Discover the truest version of you.
I trained as a Coach to offer others a path to the truth within. Because we have been conditioned to believe our lives are supposed to look a certain way or we are doing it wrong, it can be a real mission to finally arrive at that place. In my experience, the only way to true happiness is to really know yourself. That knowledge is critical to getting what you want. It took me a good long time, so if I can help you get to it quicker, I am on it.
This all started during the pandemic when I sat down in the quiet of the world to write down my story*, starting from the beginning. Once it was out of my body and on the page, I felt a little lighter.
Telling your story tends to do that. Sharing it with someone else can make you feel a million times better. So, I began sharing stories on this very platform. Curiously, each piece was always on the theme of self-discovery.
At the end of a year spent digging all the way to the bottom of a particular problem, I felt changed. Lighter. I wanted to figure out how to bring the same level of peace I had enjoyed to others. As with anything you really are meant to do, when you become open to it, there it is. In my case, it was a program designed by Martha Beck, Oprah Winfrey’s Life Coach. Martha jokes that she had never heard of such until someone said it about her. “Life Coach” sounds hokey, but there’s really no job title out in the culture that quite covers it.
Unless you are aware of the personal development techniques any given coach uses, it’s hard to distinguish one from another. Before I knew anything about this work, I wrote the whole thing off to woo nonsense. Pretend therapy or something. I had no idea. This method provides the most effective “heal your life” tools on the market.
My practice is one on one for a particular type of person. You are someone who has endeavored to check all the boxes you believed would bring fulfillment. And yet…there is STILL something missing. You have now realized true satisfaction is not going to come from anything external. The time to work on yourself is upon you.
Perhaps you have over-sacrificed until you have nothing left to give. You are thinking of your own needs for the first time in your life. The moment has arrived for you to receive the necessary support to discover the direction best suited to you. Releasing limiting beliefs and welcoming meaningful relationships comes with the package.
This is when partnering with a coach will help you find your way. It takes courage to walk straight into the garden of your life, spot the weeds, and yank them out at the root. When you do, you will have cleared fertile ground upon which to grow a rich, beautiful life. Discovering what you really want beneath what is expected of you, allows you to fully inhabit yourself and find connection with who you really are. By partnering with a coach, you can do that.
You may wonder what the difference is between therapy and coaching. The best way I’ve heard it described is the following: therapy is focused on uncovering and recovering from trauma in our past. If you are carrying trauma, therapy is the place to process it. In contrast, coaching is about discovering who we are, what we really really want, and finding some ways to get there. As someone who sat on a therapist’s couch for decades, I can tell you that this work feels much more like play than work!
The need for this unique approach stems from the conditioning to fit the mold society has set down for us. It is how we formed our Social Self. Most often, the Social Self isn’t the truest version.
That may sound odd. I’ll explain. We have an Essential Self and a Social Self. Our Essential Self is who we really are, the person we were at birth before anyone stepped in to correct us. Our Social Self is the box checker, the people pleaser, the one who worries about what Everyone Else Thinks, whether it’s our parents, our friends, or our community. That part of us who pursued goals because we thought we had to, not because we wanted to.
The trouble is, over time, not living authentically quiets your intuition and has you taking a poll for big decisions. Asking what you should do rather than simply tapping in to your inner knowing. I can tell you from experience that it feels awful. Sometimes it can even make you physically sick. As adults, we can’t change the past but we can find our way back to our true selves. It begins with taking the first step.
This work will lift off the layers of societal expectation and reveal your true purpose, the very reason you landed here on earth. You may recognize that person from way back when, before the culture told you to try your hardest to be someone else. You will finally come home to yourself.
*Like everyone else, the need to conform to my environment showed up early for me. Telling my story helped me understand how societal expectations impacted my own life. Perhaps by sharing some of my own experience with you, it will help you see your life more clearly too. So, here goes:
As a child growing up in small town Albuquerque, New Mexico, our family seemed SO weird compared to everyone else. We didn’t do anything like our Catholic, mostly Mexican-American neighbors did being the Jewish hippies from California that we were. At lunchtime in my elementary school, I longed to join my classmates for Frito pie like a local. Instead, I sat down on the long bench and choked down a peanut butter and honey sandwich on heavy brown bread, hidden from sight inside a brown paper bag.
My first order of business was to figure out who I had to be to fit in.
So I learned to hide in plain sight. A big smile and good grades helped me pass for a regular kid who teachers praised and peers respected. All I had to do was bury my odd home life deep inside and act like everyone else. But constantly worrying that I would be found out as a weirdo was exhausting. The constant worry of what others thought of me didn’t make me happy at all.
During solitary moments, I journaled, smoothing down the first page of a series of blank, flowered-fabric books, feverishly detailing the events of my life. I always ended with the same question: “what is the meaning of all this?” The answer didn’t come and my story stopped cold. It is only recently that I understand this: we are not looking for meaning. We are all looking to feel ALIVE. A life of “shoulds” never felt like that.
After half a lifetime of attempts to belong, having reached the apex of conformity as a highly compensated business litigation attorney, marrying a handsome, successful, man, building the perfect home, and all the rest, it suddenly dawned on me. External measures of success did not guarantee me a fulfilling life. That was entirely up to me, but it meant doing things my own way and abandoning the need to fit in.
What did that look like? I had my babies at home. That felt right. I made parenting decisions that didn’t line up with my peers. After making a family of my own, I didn’t go back to litigation. I wrote. I learned to coach. And then, one morning after having a dream–I do dream analysis in my practice–I realized the biggest truth of them all. I am NOT STRAIGHT. I bet you didn’t see that one coming. You’re not alone. It’s the biggest shock of my life and I can surely get an Amen from those close to me.
If you are interested in finding out what is holding you back from true fulfillment, drop me a note at [email protected] and I will sign you up for a free Discovery Session. Together, we will determine if this work is right for you.
And if you haven’t yet subscribed to my Stories, you are invited. Once a month, I share a new story on elizabethheise.com. You can read them at the drop down above. You can join me on the socials too @elizabethheise.coach on Instagram and @heiseelizabeth1 on Twitter. Happy reading!
