Coaching is present and future-focused, oriented toward solutions and change while seeking to focus on overcoming obstacles and barriers in the way of life goals. Coaching is geared towards motivated people who are ready to make changes in their lives.

You are having trouble overcoming hurdles or obstacles to get where you want to be. You are seeking some help to navigate such obstacles to get where you want to be in your life. You are motivated and ready to hit the ground running to accomplish your goals.

Counseling is focused on mental and emotional symptoms that impair daily life functioning. The goal is to help alleviate such symptoms. Often the focus is on the past and how the past is influencing the present. Counseling also addresses past abuse or trauma.

You are experiencing mental health symptoms (e.g., anxiety, depression, severe worry, suicidal thoughts) that are debilitating to your daily functioning (e.g., impacting your sleep, work, and relationships). Also, if you have a history of trauma or abuse then counseling is the best fit for you. Feel free to contact us to determine if counseling is right for you.

The primary difference would be if there are existing mental health diagnoses that need to be addressed within the couples sessions and which are impacting the relationship. For instance, depression or anxiety disorder. In addition, any ongoing substance abuse or physical abuse is better addressed in counseling. Such issues require a licensed professional to treat, for which coaching services do not address mental health. In addition, counseling/therapy is usually past focused, meaning the focus is on healing past traumas or hurts. While many couples carry past hurts and pain, our coaching work focuses on changing negative patterns couples find themselves in which inhibit them from healing from past hurts. Coaching focuses on the present and moving forward with coaches as facilitators. You will learn to better understand one another and discover solutions for your specific issues together. Coaches help couples move from where they are to where they want to be and recognize that each marriage is different. Otherwise, the difference between the two is difficult to discern given how similar couples coaching and counseling are to one another.

In working with a couple, as opposed to an individual male or female, you get the best of both worlds - a male and female perspective. In addition, as coaches, we are able to be more relatable to the couples we coach as opposed to therapists, who are supposed to limit self-disclosure and sharing of personal information. When you work with us as a couple you will not only get the benefit of a male and female perspective, however, you will also have two people sitting across from you who understand the struggles within marriage. The approach we use in couples coaching is an approach that has benefited our marriage greatly.

We use an attachment model that derives from such resources as How We Love and Hold Me Tight. Our work also incorporates a Biblical perspective and lens with which we seek to incorporate the Gospel. We seek to reorient couples to remember who created marriage and where their hope ultimately must rest. Couples coaching is present and solution-focused, which means our focus is on helping couples identify their negative cycle and change it in order to have a better marriage in the future.