Why free coaching? 

Some years ago I retired. I was certified as a life coach, by the Co-active Training Institute, 21 years ago. For over 30 years I was also a freelance management and personal development consultant/trainer/facilitator. Many of my coaching clients came via that work, and then from referrals.
 

In 2010 I moved to the far north of Scotland and over the following 7-8 years that work gradually decreased - and so, eventually, did my coaching work. By then, I was 72. I still loved coaching but I had never needed to do any active marketing & had no desire to start doing so. Retiring was not so much a decision as a gradual process. I continued with some pro bono work and was invited to step into the role of an 'elder' at various events

During those years, and particularly during the Covid years, I engaged much more with the news than I had previously done. I eventually realised that for my life to continue to feel meaningful, I needed to do something to help, and hopefully reduce, all the suffering. I am not an ‘out on the streets’ activist. My way of ‘being of service’, of activism, is my 1-1 coaching work. And I realised I still had a lot to offer.

In 2022, at the age of 76, I decided to 'unretire'. I discovered that there are 1.7 million life coaches on LinkedIn! They have blogs and podcasts and run online workshops and ..... I realised I would have to spend large amounts of time marketing/promoting myself on social media. I gave it a go! And after some months decided that what I wanted to do with the rest of my "one wild and precious life" (Mary Oliver) was to coach - not "sell myself".

So now, I intend to work only with a few people at a time and my way of contributing, of making a difference, of being of service, is to support others who wish to do the same.