We all have our ups and downs in life. We need someone to guide us during our darkest times and help us overcome our hurdles, and achieve success and peace. Suppose you are struggling to do this by yourself; no reason to worry. ?
A good life coach is always there to be your savior. Have you ever thought of taking up life coaching as your career? Not only will you be helping people get back on their feet, but it can be a great way to earn well?.
In this article, we will be studying the basics of life coaching and what to do if you are aspiring to become one. Dig in!?.
Who is a life coach?
A wellness professional and a life coach help us improve and succeed in life to achieve prosperity and peace. They become our guide and coach in matters of relationships, personal and professional, our jobs, and everyday lives, in general. Overall, a life coach helps you understand your goal in life clearly.
With the guidance of a professional life coach, you will understand the hurdles in life holding you back from giving your best. They will help you come up with ways to overcome these hurdles. Their strategies target your qualities and skills and help you understand in what ways you are gifted.
Let us have a look at the possible income of a life coach?.
How much can a life coach earn??
Before you decide that you want to be a life coach, you must judge its financial aspects and see if it suits your requirements. Generally, a life coach can earn around $62 every hour. Most life coaches are freelancers and work without regulations. Therefore, professionals can decide their rates on their own without any external influence.
The salary obviously varies based on one’s location, experience, or the organization they are working for, if any. Beginners generally charge around $30 per hour, but as you gather more recognition and experience and become a professional life coach, your rates can go as high as $150 per hour.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), life coaches earn around $42,080 per year on average.
This entirely depends on how you build your reputation and advertise your business. Since being a life coach means dealing with very delicate issues, your patients must be able to trust you with their personal matters wholeheartedly✅.
How to Become A Life Coach? (Tips)
Since there is no regulating authority in this field, anyone can become a life coach. But you have to go through certain ways to ensure that you can provide your clients with the best service, and they have no scope to question your professionalism. Let us look at some important things to remember if you are aspiring to be a life coach????:
Select your niche.
Life coaching is a broad field with a variety of niches to choose from. With expertise in a specific field, you are ensuring your potential clients that you are specially able to help them in that particular matter where they find themselves in a challenging position. These are some of the possible fields of specialization:
- Business
- Career changes
- Love life
- Academic conflicts
- Spiritual dilemmas
- Work-life balance
- General wellness
- Mental health
Finish your training.
Before you go on helping people function better in different aspects of their lives, you must dedicate yourself to training yourself for the job. In a training program, aspiring life coaches will understand the psychological models of the profession, ways to conduct assessments to find our client requirements, coaching ethics, and communication techniques.✅
For best results, try signing up for programs accredited by industry alliances, for example, the ICF (International Coach Federation). This program will go on for about 18-24 months. Also, based on your selected program, you might have to pay a fee of around $2500-$12,000.
Get your credentials.
Certification after completion of your training is very crucial. Institutions like the ICF and the IAC (International Association of Coaching) will provide you with the required credentials only if you have great work standards and ethics and can deliver your expertise in the field. The ICF and the IAC charge fees of $245 and $169-$319 every year, respectively.
A Professional Certified Coach certification, given by the ICF, requires at least 500 hours of life coaching experience, out of which you have been paid for 450 hours. Students must also have dealt with a minimum of 25 clients. Several tests might also follow.
Construct a business classification.
If you want legal security, you must get a business classification like a Limited Liability Company or Corporation nomination. This process of officially setting up your enterprise differs according to your location. ?
You will have to file documents, reserve a business title, get a license, and pay the required fees. The paperwork is generally done within $300. But, you would have to pay regular LLC fees assigned by the state when you run your business.
Get business insurance.
Life coaches don’t usually need insurance. But getting it is like a protective shield for your business and provides more reliability to your customers. You can easily avail of general liability insurance at a very low price of around $60 every month.
Start working.
It is essential to convey the message, especially in the early phase. Target your audience and advertise accordingly to get yourself the required exposure to elevate your business. Also, try to involve yourself in networking events related to people that belong to your field- you might come across potential clients in such environments.
Also, do your marketing by sharing feedback from clients you deal with. Their positive responses will aid your cause and get you more clients in the future. Ask your regular patients to write testimonials for your enterprise and try to create as much promotional content as possible.
Education Requirements To Be A Life Coach
As already stated, literally anyone can become a life coach. There are no formal education criteria for aspiring life coaches. But research suggests 55% of professional life coaches have a bachelor’s degree, and 21% of them have a master’s degree.
Remember that applying for life coach certifications might require academic qualifications like having an associate degree. If you are working on getting your degree and exploring various niches related to life coaching, it would be easier if you focus on social studies and counseling.
You can consider getting yourself a degree in psychology, social service, or business because many conventional coaching perspectives incorporate methodologies and techniques related to these fields✅.
Years of Experience Required To Be A Life Coach
Initial training courses for a life coach require at least 20-120 hours of work. If you are seeking professional certification from institutions like ICF, it takes longer to complete, around 6-12 months.
Also, you must log into your portfolio with at least 500 hours of life coaching sessions to prove that you are experienced enough✅.
Responsibilities Of A Life Coach
The responsibilities of a life coach are not just limited to helping their patients achieve prosperity and peace in life. Let us look at some of the other primary duties you would have to fulfill if you are aspiring to become a life coach in the future:
Interviewing potential clients
Before you go on helping clients achieve their personal goals and understand their merit, you have to conduct interviews first. A life coach must be able to identify each client’s unique personality, goals, roadblocks, and personal and professional background by communicating efficiently with them.⚡️
Setting a target
If you want to help your client develop a plan of action, you have to understand the goal first. You cannot begin a path without knowing your final destination.✅
Fraternizing with clients
The primary job of a life coach is collaboration. You must undoubtedly discuss and create methods of skill improvement, problem-solving, financial security, etc.
Encouraging client’s development
A life coach is a guide, promoting their client’s graduate progress through regular communication and monitoring ways to achieve life goals more efficiently and quickly.
Inspiring clients
Your clients might feel stressed out or demotivated at certain stages of their sessions with you. As a life coach, it will be your job to constantly motivate them to become their best self and teach them to never give up without a tough fight.
Creating strategies
An efficient life coach provides his/her clients with the most useful strategies that will easily bring a huge transformation in their lives.
Ensuring client accountability
As a professional life coach, you have to hold your clients accountable and make sure that whatever they do or say only brings positive growth in their lives.
Operating tests
Life coaches also need to administer different personalities and qualities that help their clients identify their areas of excellence.????
Educating clients
Life coaches also play the important role of familiarising their clients with communication and emotional dexterity.
Tips to Improve Your Career As A Life Coach
If you want to improve your career as a life coach, you must develop a certain skill set that all professionals in this field must possess. Let us look at some of these key skills:
Organization skills
This will help you guide your clients in developing specific plans and methods to achieve their life goals. Your organizational skills will also help you tackle your daily schedules, manage regular and prospective clients, and conduct your business skillfully—habits like prioritization, documentation, planning and scheduling, dedication, and time management.
Communication skills
Developing strong communication skills is very crucial for life coaches. If you want to have productive sessions with your clients, you would have to be a good speaker and listener. You would have to discuss several personal and professional issues, understand their goals and obstacles, and then guide them accordingly.
It is very important to work on your active listening, comprehension, facilitation, questioning, and nonverbal communication skills. Fluency in foreign languages is also appreciated.
Problem-solving skills
To help your clients overcome their obstacles and develop strategies to achieve their life goals, you have to be an efficient problem-solver. Since every individual has their own goals and hurdles in life, your perspective and mindset for them will be different in each case. ?
Analytic thinking, research skills, flexibility, decision-making, and assessment skills will prove to be very crucial in these cases.
Interpersonal skills
Life coaching is emotional because you are guiding someone through a journey of healing their emotional wounds and getting back on their feet. So, strong interpersonal skills ensure that you are able to connect with your clients easily, irrespective of their background or situation. ⚡️
This is more crucial when you are dealing with their sensitive issues or helping them with conflict resolution. Patience, empathy, composure, and tolerance are very important qualities in a life coach.
Business administration skills
Apart from attending to clients, you must ensure your business runs smoothly at all times. With good business administration skills, you will be able to manage the financial side of your business efficiently as well.
As a life coach, you would have to deal with certifications and licenses. It is wiser to hire assistants and support workers to help you. Familiarise yourself with the concepts of budgeting, basic computing, data entry, billing, invoicing, etc✅.
Top Schools To Become A Life Coach in the United States
The Institute for Life Coach Training
According to Business Insider, this is one of the most renowned schools for aspiring life coaches in the U.S. Depending on your coaching preferences; you can choose from various courses, for example, courses for Gen Z, millennials, or midlife coaching. A 60-hour training program shall cost around $3500.
The Certified Life Coach Institute
Approved by the ICF (International Coaching Federation), students can get certifications within 3 days. The courses are offered online and have several levels. It is perfect for students who have a limited time frame. A Level; 1 training class shall cost around $1000.
The Coaching & Positive Psychology Institute
CaPP has a Certified Personal and Executive training program for aspiring life coaches. The live virtual sessions go on for six months and include a curriculum for all aspects of life coaching. Students graduating from the CaPP have a strong foundation in life coaching as well as business strategy. A 6-month training program shall cost around $3500.
The Professional School of Studies offered by this University is one of the best scopes for life coaching aspirants, and they provide a certification in Leadership And Performance Coaching. If you want to be a life coach for high society professionals, Brown University is the best place for you. A 6-month training program will cost $10,500 if done virtually or $11,495 if done hybrid.
The training program offered here primarily focuses on helping aspiring life coaches create a signature process of transforming their clients’ lives. There are nine core concepts for students to learn the science behind life chiang. Part 1 will cost $8500 if done virtually or $10,500 if done hybrid. Part 2 will cost $2200, and Part 3 will cost $8500. if done virtually, or $10,500 if done hybrid.
Top Online Courses To Become A Life Coach in the United States
While a person goes through the most challenging period of his/her life, their friends and family might not be able to provide them with the guidance and emotional support they need. This is where the role of a life coach becomes crucial.
With their professional guidance and constant care, they can help us achieve our life goals and overcome our mental roadblocks. Let us look at some life coach courses that will help aspiring candidates exhibit the highest level of professionalism.
Among all the life coach courses available around the world, the Dual Life and Health Coaching Certification is the most unique one. It provides candidates with a combination of both life and health coach certifications. Students who finish this course will get ICF-accredited recognitions as both certified life coaches and health coaches.
The course is expensive and costs around $5,450. But the price is reasonable when compared to the advantages it offers. Also, students can avail of the option to pay their fees in monthly installments.
Certified Life Coach Institute
In this rapidly evolving world, everyone wants to get things done as quickly as possible. The Life Coach Certification offered by this institute is probably the shortest course students can get. Although an immersive-intensive course, it can be finished within three days.
Also, this is a very budget-friendly course, ranging around $1000. However, students aspiring to join ICF must finish the Coaching 102 session offered by this institute.
An intensive session that goes on for around six days, the Core Essentials Fast Track program by Coach U teaches students all-important modules and techniques of life coaching within such a short duration, everything they might need to receive their ICF certifications. After the course ends, students will have six months to prepare for an online examination, complete at least 20 hours of coaching, and will be guided by the faculty.
Coach U also provides students with a Core Essentials session that goes on for around 15 months and costs around $6000. This course can be attended online or in person.
The Certified Coach Program offered by The Coach Training Alliance offers the Certified Coach Program that provides students with every bit of understanding required to set up a life coaching business and then work on expanding it. Also, they will be able to initiate things with a very professional approach from the beginning.
This program costs around $4000 and is very popular among aspiring life coaching students. The enrollment must be done in advance because spots are filled up rapidly. Also, each session is limited to 12 students only.
Institute for Professional Excellence in Coaching (iPEC)
One of the most indispensable skills that you must possess as a life coach is to be able to carry on your independent business and ensure the apt marketing of your services to potential clients.
iPEC is one of those rare courses that help you learn how to do this very precisely. It provides you with an extensive understanding of your job and how to deal with your clients very professionally.
Moreover, it offers one-on-one training sessions to make sure every student gets the undivided attention of their course teacher and can resolve queries without getting lost in a crowd. The course is indeed quite expensive, ranging around $11, 500 and takes almost a year to complete. This can be very intimidating for students, but honestly, it is quite worth it✅.
Where to find a life coach job opportunity online?
The Life Coach School is currently hiring life coaches and allows them to create their own schedules. Full-time employees also receive special benefits like insurance, trips, and a scope to continue learning.
Tony Robbins refers to their professionals as results life coaches who are entirely dedicated to bringing a transformation in the lives of their clients. Their primary focus is on personal growth.
Job Monkey is currently offering several exciting job opportunities for life coaches. They choose people who can help their clients set certain goals and achieve them in a fixed time frame.
You can also look up common search engines like Google or sites like LinkedIn to find the life coach job you’ve been dreaming about.
Key Takeaways
Life coaches can play a very important role in the lives of people going through a difficult phase of their lives. Be it helping someone overcome their deepest fears and weaknesses, creating a workout routine to prioritize physical and mental well-being, or starting their dream business, and life coaches can inspire people to bring out the best in themselves.✅.
It’s time to go out and create the change you want to see. All the best for your new journey!?.
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I’m a former teacher with a background in child development and a passion for creating engaging and educational activities for children. I strongly understand child development and know how to create activities to help children learn and grow. Spare time, I enjoy spending time with my family, reading, and volunteering in my community.