Coaching and Sustainable Growth
The quarter life crisis. Perhaps, you’ve heard of it? That disillusioned, burned out, crushing period of the mid-20s to early 30s. It’s becoming a bigger and bigger issue in our society, emphasized by the connectedness and comparison of social media, the undercurrent of societal change with traditional life milestones, and decades of rewarding performance above everything else.
Our institutions have churned out thousands upon thousands of young adults who have no idea who they are, what matters to them, or how to measure a good life without an external yardstick. They arrive at the cubicle, the home, the letters after their name, which they’ve worked at for years and think: “...wait, this is it?” A grueling 9-5 without the commute, weekends spent brunching and posting on social media, and self-serving relationships meant to fill and dull all the mental white noise?
It’s no coincidence that the midlife crisis is happening in the mid-20’s to early 30’s. Up until this point, we are surrounded by teachers, coaches, and caregivers who guide us, encourage us to learn, and cheer us on as we grow. But, then we graduate.
And there’s crickets.
And we spiral into a sense that maybe we did all of this, chased the carrot, only to get here and feel empty, only to get here and not actually know what matters to us: beyond the GPA, the athletic accolades, the extracurricular groups.
If this is you, know that I’ve been there, too.
Somehow, along the way, I handed over the responsibility of my personal growth to someone else. I gave them all the power: to tell me what I could achieve based on how I was performing, to direct me into a career based on what I could do, to give me a sense of worth based on quarterly grades and comments.
If you’re reading this and you’re in this crisis, it’s time for you to take radical responsibility for your life. Life coaching is for you if you’re ready for a safe space to reflect without judgement, to practice communicating and speaking aloud what’s important to you, to empower you to take your life back.
Life coaching differs from traditional experiences with growth because, as a life coach, I believe that you’re the source of your growth, that everything you accomplish is an outpouring of you, that a sustainable life of satisfaction comes from internal measurements of “success”. Traditional experiences with growth aren’t sustainable because the function of the growth is to remove pressure, learning in response to something. As a result, the growth wanes when the external measurement disappears. Coaching is different because we are creating an environment for sustainable, self-motivated growth: growing to add something, out of a proactive joy of learning, out of satisfaction of living out a purpose that reflects your values.
It’s possible to be both successful and live a life that means something to you, to be both driven and be free. The key is knowing what matters most to you and preparing your days to reflect those values, to shift that external yardstick (grades, feedback, etc.) to an internal yardstick (how I think about myself, how I feel when I wake up in the morning/go to sleep at night, how my life reflects what’s important to me) so that you can ask yourself and answer confidently: “If all the external measurements were removed, how would I know I was progressing?”
It’s hard to grow in a vacuum. The reality is that we need other people to spur us on toward our growth, but we can’t outsource the responsibility. It only works when we are pursuing the growth out of a place of radical responsibility, out of service, out of a desire to give back in the ways in which we are uniquely gifted, which includes both our skills and our stories, both our pain and our purpose.
Want a starting point? Grab my “Golden Guide” for free and get started toward your dream life.