Life coaching is a supportive partnership designed to help you navigate your unique path and unlock your full potential. Unlike counselling or therapy, which often focuses on the past or clinical diagnosis, life coaching is future-focused and action-oriented. We're not here to "fix" you, your brain isn't broken, it just has a different way of operating that can feel challenging in a world not always built to maximise your strengths.

For people navigating life with characteristics of ADHD (whether diagnosed, suspected, or aligning one or a few of the typical characteristics), or another neurodiversity, a Life Coach who welcomes clients with neurodiversities might specifically include strategy around common challenges like:

• "How can I manage my time better when I'm time blind?" We develop external systems that work with your perception of time.

• "Why do I struggle to start tasks?" We explore task paralysis roots and build strategies for consistent action, customised to your energy.

• "How can I stop being so impulsive or overwhelmed by my emotions?" We work on understanding your brain's processing to cultivate greater self-awareness and regulation.

• "Will this just be another system I can't stick to?" Our approach co-creates flexible, personalised strategies that honor your values and leverage your strengths.

In essence, life coaching is about gaining clarity on your goals, understanding how your unique brain impacts your daily experience, and equipping you with personalised strategies to move forward effectively. It's about turning frustrations into forward momentum, guided by validation and support.

Absolutely! While a Life Coach who welcomes clients with neurodiversities such as ADHD is very different from a medical professional or counsellor/therapist, they are incredibly effective partners for people navigating life with characteristics of ADHD and other neurodiversities. Our focus isn't on "treating" or "fixing" the issue itself, or even the issue itself, our focus is navigating the barriers and empowering you to thrive within the unique way your brain operates to reach your goals. 

Here's why life coaching works:

• Understanding Your Brain: We help you gain clarity on how the characteristics of ADHD you experience specifically impacts your daily life, from time perception to emotional regulation. This understanding is the first step toward self-compassion and effective strategies.

• Personalised Strategies: We don't offer generic advice or any advice at all! We co-create flexible, practical systems and tools that are custom-built to work with your brain's natural tendencies and strengths, not against them. This is key to sustainable change.

• Action & Accountability: Navigating life with characteristics of ADHD in particular often comes with challenges in task initiation and follow-through. Coaching provides a supportive, non-judgmental space to break down goals into manageable steps and offers the consistent accountability you might need to build momentum.

• Focus on Strengths: Instead of dwelling on perceived "deficits," we help you identify and leverage your personal values and incredible strengths, which might be creativity, hyperfocus, resilience, and unique problem-solving abilities.

• Real-World Application: We translate understanding into action. Whether it's managing time, organising your space, navigating social interactions, or regulating intense emotions, we focus on practical, actionable steps for your life in alignment with your goal(s).

Many people with characteristics of ADHD report that coaching provides the practical, forward-looking support and understanding they need to implement strategy to achieve their goals and create a life that feels authentic and manageable. It's about finding your unique way to thrive.

That's a very important question, and the answer lies in understanding what our coaching is designed to do.

Rather than specialising in coaching ADHD, we help people navigate the characteristics of ADHD that might be an obstacle to reaching their goals. While they sound similar the two are very different.
For example, if your goal is to manage your household more easily, we can help you to identify your values and strengths relevant to managing your household more easily and use them as a foundation to co-create strategies to make managing daily tasks more effective and less overwhelming for you. If your goal is to reduce workplace conflict or overwhelm, we help you overcome the challenges impacting your work. Ultimately, our work is about helping you identify your values and strengths and develop personalised strategies to move past your obstacles so you can live a life that feels authentic and successful for you.

In our consultation, we'll work together to:

1. Give you an opportunity to teach me more about your goal and how the traits of ADHD that affect you are limiting your ability to reach your goal. This gives me insight into what your struggles are. Don't worry if you don't know the answers now - it's my job to help you identify them.

2. Make a plan that works for you. Any plan we co-create to reach your goal needs to be meaningful to you and do-able in actions, availability, beliefs and budget.

3. If appropriate book a date to get started with your unique life coaching plan to assist you to meet your goals.

Each session is dedicated to the particular step in the overall goal you are working towards.  I do not plan a standard session, they are all unique and dedicated to the clients needs.

Having said that I will always cover values in the first session as I believe they are key to understanding yourself and essential for values-based choices and motivation.  In knowing more about ourselves we have options.

1. A session begins with an update on the previous session - if applicable and identifying or confirming the next small goal for the given session. 

2. We then work consistently to develop a new or redesign a previous strategy to optimise success in achieving the bigger goal. With your consent we may use visualisation on occasions where it is appropriate so you can pretest the strategy!

3. We recap and ensure you are feeling positive about putting the strategy or action plan into play between now and when I see you next.

I'm a believer in the saying "The way to eat an elephant is one bite at a time!"

I prefer not to work with children in a Life Coaching capacity, however this can be negotiated for teens at high school who are internally motivated to achieve a goal. All work with teens is online.

I have a long history of working with children from my previous career as a Dental Therapist.

Sessions are an hour each. 
I also offer two hour sessions for people who feel they need more time.

The cost of a session is:
$95 - per one hour session 

I offer both online, and in-person sessions. 
Clients choose the option that best suits their needs and preferences.
Online sessions are conducted via secure video conferencing software and offer the convenience of meeting from anywhere with an internet connection.
In-person sessions take place at my office in Hamilton.

I really enjoy working with people online.  For some people it seems to give them enough distance and privacy to really invest in the time we have together.

It is not always possible for people to work with me in person so online is a great way of moving past the challenge of physical location.