simple and give you everything that you need here.

[01:18] I’m also going to explain to you what exactly executive life coaching is, what that means, and we’ll see if it’s right for you. So. Before I jump into this, here’s what this episode is not. This is not about me. This is not about my business. It’s about the industry and the service of coaching. And I’m going to share some examples from the results that we’ve gotten with our clients, but I’m not going to be promoting our coaching program or why you should work with us.

[01:43] This is about you and what you need to know just about coaching and having a coach and if it’s right for you. All right. Now, if you know somebody who likes this kind of content and might be interested in this episode, make sure you share episode 422 of the success through failure podcast. You can shoot them a text, you can retweet this or repost this.

[02:04] I guess it’s called now that it’s called X, but share it. On social media, give a comment, anything like that, likes and comments that just helps the social media platforms, you know, replicate that and show it to more people, the more engagement there is on a post, the more it shares it with other people.

[02:19] So thank you for your support. Thank you for sharing this. That’s how these things grow because of you. So thank you for that in advance. All right. So let’s get into the eight myths. Around coaching, specifically life coaching. All right. Myth number one, life coaching is just a form of therapy. Well, here’s the deal.

[02:41] While both professions aim to help people, coaching and therapy are fundamentally different in their approaches. My wife is a licensed therapist. Life coaching is more action oriented. Uh, it focuses more on the present in the future. Therapy can often. Start by exploring the past while, you know, this is just a generalization, you know, some coaches are going to dig into your past.

[03:03] We do that a lot of times and some therapists are gonna, you know, you’re gonna walk away with action items. So there’s certainly a gray area in between the two, but there are certainly some differences there. Myth number two, life coaches are only for people who are struggling. I think that’s probably the biggest myth out there, but here’s the deal.

[03:21] That’s like saying. You know, a quarterback, you know, quarterback coaches are just for quarterbacks who can’t throw the ball or gym memberships are just for people who are out of shape. Well, we, we know that Tom Brady had a quarterback’s coach, right? Well, you know, when we go to the gym, we see a lot of really fit people there.

[03:36] They get fit because they go to the gym. The truth is that successful people hire coaches. Life coaches, speaking coaches, executive coaches, relationship coaches, fitness coaches, you name it. Um, one of my clients, Mark McLaughlin, he’s been a guest on success through failure back in episode number 223. He’s an author.

[03:56] He’s a neurosurgeon. He’s a philanthropist. He’s. Just an incredible human being, but he, he talks when he writes articles and publications, he references, you know, my life coach, Jim Harshaw, like he knows that he has to have somebody like me outside of his head, outside of his life, who can help give him perspective.

[04:16] In our practice, we, we have, I mean, shoot, we have doctors, we have lawyers, we have school principals, we have successful entrepreneurs. We have CEOs like these are the people who tend to hire coaches. Think of it this way. I was a wrestler. Maybe you were an athlete at some point in your life. Maybe your, your coach would say something like, Hey, we’re going to have an optional practice on Saturday morning.

[04:37] Guess who shows up to the optional practice? The best athletes, right? The ones who need it, the ones who are, you know, not starting or, you know, not at the highest level on the team. Like those are the ones who not show who don’t show up. The people who show up are actually the highest performers already.

[04:53] So who hires a coach? It’s high performers. It’s not the people who are struggling and, you know, who probably need it more. It tends to be the high performance. And that’s what that really, that’s what our community is made up of. All these people who I was talking about their life coaching is for anybody who wants to find their next level.

[05:15] Quick interruption. If you like what you’re hearing here and you want to learn how you can implement this Into your life, just go to JimHarshawJr.com/apply to see how you can get a free one on one coaching session with me. That’s JimHarshawJr.com/apply. Now back to the show.

[05:33] Myth number three, coaching is expensive in coaching is not worth the investment. Let me just do this. Let me speak from the experience of my clients. One of my clients said this, he said, and again, this is, I’m not promoting my program, I’m promoting the idea of having a coach, right? Having people outside of you and your life who can help you.

[05:52] And here’s what one of my clients said. He said, I’ve paid off over 280, 000 in debt, started a business, landed a huge promotion, and we’re building our dream home and earning 90,000 more per year and giving away more than 15% of our income a month. Other than my parents and my wife, no other person believes in me and influences me like my coach.

[06:15] This is somebody who’s invested in coaching and he’s been a client of ours for several years. This is actually Jerry Stravy. I can share his name. He shares this as a testimonial. It’s on our website, et cetera. But this is, I mean, this is one of many, I mean, You know, if you join a gym membership and you’re not seeing results, like a month or two later, you’re going to quit the gym membership.

[06:34] But if you are seeing results, you’re going to continue to invest in it, right? This is an investment. Yes, it costs money. The average life coaching engagement is about a year. Our program is a little bit different. Our client’s average engagement is closer to two years. We have people who have been with us 5, years.

[06:52] But we’re also doing a little bit more than the coaching we’re providing networking and a community aspect for other people who are just for high performers. So it’s a little bit of a unique sort of version or format of coaching that we provide, not only the one on one, but it’s also groups, et cetera, in a community.

[07:07] So ours may be a little bit longer than the industry average, but if a coach isn’t working, then the average for the industry wouldn’t be about a year, it would be a month or, or people would just be out of business. Like it’s an investment coaches can help you save your marriage. They can help you make more money.

[07:24] They can help you lose that 10 pounds that you’ve been wanting to shed. They can help you be more consistent. They can help you find clarity and focus and discipline and balance in coaching. I mean, it can be all encompassing or it can just focus on one area of your life. So is it worth it? You know, the results speak for themselves.

[07:43] So that’s myth number three, number myth. Number four. Life coaching is too time consuming. I’m already busy. I don’t have the time. Well, you may have heard the quote at some point that everybody should meditate 20 minutes a day, unless you’re too busy, then you should meditate 30 minutes a day, right? It’s the same with coaching.

[08:02] We’re all busy. And it’s about being busy with the right thing. Tim Ferriss talks about, uh, he has this great quote that busyness is a form of laziness. Busyness is a form of laziness. And it’s true. I mean, if you think about that, like it’s really true. You can be as busy as you want to be. You can be busy all day long.

[08:19] You are always going to have a to do list. You’re always going to have, you know, emails in your inbox, but if you’re just busy checking things off and catching up on your inbox, then. You’re always going to be busy, right? But are you busy doing the right things? And that’s why you have to hit the pause button.

[08:35] And if you’ve been listening for any length of time, you know what the productive pause is. And the productive pause is this it’s defined as a short period of focus, reflection around specific questions that leads to clarity of action. And peace of mind, clarity of action and peace of mind when you hit the pause button, when you invest the time with the coach that helps you get clear on the things that you should be working on.

[08:58] It helps you understand how you operate and how to put things in place into your life to maximize your strengths and hedge against your weaknesses in your blind spots. So is it time consuming? It takes time, but you’re getting a return on that investment. Just like you’re getting a return on investment with your money, you’re getting a return on investment in your time.

[09:22] You’re getting more time back and certainly coaches can work around your schedule and the right coach for you is going to help you get, like I said, more out of your time. All right. That’s myth. Number four, myth. Number five, life coaching is just common sense advice, right? Common sense advice. That’s just all the life coach is going to give me.

[09:41] Well, here’s the deal. Common sense advice is everywhere. It’s on YouTube, podcasts, social media, books. This is not about information. It’s about results. Like the information’s out there. If you just needed more information, if everybody needed just more information, everybody would be living their perfect life.

[10:00] But they’re not, it’s not about information. It’s about results. Like, you know, when I was in college, I had been wrestling for what, 12 years of my life at that point. Could I run a wrestling practice? Absolutely. I’ve been, I’ve been to hundreds and hundreds and hundreds, I don’t know, thousands, maybe at that point of wrestling practices, could I have actually run a wrestling practice?

[10:19] Of course I could have run a wrestling practice, but when I get. More done, would I have a more effective practice if there was a coach? Absolutely. Coaching is not just common sense advice. It’s actually getting you to do the things that you know you need to do. And oftentimes that you don’t know that you need to do right.

[10:40] My wife and I have a marriage therapist. We actually, when, when we meet with our marriage therapist, we actually do this stuff. That we oftentimes know that we need to do, right? I have a client who was a high level division one athlete. He has a fitness coach. Is it worth it? Well, if he, if he’s actually doing more workouts and getting more fit with the coach than without the coach, then yes.

[11:04] Is that coach giving him common sense advice? Probably, you know, probably the basics, but when you have somebody helping you get results, it is worth it, right? That’s myth number five, that life coaching is just common sense advice. Not true. All right. Myth number six, the effects of life coaching are just short lived.

[11:27] It’s temporary. Well, you may have heard the quote from Zig Ziglar that he said, people often say motivation doesn’t last well, neither does bathing. That’s why we recommend it daily. I love that quote and life coach. It’s not about motivation. Of course, that’s just the quote, but the thing is. A life coach is going to help you get results over time, right?

[11:50] If you work with a life coach for a month, you’ll have results for a month, or maybe a few months. If you are like some of my clients who’ve worked with us for five, six, seven plus years, you’re going to get results for five or six or seven plus years. When I go for a run and I’m really fit, like that doesn’t last either.

[12:08] I’ve been working out consistently and if I stop, guess what, my fitness will go down. The results are short lived from my running. The results are short lived if I eat healthy for a week. The results are short lived if I get coaching for a month. That’s why you need to do it consistently. You’ve got to find the right coach for you.

[12:29] That may not be me or us or one of our coaches. Um, my wife, like I said, is a licensed therapist. She’s always said people have to find the right therapist, the right counselor for them, and it may be the person you’re with right now, maybe somebody else. So. The results last as long as you invest, right?

[12:49] That’s myth number six, number seven, life coaches don’t know about me and my specific career and my challenges. I’m a neurosurgeon. I’m an attorney. Uh, I’m a school principal and they have to be in my exact career. No, that’s a myth. Like the coach’s role is not to have all the answers, but to guide you.

[13:13] Discovering the right solutions, forcing you to pause, forcing you to step out of the rat race off of the treadmill of life, ask you the hard questions, help you find clarity, help you identify what the action items are, how to get from where you’re at to where you want to go. And then execute on those.

[13:35] Like I said, we coach people who do brain surgery. I mean, I don’t know how to, I don’t know how to do that. I have actually multiple clients who are brain surgeons and I coach them. I help them. There are ways to work with people who are smarter than these are. I got a lot of people who are way smarter than me and all of our coaches combined.

[13:59] We are trained in helping them. Get the most out of themselves. That’s what a good coach can do for you. Ask you the hard questions, help you find clarity, hold you accountable. They don’t have to know exactly what you do and have the exact same training in your job. As a matter of fact, Oftentimes it’s better to have somebody who’s not trained in the same things as you, so they can help you, uh, see your blind spots and ask the questions that, that maybe you’re not going to get asked by someone who does exactly what you do.

[14:30] All right. That’s myth number seven, myth number eight. This is the last one. Coaching is just a fad. It’s just a thing people are talking about these days. Nope. Coaching is here to stay. It’s growing. It’s a huge industry and it’s growing. Because it works because people are getting results because people find value.

[14:50] And personally, my goal is to grow my firm, the Harsha group to a hundred coaches and 10 million in annual revenue by 2030 and it’s growing. We’re finding more people who are more willing to get coaching and more understanding of the value of it. And so I hope you are too. Now, here’s one thing I want to talk to you about.

[15:08] What is executive life coaching? I told you the beginning, I was going to talk to you about executive life coaching. What is executive life coaching and how is that different than just life coaching? Like what’s the difference between let’s start with this. What’s the difference between executive coaching and life coaching?

[15:24] Well, a life coach, the primary focus of, of life coaching is really on the individual’s whole life. Right? This could include, you know, work life balance, maybe setting like clear goals, maybe health goals, relationship goals, career goals, often can be pretty diverse in terms of the range of goals from, you know, personal relationships, career satisfaction, balance, things like that, right?

[15:51] An executive coach, it’s a little bit narrower. And it’s really geared towards professionals and it’s designed to improve maybe leadership or management skills, team dynamics, organizational effectiveness, those, those sorts of things. And the focus is usually a little bit more narrowly defined within the business world or business context.

[16:09] And these coaches often work with high level professionals. You know, CEOs, managers, leaders. And so that’s the difference between executive coaching and life coaching. Now, what we do specifically is we combine both. We focus on executives. We have a lot of CEOs and leaders who we work with, and these are people who they’ve found a level of success in their lives, but they know that there’s more inside of them and they’re looking for clarity, clarity oftentimes in, in like, what is next?

[16:36] For me, what’s the next step for me to maximize my potential to maximize my career, you know, make more money, have a great family life, stay healthy and fit. They don’t want to sacrifice what’s most important to them, right? Their family, their health, the things that they love doing when maybe it’s travel and adventure.

[16:54] All right, so that’s what executive life coaching is. That’s what we do. All right. Now I’ve debunked the myths around life coaching. I’ve explained what executive life coaching is. And this is the part where I am going to promote what we do. We’re very good at what we do. We have a million client testimonials.

[17:12] If you go to JimHarshawJr.com/call, you can see a handful of those. I can send you a million more. My clients who are listening right now, they know the value that they get out of this. They come to our retreat every year. It’s an amazing organization, amazing community of like minded high performing professionals who are looking to find their next gear, their next level.

[17:36] So if you want to check it out, if you want to learn more about us. Let’s talk, go to JimHarshawJr.com/call. Find a time to talk directly with me. I look forward to meeting you. I look forward to talking to you and see if there’s the right fit. If it’s a great fit. Awesome. If it’s not, that’s fine too.

[17:50] I’m going to point you in the right direction. Either way, it’s going to be a really helpful conversation for you. All right. I look forward to talking to you. Take action. Thanks for listening. If you want to apply these principles into your life, let’s talk. You can see the limited spaces that are open on my calendar at.

[18:06] JimHarshawJr.com/apply where you can sign up for a free one time coaching call directly with me and don’t forget to grab your action plan. Just go to JimHarshawJr.com/action. And lastly, iTunes tends to suggest podcasts with more ratings and reviews more often. You would totally make my day if you give me a rating and review.

[18:28] Those go a long way in helping me grow the podcast audience. Thanks for watching. Just open up your podcast app. If you have an iPhone, do a search for success through failure, selected, and then scroll the whole way to the bottom where you can leave the podcast, a rating and a review. Now, I hope this isn’t just another podcast episode for you.

[18:46] I hope you take action on what you learned here today. Good luck. And thanks for listening.

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