As I look to launch my own Group Coaching Course called Equipped, I feel led to express what brought me to creating this content and why I feel so passionate about sharing it.
Jesus said: “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.” – John 10:10
One way the “thief” steals and kills and destroys is through challenges to our emotional and mental wellbeing. We’re told as such in 1 Peter 5:8: “Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.”
The Equipped course is designed to explore some of those challenges and to help us live a more loving, abundant life as a result - by tying Biblical truths around how to establish and maintain emotional and mental wellbeing with coaching tools that better enable this.
But what makes me qualified to launch a Course like this? Well…firstly, I’m a lifelong Christian who is certified as a Transformational Coach; has qualified in Integrated Attachment Theory and has trained in Positive Intelligence. I have years of experience in one-to-one and Group Coaching work, as well as a background in Marketing & Communications.
Perhaps more importantly though, I have personal experience of working through emotional and mental turmoil with my Bible in hand.
And this journey really kicked off on my 40th birthday…
You see, my 40th was a turning point for me. Not because the age bothered me much or because I had a big birthday bash to mark the occasion but because it marked the start of my unravelling.
What do I mean by that? Well…until then, I’d spent most of my time trying to do the right thing; be the right person and achieve all the success and popularity that would prove I was on the right path. That I was a good person. That I was likeable and perhaps even lovable. But something happened that made me question my people-pleasing, perfectionism-seeking, achievement-focused coping mechanisms.
I won’t go into the detail of what happened but I will say that this one moment in time awoke me to a whole world of anxiety and self-doubt that I had spent years ignoring; pushing down and avoiding through these coping mechanisms. Perhaps you can relate? You think everything’s going ok – sure you have moments of difficulty or upset – but generally you’re holding it all together. And then something (potentially even small) happens that brings your house of cards tumbling down and you wonder how you’ve ended up in such a mess…
Despite this “messy” moment being incredibly painful, I’m grateful for it because it led me to explore my thought-life and emotions instead of desperately ignoring them. It led me to reflect on my childhood and the impact that it had had on my sense of self-worth and anxiety levels. During this time, I cried and prayed and consumed hours of relevant online content…until, one day…I stumbled across coaching and it all seemed to fall into place…
As I trained to become a coach, I realised that so many of the tools I was learning were reflected in biblical truths and stories that I knew in my heart from years of reading God’s word. It was like a lightbulb switching on.
I was delighted to find that God’s word really can be a “light to my path” as the Psalmist said, and that God really was with me in my pain and my hurting. Equally, I was frustrated that nobody had explained how I could live out the biblical truths that would have helped me through my pain. How, for example, had I sat through thousands of sermons and never once been given a practical example of how to “Take captive your thoughts to Christ”? This one lesson alone could have helped to transform my mind, in the way that the Bible exhorts us to.
So, here I am. Sharing the results of a Course that has been 5 years in the making…or perhaps even a lifetime when I come to think of it. I hope the Course content helps those who take part as much as it has me. I hope it helps you become Equipped to move towards emotional and mental wellbeing with the Bible in hand.
Please get in touch if you’d like to get involved or just to find out more.
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