I started coaching full-time back in 2010. When I started out, I considered myself a life coach. I guess I still do today, although now my coaching practice is very much through the lens of Law of Attraction.
So, I am a life coach. And I am a Law of Attraction coach.
Well, the other day I had a realization about things coaching and Law of Attraction have in common. Three in particular, which is what I want to share.
Let’s dive in.
The first thing Law of Attraction and coaching have in common is about trying to create in the experience of others and knowing what’s best for others. (Spoiler alert: You can’t and you don’t).
Let me cut to the chase: Law of Attraction says you cannot create in the experience of another. Only you can offer your vibration to which the Law of Attraction responds.
Of course, then, the same is true for every other person. Only your husband can offer his vibration to which the Law of Attraction responds.
If your husband is feeling disappointed and discouraged, that is the vibration he is offering.
Now you may say all kinds of positive-sounding, upbeat things to him in order to get him to look at the situation differently, to think differently. But he is going to feel his thoughts. He’s going to offer his vibration, not yours.
You simply cannot offer a vibration for someone else.
Let me ground all that in a little Law of Attraction 101: You feel your thoughts. Your thoughts create your feelings. Whatever you are feeling—happy, frustrated, jealous—whatever you are feeling is the vibration you are offering.
Often clients tell me how enthusiastic they are about Law of Attraction, and how they really want their husband or best friend to get on board because they can see so clearly how their husband or friend is not attracting what they want because of the vibration they are offering.
But you cannot create in the experience of another. Period.
It’s fantastic to be enthusiastic about Law of Attraction and want everyone to know about it and benefit from it. If you truly want to use LoA to your advantage, you have to tend to your own vibration and allow others to do the same.
Rather than try to vibrate for someone else, model your own alignment. Model your ability to be a magnet for what you want. Modeling your own alignment is way more effective than trying to create in the experience of another.
I said this post is about what Law of Attraction and coaching have in common. Well, life coaching takes a very similar perspective on whether your focus should be on you or on others.
I’ll give you two examples. Here’s the first: When I’m coaching a client, she will sometimes want someone in her life to behave differently.
- Her boss needs to be a different kind of boss.
- Her spouse needs to start or stop doing X, Y, or Z.
- Her kids need to behave differently.
I always say I can only coach the person on the coaching call.
That’s because coaching is not about getting someone else to change their behavior. Coaching is not about directing or controlling those around you to do what you want or think is best. Coaching is not about getting everyone else to behave the way you want so you can feel good. Sounds just like LoA, right?
Coaching is very clear: The only person you have control over is you. Focus there. Focus on who you are being and how you are showing up.
A second example that illustrates the coaching perspective is when you think you know what’s best for those around you.
- You think your teenage daughter should major in business, not fashion.
- You think your husband needs to put himself up for the promotion at work.
- You think your best friend needs to ditch the lout she’s dating.
But you are not the expert on others.
Coaching honors you as the expert on your own life and believes you are creative, resourceful, and whole. Likewise, from a coaching viewpoint, every other person is the expert on his or her life, and is creative, resourceful, and whole.
Which means your teenage daughter, your husband, your best friend is the expert on his or her life. Not you.
Of course, you want what’s best for those around you, but your version of what’s best may not be the path they are on. When you act as if you know what’s best for others, they are not allowed to be creative, resourceful, and whole.
Think about it this way: If someone else has your answers and knows what’s best for you, that feels disempowering, right? Well, it’s exactly the same when we do that to others.
So here’s what I would ask:
- Are you trying to create in the experience of others?
- Are you trying to offer their vibration for them?
- Are you thinking you are the expert in someone else’s life—you know what they should do, the path they should take, the decisions they should make?
Let’s move to the second commonality between Law of Attraction and coaching. This one is about beliefs.
You can only create what your beliefs support. If you want to grow your business or find a life partner or have more abundance in your life, but your beliefs don’t support your desire, then you won’t be able to create what you want.
It really is that simple.
Again, let’s ground this in Law of Attraction 101: Beliefs are thoughts you have practiced thinking—that’s all! And your thinking creates your reality.
So it follows, from an LoA perspective, that your beliefs are either supporting what you want to manifest or in the way of creating what you want.
Coaching has the same perspective: One of my all-time favorite quotes I heard years ago from another coach is this: Beliefs are always the only problem.
I love it! Beliefs are always the only problem.
Often we get caught up in a big story of what’s wrong or not working in our lives. We focus on all that needs to change outside ourselves, externally. Which then makes it easy to miss the much simpler, inner solution: You very likely need to change your beliefs.
Even before my obsession with all things Law of Attraction, my coaching work was often focused around beliefs. Specifically around a client’s limiting beliefs.
- A client wants to start her own business, but her belief is she’s no good at sales and marketing. That belief is in the way of what she wants to manifest.
- A client wants to make a mid-life career change, but her belief is she’s too old. That belief is going to be in the way of what she wants.
Coaching my clients has always been about creating the thinking that supports what she wants to create.
Here’s the question I would ask: Do your beliefs—again those are thoughts you’ve gotten good at thinking—do your beliefs support what you want to manifest?
If what you want is slow to manifest, my first thought would be to take a close look at your beliefs. Because remember—beliefs are always the only problem.
This brings me to the third example I want to share of a common perspective between Law of Attraction and coaching.
In the coaching field, there’s a lot of emphasis on change. Change can be planned or unplanned, wanted or unwanted.
Perhaps a career change or job loss, a divorce or marriage or empty nest, change could be a retirement or cross-country move, a change in social status or financial position, change could be a diagnosis or the loss of a loved one.
Coaching recognizes that change is inevitable in life and navigating change is often why someone seeks out working with a coach.
In the world of LoA, there’s a lot of emphasis on contrast. At any given moment, contrast—which is the variety of life—is revealing your preferences and showing you what you want. Contrast causes new desire to be born within you.
Law of Attraction recognizes that contrast is inevitable and navigating contrast is one of the most essential LoA skills.
I see these two—change and contrast—as very much related. Before my obsession with Law of Attraction, this idea of contrast wasn’t really on my radar. Now I realize that contrast was very often the reason my clients came to me for coaching.
- Elaine was experiencing contrast and this lead to coaching to make a career change.
- Katherine was experiencing contrast and this lead to coaching to navigate a move abroad.
- Jill was experiencing contrast and this lead to coaching to start her own business.
My point is contrast clarifies preferences, launches rockets of desire, and then leads to change as someone expands into what the contrast has clarified and sparked.
I wish I’d had this concept of contrast early in my coaching career because it would have made me a better coach. I can now see the essential role that contrast plays in change.
Both Law of Attraction and coaching recognize you are a growth-seeking Being, and that contrast and change are inevitable parts of your expansion and that you are happiest when you are flowing energy to your desires.
“It is through your exposure to life experiences that your expansion is born. And once expansion is born within you, you only feel good when moving in the direction of your expansion. That’s why holding yourself in opposition to your own expansion feels so bad.” —Abraham
When you experience contrast, the change I want you to make first and foremost is a vibrational one.
Here’s what I mean by that: Change the vibration you offer to close the vibrational gap between where you stand now and what you want. Do the inner work of changing your vibration to match the new reality you desire.
I was lead to coaching years before I was lead to the Law of Attraction. One of the things I’ve always loved about the field of coaching is the role of questions in the coaching conversation. Because a good question invites the client to find the answer for herself.
Even if you’ve never been coached, I’m sure you’ve experienced this. Perhaps a friend asks you a really great question—you know, one of those questions that really lands for you, and it makes all the difference.
Because a juicy question can put you in touch with your inner knowing, create an opening to see things in a new light, can offer a possibility that wasn’t there before, be the pathway for you showing up in your life as who you really are.
Someone asking you a good question is way more valuable than someone handing you their answer.
I am a big believer in the value of asking questions. So that’s what I’m going to leave you with—three questions you can percolate on.
I invite you to think about your answers, maybe journal them. Whatever feels right.
The value in these questions is giving yourself the space to connect with your very own answers. Because after all, you are creative, resourceful, and whole.
- Where do you have an opportunity to tend to your own vibration and rather than trying to create in the experience of another?
- What new beliefs do you want to embody and what old beliefs do you want to release to manifest what you want?
- What is the vibrational change being asked of you so you are a match to what you want?
