What is a BYCA coach I hear you ask. Stick with me for a bit and I’ll explain. I’m even more proud of becoming a BYCA coach than I am of getting my MBA and that is saying something! Those that know me well know what challenges I had to overcome to get my MBA. AND know how proud I am of achieving it.
I didn’t wake up one morning and decide that I wanted an MBA or wanted to become a life coach. Both snuck up on me slowly.
In my early years in corporate I really struggled to earn a decent salary. I wasn’t sure how to fix that. A mentor I had took me aside and reassured me I was smart enough to get an MBA. Achieving it would help me with my earning power. I was a bit thunderstruck. As an ex ballerina, I didn’t think I was academic enough to get a Master in Business Administration (MBA). I just never had envisaged that for myself.
How did I get here – the MBA story
To give you context and cut a long story short. My MBA was supposed to be done and dusted in 5 years. Instead, it took me 7 years because I worked full time, studied part time and had a baby halfway through. In my last year I also constantly traveled overseas for work and as a result missed many classes. Still, I persevered. I was so determined to get my MBA, nothing could stop me, especially since somebody important believed I could do it and I didn’t want to disappoint them or myself. Once I had that MBA and it’s earning power under my belt, I felt like I had arrived!
It served me well for 20 years and allowed be to build a successful career in change management helping people adopt or make change happen in corporate settings. I LOVED my job. BUT….
What changed?
Today change is accelerating. People have to make do with less resources in complex, volatile and constrained environments, yet less people see the value in change management. It became harder to justify my existence to decision makers on projects. Working 60 to 70 hour per week sustained over months became the norm. People expected me to make things happen in the background but it was not my job to do so. To no avail. Nothing seemed to help me make others see value in what I did or believed in. It was hard trying to come to terms with not being able to add value in a way I felt appropriate anymore. I was also being told to do things that I knew would fail and went against my values. I truly felt lost, invisible and unvalued for a very long time. 6 years to be exact.
In the end I burned out. TWICE! In the process I also forgot who I really was.
Why BYCA?
Deep down I know that what I have to offer is needed in the world. Maybe it was time to find a way to serve people with my gifts and talents in a more aligned with my values kinda way.
By burning out twice I also understood that my way of working was not sustainable and that I needed to change things. I just didn’t know exactly how to go about it.
The BEAUTIFUL YOU COACHING ACADEMY found me in my quiet hours. I had taken time out to recover from my burnout (and move countries) and came across their IG profile in my feed by chance. The active, engaged and supportive community made up of mainly women, drew me in. Given that I worked in male dominated environments for most of my career, this community was just what I was looking for. I wanted to surround myself with a more feminine environment to give myself the opportunity to become me again.
I signed up predominantly to work on myself and learn how to help myself in the future. During my training though, I discovered what I was missing all along to be able to serve people more deeply. Adding the coaching skill set to my existing skills and experiences from my career, was the missing puzzle piece I never knew I needed, until I did the course. Discovering this changed my life.
What BYCA did for me
Doing the Beautiful You Life Coaching Course allowed me to:
- Find myself. I can honestly say that I know myself more deeply and truly know what I want and need from my life. My MBA gave me earning power but BYCA gave me myself back.
- Stop sabotaging myself by letting fear hold me back from being who I am and who I want to be. I am now doing what I want to be doing. Not what people think I should be doing.
- Discover exactly what I want to do with this version of myself and the rest of my life. I know deep down what I have to offer, who I can serve best with my gifts and talents and why I want to do that.
- Find my people. I am surrounded by genuine, supportive and likeminded people. For the first time in my life I feel like I truly belong and don’t have to make myself fit.
- Just vibrate on a completely new level that makes me feel good about myself, joyful, complete and be the heart centred person that can help others transition through change more easefully and gracefully.
