What Is A Holistic Mindfulness Coach, And Why Do I Need One?

A holistic mindfulness coach is a guide who came into existence to meet the needs of people on a self-discovery journey seeking an approach that aligns and honors their body, mind, heart and soul.

Mindfulness is a big deal these days, and for good reason! Every podcast I listen to and nonfiction book I read discusses the superpower of awareness and the idea that all meaningful change starts with awareness, a.k.a. mindfulness. We can’t change what we don’t see.

What is this superpower we call mindfulness?

Mindfulness involves paying attention to our thoughts, feelings, bodily sensations, and surroundings with curiosity and acceptance in the present moment.

It enables us to observe our habits rather than being caught in their trance.

Over 2500 years ago, the Buddha gifted us with mindfulness practice to help people decrease their suffering and live with greater ease and well-being.

Mindfulness has been a huge gift, but like all things, the practice of mindfulness needs to evolve to meet the needs of modern-day folks and the realization that we are awakening to our dual nature.

This means we have conditioned habits of thinking, feeling, and behaving that mindfulness helps us observe, but we also have the energy of what I call our soul that is calling us forward into who nature intended us to become.

Why does mindfulness need to evolve and offer a holistic approach?

A holistic mindfulness approach meets the needs of people on growth and development paths who seek guidance, compassionate support, and tools for discovering their deeper, truer selves and living authentic lives that bring a sense of meaning, purpose, and connection to themselves, others, and the mysteries of life.

In other words, we need to build on traditional mindfulness that primarily focuses on the body and mind and consider the energy or our soul. This awareness enables us to discern where things are arising from inside us. For example, is this emotion arising from my fear-based personality, or is it a sign from my soul leading towards a fuller life and expansion?

This discernment is becoming increasingly important as many awakening souls worldwide are living both stressful human lives and feeling the inner spiritual stress of what I call soul hunger.

People are asking questions that can’t be answered by traditional mindfulness and can only be answered by looking deep inside themselves: Who am I? What is the meaning and purpose of my life? Why can’t I be happy when I have so much to be grateful for? What’s missing in my life? The article Soul Hunger: The Silent Epidemic Of The 21St Century explores the experience of soul hunger in more detail.

These spiritual questions and soul hunger arise when our soul begins to awaken to a sense that there’s something more to life than merely surviving and meeting our deficiency needs, as described by Abraham Maslow in his 1962 book Toward a Psychology of Being. Maslow identified that new approaches were necessary to support people’s growth and self-actualization needs.

Traditional approaches to mindfulness coaching are insufficient to answer soulful questions that require a different approach.

A holistic mindfulness approach offers deep inner work and spiritual growth, distinguishing itself from mindfulness coaching methods that are either based on Buddhist teachings or have spirituality removed and are secular.

What is missing in traditional coaching or therapy?

Traditional coaching and therapy don’t recognize that an increasing number of people are awakening as spiritual beings living stressful human lives.

William Meader, a teacher of the Perennial Philosophy, explains that awakening begins when we realize we have a dual nature, meaning we have a conditioned personality (ego) and our true self, representing our potential and the energy of our soul.

Awakening is all about coming into the right relationship with our dual nature. This means that our ego (personality), which helped us survive in the first half of life, takes a back seat to our soul, which becomes the guiding force for the second half.

The purpose of growth and transformation is to shed the limitations of our conditioning and personality so we can flourish by discovering our true selves. In finding our true selves, we feel a sense of freedom, contentment, and connection with something greater than ourselves.

Many people find the awakening journey challenging because it requires managing conflicting energies and shedding our conditioned, habitual sense of self to become our true selves.

Transforming into our true selves is similar to what a caterpillar goes through to become a butterfly. This spiritual impulse inside of us is mysterious and gives us the signals that we’re meant to transition into a new way of being in the world. There’s a time when we’re called to let go of who we have outgrown, our conditioned self to evolve into who we’re meant to become.

Although challenging, it is the doorway through which we arrive at a place of more profound peace, fulfillment, contentment, happiness, joy, and service to others.

A holistic mindfulness approach considers the body, mind, soul and shadow.

What practices and tools support a holistic mindfulness approach?

As a meditation and mindfulness teacher and coach, I use practices that work from the “inside out,” addressing internal blocks, limiting beliefs, and unconscious patterns. The tools and practices aim to help people achieve deep, sustainable transformation by fostering self-awareness and spiritual growth that aligns with the soul’s purpose.

My approach is based on four pillars that enable people to flourish as spiritual beings living stressful human lives. The 4 pillars includes self-regulation, self-love, self-discovery, and self-expression. The article, Unlock Inner Peace: How The 4 Holistic Pillars Of Awakening Lead To Your True Self, explores this further.

My holistic coaching approach empowers people with a core meditation practice that shifts them from the survival mode of fight/flight/freeze by settling their busy minds and nervous systems, making them more receptive to soul nudges—quiet and subtle messages arising from our intuition and synchronicities.

The part of us always weighs in on whether we’re living lives that are true to who we’re meant to become. Meditation can help us access this inner wisdom and guide us toward our true selves. The article, With So Many Choices, What’s The Best Meditation Practice For Me?, provides some insights about establishing a core practice for holistic well-being.

The Enneagram of personality and soul is another essential component of my mindfulness coaching approach. The Enneagram helps people by providing a map for understanding and discovering themselves from a psychological and spiritual perspective. It enables people to see their core motivations, habitual thoughts and feelings, blind spots, and what may keep them stuck and spinning their wheels.

The Enneagram map also provides insights into what specific and intentional practices are most appropriate to help people grow into the next version of themselves. When people combine the wisdom from the Enneagram map with intentional meditation and other practices, they build new muscles that lead them toward a more profound sense of peace, contentment, connection, and fulfillment. I explain why this is so helpful in the article, Deepen Your Meditation Practice By Using The Enneagram Of Personality.