Applying the Principles of Medicine Through Coaching

“What do we need here?”

This is the question I pose myself, when sitting down with a new or existing client.

Sometimes, the answer may be a technical series of complicated interventions, but usually it is far simpler: people need to feel understood, cared about, and championed to be their best.

Which- in a world of managed health care systems- is a far cry from what we are ordinarily provided: a 15-minute window to fit a complicated medical history into a synopsis, somehow only treatable with the stroke of a pen on a prescription pad. The people that come to me, well, haven’t had the best of luck working solely from a western medicine box, often feeling neglected, misunderstood, all-too-often misdiagnosed, and sometimes even being told,

“This is all in your head.”

(Head injuries usually are)

Or they may be referred out to a specialist who may not have an available appointment for months, leaving the patient to flounder in a persisting condition in the meantime.

On one thing I am quite clear: those that come to me for help have complications, and most often, the hope of relief is fading fast. To attempt to provide steerage in a series of disjointed appointments staggered weeks apart, is probably another errand unlikely to succeed. What I try to provide is perhaps the best they can hope for: someone well informed to become involved in their lives, a beam of light in a dark room. A coach.

I heard in a lecture in the last year, someone said they believed coaching was the wave of the future. What makes it different is it is very personal, it creates accountability, and in my case, is forged upon the idea that the Provider of services has suffered in the same way as the person receiving said services. In short, it is unique: an intimate and unfolding application tailored to whomever it was met for, and what they can accommodate. I suppose only time will tell if it is “the future” or not.