Therapeutically informed coaching

Lately, I’ve been reflecting on what the future of coaching might look like, particularly through the lens of my own journey. When I first decided to leave my 15-year career as a therapist in 2016 to step into coaching, I thought I had found my “forever” career—the work I’d do until I no longer wanted to work. Back then, the path forward felt clear: get training, build my practice, and keep doing what I loved indefinitely. However, as I’ve grown and evolved in this field, my perspective has shifted.
In the early years after coach training, I was trying to find my footing. Like many new coaches, I was focused on gaining hours, earning certifications, and figuring out how to make coaching financially viable. I wrestled with questions about my niche and whether I could establish credibility in spaces I hadn’t worked in before, especially corporate America. Having never held a position in a big company like Microsoft or Amazon, I wondered if I had what it took to work with leaders at that level.
But little by little, through an online coaching platform, I began gaining experience—and confidence. I found myself working with leaders across a range of levels (from individual contributors to first-time managers, seasoned directors, and even C-suite executives) and industries (non-profits, tech, pharma, entertainment, and more). This exposure broadened my perspective and helped me see that the core of leadership development wasn’t about knowing the corporate playbook—it was about helping people navigate the human challenges of leadership.
Over time, my work expanded: I became a mentor coach, trained as a coaching supervisor, served on the ICF Washington Board, and volunteered in ways that deepened my practice. These experiences have reshaped how I see coaching—not just as a tool for individual growth, but to catalyze transformation across systems and communities.
This past summer, I joined a small group of coaches in a conversation about the future of our profession. One coach, who’s been in the field for over 20 years, shared his perspective: coaching, as we know it, must evolve—or risk becoming irrelevant. He described how coaching has often been used in corporate settings as a tool to “performance manage” struggling executives—essentially, a last-ditch effort to address problematic behaviors before termination becomes inevitable. More recently, coaching has also been framed as support for new leaders adjusting to high-stakes roles, helping them reflect, strategize, and succeed.
But the language of coaching is changing. Terms like “mental fitness,” “psychological well-being,” “emotional agility,” and “executive presence” have become mainstream, blurring the lines between coaching and fields like organizational psychology or therapy. At its core, though, coaching remains deeply human. It’s about helping individuals mature—emotionally, cognitively, psychologically, and even spiritually—in ways that ripple outward into their relationships, communities, and the larger world.
During this conversation, we explored the idea of maturity and its role in human development. What does it mean to grow into maturity—not just for ourselves but for humanity as a whole? And what role can coaching play in fostering this growth? These questions sparked something in me, a sense of urgency about the transformative potential of coaching—not just as a tool for personal success but as a force for collective healing and connection.
As I reflected on coaching supporting people to grow into maturity, I’ve been synthesizing on an idea of “therapeutically informed coaching”. For 15 years, I sat with clients in the sacred space of therapy—a place where they could unpack the emotional, mental, and behavioral patterns that often stemmed from deep wounds: childhood trauma, abuse, neglect, or violence. These experiences left lasting imprints on their sense of self, shaping who they believed they were and what they thought they deserved. The therapeutic space became a container for exploring those shadows—the dark, fearful parts they were too scared to reveal to anyone else, afraid they’d be judged, rejected, or unlovable.
But in that space, something remarkable would happen. By bringing those hidden parts into the light—by allowing them to be seen, known, and shared with another—they could begin to face those shadows with courage. The shadows, once so powerful in the darkness, started to lose their influence, as they are brought into the light. And as my clients learned to stand in the light, they found they could make intentional choices about who they wanted to be. No longer bound by fear or shadows of their past, they could decide how to move forward with more freedom and self-compassion.
At its core, therapy is also about connection—being deeply seen, heard, and accepted by someone who is fully invested in your well-being. It’s a relationship grounded in trust and care, where the goal is always to move toward emotional and mental health.
Coaching, in many ways, offers a similar kind of space. It’s a place where clients can explore their goals, aspirations, and yes, even their shadows. Those same shadows show up in coaching, though perhaps in different forms—limiting beliefs, inner critics, or fears of failure. And while the focus in coaching is often future-oriented and directed by the client’s goals, the partnership between coach and client still requires safety, trust, and a collaborative spirit. As a coach, I don’t come in as the “expert” or “savior.” Instead, I walk alongside my clients, honoring their agency and holding space for what matters most to them.
When I first entered the coaching world, I noticed a deliberate effort to draw a distinction between therapy and coaching (particularly in the U.S). There seemed to be a need to keep the two separate. But now, I find myself wondering: what could coaching look like if we integrated some of the psychological frameworks and developmental understandings that are foundational in therapy? What if coaching wasn’t afraid to embrace the richness of human complexity, including the deeper emotional and psychological layers of growth?
Both therapy and coaching have so much to offer—each with its unique strengths—and yet, I can’t help but feel that they could benefit from learning from one another. Coaching, with its forward momentum and partnership model, and therapy, with its depth and understanding of the human psyche, both aim to support people in becoming more fully themselves. What might be possible if we allowed the two to dance together, blending their wisdom to create something even more transformative in supporting human maturity?
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