Are you a coach? I make notebooks and journals for coaches and their clients. Take a look.

Get all of our favorite expressions on the cover of a notebook that would be perfect for a Thought Download or Coaching Session. 

“All the Things”

“What Am I Making it Mean?”

“Blow Your Own Mind”

“Best News Ever”

You know when something is too good not to share? Like when you finish reading the perfect novel.. Or when you see the funniest meme.. Or when you try the most delicious restaurant? You just have to tell everyone you know who would love it too.. And you convince them to try it too! 

That is how I feel about my favorite teachers. I’ve learned so much from them and I just have to tell you why I love them, so, today I’m introducing a new series – on the First Friday of each month, I’ll share an entire episode about the people who have changed my life. I consider these people my teachers, my mentors and my examples. 

This episode is about one of the most important people who has changed my life in the most profound way. And, I got this idea of focusing on one teacher during an episode from her! She has a podcast, and for the first few years, every 10th episode would be dedicated to one of her favorite teachers. And since imitation is the purest form of flattery.. Here we go!

My Favorite Teacher: Brooke Castillo

One of my favorite teachers is Brooke Castillo. She’s a Life Coach who is on her way to making $100 million dollars and who is changing the life coaching industry and landscape for everyone! Her mission is to be an example of what is possible. 

Before I go any further- I just want to check  in with you: did you notice any resistance or question marks pop up for you when I mentioned the words “life coach” or “$100 million dollars” or “Life Coaching Industry?” If you did, I want to hear about it! 

So, let’s continue..  I first “met” Brooke (and by met, i mean I encountered her work- I actually haven’t officially met her yet) when the company I was working at used her work and tools in a management training program I was going through. 

Life Changing Workshop

Our Performance Coach team trained all of us on the concept of Self Coaching and using Brooke’s Model and asking ourselves “what are you making that mean” when faced with difficult management scenarios. 

Even that 3-day workshop that I attended was pretty life changing for me at the time. I remember getting back to the office and feeling so much more relaxed about “having to work with a certain coworker” and feeling so much more in control of my own reactions to some of my workplace situations – but I now know, that was just a hint, just a whiff of what was to come. That was just the tiniest, faintest whisper of the impact that this teacher would have on my whole life. 

A few years later, and after many other management workshops, and employee engagement seminars, and company value sessions, when that original Performance Coaching workshop was just a satisfying memory, I was looking for a new podcast that I could binge on during my daily commutes and during my downtime.  

I listened to a lot of audio books and podcasts and I would get impatient if I had to wait a week for the next episode, so I really enjoyed finding “new to me” podcasts that already had a lot of published episodes that I could just listen to straight through. 

Trying out the Podcast

For some reason, Apple Podcasts suggested The Life Coach School podcast to me, and I gave it a try – even though I had no interest in life coaching or going to school- something about it called to me and luckily I answered! 

As I was listening to one of the first episodes, the content started to sound familiar to me, and I remembered that Performance Coaching workshop from years earlier. It sounded so similar so I wondered if it was based on the same work. 

When I got to work that morning, I pulled out my notebook from that training and flipped to the back cover where I had written down the title of the book that the training was based on and was so surprised to see that the book was called Self Coaching 101 and the author was Brooke Castillo- the podcaster who I had just started listening to. I liked that coincidence. I thought the connection was cool.. And I liked the content, so I kept listening to her podcast. And she changed my life!

A Framework and a Vocabulary

She has given me a framework and a vocabulary to have more awareness of what I’m creating for myself. And, as a bonus, she’s provided me with some logical, rational explanations of some very woo topics. 

Brooke’s podcast is called the Life Coach School, but it’s really not specifically for people who want to learn how to be life coaches. It’s more about how to use her work and her tools to coach yourself, to notice your own thinking, understand the relationship between thinking and feelings and see how our results always stem from what we’re thinking. 

Pretty soon I had listened to all of her previous episodes and had caught up so that I was now waiting for them to come out every Thursday. I had shared the podcast with my Mom and my sister and my friends and I was practicing some of the techniques that she taught. 

Taking Massive Action

One of the first concepts I implemented that I heard her describe was the concept of taking massive action. She described it using an example, like if someone wants to meet their partner, they should plan to go on 100 dates – that’s massive action- because then they’re opening up to so many possibilities and allowing so many options that they otherwise wouldn’t be open to. And also, if 1 or even 10 dates don’t go well, or aren’t a match, it doesn’t matter, because those are just a fraction of all the dates they’re going on. And they are continuing to go on those dates until they meet their goal. 

I shared this concept with my friend who had recently started dating again after getting out of a long-term relationship. We joked about it a little and laughingly agreed that she would go on 100 dates. She went on the first date- it was a dud. It didn’t matter, she still had 99 more to go on. No big deal. She went on the 2nd date. He was pretty cool – still, no big deal.. Still so many more dates to go on. But she did like the 2nd guy, so she went out with him again.. And then she didn’t go on any more dates with any other guys because she’s been with that 2nd guy ever since. 

So, Brooke changed my friend’s life even though the only time my friend listened to her podcast was when we were stuck in a traffic jam coming home from a girls weekend and we were tired of talking to each other. 

Easy to Understand Explanations

I love Brooke’s clear, easy to understand explanations and I love the matter-of-factness in her delivery. 

After a few years of listening to her, I realized that her teachings are a streamlined, simplified version of concepts I was also hearing from my other favorite teachers- but explained in a very approachable way. 

This was confirmed for me when I listened to Brooke’s audio book Self Coaching 101 – which had been recommended to me years earlier.. and which I had written down in the back of that workshop notebook, but never actually read until I was already deep into her work. It’s true what they say: when the student is ready, the teacher will appear. 

What We Think Creates Results

Some of the more Woo concepts I’ve heard Brooke teach in her matter-of-fact style are about manifesting and the law of attraction. She proves to me over and over again that what we think is what creates our results. I love being able to find examples of that in so many different areas of my life. 

She also talks a lot about unconditional love which, on the surface, sounds too soft and flowery to me, but when I think about it, and question my own resistance to practicing unconditional love, I see all the benefits that she describes. 

I recognize how much BETTER practicing unconditional love is than holding on to the alternative… conditional love – which basically means, I’ll only love you, or this, or myself, or them, or that, if certain conditions are met. If those conditions aren’t met, I won’t love. See how manipulative that sounds just in that simple explanation?

3 Favorite Things I’ve Learned from Brooke Castillo

Three of the favorite things I’ve learned so far from Brooke are massive action (which I just described and which I’ve successfully used to create momentum in my own life), the expression “nothing matters, so go all in” and “you can be wrong about me.”

When I learned her concept that “nothing matters, so go all in” – I had to think about it for a little while before I got it. Maybe my understanding of it is still evolving. But I love it. Think about it- what holds YOU back from going ALL IN on something? Is it fear? doubt? insecurity? a lack of knowledge? What if whatever you were afraid of doesn’t even matter? 

So, for example, for me with my podcast. What if I had a fear that no one would listen to it or that it wouldn’t sound the way I want it to sound? 

Nothing Matters So Go All In

If I apply the belief “nothing matters so go all in”, I can answer my own question about what if no one listens. No one is listening – that doesn’t matter! Just do the podcast! Just go all in! What about my lack of knowledge about how to produce a podcast? What if I don’t know all the technical stuff and have to re-do it or it doesn’t sound professional? Again, It doesn’t matter- just jump right in and figure it out! Since nothing matters, there’s nothing to lose! There’s no risk! 

This belief and understanding is so liberating! And motivating! And this is the result- you’re reading it!

Brooke also frequently says the phrase “you can be wrong about me.” I love this! The context for this one is if someone says, something about her like “Oh, Brooke Castillo is so –whatever—.” and she responds (maybe mentally, but maybe out loud)  “that’s fine, you can be wrong about me.” 

So Many Layers

There are so many layers to how great this is.  

First, it means you don’t have to worry about what other people think about you. Who gets to decide how you are? YOU do! Who defines that? You do. 

So if YOU think you’re crazy talented. You get to live your life with that belief.   If someone else thinks you’re not that talented- that won’t bother you at all. The other person can be wrong about you, that’s fine. 

This phrase also acknowledges the truth that we are all entitled to our own thoughts. Back to the talent example. If someone thinks you’re not talented, that’s fine. They are entitled to that thought and you’re entitled to think they are wrong! Perfect, right? It means what others think doesn’t affect you. The only thing that affects you is what you think!

Knowing and accepting that other people get to be wrong about me, and they get to keep holding on to their own “wrong beliefs” helps me release any resistance I might have about what people think about me. I don’t need to convince them that they’re wrong. They can just be wrong! Easy!

Is This a Cult?

Sometimes, I think of Brooke and all her raving, die-hard fans as a cult. We all quote her and use the same vocabulary. We all do self-coaching (so that’s like a standard set of behaviors that we all follow).  It’s interesting to compare this to a cult because Brooke tells a story of how she joined a cult in her younger days and gave away all her money. But, then she made her way out of the cult, and made back all her money.. And now, dare I say? Started a cult of her own? But, if this is a cult, pass the kool-aid! I’m in deep and I love it.

I started out by listening to her content. Then I subscribed to her weekly newsletter. Then, a few years ago, she did a live event for her podcast listeners so I went to that, then I signed up for a coaching program with one of her certified coaches. Then I joined her membership program called Self Coaching Scholars. Last year, I went through her Life Coach Certification program and became a certified life coach. 

Her content is so good. Her teaching is so clear and her students are so brilliant. I love being a coach and I love getting coached by my fellow Life Coach School graduates. 

Learning from Brooke Castillo

The whole point of this podcast is to introduce you to this amazing woman, who I haven’t even met yet, who has changed my life so profoundly. If this is the first time you’re hearing of her, or if you’ve heard of her before, but didn’t really get it, I hope you’ll give her a try – or another try. I recommend starting at episode 1 of her podcast rather than starting with something current That way you’ll get all the basics before diving into the more advanced topics. You could also get the book Self Coaching 101 – I really enjoyed it. 

I think Brooke’s teaching and content is great for people who are open to questioning and examining themselves. And specifically people who are open to pushing past any personal preferences they have to actually hear and apply the message to themselves. 

The reason I say this is because I have heard that some people don’t appreciate her style, she is VERY confident. She likes to talk about how great her life is, and how much she loves money. Sometimes she likes to mention the weather or her dogs when she starts her episodes, so if you know any of that kind of banter is going to bug you, just fast-forward to get to the concepts. Don’t discard her work, just because you might not like her delivery style or her favorite topics. 

Practical Things to Try

If you want a few practical things you can try today before you even check out her work.. 

Why don’t you try on the phrase “they can be wrong about me.” See what that brings up for you. Do you have any resistance to letting people think whatever they want about you without your interference?

And, you could try being unconditionally loving today. What if you just loved everyone, without any conditions?

What if you loved the slow-walking person in front of you when you’re in a hurry? 

What if you loved the coworker nearby who’s talking loudly and being obnoxious? 

What if you loved that family member who knows how to push all your buttons? 

What if you just loved them all unconditionally without expecting them to hurry up, or quiet down, or consider how you feel? How would you be different if you loved unconditionally?

Ok, the first point of this post was to introduce you to Brooke and to her work. 

Thank You Card, Love Note, and Fan Letter

The other point of this post is to be a thank you card, a love note, and a fan letter to one of my favorite teachers… 

so, Brooke, if you happen to be reading this, let me personally thank you for being an example of what is possible. I’m so excited to follow along as you blow your own mind and earn 100 million dollars as a life coach. 

I’m so grateful that you decided to start a podcast so that I could find you. 

I’m so thankful that you continue to run your business even though I’m sure you could just retire and fly a private jet to relax in a tropical paradise with your husband and your dogs. I love how consistent you are and I’m a huge fan of your pretty clothes and make up. You are an inspiration to me! Oh.. and PS Brooke, I wrote the content for this in November 2019, and then in December, you posted an episode about how you’ve received feedback and thanks from your students. So, even though this hadn’t been published yet, I feel like I got a response directly from you! I hear you! I’m honoring our relationship by sharing what I’ve learned!

Are you a Brooke Fan?

Ok- back to you my dear friend who is actually reading this for real! I’m so curious to hear what you think. If you’re a Brooke fan.. What are your favorite things about her? If you’ve never heard of her before, are you going to check her out? And, if you had any resistance about her earlier when I was introducing you to her, I want to hear about that too.. I’m so curious!

In the next post, I’m going to explain her Model. This is the framework that Brooke came up with based on all the teachers and beliefs that she follows and it is the basis for Self Coaching. If you don’t know what the Model is, I want you to be sure to come back next week so you can consider trying it for yourself. If you do know and love and use the model, I want you to listen so that we can compare notes!

And now I want to know your thoughts and your reactions. Leave a comment below to let me know what you think!

Life Coach School Podcast on a screen