Why Coaching?
This past November, I completed an incredibly intense, sometimes grueling, and absolutely transformational coaching program and became a certified Adult Chair Coach. Becoming a coach was never part of my plan. For more than 20 years, I’ve worked in the nonprofit sector, and I love my job. I’m good at it, I’m passionate about the mission, and I love doing work that makes a difference. The only thing in my life I have ever been as dedicated to as my career is my personal development journey.
Like almost all of us, I’ve experienced my share of hardships, but about 15 years ago, I made a commitment to healing and personal growth, and I’ve never looked back. Over the years, I think I’ve explored and experienced almost every modality under the sun, and while not all were for me, each one provided valuable wisdom and insight and took me one step closer to where I am today.
A few years ago, while dealing with a particularly challenging manager at work and the impact their personality and actions were having on the team, I was struck by how precisely the situation mirrored the way alcoholism and dysfunction affect the entire family system. This wasn’t just about how this manager’s behavior was making people feel, it was about how they were behaving as a result. This manager’s behavior was essentially causing a domino-effect of maladaptive behaviors within the team and the organization because everyone was trying to adjust to the volatility and escape the ensuing chaos with minimal damages. And as expected, this caused nothing but more frustration and chaos.
Having spent years in Al-Anon, which for anyone unfamiliar, is a 12-step program that provides support to those who are affected by the drinking or dysfunction of family and loved ones, I knew that the tools that I learned in that program could be applied to my situation at work. And I also believed that if more people had the right tools, painful, costly, time-consuming situations like the ones so many organizations experience could be avoided.
Later that year, I delivered a presentation at the Best Friends Animal Conference entitled “Applying 12-Step Principles to Succeed, Stay Sane and Save Lives.” The presentation was so well-received that a few months later, the organization reached out to ask if they could feature the entire presentation on their podcast.
It was clear that many of the challenges I had experienced at various organizations were widespread, and people were desperate for tools and solutions. For the next few years, I read and listened to every book and podcast about leadership, culture and personal development I could find. I knew that I wanted to help professionals – and that I was particularly passionate about supporting nonprofit leaders – but I didn’t want to just discuss tactics for surface-level problems because I knew that incorporating inner work would be the key to real, sustainable change and growth.
For years, I had been a fan of a podcast called “The Adult Chair,” hosted by a coach and therapist named Michelle Chalfant. In the Adult Chair, Michelle applies a holistic approach to healing and transformation as a foundation for better understanding our relationship with ourselves and others. When I learned of her coaching program, I knew it was the tool I had been looking for, and I completed my certification at the end of 2023.
I believe that we can all benefit from working with a skilled coach to uncover our limiting beliefs, rid ourselves of old programming, and help us achieve our personal and professional goals, but I also believe that this work can be particularly valuable to nonprofit professionals. Many of us have faced our own challenges in life and are especially attuned to the suffering of others. We gravitate to this work because we are helpers at our core; we are compassionate, sensitive, caring individuals who want to heal the world. But to do that effectively, we must first heal ourselves.
