When a Coach Fully Claims Her Authentic Way
I spent last week traveling and reconnecting with coach friends, some of whom I've known for years. There's something about being in a room full of brilliant people who care about deep work and doing things with their whole hearts.
But one moment in particular has stayed with me long after I arrived home, unpacked, and settled back into my routine.
A colleague shared a closing reflection at the end of our group time together, and it was breathtaking. Not because of the specific words she used, but because of her presence and clarity.
She glowed.
She wasn't trying to be impressive or brag about how good things were for her. She spoke with this calm, grounded energy that made it so obvious she wasn't just talking about her work; she was truly living it.
She had claimed her authentic way of doing her work.
Why So Many New Coaches Feel Like They're Performing Instead of Coaching
I've known this coach for a long time. I've had many conversations with her when she felt intimidated, stuck, or unsure about how to share her services in a way that felt good. I've listened to her frustration about posting on social media, her hesitation around putting herself out there, and her resistance to strategies that felt like they were built for someone else.
And I've been there too. There were many years when I was caught in the loop of shoulds, trying to follow the rules, replicate what worked for someone else, and show up in ways that never felt quite right for me. The results? Disconnected. Scattered. Pretending. (Ouch, that one is hard to admit out loud.) And second-guessing everything.
This is one of the most common struggles I see in coaches, especially in the first few years. You invest in training. You learn powerful tools. And then you get out into the world and immediately start looking around at what everyone else is doing, convinced that their way is the way it's supposed to look.
So you try to write posts the way someone told you to. You build a website that sounds like every other coaching website. You follow a marketing formula that makes you feel like you're wearing someone else's clothes.
And you wonder why it feels heavy. Why the clients aren't coming. Why you dread the thing you were so excited about six months ago.
It's not because you're bad at coaching. It's because you're performing instead of leading from who you actually are.
How to Know If You're Building Someone Else's Coaching Business
This is worth pausing on, because the signs are often subtle. You might not realize you've drifted into someone else's blueprint until the disconnection gets loud enough to notice.
Are you following a strategy that feels draining every time you sit down to do it? Do you post on social media out of obligation rather than genuine desire to share? When you describe your coaching, does it sound like you, or does it sound like a template? Are you doing things because someone told you "this is how it works," even though it doesn't feel right in your body? Do you find yourself comparing your approach to other coaches and always coming up short?
If any of that landed, it's not a problem with your work ethic or your coaching skills. It's a misalignment between who you are and how you're trying to show up. And the fix isn't to try harder at the thing that doesn't fit. The fix is to come back to yourself.
Start with Your Values, Not Someone Else's Strategy
My colleague didn't find her glow by following a better marketing plan. She found it by asking herself four honest questions: What am I good at? What do I know? How do I want to work? What kind of business do I want to build?
And then she went for it.
This is the foundation. Before you build a single strategy, you need to know what matters most to you, in life and in your coaching practice. Where do you feel friction in your work? Where does it feel like you're living out of alignment with what you actually care about?
Your values aren't a nice-to-have. They're the architecture. When your business is built on your values, decisions get simpler. You stop agonizing over what to post because you know what you stand for. You stop saying yes to clients who aren't a fit because you know what kind of work lights you up. You stop performing because you're finally building something that's yours.
Reconnect to the Reason You Started Coaching in the First Place
When things feel heavy or scattered, it's almost always because you've lost touch with your mission. Not the polished version on your website. The raw one. The reason you said yes to this work in the first place.
Why are you doing this? What future are you building? What do you want to be true about the way you spend your days?
When you center your mission, you create a practice that energizes you, and that energy is what resonates with the right clients. People don't hire coaches because of a perfectly optimized Instagram grid. They hire coaches whose clarity and conviction they can feel. The coaching industry is growing rapidly, with the International Coaching Federation reporting significant year-over-year increases in both coaches and clients globally. There is room for you. But only the version of you that's actually you.
Learn the Difference Between Fear and Misalignment
This is one of the most important distinctions a coach can learn, and it applies to how you build your business just as much as how you coach your clients.
Posting online might feel scary because it's new. That's fear, and fear is a normal, predictable part of doing something unfamiliar. Your nervous system is doing its job. You move through fear by taking the action anyway, gently, with support.
But if the format, tone, or approach feels heavy, draining, or fundamentally off-brand, that's not fear. That's repulsion. That's your body telling you this isn't your way.
One is a protective response you move through. The other is a misalignment you move away from.
Knowing the difference will save you years of forcing yourself into boxes that were never built for you. When something feels scary and exciting, lean in. When something feels like dread every single time, stop asking yourself to push harder and start asking whether this is even the right path.
Build Your Coaching Practice Around Your Natural Energy
Do you love writing? Speaking? Hosting small in-person gatherings? Taking beautiful photos? Coaching at the whiteboard? Going deep in one-on-one conversations?
Your business should reflect your natural energy, not someone else's strengths.
The coach I watched glow that day had stopped outsourcing her energy to expert advice and rigid success formulas. She dropped the "you should do it this way" approach and started building from what she was naturally good at, what she genuinely enjoyed, and how she actually wanted to spend her days.
I could see the shift not just in her results (though yes, she's signing clients), but in how she carried herself. She looked free. Aligned. Magnetic. She was glowing.
And it reminded me: this is what I want for all of us. To get to this place.
Name the "Shoulds" That Are Running Your Business
Where are you doing things because you think you have to? Whose advice are you following without questioning whether it fits? Whose voice are you afraid of disappointing?
These questions matter, because the shoulds are often invisible. They disguise themselves as "best practices" and "what works." But best practices built for someone else's personality, audience, and energy will always feel like borrowed clothes on you.
Just because you haven't seen it done your way doesn't mean it can't be done. You get to go first.
This is what I love helping coaches do inside the Golden Coaching Certification Program™. I don't train carbon-copy coaches who all sound the same. I train women who lead with integrity, who want to coach the whole human, not just reframe thoughts. Women who build practices that reflect who they actually are, not who they think they're supposed to be.
It starts with self-coaching, because you can't lead someone else to a place you haven't been willing to go yourself. And it ends with a woman who trusts her own voice, her own way, and her own expertise enough to stop looking around and start leading.
I'd love to be part of that process for you.
Learn more about the certification →
With immense appreciation & gratitude. Always.
About Katie Pulsifer
Katie Pulsifer is a Master Certified Life Coach and the founder of the Golden Coaching Certification Program™, a training program for women who want to learn how to compassionately coach themselves and others to create extraordinary results. She specializes in working with high-achieving women who look great on paper but feel unfulfilled, helping them rebuild self-trust, make aligned decisions, and stop postponing the life they actually want. Katie's coaching is grounded in neuroscience, radical self-responsibility, and the belief that your worth is inherent, not earned.
Read how Katie went from the bathroom floor to building her own certification.
