A newsletter made just for coaches like you...a space designed to elevate your skills, strengthen your confidence, and keep you connected to the evidence-based heart of our profession. Whether you’re just beginning your coaching journey or advancing toward the NBHWC credential and beyond, this newsletter will deliver the tools, insights, and support you need to grow with purpose.
Each month, you’ll find practical skill-building tips, research-based guidance, cohort announcements, NBHWC-exam study support, and resources you can use immediately in your coaching sessions.
Our mission is simple: to help you master your craft, stay inspired, and feel empowered as a leader in the field of professional health and wellness coaching.
Let’s grow, learn, and lead...together.
Skill Builder of the Month: Using Metaphors
Listen to how clients describe a stuck place and you'll notice they rarely describe it literally.
I'm spinning my wheels. I hit a wall. I'm treading water. I'm white-knuckling it. I'm carrying all of it. I keep falling off the wagon.
Every one of those is insight and coaches have the privilege of receiving these nuggets of wisdom. The client has just handed you a picture of their experience that is more precise, more emotionally loaded, and more useful than anything they'd produce if you asked them to simply explain the problem. The skill is noticing it, and then resisting the urge to change it.
The mistake? Most of us translate. A client says I'm spinning my wheels and we reply, "So you're feeling like you're not making progress." Accurate, but flatter. The metaphor had traction, mud, effort, and a stuck vehicle in it. The translation has none of that, and the client now has to do the work of getting back to their own image.
Try staying inside it instead. Reflect the phrase back in their words, then ask a question that relates to the same image:
- "Spinning your wheels. What would traction look like?"
- "You hit a wall. What do you know about this wall?"
- "You're carrying all of it. What's the heaviest thing you're carrying?"
Clients almost always go somewhere they wouldn't have gone otherwise.
Coaches must ensure they don't hijack the statement. If you offer your own metaphor, offer it lightly and hand it straight back: "It's landing for me a bit like a tug of war. Does that fit, or is it something else?" A client who politely adopts your image has stopped working on their own experience and started working on yours.
Notice when a metaphor is doing damage. I'm broken. It's a war with my body. I'm the problem. Those are images to examine. "You said broken. Is that how it feels all the time, or only in certain moments?"
Practice this week: In every session, write down the exact figurative phrase each client uses. Their words, not your paraphrase. Don't do anything with it at first. Just collect the information. By the end of the week, you'll have a page of them to reflect on.
If this is an area you want to go deeper in, look into David Grove's Clean Language work. It explores an entire questioning method built around staying in the client's own imagery.
Coaching Asset: Close the Year Strong
Ask most people how the last three months of the year go and you'll get some version of the same answer: "I'll start again in January" or "C'mon, it's the holidays. I have to live a little."
October through December tend to hold a much lower bar of expectations, making it the perfect time to boost our client's self-efficacy with a challenge. Provide the accountability and/or peer support, watch them flourish during the holiday months, and then help them to notice how much further ahead they are on January 1st as opposed to previous years.
The premise is simple. October 1 through December 31 is about 90 days. Invite your clients - individually or as a small group - to choose one behavior they'll hold onto through the messiest quarter of the year, and then build a little structure around it. Make it playful, fun, and festive...not just something else to add to their plate.
The Basics:
- One goal or habit: The client picks something small enough to survive a holiday week, and specific enough to answer yes or no to each day. Resist the urge to hand them a program. The last 3 months of the year are chaotic and to-do list heavy already.
- A finish line: Most goals are open-ended, which is why they erode. An end date changes the question from "Can I keep this up forever?" to "Can I do this until December 31?"
- A weekly check-in: Fifteen minutes, or even a group thread. What worked, what didn't, and how will they pivot, if necessary. Want to get real fancy? Give them a tracking tool and make it colorful!
- A restart rule: Decide on day one what happens after a missed day, because there will be missed days during this season. "I get back to it the next morning" prevents an extra piece of pie at Thanksgiving from ruining the whole thing.
- A celebration: A final session, a group call, a reflection prompt, etc. Something that makes December 31 something to celebrate ahead of the new year. This creates excitement for launching into new goals in 2027.
A word of caution: A fall challenge can slide very easily into holiday diet culture. Maintain a message of consistency and follow-through, let clients define success in their own terms, and steer away from anything that makes the number on the scale the scoreboard.
On the business side: A 90-day challenge intentionally fills a quarter that's usually your quietest, gives lapsed clients a low-commitment way back in, and puts a natural conversation about January coaching packages at the forefront. Your clients end the year feeling capable and confident, and you start the new year with renewed client contracts. Cheers to 2027!
Don't delay....launch this now so your clients have time to prepare. Invite them to build their own accountabilty by gathering friends/coworkers/family members, etc to join in the fun. Remember...October is right around the corner. Play around with some catchy names and get moving!
Coaching Asset: Click Here to See a Worksheet Template
Fall 2026 Coaching Cohort
Live sessions begin tomorrow, 9/17! This is the last chance to become certified in 2026. Join us today.
Enroll Now: www.expertcoachcenter.org/store
Check out our new pricing tiers: www.expertcoachcenter.org/pricing-tiers
NBHWC Exam Study Hub
Testing in the fall of 2026? We offer a digital study course, study guide, and a peer-led study cohort. Check out our study opportunities here.
Congratulations to our graduates who passed the most recent NBHWC exam. All students from our peer-led study cohort passed the exam and we couldn't be more proud!
Our next study cohort kicks off on Sunday, October 11th. Sessions are held on Sundays from 5-7pm cst through the end of November. Join us to amplify your study strategies and gain accountability through peer interactions.
Are your CE credits due September 30th? Check out our Continuing Education courses. We have a wide variety of options available. All courses are self-paced and offer automatic certificates upon completion. Topics include: Active Listening, Empathy, Balance, Nutrition, Relationships, Gender Diversity, Adolescent Coaching, and Coaching Case Studies. Also, check our our business-building courses below!
Check our the courses at www.expertcoachcenter.org/cec
Building Your Coaching Business: Did you hear?
Expert Coach Center is collaborating with Coach Business Training to offer 5 individual courses, including options to bundle! All approved by the NBHWC for continuing education credits.
Courses include:
AI Powered Marketing (3 CECs; $87)
Building Collaborative Referral Networks (3 CECs; $87)
Time Management and Productivity for Solo Entrepreneurs (4 CECs; $97)
Launching your Business (11 CECs; $287)
Applied Business Launch 1:1 Coaching (6 CECs; $597)
Instructor: Karin Mayer, NBC-HWC, ICF ACC
Check out our NBHWC-approved business-building courses here.
Join Us:
Fall Office Hours: Wednesdays 1-2pm cst beginning September 2, 2026
Join ECC staff to bounce ideas, ask questions, and build community.
Zoom Link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/87621683470
(No office hours the week of Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years.)
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Click Here to offer suggestions for content you would like to see in this monthly newsletter from Expert Coach Center!
Until next time, happy coaching!
~Holly Miller, Owner of Expert Coach Center
