Life coaching is not about telling you what to do. It's about showing you the wide range of options you've got, encouraging you to make changes and supporting you in your journey towards fulfilling your dreams.

Life coaching is usually conducted in a series of one-to-one meetings or telephone conversations, lasting up to an hour each. During these, your coach will facilitate your focusing your goals and finding manageable steps towards achieving them. At the next session, you will report your progress to your coach.

Life coaching is different from counselling and psychotherapy in that counselling and psychotherapy tend to work with the emotions, whereas life coaching is about getting results through behavioural change. Your coach will talk to you not so much about how you feel as about what you have done and what you are going to do next. However, life coaching does involve challenging negative thought patterns (which we often inherited from our parents), in order that you may discard them and be free to enjoy your promising future.

Have you always wanted to start your own business/work abroad/climb Mount Everest? Do you want to get fit/learn new skills/expand your social circle? If so, what is stopping you from doing it? A life coach can erode your fears, build your confidence and help you to live the life you've always dreamed of.

Life coaching won't necessarily work for everybody. People who have been traumatised, either as children or later in life, may find that they need to work through the pain in therapy before they can benefit from the brisk approach of life coaching. However, if this is not your case and you are feeling stuck in a rut, struggling with time management, sure there must be a great deal more to life than this, then life coaching can transform you.

You can find a life coach to give your life a general shake-up or to specialise in a specific area. You can have coaching to help with your work, coaching to help you land the job you've always wanted, coaching to support you through a big change such as moving house, coaching to inspire and motivate you to make the most of your life - any, all or a mixture of these.

It's not difficult to find yourself a life coach by searching the internet. It doesn't matter if there isn't one in your area, because you can always have your coaching on the telephone. Most coaches will offer a free introductory consultation, during which you can decide whether life coaching is for you and whether you like this coach's style. So you've got nothing to lose - what are you waiting for?