Wellness Coaching - The solution to the obesity epidemic
Coaching is a field that is well-known in terms of professional development in big corporate, as well as a service for professional and Olympic athletes, but has just recently entered the fields of health and wellness over the last 8 years since 2000. Based on the same coaching models, wellness coaching has proven consistently to help clients with a wide range of wellness goals to meet a minimum of 70% of their goal each time they work with a coach to create behavior change in their life over the course of a three month period. Better still, they are able to continue on their own and retain the behavior change in their lifestyle.
So how is wellness coaching so successful, you say? Personal trainers and dieticians, while also instrumental in the health and wellness process, simply tell clients what to do & only address client solutions in a limited environment and timeframe, whereas a wellness coach acts as a catalyst to the behavior change process that addresses ALL areas of the clients life, environment, and lifestyle. The coach leads the client through the decision process as needed, but does not tell them what to do - allowing them to work with a leader in the field drawing from health and wellness expertise as needed, but experientially learning their own health and wellness life change through a partnering process with their coach. The client and coach partner together via phone and web, and can work together regardless of geographic location; one of my current colleagues located in CA (USA) is coaching a client in France at the moment. The client enjoys the safety of working through the coaching process in the privacy and comfort of their own home.
At the end of the process the client is able to implement the newly learned health and wellness lifestyle skills consistently on their own, with or without the coach. It is an empowering, successful process that, when combined with solid health/fitness/nutrition expertise from the coach's background, proves a powerful solution to our obesity epidemic at hand, and unmatched by other approach to good health that have been instituted to date. Wellness coaching is one of the largest growing personal services fields currently worldwide. http://www.wellcoaches.com/images/What_is_WellnessCoaching.pdf
WARNING!! As with many health and wellness subjects there are a lot of people out there claiming to be wellness coaches that simply took a 1 day course and have no credentials or experience in training, nutrition, or a health-related field. You must work with a coach is who formally trained with a reputable industry organization. For example, my background is with WellCoaches - an organization that kicked off the wellness coaching industry in 2000, is led by a CEO whose background stems from Havard Medical School of Public Health, and attracts students from around the world to their wellness coach training program. Their coach training program requires months of participation & only accepts students that are either career Dr's, Nurses/RN's, Registered Dietician's with the ADA, of Personal Trainers that come from the highest standarded certifying bodies in the industry - NASM & ACSM. As with anytime you seek out professional services, make sure you have a full understanding of what you're getting in return for the services you're paying for - the coach should not only be trained by a strong wellness coaching organization, but they should have solid industry education and experience such as the above. I am very proud to be a part of this cutting edge movement as an ACSM WellCoaches Licensed Wellness Coach -- one that is proven to help people finally achieve their health & wellness goals.
Here is a demo of a client wellness coaching experience with an ACSM WellCoaches Wellness Coach:
http://www.wellcoaches.com/demo_tour/
Should you have not reached your own health and wellness goals in the past and be looking into wellness coaching as a possible solution, I'd be happy to answer any further questions you may have.
In good health & wellness,
"Health Matters"- NASM CPT, ACSM CPT, Licensed Wellness Coach
