The image builders
Life coaches are using their skills to help people meet life's challenges head-on, says Sushmita Biswas
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Malti Bhojwani is just a phone-call and an email away from her clients who contact her from across the world; Pic by Gajanan Dudhalkar
All-rounder cricketer Abhishek Nayar is the toast of this season's IPL. He lived up to the hot property tag at IPL auction with as many as six teams bidding for him and was finally sold to Pune Warriors at $675,000 (Rs 3.3 crore). But behind his success is a story which few know. Nayar had approached comedian and peak-performance coach, Anand Chulani, during a Kings XI Punjab match last year to make him emotionally fit.
"He had stagnated and his injuries too had taken a toll," says the globe-trotting, life coach Chulani. Chulani first broke Nayar's stress through his signature LOL method. "Laughter and comedy are the best ways to relieve your inner tensions. And I always tell my clients to be childlike and not childish." The outcome was that Nayar broke through the stress which was holding him back.
Chulani has his hands full this season coaching 20 IPL players and also Bollywood actors who come to him to uplift their performance.
Can a life coach really help you change? And haven't people turned to friends and family for help and guidance for years anyway? Life coaching is just a professional extension of that help with a mix of management practice and counselling. And though critics might say that coaching might be an expensive way to have a nice talk, the fact is that people are turning to life coaches in increasing numbers.
Sceptics may continue to frown, but in the stressful times we live in, countless people are either seeing a life coach, thinking of seeing one, or thinking of becoming one! For those who came in late, life coaches are part of a growing profession who are guiding their clients to identify their dreams, recognise what's stalling their fulfillment, and then coming up with specific steps to convert all this into reality. Shiv Khera, the guru of self-help books explains: "Coaching is somewhat like mentoring which is done one-on-one, where people talk about their personal issues and are looking for more personalised guidance."
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Anand Chulani has his hands full this season coaching 20 IPL players and several Bollywood actors
Today life coaches have many takers — from corporate honchos, sportspersons to school kids. Typically, those who feel they are stuck in a rut and want to be clearer about achieving new goals. And others who are already successful but want to push themselves to achieve even more.
It was one such life coaching ex-perience that changed the course of Shaina Mehta's life (her name has been changed on request). She hired life-coach Malti Bhojwani to allay the inner fears that were making her sluggish. Bhojwani recalls Mehta severely lacking in courage. Over many telephone conversations, Bhojwani offered her simple exercises — called Centering Exercises derived from the American personal development organisation called Newfield Network — which are all about the power of positive thinking.
The mantra (more like staccato instructions that she shot out) appeared to do the trick. It went something like this: Sit upright. Close your eyes. Accept things as they are. You are now in neutral mode. "From here, your choices increase," she says. This exercise aims to calm the body and open up the mind.
The basic premise of this exercise is that the body is a template on which you can learn to manage your mind. Says Mehta: "The mind, body, language exercise which she made me do was very calming and acted as a stress buster."
Part pep-pundits and part agony aunts, however, life coaches do it differently from plain motivational speakers and counsellors. While a motivational speaker gives speeches to motivate an audience, a counsellor is one who deals with dysfunctions in one's life and suggests the dos and don'ts.
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Priya Kumar started her career as a motivational speaker but turned to life coaching after doing a short course in Human Evaluation from the US; Pic by Gajanan Dudhalkar
Most life coaches have found their calling after hitting some personal or professional crossroad themselves. The Singapore-born Bhojwani, who moved to India three years ago, says: "I turned to life coaching when I had a breakdown after my divorce." She has also got her certification from the International Coach Academy (ICA) in Australia. However, Bhojwani herself remains suspicious of scores of courses that offer life-coaching qualifications.
The problems the life coaches deal with range from issues of depression, career guidance, suicidal tendencies, drug abuse and strained relationships, she adds. Typically, a three-month life-coaching package costs anywhere between Rs 50,000 and Rs 1.5 lakh.
So, how does life coaching work? Most life coaches operate solely over the phone, email and Skype. Personal face-to-face interaction is very limited. Says Bhojwani, "Ninety per cent of coaches work over the phone. I can sense my client's shift in energy, mood, and even body position over the phone."
A typical first session would include helping clients get clarity on what they really want. The coach often suggests the client homework while the week is also spent accomplishing those tasks.
A coach's job is to delve deeper into the psyche of the client to gather personal information. Bhojwani says that a session of coaching involves her asking the client a series of questions: What if we could look at your problem from another point of view? What would you ask for if a genie granted you three wishes? What feelings dominate your mind in office?
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Veechi Shahi offers special workshops for women’s empowerment with an emphasis on meditation and relaxation; Pic by Anita Vaswani, Halo
Chulani remembers applying his LOL method on CEOs and business leaders who are stressed out. He clowns around and makes them do fun body movements. He says: "The first step is to ask them to jump, clap and to shake their hands and legs. The aim is to release the inner tensions and pent up emotions. I also ask them about the craziest things that they ever did."
The second step is physiological de-stressing and he asks them to focus on their present situation and not go back to the past. The third and the last step involves breaking their stress. "At this stage I ask questions like what makes them stressed-out. I try and motivate them to look for multiple options," he says.
Bhojwani agrees that conversation is the key to resolving most issues. "And yes, they should ask the experts for advice in specific areas, but trust their own instincts when they need direction in their lives," says Bhojwani.
Mumbai-based life coach Veechi Shahi, who till a few years ago was working with the ITC Group of Hotels, is a life coach today dealing mostly with corporate executives. She learnt all about life-coaching from the Franklin Covey Institute, Mumbai in 2008.
Shahi says, "While corporate coaching is about realising organisational goals, the focus of personalised coaching of individuals is on personal transformation."
So, what has led to a sudden de-pendency on life-coaches? "This is because traditional social support systems like friends and family seem to be falling away. So, people are looking for professional help," says Rajiv Vij, life-coach based in Singapore who has launched his company The Personal Alchemy with clients based across the world. Vij was the managing director (Asia) for Franklin Templeton Investments, Singapore, until a few years ago.
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Sujit Sumitran started his company, The Yellow Submarine, last year after abandoning a three-decade career in the IT sector; Pic by Jagadeesh NV
The surge in interest in life coaching is also keeping people like life coach Priya Kumar on the go. Kumar started her career as a motivational speaker in 1998, but plunged headlong into a career in life coaching three years ago after doing a short course in Human Evaluation from the Hubbard College of Administration, USA.
Or look at Bangalore-based Sujit Sumitran who started his company, The Yellow Submarine, recently after chucking a 29-year career in sales in the IT sector. He says, "As a coach, my biggest challenge is to quickly make my clients self-reliant so that they don't have to depend on me for support for too long."
Sumitran too believes that the best answers that a client wants to hear lie within him or her. He once coached an entrepreneur who experienced emptiness in his life and was bored with his business. Sumitran put him through a series of questions. "He wasn't very regular with the assignments that I suggested, but he never missed a single session with me. It took three months of regular conversations to solve all his issues," recalls Sumitran.
Shahi on the other hand uses meditation as a crucial coaching tool. She offers workshops for women's empowerment and takes them through the paces of meditation and relaxation to relax their minds.
Anand Chulani's LOL methodology is used to coach school kids in stress across the world by using fun body movements through which they learn the power of laughter. He says, "Today's kids are conditioned to be achievers and so they are exposed to a lot of stress. But with humour and laughter they are able to sharpen their communication skills and make friends easily."
Most coaches are armed with inspirational and feel-good books penned by them. Kumar who has written three books is planning to launch DVDs now. Bhojwani who has authored the book Don't Think of a Blue Ball has a series of book projects on hand. Chulani too wants to reach out to school children in India with his LOL method.
However, there are a certain dos which every coach should follow. As Sumitran says, "A coach should push people out of their comfort zone and hold them accountable for their actions."