Let’s solve a mystery

The quarter moon over Raleigh City Farm last weekend, with a beautiful halo and stippled cloud cover.

In last week’s email, I wrote more directly to you than I have in the past - I revealed that I can see who opens these emails (hi), and that this helps me feel more connected to my readers as people I’m talking to.

I also asked a couple questions, namely “would you be interested in talking more about the stuff I write on” and “do you ever consider working with me”. Also, what location would you haunt if you were a ghost.

The answers were mostly:

Yes, but I don’t know how that’d look

Maybe, but I don’t really get what you do

And a wonderful variety, my favorite being A bakery and/or cafe in a small town.

Today I’m gonna talk about what the hell I do, by answering a few questions people tend to have for me.

What’s the difference between a therapist and a life coach?

There’s definitely some overlap. My goals in my own therapy are a) process the things that are on my mind, b) address long term relationship issues, and c) get to know myself better. These are all things I do with clients.

However, that a, b and c are projects I plan to keep up with for . . . well, forever. Because of this, therapy needs to fit easily in with my priorities and other projects, be flexible, and change and grow in focus as I grow. An hourly meeting once a week where I can talk about anything at all works well for this.

Life coaching the way I do it is very different from therapy in shape and scope. In my work with clients, I plan to meet with them for fourth months. Sometimes we do another four months (or more) after, but four months is the arc within which I plan all client journeys.

I have a specific framework to my coaching, called ALCHEMY. This framework guides my work with all clients, and provides the priorities we address in our time together:

Awareness:

Meet the parts of yourself that have been hiding: your desires, skills, and secret longings.

Liberation:

Compost shame, judgment, and expectations that don’t belong to you into something new.

Creation:

Channel your magic into a spiritual practice, creative project, or bold vision for your life.

Healing:

Use rituals, Tarot, and guided exploration to mend old wounds and grow your capacity for compassion.

Expression:

Step into your power and share your gifts with the world, whether that’s through art, connection, or radical self-love.

Meaning:

Align your time, energy, and relationships with what truly matters to you.

You:

I trust my clients to have their own cures, even if they take a little while to uncover. Build confidence in your self and receive support in making aligned, powerful decisions.

My coaching program clarifies a client’s specific goals, and helps them both shift the internal struggles holding them back and make moves towards the life they want to live. I built it out of techniques I’ve used to care for myself and build my own joyful life, as well as some I’ve learned from coaches and teachers along the way.

I’m also not a licensed therapist (not my life path thus far), and I use ritual and Tarot with many of my clients, which most therapists don’t do ;) (though not all!).

What does a session look like?

I start work with every client by clarifying 3 main goals for our time together. All of our sessions, and all between-session “witch’s work”, connects back to these goals, which are written down in our shared Notes.

I begin each session with a short grounding meditation, to help us both land in ourselves and in the intentional space of our work.

I prep for sessions and have a tentative plan, but after this meditation I always listen to how a client is, and then suggest how to move forward within the hour. I also take notes throughout in a shared document so my clients can focus on what we’re doing.

We might:

• Use parts work therapy to connect with the inner voices shaping your life

• Do a Tarot reading for insight, clarity, and intuitive wisdom

• Discuss structure and accountability to help you stay aligned with your goals

• Talk about the hard emotions you’re experiencing and do a guided visualization to understand how to move forward

• Decide what creative projects are your priorities, and make a plan for starting and keeping up with them

• Work on your budget to heal money shame and build stability

• Create an authentic dating profile that simplifies and aligns your dating

At the end of every session, I write down Witch’s Work, to be worked on between sessions, in our Notes.

Between sessions, I communicate with clients in the Telegram app, to listen to their breakthroughs and struggles, and to offer celebration and support.

I’m feeling pretty good, though. I don’t think I need a life coach, do I?

Ultimately, that is totally up to you. What I do recommend is digging into that “pretty good.” We live in a world that moves fast, and we are a species that adapts to our circumstances really fucking well. These things make it hard to notice when things are not pretty good, they’re just standard for where we’ve been at.

I have a client who said to me, “I did not think I needed a life coach when we started. My job was under control, I was seeing a guide for support around specific things. But then we started to get into what was going on inside me - the stress, the anger, the places I wanted to go that I couldn’t see. I had no idea how stuck I was, or what was possible.” She thought she was pretty good, but our work revealed where she actually wanted much more, and how she could get there.

Curiosity, and something in her that did understand she needed more, led her to work with me. Since then she’s really felt her anger for the first time, figured out how to express her needs in a way that improves her relationships, and, let’s throw the cherry on top of the sundae, is making more money doing work she enjoys more.

Okay, now that I’ve shared all that . . .

I hope you’re having a sweet early August. It’s been rainy here in Raleigh, and I could use some sunshine, which looks like it’ll come round the corner this weekend. I’m glad to be here with you.

xox

Isabel

Remember I said I was gonna can peaches? My partner Evan and I did that this weekend. We also canned a bunch of tomatoes. I’m really excited to have tucked that summer magic away for myself to savor in in the cooler, darker months.

Village Witch’s Corner

My intention this week : 

Care for myself. Remember to tend to my roots even as I grow.

Question(s) I'm asking this week:

What is Good Enough?

What I’m listening to:

This song. Over and over. It’s inspiring me to write some new fiddle parts for my band.

Tiny Spell of the Week:

Try out being moody in the rain, instead of resisting it.