Stephen Lovegrove On Overcoming Adversity, Life Coaching, And Goalsetting
Stephen is nicknamed “America’s Life Coach”. His own discovery and building of self-awareness led him to the field of coaching others. Now he is one of the most powerful coaches in the world.
Beyond working with clients he creates incredible content and shares free information that can help anyone reinvent their life.
We talked for a while about growing up in a cult, breaking free to build his own future, goal setting and what it takes to be a successful life coach.
Overcoming Adversity Growing Up In A Cult
Stephen shared the incredibly challenging life experience he had growing up in a religious cult. It was tough because he was faced with internal conflict at twelve years old as he was learning what it meant to be gay.
But even more challenging, is what it meant to be gay within this religious context.
It’s an understatement to say that he environment he was growing up in was not at all supportive. In fact this led to him being kicked out of his childhood home.
He shares about this challenging period in life where coming out to friends and family did not feel like it was in the realm of possibility at the time.
One of the cool moments of our chat was Stephen sharing how all of us have things that we just intrinsically feel are impossible. We should explore those often because in all likelihood they are possible.
Living A Life Of Compassion
Stephen is not against specific people or groups of people. He is against the idea that we must put people at odds with each other based on ideology.
If people believe things differently from you, it does not mean they are wrong. It doesn’t not make them evil, and it does not mean something is wrong with them
We talked about this idea of being much more compassionate. Not necessarily accepting the things that people do. But understanding that people don’t just choose to be a certain way.
Everything a person is choosing makes sense, on some level, in their brain. Given the same circumstances and experiences, we would be in a similar position ourselves.
Instead of always seeking, or debating absolute, right answers based on certainty, we should approach beliefs as possibilities. We should approach any debate with an open mind and an open heart.
What Is The Goodlife?
Being obsessed with the classic big questions has been a big part of Stephen’s life. “Why are we here? What is life for? Why do bad things happen to good people? Etc.”
Much of our conversation was about topics of philosophy, spirituality, and psychology, Simply put, sometimes there are no answers to life’s greatest questions.
Some things require unknowns and mystery, and that’s ok.
Make The World Your Greatest Teacher
We talked a bit about learning growing up. Stephen shared that he loved to learn, but not necessarily school. He shared how he started enjoying formal education more once he decide to take learning and school and make it his own. He would create his own assignments, or get permission to do things that were different than what the teacher had assigned.
This is similar to how we should approach life and goal setting. If we want to learn something, or we want to head in a new direction, all of the information exists already.
We need to be the driver. We should choose what we want our next step to be. In order to live with alignment, you will have your own unique, current truth. Lean into learning about that direction, not stories from the past.
It was really powerful when Stephen shared his tips on being a life coach. Not only are these tips for coaches, but they will help anyone trying to better their own life too.
11 Tips For Life Coaching & Goalsetting
- Read the prosperous coach by Rich Litvin & Steve Chandler.
- Coaching has a low bar for entry and a high bar for success, be the person willing to meet that high bar.
- Always meet people and do work with them in the present, calm, mindful moment.
- Don’t let your sales, or marketing outperform your coaching. The coaching needs to measure up or be better than the ability to sell it.
- Stay connected to the needs and experiences of your clients because they evolve, shift and circumstances change.
- Coaching can be a rewarding and lucrative career, but only if you really want to build with integrity and values. Hold yourself accountable to serve from your heart and integrity to clear that high bar of success and you’ll do fine.
- You shouldn’t have unhappy clients because you should build your business on a strong foundation and the values of coaching itself, not the money.
- Don’t worry, or stress about the negativity of the industry. There will be bad coaches out there. It does not have anything to do with you. Be on your own journey. Focus on your improvement and your client’s goals.
- Decide to be grounded in doing work that you truly believe in, that is uniquely you, not just copying what other people do.
- Let others hold you accountable. Have a coaching relationship yourself. Be sure to always be a client yourself, no matter how much success you achieve.
- Be a lifelong learner when it comes to the craft of coaching and never stop working on yourself.
Memorable Quotes
“One of the greatest gifts in life is being exposed to someone else’s experience and perspective that is different than our own and that is always available to us.”
“It doesn’t work to build a life only out of the things you don’t want. There has to be a vision in front of you that pulls you forward.”
“There are always insights waiting in the questions, what do you really want and what part of you doesn’t want it?”
“Most of our loyalty, relationship struggles are not about the person, but the identity and belief. It’s not so much about the externals of cutting people off, because often times those ideas stick around. It’s about on an inner level making sure you can fully step into the new.”
“The biggest challenge, but often the biggest miracle is seeing yourself in a new way.”
“The biggest thing was releasing the idea that I needed to prove something.”
Guest Bio
America’s Life Coach, Stephen Lovegrove is one of the fastest-growing names in personal development. After a traumatic childhood as a gay child in a fundamentalist cult, Stephen restarted his life and created the life and business of his dreams.
Author of the international bestseller, “How to Find Yourself, Love Yourself, and Be Yourself: The Secret Instruction Manual for Being Human,” Stephen now supports entrepreneurs and entertainers in changing their lives from the inside out.
From Billboard chart toppers to household name CEOs to national television stars, Stephen is the go-to coach for influential people who need something to shift - and shift NOW.
With millions of fans globally on social media and repeatedly ranking as the number one life coach on Instagram, Stephen is a prolific media personality, featured in all of the major news and media outlets.
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