Jess (00:00.782)
Welcome back to How to 20 something and boy am I excited for this episode and judging by the title, you could probably guess why. For anyone out there wondering whether they need a coach or a therapist or both, this episode is for you. And I do want to really emphasize that at the end of the day, no matter who you pick to work with, all we want is to help you improve your life experiences.

Sometimes that means digging into your past, understand why something keeps resurfacing and other times that means having someone else help you make a plan for goals that you want to achieve and action steps to get there. Both coaching and therapy are extremely beneficial when it comes to your overall mental health and wellbeing. And it’s time for you to know how either one can help you out the best. As someone who has a coach and a therapist, which I’ve mentioned several times on here before,

I can see why there is so much confusion between the two. So I’ve brought on an expert guest to help answer any questions you may have based on whether it would be more beneficial for you to work with a therapist or with a coach, or again, with both. Today, we’re going to be discussing the similarities between therapy and coaching, the differences, each of their strengths and weaknesses, and how to determine which track is the best for you. And…

why each of them are beneficial for different reasons. But before we get into all of that juicy goodness of information, I’m going to introduce today’s guest to you guys so that you have a better understanding as to why she is the expert that you should be listening to. So, can’t speak. Shoshana Belial is a doctoral candidate at Saybrook University in their Department of Mind Body Medicine with a specialization in integrative mental health.

She has a master’s in social work from NYU and a master’s in psychology from Columbia University Spirituality Mind Body Institute. She is a former therapist and currently is working as a wellness coach. She is also a certified yoga teacher and has been teaching yoga for 15 years in her community in Vermont. For her PhD dissertation, her current research focuses on wellness coaching and mental health. She’s an advocate for a whole person integrative approach to mental health and wellbeing.

Jess (02:16.654)
and is proud to have served in various capacities as a therapist, researcher, and fundraiser in one of the first academic integrative medicine facilities in the country. Hi Shoshana, welcome to How to 20 something.

Shoshana Belisle (02:28.79)
Hi, Jess, thank you so much for having me. I’m really excited to have this conversation with you today.

Jess (02:34.478)
I am too, and it’s been a long time coming. So glad it’s finally here. Now, you’ve spent the last two years diving into this type of research and you pretty fully understand the similarities and differences between life coaching and therapy. I know I have my own way of explaining the differences, which we’ll touch on, but how would you describe those differences to someone who doesn’t really know or understand what life coaching or wellness coaching is?

Shoshana Belisle (03:02.582)
That is a very good question and a question that I’ve been wrestling with pretty thoroughly for the past couple of years in my doctoral research. I think it’s really important to look at the definitions of psychotherapy and coaching and that could help to resolve this challenge of differentiating the two modalities. So just.

you know, for anyone who’s not so familiar with these different kinds of ways of working, psychotherapy is any psychological service that’s provided by a trained professional using different forms of communication and interaction to assess, diagnose, and treat dysfunctional emotional reactions, ways of thinking, and behavior patterns. And that’s from the American Psychological Association. So there’s like the keywords there are assessing, diagnosing, and treating.

emotional, mental, and behavioral patterns that are dysfunctional. So on the other hand, coaching is, it’s also uses conversation and ways of relating and interacting, but it’s more of a partnership. So an organization that helps to credential coaches called the International Coaching Federation, they describe coaching as partnering with clients in a thought provoking and creative process.

that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential. So partnering with clients in a thought -provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential. And so the keywords there are partnerships and an emphasis on maximizing personal potential. So both of these…

modalities involve, you know, relationships, partnerships, but one is more about diagnosing and treating mental health conditions, whereas the other is more about partnering and moving towards personal goals that will help an individual to maximize their potential. So on the surface, they could seem very similar, you know, both involve a conversation like a meaningful conversation with a trained professional.

Shoshana Belisle (05:17.494)
really important topics come up, we dive into pretty significant issues often, but the intention and the nature of the conversation will differ depending on that modality.

Jess (05:32.558)
Makes sense. The way that I describe it, I say it in two different ways. So one of them in a very short, simple, clear, concise way, I say that life coaching is we take the cards you’ve already been dealt and learn how to play the game. And the game is the game of life. So how do you want to move forward from where you are right now? The other way I describe it is therapy is your past to your present. So if there’s something from your past that is preventing you from moving forward, it’s therapy.

Life coaching is your present to your future. So if there’s something that you’re not liking right now, a current experience, and you want something different, it’s life coaching. It’s a lot more forward thinking. Would you say that is a good way to explain it? Or have I been steering everybody wrong?

Shoshana Belisle (06:17.046)
No, I think that’s a really excellent and clear way of describing it. And that’s essentially the language that I’ve been hearing from the participants in my research study. I’ve been interviewing coaches, national board certified health and wellness coaches to ask how they address mental health issues that come up in their coaching practice. And one of the issues that I have to clear up with them is like, well, how do you define the difference between coaching and therapy? And many of the people I talk to use

description similar to what you just said. Therapy is often about looking towards the past, resolving unprocessed issues, maybe traumas, maybe challenging relationship issues that you’ve had to move through or difficult emotions. And then, you know,

resolving that so that you can function in a more effective way in daily life, whereas coaching is about looking towards the future. What do you want to achieve in your life? Where are you going? What’s meaningful to you? Where are your values? What is your vision for your life moving forward and doing what you need to do to get from where you are now to where you want to go? We move back and forth in time a lot, you know, in terms of like sometimes in both modalities, we’ll have to

look in the other direction a little bit, at least to some extent. But I would say you’re correct with the emphasis being, you know, looking more resolving past issues and there be maybe looking into the future when the person is ready. And then the other way around as well, like, you know, looking towards the future and coaching, but sometimes we have to touch upon the past if it’s relevant for what we’re doing now and looking into the future.

Jess (08:00.398)
Yeah, I just started working with a new client and I was talking to her about it because she came from therapy and it for what she was needing help with therapy was not the solution for her because it’s time management, it’s priorities, it’s like getting into a routine, it’s things that I do as a life coach with my clients and part of it was having her history of with depression, knowing that okay, that’s there. Like we’re not

there’s going to be some things that I’m like, what have worked, what has worked in the past? Like, what have you been working on? What happened? But it’s not going to be like, what happened when you were five years old between your parents? Like, that’s not me. I’m not that’s a therapist. I’m a life coach. But there could be some type of experience that is happening that I need to know about so that I’m not furthering any potential trauma that might happen. And I get to work around that so that you benefit as well and that we can continue to move forward.

But that’s also where working with both, if you have that unresolved trauma, comes into play.

Shoshana Belisle (08:57.27)
Mm -hmm.

Shoshana Belisle (09:03.19)
Yeah, exactly. There can be a really wonderful synergy that happens if an individual is working with both a coach and a therapist. You can sort of dance between the two. And…

have different kinds of conversations depending on the person you’re talking to. But yeah, sometimes we have to address as a coach, sometimes we have to address things that have happened in the past, but we just won’t dive deep into it. I have a really wonderful analogy or metaphor. I have a really wonderful metaphor. I’ve learned from one of my teachers in that wellness coaching field. I’m not sure if you’ve heard the name Michael Arlosky, but he’s one of my teachers. And

He talks about wading in the waters of emotion. Like coaches can wade in the waters of emotion, but we have to keep our feet on the ground and our heads above water. And, you know, we can touch upon, we want to acknowledge and touch upon emotional issues. We just don’t want to dive into the deep end of the water. We don’t want to submerge ourselves and get, you know, dragged into like really deep unprocessed content.

I find that to be a really useful metaphor and I love to give Dr. Arlosky credit for it because I think it’s really useful.

Jess (10:17.006)
Yeah, that was a very beautiful metaphor too. It’s like I can imagine that for myself as well being in this space. So that was very helpful. How would you say the approaches between the two or even techniques used differ?

Shoshana Belisle (10:33.334)
So like I mentioned earlier, on the surface, they could seem very similar. And in fact, the field of coaching, which is a newer field than psychotherapy in general, coaching does draw from a lot of psychological theories. So there are a lot of areas of overlap. But in terms of techniques and approaches, I would say that…

Shoshana Belisle (11:06.39)
Coaching is going to offer a considerable, considerable more, coaching is going to offer considerably more structure, like a structured container in which to have a conversation. So you’re gonna have a conversation around your agreed upon goals, like what you wanna work on, maybe crafting your wellness vision or your well, you know, well life vision. And then we’ll,

sort of figure out the objectives and the goals that are going to help you get to that vision. Psychotherapy is often not that clearly organized depending on the modality. Like I was trained in psychodynamic psychotherapy and really the individual just will walk in the door and will just wait and see what comes up and whatever comes up.

will be the topic of the conversation and will often lead to uncovering of issues that have been under the surface or emotions that are maybe stored deeper in your unconscious mind. And so slowly things will emerge. There are other kinds of modalities of psychotherapy that are a little bit more structured.

like cognitive behavioral therapy is a little bit more structured. And then there’s some approaches like somatic psychotherapy where the body will be involved in the healing process as well. But it kind of depends on the orientation of the provider. But in general, I’d say that coaching is a little bit more structured.

Jess (12:42.094)
Yeah, I would agree with that statement. I part of the discovery call I had literally yesterday at the end of it. She said, she’s like, okay, there’s, I feel a lot more confident about coaching because there seems to be a plan and there’s a finite containers. We’re not working together for an endless amount of time. It’s within contracts. It could be a three month contract or a six month contract, or even a month to month, depending on the coach that you’re working with and what their program offers.

but it is set timeframes with renewals that are possible for you. Whereas therapy is more of a, I guess we’ll just keep seeing each other over and over again every week, or then it drops down to every other week or once a month until maybe you feel like you’re good and you don’t need it anymore. It’s a little more, it’s more undefined is the best way I can describe it. But.

What would you say in terms of the tools that are used in therapy versus the tools used in coaching? What would you say are the differences between the tools used in therapy versus the tools used in coaching?

Shoshana Belisle (13:52.086)
So a lot of the tools in coaching are going to be around mobilizing internal resources or external resources in order to move towards goals. So you may have like heard about, you know, doing values assessments and strengths based assessments to figure out how you’re going to, you know,

get yourself aligned with your goals, like align with your values, align with your strengths and use those to move towards your goals. Sometimes we’ll do, you know, particular envisioning exercises or things like that to start to clarify the future that you’re trying to create. There’s the tools that you may have heard of in your coaching training, like motivational interviewing is really…

common tool where we help to resolve ambivalence around issues that we’re hoping to overcome or taking action towards towards goals. And that comes out of the addiction space. Thinking.

Can you repeat the question again?

Jess (15:08.174)
What are the different tools? So what tools are brought into therapy versus what tools are brought into coaching?

Shoshana Belisle (15:14.806)
Mm hmm. So in therapy, we’re going to be doing I’m going to speak from my experience as a psychotherapist who’s trained from a psychodynamic perspective. So we’ll just you know, it’s a lot of just exploring our experiences and our in our daily life, in our relationships and noticing where we get stuck and starting to like dig a little deeper to understand like why we’re getting stuck.

And sometimes we have to maybe start to peel away some of the defenses that we have that are preventing us from like seeing the truth that’s under the surface. Like you might have maybe thoughts or feelings that are outside of immediate awareness that are.

driving us to take action in a certain way. So therapy will help us to peel away those barriers, to become more aware of what’s driving us so we can live in a more conscious manner.

But again, that can often involve going a little deeper, going beyond what the coaching scope would typically be. So I’m speaking about my experience from that psychodynamic perspective. Obviously there’s many different types of therapy. There’s dialectical behavior therapy. There’s, like I mentioned before, cognitive behavioral therapy. It really depends on the modality that you practice. But…

The example I shared is from my orientation.

Jess (16:46.414)
Was your orientation more talk therapy? Is that what that is? Okay, good. Cause I think that’s the, what you go.

Shoshana Belisle (16:50.294)
Yeah, well, go ahead. So yeah, I mean, they’re all different versions of talk therapy, but this is more like, you know, informed by thinkers you may have heard of like, Freud and Jung for that psychodynamic orientation. Yeah. So.

Jess (17:15.214)
Okay. All right, this makes sense. Where would you say therapy and life coaching or wellness coaching overlap? So in other words, how are they similar? Where is that that bleed? I know I said that like, it’s it’s the present. But in terms of the actual practice of it, where are they similar?

Shoshana Belisle (17:34.934)
So they’re both really helpful and important relationships and sources of support. Both therapists and coaches are going to create confidential and safe spaces for you to explore your inner experience, navigate circumstances, and work towards growing and developing as a person. And…

you know, therapists and coaches are both going to provide empathy and warmth and support. And they’re again, drawing from some similar theories related to psychology and behavior change. So, you know, a person going into coaching and a person going into therapy,

they may not seem immediately all that different because you’re still working in this container of a safe space and having a warm and supportive and empathic conversation with somebody. I’d say that’s a really important area of overlap.

Jess (18:39.406)
Yeah.

Yeah, I can, I can agree with that one. And if it, when we talk about strengths and weaknesses between the two, you’ve brought up strengths that they both share, but I, I want to dive into each of them separately. So let’s start with therapy and we’re for the purpose of this episode and clarification. So you don’t say there’s so many different types over and over again, we’re just going to focus on more of the talk therapy side of things. I think talk therapy and coaching is where it is the most similar and that’s where most of the confusion comes from. So.

What are some strengths and weaknesses behind therapy?

Shoshana Belisle (19:16.862)
So therapy is an evidence -based intervention to help people resolve mental health challenges. And I’d say one of the strengths is that it is so well –

researched at this point, we have so much research to back up the efficacy of therapy as this evidence -based modality. We now know that it really does work to help people resolve depression and anxiety and PTSD or…

eating disorders, all different kinds of conditions. So I think there’s a lot of faith that therapy is effective and we can trust it. Another strength of therapy is that it is generally delivered by someone who’s a licensed and trained practitioner. These practitioners have to go through rigorous training, masters or doctoral level training, tremendous experiential requirements.

you know, multiple years of supervised experience, licensure within their state. It’s a very regulated practice. So a patient or consumer, client, whatever you want to call the individual can feel confident that they are in safe and competent hands and that they’re going to receive a service that will help them to alleviate their suffering or challenges.

So there’s that sort of degree of confidence. Also, since it’s a clinical and regulated modality, it’s often covered by insurance. I mean, depending on the person’s insurance coverage, typically a person can get reimbursement or find someone within their network who can help them. So those are several advantages.

Shoshana Belisle (21:12.886)
In terms of the weaknesses, I think one thing we have witnessed over the past few years, especially, especially since COVID is that there just aren’t enough practitioners available. We just don’t have enough people available to meet the growing demand. I mean, so many people are suffering right now. There’s so much stress in the world. People are really having a hard time and it’s often very difficult to find the support.

that is needed. There’s long wait lists, things like that. And I’d say another weakness of therapy is that it has sort of inherited this patriarchal perspective often of, you know, you are the patient and I will take care of you and, you know, you’re experiencing pathology. It has sort of this connotation of, of,

addressing pathology. And people often experience some degree of stigma, even if it’s unfounded. I mean, thankfully, stigma is starting to dissolve or not seeing as much of it, but there’s still some degree of stigma associated with pursuing therapy. So that lingers, unfortunately, I’d love to help remove that altogether.

but there’s a little bit of a lingering stigma. And so some people may feel uncomfortable pursuing therapy, even if they need it. And that’s a real problem. I would love to help people let that go because when we need support, we need support and we need to remove all the obstacles in order to get the needed support.

Jess (23:04.046)
Yeah, I agree that therapy does have a negative stigma to it. It’s like, you’re in therapy because something’s wrong with you. Like your brain’s messed up. That’s why you’re in therapy. And I will say, at least within my generation, over the last, honestly, probably three years, maybe like towards the tail end of the world shutting down, it has turned around. It has become more…

of a widely accepted thing of hey, everyone should be in therapy because we all need a little bit of help. And it’s there’s nothing wrong with you per se. It’s more of a you’re working on yourself and good on you for doing that and seeking out the support. So I think that there has I’m speaking for my generation for Millennials, millennials, Gen Z, whoever you want, whoever’s listening that it has started to become there has started to be the shift.

into the more positive side of it and not be such a weighed down negative stigma around it.

Shoshana Belisle (24:06.358)
That’s excellent to hear and I’m really happy that you’re witnessing that shift. I believe there’s also a shift happening within the mental health field to sort of present it as an opportunity for growth and the personal development and you know, you don’t have to be suffering dramatically in order to seek out and pursue therapy. Please, this is for everybody.

I think that therapy is also starting to adopt more of a wellness orientation rather than a pathology orientation, rather than an illness orientation. I think that provide that therapists, clinicians who are being trained in the recent past and now are starting to really adopt more of this wellness framework, which I think will help increase.

people’s willingness to pursue it.

Jess (25:09.358)
Yeah, one of my friends was asking me and another friend, like, what’s, what advice would you give around therapy? Like going into therapy? Cause he, he didn’t have, he, well, he doesn’t, he still doesn’t have a therapist. And my advice was don’t be afraid to fire your therapist because it’s not the first person you meet. It might not be the best fit for you. But my friend’s advice was interesting. And she said, start when you’re healthy before shit hits the fan. So.

Those were just like two different takes on advice given of when it comes to the world of therapy, what would you say in terms of having it be a preventative measure rather than just going when you are struggling, when you are already down bad?

Shoshana Belisle (25:55.222)
I think that’s an excellent solution. I think we should look at therapy as one tool that’s available for just finding support in daily life. I mean, we all need support. We all need people we can go to to talk to about things. So if you get that, you know, if you get that person in your team,

when things are going okay, you know that that person is there. And you’re also building knowledge about yourself and resilience and skills for managing your mood and taking better care of yourself. If you have the ability to engage a therapist when you’re feeling all right, that’s amazing. Now, because therapists have to work generally within a medical model and have to, you know, try to bill insurance, it can be a little tricky to…

advocate for prevention oriented therapy and get reimbursed for it. But there’s usually ways of working around that. Yeah. But if you’re looking in terms of like finding a person to be on your team who can help you when you’re just kind of feeling okay, a wellness coach could actually be a really good person to have.

in that circumstance. If you don’t need a therapist, but you’re looking for some support, a coach, a life coach, a wellness coach, some specially trained kind of coach could actually be a really good source of support. Especially if you’re not currently in need of more clinically oriented support.

Jess (27:42.478)
Yeah, which is a good segue into what can you tell us about the strengths and weaknesses behind coaching? So life coaching, wellness coaching, just that type of anything under that umbrella of coaching.

Shoshana Belisle (27:56.406)
Yeah, so, you know, as we were talking about, there’s a lot of people out there who, you know, want to pursue a goal that’s not

related to mental health necessarily. They’re just dealing with the ups and downs of human experience and they’re, you know, doing just fine in daily life and they have some goal or circumstance they wish to pursue or navigate more effectively. And, you know, maybe they’re feeling like not fulfilled in their professional lives, they’re not feeling satisfied with their job or their career path. So these are good candidates for securing a coach who has a special

in like a certain area. So as you know, we know we’ve we in the coaching world know this coaching is technically an unregulated profession like anybody can call themselves a coach, which has its pros and cons like, you know,

if you feel like you’re an expert in a certain area and want to be able to help people with that area, it’s useful to be able to use the term coach. But as a consumer, it doesn’t give us that same degree of confidence that we can trust that the coach knows what they’re doing or that they’re really expert in that area. So.

That is why organizations like International Coaching Federation or the National Board for Health and Wellness Coaching are starting to implement these credentialing. That is why they are currently implementing credentialing standards for what it means, what it’s required to become a certified coach. Just got lost. What was your question again?

Jess (29:44.206)
the strengths and weaknesses. But before you say that, I want to say like, I do want to talk about like what’s considered to be out of scope for a life coach. But on the topic of that, like therapists versus life coaching, I take it into I was an interior design major and interior designers could be decorators, but decorators could not be interior designers. And it’s a similar way with therapists and life coaching. So therapists can be a life coach.

a life coach cannot be a therapist unless they go back to school specifically for it, like have a degree, which is again, same thing with interior design, you need a degree, you need to know fire codes, you need to know certain ADA regulations, you there are certain things you learn in school that have that backing, you don’t just become a housewife and all of a sudden want to be an interior designer for a family, like that’s not how it works. And it’s the same thing with therapy and with like life coaching in that bridge of

who can be what, who to trust, like where does it come from? But I agree with the accreditations that come with life coaching are very important. I’m gonna be honest, I’m not accredited. I’m not certified, like I am certified, but through a certification, not through the national board or anything. That might be something in my future, but right now it’s I build a business off of referrals or people that need me. And it’s been working so far. I do.

think that in the future there’s going to be, there’s going to come a point where I will need that backing to fully give me that confidence in the eyes of the consumer. But back to strengths and weaknesses.

Shoshana Belisle (31:20.982)
Yeah, I think you’re, but if you’re a consumer, I mean, just to continue that thought, if you’re a consumer looking for a coach, there are many different ways of like vetting the coach and finding whether this person is the right fit for you. And maybe you want to see that the person has this sort of national designation.

Or you could be tracking the person’s content on social media and listening to their podcasts and reading what they have to say. And that gives the credibility that you’re looking for so that these designations may not seem as important. I think it depends on the person. You’re doing a really great job of establishing your own credibility in your own way. People can track what you’re doing and…

Jess (31:59.63)
Mm -hmm.

Shoshana Belisle (32:10.198)
you know, have faith that you are a competent and skilled and empathic coach. So.

Jess (32:16.206)
Yes. And it’s also why our coach, because Shoshana and I met through our coach, teaches, she’s a business coach, business life mindset, everything, but teaches us a system. And it’s a system, like we create our own system based off of our niche and our market. And that’s what we present to clients. Like, this is the plan. This is the journey I’m taking you through. And it helps back you up of there’s a plan and I know what I’m doing. And so that

the client is like, wow, okay, I actually trust you. And I’m confident in your ability to help me get to where I want to go.

Shoshana Belisle (32:53.11)
So going back to your question, which is about the strengths and weaknesses of coaching. Okay. And I know things are getting edited out, so I’m trusting that. Okay. So in terms of the, the strengths of coaching.

Shoshana Belisle (33:13.398)
Some people are really looking for that kind of equal partnership between themselves and the person that they’re seeing. And the nature of coaching is to create a partnership of equals. This coach may have gone through a challenge that you’re hoping to go through and navigate effectively. And so maybe they’re like a few steps ahead in a certain area, but generally they’re going to

come into the relationship as your partner and your cheerleader and your support, your accountability partner, and will kind of accompany you on your process. So I think that style of being in relationship can really work for a lot of people. Coaches often are a little bit more transparent about their personal experiences. They may use a little bit more disclosure.

than a therapist would, you know, sharing about their lives or how they’ve handled certain circumstances, of course, within boundaries, they’re not going to overshare, hopefully, but they may share a little bit more than a therapist would, which might increase the client’s comfort in being in that relationship. Or maybe the coach will be a source of support or excuse me, the coach could be a source of inspiration.

for the client because they’ve done such a good job navigating a particular challenge. Like maybe they’re like a parenting coach and they can speak to their successful experiences parenting or maybe they’re a weight loss coach and they’ve had an incredible journey becoming comfortable in their bodies or whatever it is. So we can take inspiration from that, from the journey that the coach has gone through before us.

So I would say that would be one good benefit for the client. For the person serving as coach, since it’s technically an unregulated field, there’s a lot of room for creativity and working the way you want to work. Because it’s unregulated, we don’t worry as much about jurisdiction issues. We don’t have to worry about

Shoshana Belisle (35:36.278)
being licensed in one state and not another. And, you know, in the therapy world, there’s a lot of discussion around, especially during COVID, like what do we do if we’re in one state and our client or patient has moved to a different state and now they’re working across state lines, that there can be issues around that. So in coaching, we don’t really have that problem. You can work wherever you are and with whomever you want.

So I’d say that would be an advantage. As long as the coach is operating from a very thoughtful and ethical perspective, you know, is really careful about ethics and scope of practice and not navigating into those deeper waters like we mentioned before, you know, staying within their safe domain.

Jess (36:32.91)
what would be considered out of scope for a life coach.

Shoshana Belisle (36:38.198)
That is an excellent question. And it’s a question that I hope coaches will reflect upon carefully. If a client comes with very depressed mood, anxious thoughts,

suicidal ideation or any expression of suicidality concerning disordered eating. These are not the areas in which the coach should be treading. This is the domain of a therapist.

it gets a little tricky because, you know, the human experience involves emotions, you know, sad moods happen, anxious thoughts happen, and, you know, there’s a pretty broad range of normal. So even a cautious coach is going to encounter anxiety, stress, depression, and they have to have enough knowledge and carefully honed intuition.

to consider having conversations with clients about referrals or collaborations with clinicians if the conversation gets a little bit too intense or problematic.

So yeah, if there’s situations involving depression, anxiety, difficulty functioning in daily life for those reasons or others, very severe stress, trauma, abuse, substance abuse, a clinician really should be involved.

Jess (38:35.214)
Yeah, I agree. I think it is. You’re right. Like we all have our own human experiences and there are going to be days of negative emotions, if not like a week long stretch or multiple weeks stretches. But knowing when to refer your client out where they need a professional like an actual licensed therapist to help them. I know I do nutrition coaching and I do life coaching and I have talked to

I have like mental health therapists in my back corner who specialize in eating disorders and getting out of it and reversing it. And I had one client last year where I messaged this therapist, I just wanted to get their ideas like am I step away? I don’t want to step out of line. What it what am I doing? Like this is the progress we’ve made so far. And that therapist actually able to tell me like, No, you are doing great. Like they’re eating more there. They’re have this healthy relationship. They’re not starving themselves. They’re out of that mentality.

so they actually didn’t need to go and seek like extra professional help. It was fine with what we were doing, what we were focusing on with focusing on macros and strength and the healthy side of it. But it is as a coach, it’s having those people that you can resource out to for the benefit of your client. It’s not, I think a lot of times we get in our heads of if they’re paying for a therapist or some other type of specialist, they’re not gonna need me.

And then I’m out of a business, I don’t have money, and it becomes very scarce minded. And when we really need to shift that focus into what is our client need them at this present moment, like what is in their best interest? And how can you support them in that way, even if it means not working with you right now? Because at the end of the day, they’re going to come back to you or they’re going to refer to you because they trust you because you’ve built that higher level relationship with them.

that it’s not about the money. Like, yes, we need to pay our bills. We do need money. We are all, for the most part, self -employed, but we want you to thrive and whatever it means or whatever it takes for you to be able to do so.

Shoshana Belisle (40:45.942)
Absolutely. I think you’re doing an amazing job of describing this sort of issue that coaches will struggle with, which is like, I want to operate in scope, but I also, and I want to take good care of my clients, but I also need to build a business. And it really comes down to being…

pretty religious about being ethical in your practice. We just have to. We have to just keep the client’s best interest in mind. There’s just no question around it. And you’ll continue to build your reputation as a really conscientious and thoughtful and skilled coach, the more that you adopt that mindset.

I think it’s great to keep a roster of potential referrals or resources in your back pocket. That’s one of the topics that’s come up in my interviews is that a lot of coaches will start to think about people in their community that they can refer to if there are clients that need extra support. But you know, since coaches and clients could be spread out across the country, that can be really difficult. So even just sending.

coaching clients to look at like psychology today online and just trying to find a clinician in their area that meets their needs and is licensed in their state. That can be a really useful resource. Yeah, being able to refer. And one of the things that comes up, this is kind of like an interesting nuance is that, in coaching, we don’t tell people what to do. I’m not sure if we really talked about that before, but we…

Jess (42:29.326)
Not yet.

Shoshana Belisle (42:30.87)
We, in coaching, we don’t instruct, we don’t necessarily educate, we don’t tell people what to do, we create a partnership and we…

elicit the individual’s own ideas and resources about how to solve a problem. So the same thing can be relevant in a referral situation. If a client needs a referral, sometimes it’s better not to say, please call this person. I have this person on my list. It could be more about having a coaching conversation around that individual finding their own resource that works for them. Sort of putting on the coaching hat.

in terms of finding additional support? Like I’m getting the sense that we’re treading into water that may be like beyond my scope and you know what kind of support can you envision for yourself that would be an adjunct or you know would help to bolster or enhance the work that we’re doing together and address these things that seem to be coming up a lot? That kind of question.

Jess (43:44.174)
Yeah, I never thought about it like that, which is kind of ironic because I guess like in the moment in the session, like those thoughts do come up for me. Like with that nutrition client in particular, the next session I had with her, I asked her how she felt she was doing and how her relationship with food has changed if she feels it has. And she was able to say like, it’s been amazing and that she doesn’t have a fear around food anymore. And like all these positive things that I didn’t even need to bring up the…

maybe we should look into extra help. Because it was she was in this place of I’m thriving and I can see all the growth that I’ve made. And it wasn’t it wasn’t even something that we had to talk about because I was like, amazing. What can we do next to even continue this growth further?

Shoshana Belisle (44:30.622)
Great coaching question.

Jess (44:34.254)
Yeah, thanks. When it comes to a breakdown of a session, I know it’s gonna definitely vary depending on the therapist and depending on the coach that you’re working with. I know I have my own experiences with me being the coach and then also with working with my coach and also working with my therapist. But what can someone expect during a session with a coach versus a session with a therapist?

Shoshana Belisle (45:00.118)
Well, again, this is going to differ based on the training and orientation of each provider or partner. We’ve talked before about how coaching tends to be a little bit more structured. So in my training, when we start a coaching session,

we’re setting an agenda. Like, what are the things we’re going to be talking about today? What’s your priority? What are you hoping to achieve as an outcome from our session? How would you know that this session has been successful? Those kinds of questions. So there’s like a really deliberate setting of an agenda and deciding what you’re going to talk about and the goals you’re wishing to achieve, not just for the coaching agreement as a whole,

but for that particular session. So whereas in the kind of therapy that I’ve offered, we don’t necessarily do that. The person will show up, we’ll talk about what’s going on, may talk about what happened yesterday, what they’re planning for tomorrow. It’s a little bit less organized, but hopefully there will be an arc.

of checking in, exploring how the person’s feeling, what’s coming up, what needs to be processed, and ideally resolving some aspect of an issue before the conclusion of the session. But it’s a little bit more freeform, I would say.

These are broad generalizations and different coaches and therapists may have different ways of describing it, but I think the allegiance to structure is one of the biggest differentiators.

Jess (47:04.014)
Yeah. I, with my personal experience with my clients as the coach is there is structure to it. So that’s, there’s going to be some type of agenda. And usually with my clients, they don’t know what it is because as a coach for 20 somethings, like I am providing tools for them, but how we’ll do it is we’ll do a recap. Like what has happened within the last week since we last spoke? Like, what can we celebrate? Did you do your action steps?

If you didn’t, what happened and start to like rework some things. And then we’ll talk about any obstacles or challenges that came up like, I had a mental breakdown because I looked in the mirror and I just thought I looked fat and it was a really bad day. And we get to, we had to talk about that of what can we do differently next time so that this doesn’t repeat itself. Sometimes those, that obstacle portion of the session takes up the whole rest of the session. And it’s more so of, I have tools that if there’s time.

I will provide them because those tools will help you with your goals, your overarching goals that we set upfront when we first start this partnership. Whereas those obstacles are real life in the moment things that are going to keep happening and we want to nip it in the butt. So it’s, there’s never a wrong way to go into the session if the client, cause it’s always what the client needs in that moment. And as a coach, like I’m going to be flexible and lean into that, not being like, my God, no, we have to cover this today. Otherwise it’s not a good session. Like no.

It’s what does this client need and how can we best support them so that it’s either helping them in this present moment with a current obstacle or helping them with a future one or helping progress them towards their goals and what that looks like. But there is a set structure no matter what to how we approach it. And I also tell my clients when they’re when they’re new to it is the biggest difference is that I’m coming to the session ready to talk to you. Like I’m the one that’s.

kind of steering a little bit. And I’m going to let you take the driver’s seat at times, but know that there’s a plan underneath it all. Whereas with therapy, it is that more fluid of the client does the talking, like the client comes and is like, well, this happened. Okay, let’s talk about it. And the therapist in there like we need to talk about what happened when you were 14 years old. And like, it’s a lot more in the moment, but knowing your past.

Jess (49:26.19)
and how that is resurfacing based off of an undesirable experience that keeps reoccurring.

Shoshana Belisle (49:31.926)
Mm hmm. Yeah, learning from the past. Yeah, it’s interesting. Like, we, we like to think of coaching as being very like, client focus, which it is, but, but it really is the responsibility of the coach to hold the container to like hold the structure.

of the session. And then the client brings the content, brings their goals and desires and issues that are coming up. But it’s really the coach that’s holding the space. And then I’d say you’re probably right. A lot of the time in therapy, the client is…

is sort of guiding the way and the therapist will kind of go along with and see where it goes and work through whatever arises with wherever the client goes. And maybe write a little deeper, pardon?

Jess (50:26.893)
Yeah, it’s kind of.

Yeah. Yeah. So sometimes I’ll have client sessions and the client had a great week and there’s no obstacles to talk about and we just kind of breeze right through and it’s like, they don’t have anything else to say. It’s like, great, here’s a tool. Let’s work on this together. How can we apply it to your life and move you forward? Whereas like in therapy, if I’m like, I have nothing to say right now, it’s a lot harder to have a session because there’s not much that for the therapist to work off of if I’m like,

I don’t know, I’m just kind of existing right now. Nothing good, nothing bad happened. Cool. And it’s more of a slower conversation. At least that’s what I’ve had in my experiences where some therapy sessions, I’m like, I don’t think I really needed therapy today. Like that there was nothing for me to talk about. Whereas other times I’m like, my God, I needed this session so bad. There was so much I had to say. So it really it varies. But yeah, I will say, I like that you said that like,

coaches or coach wellness coaches, coaches in general are in charge of holding that container and having that structure move through the session in a very nice, easy, but formatted way and therapy is more fluid.

Shoshana Belisle (51:37.814)
Yeah, and not to say that therapists aren’t holding a container too. I mean, they really are holding a container and they are entering this space with the client. But I think the container is maybe broader and like depending on the style, like less directive. I mean, just to be clear, there are styles of therapy that are very directive.

But I’m speaking about what we typically think of as talk therapy, you know. Yeah.

Jess (52:07.566)
Yeah. How can someone begin to do their own research behind finding a therapist or a coach that is the right fit for them?

Shoshana Belisle (52:20.726)
Well, they can listen to all the awesome podcasts. That can be a great way to start. So I mentioned these credentialing organizations and that’s one place to go. If you’re looking for a health and wellness coach, you might look at the national board for health and wellness coaching, or if you’re looking for a coach with a different kind of orientation, you might look at the international coaching federation and they’ll have their databases of coaches. I mean, you can look, you know, do a search on

on LinkedIn and see what shows up. I would say for finding a coach, it’s particularly important to do your research to figure out if this coach has been trained in a way that you feel comfortable with and has experience and potentially even has been able to demonstrate their effectiveness in a certain area.

Shoshana Belisle (53:21.878)
But those are some of the resources that I think would be useful. Maybe finding out whose voice you resonate most with on social media, but then again, doing your research to make sure that this person has in fact been trained at a coaching institute that is reputable, things like that.

Jess (53:45.422)
Mm hmm. I think it’s also important to go into this research. No, because research could even be asking your friends, but go into it knowing what are you looking for? What do you need help with? Or what do you want to improve on? And then find someone that matches that. And an example I’ll give is when I first started therapy in the fall, I

asked my best friend, we’re very similar. And she raved about her therapist. And I was like, great, send me your information. Because if she’s a good fit for you, she’ll be a good fit for me. Not a good fit for me, did not really help me with what it is I needed help with. And when I talked to my friend about it, I was explaining a little bit of my frustrations and that I think I need a new one. And she mentioned, I go to her because I just really need a place to vent. And I was like, I don’t need a place to vent. I actually need help with these things. So had I started it,

with I need a therapist to help me with this, she probably would not have recommended her therapist. But now I have one that does help me with what it is that I was looking for. So and it’s the same thing with coaching of go into it of what am I trying to improve on? Is it I want to lose weight? Is that I want to build muscle? Is it I want to be a good parent? Is it I want to get my shit together? Like, there are certain coaches with certain niches and specializations for those things. Like there is a

a coach for everything. You just need to find who you resonate with and who’s going to help you with what it is you’re looking for.

Shoshana Belisle (55:16.022)
Exactly. I think really getting clear on, on like the keywords is going to be important. You know, there’s so many different coaches out there. There’s so many different therapists out there doing that little bit of reflection, like what it is that I, you know, what do I hope to achieve or what’s the style of relating that’s important to me? Or, you know, is the, is the background or, you know,

Is the identity of the therapist or coach important to me? Do I want to align with certain aspects of that person’s identity? Thankfully, we, you know, in psychology today, for example, you can search from, you know, with all these different types of filters to figure out who’s going to be the best fit for you. And then still, maybe interview a few people, have a few consultation calls, see where you feel the most.

degree of fit, the highest degree of fit. One thing I like to reference in my research on coaching and therapy is that the quality of the relationship is key. It’s even more important than the style of work that a coach or therapist does. The biggest predictor of success in therapy and in coaching is the quality of the relationship.

So it’s really important that you find someone that you gel with, that you feel really comfortable with, where you know that you can have a really effective partnership. Even if that means interviewing several people or trying for a few sessions and if it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work and move on, find somebody else and that’s okay. You trust your.

Jess (56:56.718)
I agree.

Jess (57:07.31)
Yeah. I know with coaching, at least the way our coach preaches it is doing a lot of free events so that you get a feel for our personality and for our styles. And then it’s also having a discovery call, like a get to know you type call before even talking about cost and agreeing to work together. It’s having, it’s, we establish a relationship with you first so that both of us kind of get to get a feel for each other because it works two ways. Coaching is a partnership.

Therapy, it is more of a you need the actual session. I know most therapists, I have yet to meet a single therapist where it’s just a free hour long call with them to see if you mesh well. It’s usually like you just get started right away and see, but you’re also not confined into a contract. So there’s some differences within that, but it really matters who you vibe well with and who you can trust and who you get along with and who you believe in.

what you’re going to believe is coming out of their mouth too, that they talk to you about things like, do you trust this person solely based off of the energy they give too? It’s, there’s a lot of factors at play and it’s okay to hop around. You’re, it’s not a, it’s like dating. You’re not going to marry the first person you go on a first date with. You are allowed to see what else is out there and what’s going to fit you the best.

Shoshana Belisle (58:30.646)
Exactly. Goodness of fit is really key. And trust your instincts. Do your research, try it out, trust your instincts, and feel confident in yourself that if you need to change your mind, that’s perfectly fine.

Jess (58:50.382)
Yeah, you’re allowed to change your mind. All right, is there any final message or piece of advice that you want to give to the 20 somethings listening who know they need some kind of support or help but aren’t sure which one to go with?

Shoshana Belisle (58:52.534)
You’re not just…

Shoshana Belisle (59:11.926)
So I think the biggest piece of advice I’d like to offer is that if you have an instinct that you need support, please listen to that instinct and find it. Find support. Sometimes, friends, family, peers.

advisors, mentors, all these people in our lives, they can be some degree of support, but oftentimes it’s not enough and you need a confidential, safe, objective space in which to explore the things that are pressing in your life. So if you feel like you need it, please go get it. If you feel like what you’re struggling with is really

impacting your daily life. You know, if you’re having a really hard time dealing with the responsibilities of daily life with work, family, whatever is going on, if it’s, if it’s a real struggle, you probably are going to want to consider looking into therapy. It’s probably a safer option. But if you’re feeling kind of like pretty good, life is okay. Maybe you’re feeling a little blah.

And you have this sense that something more awaits you, that there are goals out there that you want to achieve, experiences you want to have, things you want to harness. Find a coach who can help you move from where you are to where you want to go. So,

That’s a piece of advice I’d like to offer.

Shoshana Belisle (01:01:01.174)
And also know that if you start working with a coach and things are going okay, but maybe they take a turn at some point, a trained coach is generally going to be able to refer you to an appropriate resource if you need it. So you can also trust that even if you don’t know or think that you need therapy right now and you go see a coach, if you…

find that you need therapy that will typically come up in the process and you’ll be able to redirect and move into that world if you need it. But.

thinking for another minute if I have other advice.

Shoshana Belisle (01:01:50.646)
There is no shame in getting support. It’s really important that we build our team. We get all the hands on deck. We find all the people who are going to help inspire us and move us in the direction that we want to go. So be conscious about building that team. Put the people on your team that you really believe in, that you know are going to be able to.

help you grow and develop and evolve as a person.

Jess (01:02:24.75)
know that the best kind of investment you could ever make is the one in yourself. As cheesy as that sounds.

Shoshana Belisle (01:02:31.03)
Absolutely. Hallelujah to that.

Jess (01:02:34.158)
All right. I’m choking now. Give me one second. Wow. Amazing Shoshana. This was all so valuable and I know this will help so many people on their own growth journeys and even healing journeys and just bring some clarity to the world of life coaching as it is a fairly new industry. So thank you for sharing your expertise and being a guest on How to 20 something.

Shoshana Belisle (01:02:38.87)
Thanks.

Shoshana Belisle (01:03:02.55)
This has been a pleasure. Thank you so much for engaging me in this conversation. And yeah, thank you.

Jess (01:03:12.014)
Of course. Where can people find you if they have more questions or even learn more about your dissertation or the work that you do?

Shoshana Belisle (01:03:22.358)
Thank you for asking. My website is flexiwellness .com so they can find me there. I am most active, I’d say, on LinkedIn. So you’d find me under Shoshana Belial on LinkedIn. So yeah, I’m happy to have conversations with anyone interested in therapy versus coaching or finding the right support.

Jess (01:03:49.134)
Great. And you guys know by now that that will all be linked in the show notes for you to access. But hopefully now you have a better understanding behind what therapy is and what coaching is and which one is going to support you the best with what you want to work on right now. And you know that I will always be a resource to help you feel more confident around any area of your life from your nutrition to your exercise, your relationships, career and adulting in general.

All you have to do is book a road to success call with me that is also linked in the show notes where it says let’s chat. Otherwise, this does conclude another episode of how to 20 something. If you liked what you heard, please share it, pass it along to a friend, post on social media, do something to help me reach a wider audience. And I can’t wait to be in your headphones again next week with another brand new episode.

Peace out.