I've been a health and wellness coach* for two years, and have consistently found that most people don't know what this coaching is or why they might choose it for themselves.

So, what does a health and wellness coach do?

As your H&W coach, I will:
1. Trust and believe in your ability to grow and change.
2. Listen deeply, with compassion, and without judgment.
3. Encourage you to envision your best self - this is called a Vision and Values Statement.
4. Assist in your creating goals and action steps based on your vision statement. 
5. Help you explore and achieve behavior and habit changes you choose for yourself.
6. Offer a gentle accountability for your action steps.
7. Help you understand why habits are so hard to change, and what you can do to help yourself make those changes.
8. Explain my techniques and processes so that you will, in effect, learn to coach yourself.

For example, you may envision yourself as being healthy enough to travel. I'd help you dream a little: 
* what would be better about your life if you could travel?
* how would you change for the better with more travel?
* imagine yourself traveling to your favorite place - how will you feel? what will you do there?

Then, we'd create goals for change by asking certain questions:
* what's standing in the way of you traveling now?
* what needs to change in your life so you can start traveling?
* what habits might you have that keep you less healthy?

Our sessions together will be a process of choosing your most important goal and creating weekly or daily action steps - small, baby steps - toward reaching that goal.

All the while, we'll keep your ultimate vision - to be healthy enough to travel - in front of us as a guide and inspiration.


* Certificate from Georgetown University's School of Transformative Studies Health and Wellness Certification Program; national certification from NBC-HWC. 

So many of my clients tell me they're chronically tired because of work and life requirements, and because they don't sleep well. They struggle with insomnia, or at the very least, with difficulties getting to sleep and staying asleep.

This is about what's now called sleep hygiene, which encompasses all your habits and processes around sleeping. There's a lot of common wisdom about sleep hygiene, and the five tips below are adapted from a CDC document entitled TIPS FOR BETTER SLEEP. The pdf is HERE.

1. Their first tip is about CONSISTENCY. For good sleep hygiene, you want to be going to bed at the same time every night, and getting up at the same time every morning.

2. Make your bedroom QUIET, DARK, RELAXING, and a COMFORTABLE TEMPERATURE --- usually on the cool side is best for sleeping.

3. Take away all electronic devices. This seems to be the hardest step for many of us. But at the very least, stop your screen watching, scrolling, and reading at least an hour before you go to bed. Don't use your cell phone for your wake-up alarm. Put the phone and the laptop or iPad outside your bedroom. 
a. HERE'S A LINK to an article about silent alarms.
b. HERE'S A LINK to ideas for old-fashioned, no-screen, no-LED display alarm clocks.

4. For 2 to 3-hours before bedtime, do not eat a large meal, or drink alcohol or caffeine. 

5. Getting some physical activity during the day is a great help for your sleep that night.