Allow me to introduce myself.

Hi, I’m Kristy! For lack of a better title, I call myself a coach. Never did like that term–these days, it’s such an overused buzz word, and people equate it to therapy, which it’s not. Here’s what I am: I’m a catalyst.

A velvet hammer. A keeper of dreams. A truth-as-I-see-it teller. A perspective detective. A mirror. Mostly, I’m an eternal optimist who gets a charge out of helping people on their unique quest for growth.

Wanna know how I think about life, work, and coaching?  Read on.

I’m a big believer in writing your own game plan for life, work, relationships, or play. There is some weird agenda out there in the world about The Way Things Are Done, and I for one don’t really subscribe to it. I think you can decide your own way to live, and as long as you do it with integrity and honesty with yourself and others, then you should.

I’m a fan of people who decide get off the beaten path, who get curious about life outside of the usual routine, who are willing to take some risk for the sheer enjoyment of new experiences, learning, growth, and for the satisfaction and reward of following their gut and heart rather than a well-worn rut through life.

When I talk about success and big thinking, I mean it in a very specific way. I mean it in the sense of living in your own personal best zone, your sweet spot. For some, that may mean being the next Mother Teresa. For others, it’s living off the grid as a hermit in a self-sustaining world. It really has nothing to do with the external stuff—it’s more about, do you know what it is that truly satisfies you and are you living it in your day-to-day existence?

I don’t really think there’s any such thing as Truth with a capital T. I think there’s the way you view things, the beliefs you hold that may or may not be true, the experiences you’ve had that shape how you make sense of things, and things you’ve learned that might be relevant in some circumstances, but aren’t necessarily universally true.

I think that the distinction between leadership coaching and life coaching is a false one. While I tend to work with people around questions related to their work and career, the reality is that I help people with personal development, with who they are as a person in the context of their work, their hobbies, their families and so forth. The business or career is just the wrapping on the package—the real work is about you, no matter what your circumstances may look like.

I’m way more interested in searching for the root of a problem and working towards sustainable change, rather than dealing with the symptoms to get some temporary relief. In coaching, this means I’m always looking deeper, trying to find the connection between the thing you want help with and the core belief or habit that sustains the problem.

Here are my official credentials:

• I earned a Master’s Degree in Applied Behavioral Science from the Leadership Institute of Seattle at Bastyr University. This was perhaps one of the most amazing and personally challenging periods of my life, and I am continually grateful for the learning I had there and for the ongoing relationships in my life that began there.

• I earned my Certified Co-Active Coach credentials through the Coaches Training Institute. Because why stop with just a master’s degree, right? This is one of the best coaching programs around, rigorous and thorough—the gold standard in the world of coaching.

• I’m an Associate Certified Coach with the International Coaches Federation. They’re one of the largest ethics and standards organizations for the coaching profession. These days, with everybody and their dog hanging out a shingle and calling themselves a coach, having this extra alphabet after my name is an extra dose of assurance to you that I’m the real deal.

And here’s some random things about me that you might also find interesting:

• I created and ran a fairly good-sized, successful business for many years, so I have personal experience of what it means to be an entrepreneur.

• I’ve been self-employed my entire adult life, other than my first job as an apprentice right out of beauty school.

• That’s right, beauty school. I spent many years as a hairstylist, which was great unofficial training for being a coach. It’s made me uniquely gifted in working with and understanding people.

• Speaking of the hair thing: no, I don’t want to talk to you about your hair. Though I do love fashion and any creative, artistic endeavor. Including hair.

• I’ve traveled a bunch, often by myself, mostly in foreign countries. So dealing with things that are unknown and unfamiliar doesn’t scare me. Usually.

• I can be pretty direct when I need to. With me, you can trust that I’ll call it like I see it.

• I love food. I love eating it, I love cooking it, I love growing it, I love shopping for it, you name it. Foodfoodfoodfoodfood. Yay, food!

• Thank goodness I’m also pretty sporty—it balances out the food thing. I bike, run, scuba dive, hike, and ski, among other things.

• I’m fairly irreverent. I can be a bit of a smartass at times, and I find humor and irony everywhere.

• I’ve been known to swear on occasion. If that’s a problem for you, I apologize in advance.

• I’m completely human (but you guessed that, right?) This means I have blind spots along with strengths just like anyone else. I struggle with the same things anyone else struggles with. So I have complete compassion and empathy for the people I coach.

So.  Enough about me. Even though we’re on the official About Me page.

It’s nice to meet you, and I hope you’ll check back in from time to time.  I update this blog regularly, with new posts, workshop announcements, great books to add to the reading list, and so on.  I’d love to hear from you, whether it’s via email, Facebook, Twitter, or even a phone call (yeah, I know.  Old school.)

And of course, you can always hire me as your coach.  I’m just sayin’.