Integrative Health Coaching
Integrative Health Coaching
What is Integrative Health Coaching?
Integrative Health Coaching empowers clients to make lasting behavior changes that are the foundation for a lifetime of health and well-being. Health is impacted by multiple interconnected dimensions. These dimensions include the choices one makes that affect their physical, mental, spiritual well-being and the medical care approaches utilized for their health. An Integrative Health Coach helps support their clients in discovering ways to successfully implement healthy lifestyle behaviors across these various dimensions into their unique lives.
Everything we do impacts our health and our health impacts everything we do.
Whether for yourself or an employee, the results of coaching’s impact show:
- Decreased stress
- Greater energy, motivation, confidence, self-esteem
- Improved ability to effectively deal with change and conflict
- Better personal and professional decision making
- Enhanced communication and management skills
- Improved health and thought processes, finer decisions
For any business organization the bottom line is less money wasted on sick days; and an increase in productivity and profitability.
How one of my clients benefited:
Gail, a marketing executive, told me that she wanted to get a new job. She dreaded her daily commute which took one hour each way. By the time she got home she was exhausted. She didn’t even have the energy or attention to research new employment. Meanwhile, another goal was to meditate and do yoga. From our work, she agreed to take a yoga class one day a week at lunch time. In addition, she promised to do five minutes of meditation or yoga immediately upon arriving home after work each day. Then she created a list of small ways to refresh her energy during the day on the job. She came to understand that until addressed her worn out condition, she wouldn’t have the physical energy or mental drive to pursue a new line of work. The result was that within three weeks of implementing these self-care strategies, she felt rejuvenated was highly motivated to dive into her job search.
It's all connected...
I coach from an integrative perspective because all the parts of our lives affect each other. What we eat and how we sleep affects our energy. Our energy affects how we think. What we think affects our moods. We are whole beings, we don’t live in parts.
If you think about the main areas of your life like sections of a wheel, as in the example of the Wheel of Health (to the right) created by Duke Integrative Medicine, you can see that when one or more parts are out of balance, it will impact all the other areas.
Do you:
- Want to lose weight?
- Want to begin or increase exercising?
- Know what you “should” do to take care of yourself, but feel guilty about not doing it?
- Have self-defeating thoughts or behaviors that undermine your progress?
- Feeling stressed and don’t know how to manage it?
- Want to lower your blood pressure or reduce your cholesterol?
- Want to manage a specific health concern?
- Need to discover what truly nourishes you?
- Wish you had someone to accompany you and help identify the best health regimen for you?
I lost 100 lb in eight months and I could not have done this without Andrea Shaw. She was a fabulous coach for me. Our work gave me the foundation to take care of myself for life. As the weight was coming off, one day I bent down and I realized that I could tie my shoes again, without pain. This came from hard work with a great collaborative partner! I never realized how important having a coach was. Her consistent interest, encouragement and support made the difference. Her great questions helped me think in new ways. That led me to new behaviors. I always felt encouraged, never judged. I began learning other approaches. We’d think things through together, and she’d be there with kindness, yet also with an eye toward whether I did what I said I would. If I got off track, she’d nudge me back. Over the course of eight months, I learned how to eat correctly, to exercise, to manage stress, to work things out in relationships when I was bothered by something. My work with Andrea Shaw, at Duke Integrative Medicine, was a totally positive, life-changing experience. I would recommend her to anyone. She’s calm, insightful, very sweet and open. She knows her stuff.
If moving forward in any of these areas is challenging for you, it's very likely that I can help you get on track and into a good restorative and energizing health routine.
I can help.