Why Do You Need A Health And Wellness Coach?

WHY DO YOU NEED A HEALTH AND WELLNESS COACH

The growing understanding of the importance of focusing on overall wellness makes many people turn to various experts to help them achieve their health goals. One of such experts in the health and wellness coach.

Just as a sports coach helps an athlete develop and excel at a sport, a health and wellness coach can help you improve your overall health and wellness.

WHO IS A HEALTH AND WELLNESS COACH?

A health and wellness coach, or simply put, a wellness coach, is a supportive guide that works with you to:

• Assess your current physical and emotional state,
• Set personalized goals for what you want to achieve regarding your overall health and wellness, and
• Develop sustainable action plans to reach those goals.

Wellness coaching is similar to talk therapy, where you discuss issues and ideas with another individual. But wellness coaching is different in that you are in charge of creating your goals and plans to achieve the goals.

In a nutshell, a wellness coach helps you make sustainable and positive behavioral lifestyle changes to support your overall wellness.

HOW CAN WELLNESS COACHES HELP YOU?

The primary focus of health and wellness coaches is to encourage positive behavior changes in various aspects of your life. Examples include:

• Healthier diet,
• Improved physical fitness,
• Better stress management,
• Smoking cessation,
• Improved relationship with self and others,
• And much more.

WHAT MAKES WELLNESS COACHES UNIQUE

Though dietitians and personal trainers may provide similar services, health and wellness coaches are different, not in the issues they address, but in how they address them.

They can empower and motivate you to become an expert in YOURSELF by encouraging a positive mindset around health and wellness. They also do not “tell” you what is best for you. Instead, they share their knowledge and tools about holistic health and how to make sustainable changes with you.

Because coaches provide you with a holistic perspective on health, they not only focus on food. They also focus on other areas of your life that can impact your wellness, including career satisfaction and the quality of your relationships.

Some Techniques Used By Wellness Coaches

Motivational interviewing techniques

This involves your coach asking you open-ended questions aimed at helping you uncover your reason for seeking a particular change. For instance, where a doctor might say, “You need to lose weight,” a coach might ask you, “How might your life be different if you lost the weight that you’ve been trying to lose?”

The concept is that people trying to change for their own reasons and on their own terms are far more likely to succeed than when they are being told what to do. The latter is less motivating and more likely to trigger a resistance to change. This concept is also backed by research.

Positive psychology

Traditional psychology often focuses on what is “wrong” and tries to fix them. On the other hand, wellness coaching focuses on what has, can, and will work better for you.

Therefore, instead of searching for problems, a wellness coach will work with you to use your strengths to improve the health behaviors you are looking to address.

Personalization

Coaches believe that you are an expert when it comes to your life and needs. And that no two individuals are the same in terms of food choices and lifestyle practices. Therefore, a wellness coach does not prescribe specific meal plans or workout regimens. Instead, they work with your strengths to create a highly personalized, long-term, and sustainable wellness plan.

They also provide you with a safe space where you can learn how to listen to your body. This will ultimately make you an expert on what makes you feel great and what makes you feel burned out.

IS HEALTH COACHING EFFECTIVE?

Health and wellness coaching can help you improve your overall health. It can also help you prevent and manage many health conditions. According to a recent study, coaching can help improve many risk factors, including blood pressure, cholesterol levels, blood sugar, body weight, waist circumference, and cardiorespiratory fitness.

Health coaching has also been shown to improve health-related quality of life and reduced hospitalization in COPD patients.

The proven effectiveness of health and wellness coaching is the reason some insurance companies now pay for it. It is also why private companies now offer it to their employees to help lower their healthcare costs.

SHOULD YOU CONSIDER GETTING ONE?

The recommendations for a healthy living seem pretty straightforward: healthy eating, regular physical activity, quality sleep, and practicing self-care. But it is usually easier said than done because life can get in the way. This can be in the form of a busy career, a family to take care of, and so on, which leaves you with little time to make healthy lifestyle choices.

It is also possible for you to not be clear about what approach to choose to improve your overall health: should you count calories, exercise more, try to minimize stress, or combine all?

You may even be unable to find the motivation to start on your life-long health journey.

All these can make it difficult for you to achieve your health and wellness goals. Fortunately, a wellness coach can help you get on the right track by helping you overcome obstacles to maintaining healthy life-long habits.

The following are what you gain when you work with a wellness coach:

Motivation to get over the initial resistance.

Making changes to your lifestyle usually comes with some resistance and fear. This often happens in your subconscious and can make creating new habits challenging. Studies have also shown that many people unconsciously prefer to stick with what they are familiar with. This resistance can make you give up before your new habit sticks.

On the bright side, a wellness coach can provide you with a safe space to identify and gently work through these emotions. As with any significant change, having someone to help you reflect objectively can greatly boost your chances of success.

A Personalized and SMART Plan.

Making a resolution is not the same as setting a realistic goal. Resolutions often address a symptom rather than the underlying problem. An example is focusing on your weight instead of eating habits. Resolutions also lack specific elements that can turn them into reality. This is why many people make the same resolutions over and over again.

But a wellness coach can work with you to assess your health and draw up a customized and SMART plan consisting of specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound goals. This plan includes goals that take all facets of your life – from food and exercise to sleep – into consideration. The plan also fits well into your lifestyle, which increases your chances of success.

Expertise in making safe and rational decisions.

Your overall health is a combination of your mind-body attunement, eating habits, lifestyle choices, stress management, emotional health, and personal fulfillment. However, where you think you are out of balance may not be correct. Loads of dietary and fitness trends can also be confusing, overwhelming, or even dangerous, leaving you unclear about what to do or where to start.

But, health and wellness coaches are trained to deeply examine your health and help identify the behaviors you need to modify to boost your health. They will help you improve your overall health by incorporating rational and evidence-based changes into your lifestyle. They will also raise red flags where needed.

Accountability for increased success

Having to account to someone creates a social expectation, which has been shown to motivate most people to achieve their set goal(s).

So, when you share your wellness goals with a coach that is aware of your habits and blind spots, you significantly boost your chances of success. Even when you face some obstacles.

Better Time management

We currently live in a busy world, which can make it difficult to effectively manage your time. In fact, lack of time is one of the usual excuses for making healthy changes to your habits. But research shows that better time management can increase your success rate in whatever you do, including achieving your health goals.

You can work with a wellness coach to identify where you are out of balance with your time management, review your priorities, and set clear health and wellness goals. This collaboration can help you create a personalized schedule to support your most crucial wellness needs.

CHOOSING A HEALTH AND WELLNESS COACH

Health and wellness coaches have different areas of specialization. So, you should find one that matches your wellness goals. Check their credentials and educational background to ensure that they are qualified to coach in your desired area(s).

Furthermore, the coaching industry doesn’t have regulations, so anyone can claim to be a coach. However, you can seek a coach with certification from the International Coaching Federation or International Consortium for Health and Wellness Coaching.

You can also ask questions about how they usually work with their clients and references. This is so you can get a sense of their personality, style, and whether or not they fit with yours.

Finding a coach is an important decision, one that requires you to be comfortable with your coach. The collaboration should also be an empowering and motivating experience, not a daunting one. So, you should take your time when seeking a coach to help you get on track with your health goals.

THE BOTTOM LINE

A health and wellness coach aims to support you in making health decisions that make you feel fantastic. Their focus is not to prescribe diet or fitness plans but to empower you to make changes that help you gain better control of your health.

Unlike many health fads that come and go, working with health and wellness coaches is backed by solid evidence that it effectively improves your health and overall wellness. Therefore, collaborating with a wellness coach can set you up for success and help you take your health to a new level.