Most of the labels we carry were handed to us before we could choose them, and many coaches keep wearing them because the known feels safer than an unknown future. The way forward is to examine each label, decide on purpose which ones travel with you into tomorrow, and listen to your own language, because fixed phrases are usually where the stuckness lives.
"You lose sight of who you really are because you're using yesterday's container as your identity for today."Adam Roach · I Love Coaching Podcast
Take the scorecard at ilovecoachingco.com/scorecard and ask Adam's question as you answer: is what I'm offering really mine, and is it authentic to me? Then name one label you have been wearing from your past and decide, on purpose, whether it comes with you into tomorrow.
Show Notes + Resources
What You'll Learn
- Why leaning on a past title or credential feels safe, and what it costs you right now
- The difference between borrowed authority and your own, and how to tell which one you are using
- How fixed phrases like "I'm not a tech person" turn into brick walls, and how to reword them
- Why praising the process instead of the label ("you're smart") changes how people respond to hard things
- How metacognition and the deep dive "why" questions slow down fast-thinking clients without labeling them
- Why visionaries who want exponential growth can't get there with linear, fixed thinking
- Why identity can't be built in a silo, and what a good reflective community gives you
Resources Mentioned
- Be Your Future Self Now by Benjamin Hardy
- Mindset by Carol Dweck
- Coaching offer scorecard: ilovecoachingco.com/scorecard
- Virtual three-day Sellable Offer Challenge and live workshops: ilovecoachingco.com/events
- Instagram: @ilovecoachingco / @adamrroach / @thejesswebber
Timestamps
- [00:00] Intro: Clark Kent, Bruce Wayne, and the identity question
- [01:41] Professionals entering coaching in yesterday's container
- [01:56] Jess's 20-year reunion: who kept the labels
- [03:00] Borrowed authority and imposter syndrome
- [04:04] Labels we were given vs. labels we choose
- [05:14] Letting go of yesterday (and Be Your Future Self Now)
- [06:36] The 11 p.m. aha in the car
- [08:12] Why building in a silo keeps labels sticky
- [09:24] Carol Dweck's Mindset: fixed vs. growth language
- [10:43] Spotting fixed language in yourself and your clients
- [12:50] What Jess caught herself saying to her five-year-old
- [14:14] Spotting borrowed authority vs. your own
- [15:25] Metacognition: slowing down fast thinkers
- [16:01] Using the deep dive and three amigo questions
- [17:32] Macro to micro: the Angel Oak root system
- [19:17] Why speed and linear thinking collide with exponential goals
- [20:20] "I'm not good at tech" and why AI isn't optional
- [22:10] Landing the plane: books, events, scorecard
- [24:05] Bonus point: identity can't be built in a silo
The I Love Coaching Podcast is hosted by Adam Roach and Jess Webber of I Love Coaching Co. New episodes drop biweekly wherever you listen to podcasts.