Julie wants to change your life

Life coaching is like taking somebody into a really nice clothes shop and encouraging them to try on something they would never wear, says Julie Lambert.

When they leave wearing the new outfit and people say they look fantastic, "they’ll chuck out everything in their wardrobe".

"It’s like a mental makeover," she says.

"Sometimes people just need a bit of a nudge," says the Browns Bay resident who’s been a life coach since 2001.

Originating in the United States in the 1980s, life coaching is gaining popularity in the United Kingdom where Mrs Lambert lived for the past 21 years.

Having recently moved to New Zealand, Mrs Lambert says life coaching is not as well known here.

Not everybody needs a life coach but it can help people who feel stuck and lack direction, she says.

Mrs Lambert says she can give her clients the tools to manage life’s challenges.

She does that in six one-hour sessions on the phone.

She says family and friends with a vested interest often give advice and opinions. "Everybody has an opinion so a coach with no vested interest in a person can help them do what they want to do."

Mrs Lambert says people within 18 months of a decade birthday are "great coaching clients – they’re really motivated around birthdays".

Many clients are bereaved or ill, she says.

New Zealand Association of Counsellors Auckland branch chairman Graeme Steel says life coaching is best done by people with formal qualifications who are members of a professional body.

"I’m not sure there is a formal body," he says.

Mr Steel says a professional body provides a code of ethics and professionals can often get indemnity insurance through these bodies.

Mrs Lambert says the profession is not yet registered because it is relatively new.

It took her two years of part-time training through Coach University in the United States to become a life coach.

Usually counselling is about looking back but life coaching is about where you are today and moving forward, Mrs Lambert says.

"At times it challenges clients to do things."

- © Fairfax NZ News