Hello Everyone,

We’re excited to announce that our weekly motivational webinar is just 3 days away! Mark your calendars for Thursday, June 4th, 9am UK Time

This week’s topic is: From Knowledge to Results -The six layers that shape your life.


This session is designed to help you bridge the gap between what you know and what you actually achieve. We’ll explore six powerful layers that influence your decisions, habits, and ultimately the results you create in life.

CLICK HERE FOR THE ZOOM LINK

Also we invite you to revisit our previous webinar

Don’t miss this opportunity to gain clarity, motivation, and strategies that can reshape your journey.

See you there

Noble Manhattan Coaching Team

The post Motivational Webinar in 3 Days : From Knowledge to Results – The six layers that shape your life appeared first on Coaching Blog.

During the spring and summer of 2026 I’ll be presenting a series of posts on the art and practice of self-coaching. I think you’ll find this series valuable for your own purposes; and, if you work with clients, in your work with clients. Please enjoy! You can always reach me with comments and questions at ericmaisel@hotmail.com

Self-coaching is not a single insight, a breakthrough moment, or a particularly good day of thinking. It is a practice—a way of relating to your own life that deepens over time through repetition. Like any meaningful practice, it becomes powerful not because it is dramatic, but because it is sustained.

Many people are drawn to the idea of self-coaching but struggle with consistency. They reflect deeply for a few days, perhaps write in a journal, ask themselves thoughtful questions—and then life intervenes. Busyness returns. Old habits reassert themselves. The practice fades.

The real task, then, is not just to understand self-coaching but to build it into your daily life in a way that is realistic, flexible, and enduring.

Why Daily Matters

Personal change does not occur in isolated bursts. It happens through small, repeated acts of awareness and adjustment. A daily self-coaching practice keeps you in ongoing contact with your own experience.

Without that contact, it is easy to drift. Days pass without reflection. Decisions are made reactively. Emotional patterns go unnoticed. You may find yourself wondering, “How did I end up here again?”

A daily practice interrupts that drift. It creates a rhythm of attention. You begin to notice sooner, adjust sooner, and engage more consciously with your life. Daily does not mean intensive. It means regular.

Keeping It Simple and Doable

One of the most common mistakes is to make the practice too elaborate. If your self-coaching routine requires an hour, a perfectly quiet environment, and a particular mood, it will be difficult to sustain.

A more effective approach is to design a practice that is simple enough to do even on a busy or imperfect day.

For example, a basic daily self-coaching practice might include:

• Five to ten minutes of reflection
• One or two thoughtful questions
• A brief note or intention for the day

This can be done in the morning, in the evening, or at a consistent point in your day. The key is not the duration but the reliability. You are building a habit of turning toward your life, not away from it.

The Morning Orientation

Many people find it useful to begin the day with a brief self-coaching check-in. This is not about predicting the day or controlling everything that will happen. It is about orienting yourself. You might ask:

• “What matters most to me today?”
• “What kind of person do I want to be today?”
• “What is one thing I want to move forward?”

These questions help you begin the day with intention rather than reactivity. They remind you that your day is not just something that happens to you—it is something you participate in shaping. Even if the day unfolds unpredictably, this initial orientation provides a reference point.

The Midday Reset

Life rarely proceeds exactly as planned. By the middle of the day, you may find yourself off track—distracted, stressed, or caught in unhelpful thinking. A brief midday reset can be invaluable. This does not need to be formal. It can be as simple as pausing for a minute and asking:

• “Where am I right now, mentally and emotionally?”
• “What do I need in this moment?”
• “What would help me re-engage?”

This kind of check-in prevents the accumulation of unnoticed tension. It allows you to course-correct in real time. Self-coaching is not only retrospective. It is also in-the-moment.

The Evening Reflection

At the end of the day, reflection helps you turn experience into learning.

You might ask:

• “What stood out to me today?”
• “What went well, and why?”
• “What was challenging, and what can I learn from it?”
• “What, if anything, would I do differently next time?”

This is not a performance review. It is an opportunity to understand your day more fully.

Over time, these reflections begin to reveal patterns. You notice recurring themes—situations that energize you, situations that drain you, habits that support you, habits that undermine you. This awareness becomes the foundation for change.

Writing as a Tool

While self-coaching can happen entirely in your head, writing often deepens the process. When you write, your thoughts become more concrete. Vague impressions take shape. Contradictions become visible.

You do not need to write extensively. Even a few sentences can be enough.

For example:

• A brief note in the morning about your intention
• A few lines in the evening about what you learned
• A single question written down and explored

The goal is not to produce polished writing. It is to create a record of your thinking and to engage with it more deliberately.

Working with Resistance

At some point, you will not feel like doing your practice. This is inevitable. You may feel tired, distracted, or resistant. You may think, “What’s the point?” or “I’ll do it tomorrow.” This is where the practice becomes meaningful. It is easy to reflect when you feel inspired. It is more significant to show up when you do not.

On these days, simplify. Instead of skipping entirely, do the smallest version possible:

• Ask one question
• Write one sentence
• Take one minute to check in

This maintains continuity. It reinforces the identity of someone who engages in self-coaching, even under less-than-ideal conditions.

Avoiding Perfectionism

A daily practice does not need to be perfect to be effective. Some days will feel more insightful than others. Some reflections will seem shallow or repetitive. This is normal.

The value of the practice lies in its accumulation over time, not in the brilliance of any single session. If you miss a day—or several—begin again. There is no need for self-criticism. The practice is always available to you.

Connecting Reflection to Action

A self-coaching practice becomes especially powerful when it leads to small, concrete adjustments.

For example:

• Noticing that you feel rushed in the morning → deciding to wake up ten minutes earlier
• Realizing that a particular task creates anxiety → breaking it into smaller steps
• Observing that a conversation pattern is unhelpful → experimenting with a different response

These adjustments do not need to be dramatic. In fact, small changes are often more sustainable. The role of reflection is to inform action. The role of action is to create new experience. And the cycle continues.

Making It Your Own

There is no single correct way to build a daily self-coaching practice. What matters is that it fits your temperament, your schedule, and your preferences. You might prefer structured questions or open-ended reflection. You might write in a notebook, type on a device, or simply think quietly. You might practice in the morning, the evening, or both.

Experiment. Adjust. Keep what works and discard what does not. The practice should feel like a support, not a burden.

Becoming a Daily Companion to Yourself

At its core, a daily self-coaching practice is about becoming a consistent, thoughtful presence in your own life. Instead of rushing past your experience, you pause. Instead of ignoring your inner life, you engage with it. Instead of leaving your thinking unexamined, you shape it.

Over time, this changes how you relate to yourself. You become less reactive, more aware, more intentional. You develop a sense of continuity—a feeling that you are accompanying yourself through your days.

And that, ultimately, is the heart of self-coaching: not a set of techniques, but a relationship with yourself that is attentive, curious, and committed. Built day by day, this relationship becomes a steady foundation for personal change.

I hope that you’re enjoying this series. Please check out the Noble Manhattan Existential Wellness Coach Certificate Program and my latest books, Brave New Mind and Night Brilliance.

Check out Eric Maisel’s transformative courses in collaboration with Noble Manhattan—designed to elevate your coaching journey.

Creativity Coaching Program

Existential Wellness Program

Relationship Coach Training

Each week Eric Maisel provides tips on the coaching life. Come to take a look at his three programs with Noble Manhattan Coaching: a Creativity Coach Certificate Program, an Existential Wellness Coach Program and a Relationship Coach Certificate Program

The post Weekly Coaching Tip: Building a Daily Self-Coaching Practice appeared first on Coaching Blog.

Click here for the zoom Link

This promises to be a valuable discussion, and I encourage you not to miss it.

We look forward to seeing you on June 4th.

Best regards

Noble Manhattan Team

The post Save The Date !! For Our Upcoming Webinar on June 4th : From Knowledge to Results – The six layers that shape your life. appeared first on Coaching Blog.

During the spring and summer of 2026 I’ll be presenting a series of posts on the art and practice of self-coaching. I think you’ll find this series valuable for your own purposes; and, if you work with clients, in your work with clients. Please enjoy! You can always reach me with comments and questions at ericmaisel@hotmail.com

In the language of self-coaching, reflection is often treated as a gentle activity—something akin to pausing, journaling, or “checking in” with oneself. But in truth, reflection is far more consequential than that. It is one of the primary engines of personal change. Without reflection, experience simply accumulates. With reflection, experience becomes usable.

We all live through events, make decisions, feel emotions, and encounter challenges. But living through something does not automatically mean learning from it. A difficult conversation, a creative failure, a burst of anxiety, a moment of courage—these pass through us quickly. If they are not examined, they fade into the general blur of life. Reflection is what slows experience down long enough for meaning to be made.

Experience Alone Does Not Teach

There is a common assumption that “experience is the best teacher.” In practice, experience is only a potential teacher. It becomes instructive only when it is reflected upon.

Consider two people who go through the same setback—a rejected manuscript, a failed business idea, a relationship that ends abruptly. One person moves on quickly, perhaps telling themselves a simple story: “It didn’t work out.” The other person pauses and reflects: “What did I want here? What actually happened? Where did I act in alignment with myself, and where did I not? What might I try differently next time?”

The difference is not in the experience but in the reflection that follows it. Without reflection, we are prone to repetition. We relive similar patterns, make similar mistakes, and draw similar conclusions. With reflection, we create the possibility of change. We interrupt automaticity. We begin to see ourselves in motion.

Reflection as Meaning-Making

At its deepest level, reflection is an act of meaning-making. It is how we interpret our lives. Events do not come with inherent meaning attached. A setback can be interpreted as failure, as feedback, as injustice, as redirection, or as something else entirely. Reflection is the process by which we decide—consciously or unconsciously—what an experience means.

In self-coaching, the goal is not to impose a forced “positive” meaning on every event. That can feel inauthentic and even dismissive of genuine pain. Instead, the aim is to engage with experience honestly and thoughtfully.

You might ask:

• “What does this experience mean to me right now?”
• “What meanings am I tempted to assign, and are they helpful?”
• “Is there a way of understanding this that supports my continued engagement with life?”

These questions acknowledge that meaning is not fixed. It is something we participate in creating.

The Discipline of Looking Again

The word “reflection” suggests a kind of mirroring—a looking back. But in practice, reflection is not just looking back; it is looking again, with intention.

When you reflect, you revisit an experience with a different mindset than you had in the moment. You are no longer caught up in immediate reaction. You have some distance. That distance allows for new perceptions.

For example, in the heat of an argument, you may feel entirely justified. Later, in reflection, you might notice nuances you missed: the other person’s tone, your own defensiveness, the moment where the conversation could have shifted.

This is not about self-blame. It is about gaining a more complete picture. Reflection asks you to become both participant and observer of your own life.

Emotional Honesty and Tolerance

Effective reflection requires emotional honesty. It asks you to face what you felt and what you did without excessive distortion.

This can be challenging. There is often a temptation either to minimize (“It wasn’t a big deal”) or to exaggerate (“It was a disaster”). Reflection invites a more balanced stance: “What actually happened, and how did it affect me?”

It also requires a certain tolerance for discomfort. Some reflections will bring you into contact with regret, sadness, or uncertainty. If you avoid these feelings entirely, your reflection will remain superficial.

At the same time, reflection is not meant to become self-punishment. There is a difference between honest examination and harsh self-criticism. The former leads to growth; the latter often leads to avoidance.

A useful question here is: “Am I trying to understand, or am I trying to judge?” The intention matters.

Reflection and Choice

One of the most important functions of reflection is to reconnect you with your capacity for choice.

When you are caught in the flow of events, it can feel as though things are simply happening to you. Reflection reintroduces the dimension of agency. It helps you see where you had choices, where you made them, and where you might choose differently in the future.

For instance:

• “What choices did I make in this situation?”
• “What alternatives were available to me?”
• “What might I choose next time, given what I now understand?”

These questions do not assume that you could have controlled everything. Life is full of constraints and unpredictability. But they do assume that you are not entirely passive. There is always some degree of participation. Recognizing that participation is essential for change.

The Rhythm of Reflection

Reflection is not something to be done once in a while, only in moments of crisis. It is most powerful when it becomes part of a regular rhythm.

This does not require hours of analysis. Even a few minutes of intentional reflection can be valuable. You might build simple practices such as:

• A daily check-in: “What stood out today? What did I learn?”
• A weekly review: “What worked well this week? What didn’t? What do I want to carry forward?”
• A post-event reflection: “What happened in that conversation or meeting, and what can I take from it?”

The key is consistency. Over time, these small acts of reflection accumulate. They create a body of self-knowledge that informs your future actions.

Reflection as Self-Relationship

There is another dimension to reflection that is often overlooked: it shapes your relationship with yourself.

When you take the time to reflect, you signal that your experience matters. You become someone who listens to yourself, who is interested in your own life, who is willing to engage with it thoughtfully.

This stands in contrast to a more neglectful stance, where experiences are rushed past, ignored, or dismissed. In this sense, reflection is an act of self-respect.

It is also an act of companionship. You are, in effect, accompanying yourself through your life—witnessing, questioning, and supporting your own development.

From Reflection to Change

Reflection alone does not guarantee change. It must eventually connect to action. But without reflection, action is often blind or repetitive.

The process might look like this:

1. Experience – Something happens.
2. Reflection – You examine and make sense of it.
3. Adjustment – You decide what to do differently.
4. New Experience – You act, and something new happens.

This cycle repeats. Over time, it leads to gradual but meaningful shifts.

You become more intentional. You respond rather than react. You align your actions more closely with your values and your understanding of yourself.

Learning to Reflect Well

Like any skill, reflection can be improved. It benefits from structure and intention. You might experiment with:

• Writing rather than just thinking, to make your reflections more concrete.
• Asking specific questions rather than engaging in vague rumination.
• Setting time boundaries, so reflection does not turn into endless analysis.
• Revisiting past reflections to notice patterns over time.

The aim is not to become perfectly self-aware—that is neither possible nor necessary. The aim is to become more aware than you were, more able to learn from your experience, and more capable of guiding your own life.

A Quiet but Powerful Practice

Reflection is not dramatic. It does not announce itself. It often happens quietly, in the margins of your day. And yet, it is one of the most powerful tools available in self-coaching. By reflecting, you transform experience into insight, insight into choice, and choice into change. You begin to live not just reactively, but deliberately.

In a world that often pushes toward speed, distraction, and constant forward motion, reflection is a counter-practice. It asks you to pause, to look again, and to engage with your life as something worth understanding. And from that understanding, change becomes possible.

I hope that you’re enjoying this series. Please check out the Noble ManhattanExistential Wellness Coach Certificate Program and my latest books, Brave New Mind and Night Brilliance.]

Check out Eric Maisel’s transformative courses in collaboration with Noble Manhattan—designed to elevate your coaching journey.

Creativity Coaching Program

Existential Wellness Program

Relationship Coach Training

Each week Eric Maisel provides tips on the coaching life. Come to take a look at his three programs with Noble Manhattan Coaching: a Creativity Coach Certificate Program, an Existential Wellness Coach Program and a Relationship Coach Certificate Program.

The post Weekly Coaching Tip: The Role of Reflection in Personal Change appeared first on Coaching Blog.

Hello Everyone,


We’re excited to announce that our weekly motivational webinar is just 3 days away! Mark your calendars for Thursday, May 21st, 9am UK Time


This week’s topic is: “Setting Boundaries In Life: Who you let in, shapes who you become” — A CPD Lecture designed for both Qualified & Student Coaches.

This discussion will be both insightful and inspiring, focusing on the importance of boundaries in shaping our personal and professional lives. It is designed to provide practical guidance and meaningful reflection, an opportunity you will not want to miss.

Also we invite you to revisit the recording of our last meeting, that you can access it here : 

Join us and be part of this empowering session!

See you there

Noble Manhattan Coaching Team

The post Countdown : May 21th – Setting Boundaries In Life – Live webinar appeared first on Coaching Blog.

During the spring and summer of 2026 I’ll be presenting a series of posts on the art and practice of self-coaching. I think you’ll find this series valuable for your own purposes; and, if you work with clients, in your work with clients. Please enjoy! You can always reach me with comments and questions at ericmaisel@hotmail.com

In self-coaching, the quality of your life is intimately tied to the quality of the questions you ask yourself. Most people do not recognize this. They assume that change comes from better answers—more insight, more knowledge, more advice. But in practice, answers tend to follow the path laid down by questions. If the question is narrow, reactive, or distorted, the answer will be too. If the question is expansive, honest, and well-aimed, the answer has a chance of being useful, even liberating.

To learn to ask yourself better questions is to begin to take charge of your own thinking.

The Problem with Default Questions

Left to its own devices, the mind asks predictable questions—many of them unhelpful. These questions are often shaped by fear, habit, and cultural conditioning. You might notice yourself asking:

• “What’s wrong with me?”
• “Why can’t I get it together?”
• “What if everything goes badly?”
• “Who is to blame?”

These questions feel natural because they arise automatically. But they tend to produce answers that reinforce distress. “What’s wrong with me?” leads to a list of perceived flaws. “Why can’t I get it together?” suggests that you should already have done so and invites self-criticism. “What if everything goes badly?” rehearses catastrophe. “Who is to blame?” narrows your attention to fault rather than possibility.

Default questions are not neutral. They actively shape your emotional life. One of the first tasks in self-coaching is to notice your default questions and to challenge their usefulness. Not all questions deserve to be entertained simply because they appear.

The Shift from Judgment to Curiosity

Better questions often involve a shift in tone—from judgment to curiosity. Compare these two approaches:

• Judgmental: “Why am I so lazy?”
• Curious: “What’s making it hard for me to start today?”

The first assumes a negative identity (“lazy”) and locks you into defending or attacking that identity. The second opens a space for investigation. It suggests that there are conditions, factors, or obstacles worth understanding.

Curiosity does not mean indulgence. It does not mean excusing yourself from responsibility. Rather, it means approaching your experience with enough openness that you can actually learn something about it.

Curious questions tend to be more specific, more situational, and more actionable. They invite you into a relationship with your own experience rather than into a verdict about it.

The Power of Reframing

A core self-coaching skill is the ability to reframe a question—to take an unhelpful question and transform it into a more useful one.

For example:

• “Why is this happening to me?”
  → “Given that this is happening, what are my options?”
• “What if I fail?”
  → “What would failure actually look like, and how would I respond?”
• “Why don’t they appreciate me?”
  → “What do I need, and how can I express it clearly?”

Reframing does not deny reality. It accepts reality but changes your orientation to it. Instead of asking questions that trap you in helplessness or resentment, you ask questions that move you toward agency and clarity.

This is not always easy. The original question often carries emotional weight. But with practice, you can learn to pause, notice the question you are asking, and deliberately choose a better one.

Asking Questions That Lead to Action

Some questions lead to rumination. Others lead to action.

Rumination questions tend to circle endlessly:

• “Why am I like this?”
• “What’s wrong with my life?”
• “Why does this always happen?”

These questions rarely produce satisfying answers. They keep you in a loop of analysis without movement.

Action-oriented questions, by contrast, point toward next steps:

• “What is one small thing I can do today?”
• “What matters most right now?”
• “What would make this situation slightly better?”

The goal is not to eliminate reflection but to balance it with movement. A good self-coaching question often contains an implicit invitation to act.

Even a modest action can interrupt a cycle of rumination. When you ask, “What is one thing I can do?” you shift from passive analysis to active engagement with your life.

Honoring Complexity Without Losing Direction

Human experience is complex. Your thoughts, emotions, history, and circumstances intertwine in ways that are not easily disentangled. Better questions respect this complexity without becoming paralyzed by it.

For instance:

• “What are all the factors contributing to how I feel right now?”
• “Which of these factors can I influence, and which can I not?”
• “Where do I want to place my attention and effort?”

These questions acknowledge that your situation is layered. At the same time, they help you orient yourself within that complexity. They invite discernment—an essential skill in self-coaching.

Not every problem can be solved immediately. But you can always ask a question that clarifies where you stand and what is possible next.

The Role of Values and Meaning

Better questions often reconnect you with your values and your sense of meaning.

In moments of confusion or distress, it is easy to lose sight of what matters to you. Your thinking becomes reactive, focused on discomfort rather than direction.

Questions such as these can help:

• “What kind of person do I want to be in this situation?”
• “What matters to me here, beyond my immediate feelings?”
• “If I were acting in alignment with my values, what would I do?”

These are not easy questions. They do not produce quick answers. But they bring depth to your self-coaching. They remind you that your life is not just a series of problems to solve but a series of choices about how to live.

Practicing Better Questioning

Learning to ask better questions is a practice. It requires repetition, patience, and a willingness to experiment.

You might begin by setting aside a few minutes each day to reflect on a current challenge and to deliberately generate better questions. Write them down. Notice which ones open something up and which ones shut things down.

You can also catch yourself in the moment. When you notice a distressing thought, ask: “What question am I asking right now?” Then consider: “Is this the best question I could be asking?”

Over time, this becomes more natural. You begin to internalize a different style of thinking. Your mind becomes less of an adversary and more of a collaborator.

Becoming Your Own Questioner

At its heart, self-coaching is about becoming your own thoughtful questioner. Instead of waiting for someone else to guide your thinking, you take on that role yourself.

This does not mean that you will always have the perfect question. You will still fall into old patterns. You will still ask unhelpful questions. But you will also have the capacity to notice, to adjust, and to try again.

Better questions do not guarantee easy answers. But they create the conditions for more honest, more useful, and more life-affirming responses.

And in the long run, that is what self-coaching is about: not having all the answers, but learning how to think in ways that support the life you want to live.

I hope that you’re enjoying this series. Please check out the Noble ManhattanExistential Wellness Coach Certificate Program and my latest books, Brave New Mind and Night Brilliance.

Check out Eric Maisel’s transformative courses in collaboration with Noble Manhattan—designed to elevate your coaching journey.

Creativity Coaching Program

Existential Wellness Program

Relationship Coach Training

Each week Eric Maisel provides tips on the coaching life. Come to take a look at his three programs with Noble Manhattan Coaching: a Creativity Coach Certificate Program, an Existential Wellness Coach Program and a Relationship Coach Certificate Program.

You can subscribe to Dr. Maisel’s weekly newsletter here, visit him at his site here, and purchase his new resource for coaches, The Exceptional Coach, here

The post Weekly Coaching Tip: Learning to Ask Yourself Better Questions appeared first on Coaching Blog.

Hello Everyone

We wanted to let you know that our weekly motivational call will be on pause until May 21st.


and we encourage you to mark your calendars for what promises to be an exceptional session.

The upcoming topic will be: “Setting Boundaries In Life: Who you let in, shapes who you become” — A CPD Lecture for Qualified & Student Coaches.

Click Here for the zoom link

This discussion will be both insightful and inspiring, focusing on the importance of boundaries in shaping our personal and professional lives. It is designed to provide practical guidance and meaningful reflection, an opportunity you will not want to miss.


Although we are unable to hold our usual weekly motivational Zoom meeting for now,

we don’t want you to miss out on the energy and inspiration that these sessions always bring, we invite you to revisit the recording of our last meeting.



You can access it here:

The post Will Be Back On May 21st !! Dont Miss Our Exceptional Session appeared first on Coaching Blog.

During the spring and summer of 2026 I’ll be presenting a series of posts on the art and practice of self-coaching. I think you’ll find this series valuable for your own purposes; and, if you work with clients, in your work with clients. Please enjoy! You can always reach me with comments and questions at ericmaisel@hotmail.com

In the landscape of self-coaching, few distinctions are as important—or as easily overlooked—as the difference between advice and self-inquiry. At first glance, they may seem closely related. Both are attempts to move forward, to solve problems, to feel better, or to make clearer decisions. But in practice, they arise from very different orientations toward the self, and they lead to very different outcomes.

What is Advice?

Advice is directional. It tells you what to do. It points, instructs, recommends, or prescribes. Advice can come from others—friends, experts, books—but it can also come from within. You may have an internal voice that says, “You should just get over it,” or “You need to be more disciplined,” or “The right thing to do is obvious.” This internal advice often carries the tone of authority, urgency, or even impatience

What is Self-Inquiry?

Self-inquiry, by contrast, is exploratory. It does not tell—it asks. It opens space rather than closing it. Instead of directing you toward a predetermined answer, it invites you to discover what is true, relevant, or meaningful for you in this particular moment. Self-inquiry sounds like: “What is actually going on here?” “What am I feeling?” “What matters to me in this situation?” “What feels like the next right step?”

The Appeal—and Limits—of Advice

At a surface level, advice can feel efficient. It promises quick clarity. It reduces complexity to a clear instruction: do this, don’t do that. In moments of confusion or distress, this can be deeply appealing. You want relief, and advice seems to offer a shortcut to resolution.

But the efficiency of advice is often deceptive.

Advice tends to operate from generalization. It draws on what has worked before, what is commonly recommended, or what seems logically sound. While this can be useful in straightforward situations, it often misses the nuances of your actual experience. Your history, your temperament, your values, and the specifics of your current situation may not align neatly with the advice being offered—even if that advice is, in some abstract sense, “good.”

The Burden of “Shoulds”

This is especially true when the advice is internalized. Many people carry around a collection of “shoulds” that guide their /* removed */ “I should be more productive,” “I should be more confident,” “I shouldn’t feel this way.” These statements often masquerade as helpful guidance, but they can create tension, resistance, and even shame. Instead of clarifying the path forward, they can leave you feeling inadequate or stuck.

How Self-Inquiry Works

Self-inquiry works differently. Rather than imposing a solution, it begins with understanding. It assumes that your experience is complex and worthy of exploration. It recognizes that the most useful answers are often not the most obvious ones, and that they cannot be arrived at through force or assumption.

When you engage in self-inquiry, you slow down. You turn your attention inward, not to judge or fix, but to notice and to learn. You might discover that what you initially framed as a problem is actually composed of several layers—conflicting desires, unacknowledged fears, competing values. Advice tends to flatten these layers into a single directive; self-inquiry allows them to be seen.

Example: Procrastination

For example, imagine you are procrastinating on an important project. Advice might say: “Just get started. Stop being lazy.” This may contain a kernel of truth—action does matter—but it bypasses the underlying dynamics. Self-inquiry, on the other hand, might ask: “What am I feeling when I think about this project?” “Is there fear here? Doubt? Perfectionism?” “What feels difficult about beginning?” “What would make the first step more manageable?”

Through these questions, you might uncover that your procrastination is not about laziness at all, but about fear of failure or uncertainty about how to proceed. With that understanding, your response can be more targeted and compassionate. You might decide to break the task into smaller pieces, to seek clarification, or to allow yourself to do a rough, imperfect first draft. The action that emerges from self-inquiry is often more sustainable because it is grounded in reality.

Authority and Autonomy

Another key difference between advice and self-inquiry lies in their relationship to authority. Advice assumes that the answer is already known—either by someone else or by a part of you that claims certainty. It positions you as the recipient of that answer. Self-inquiry, in contrast, positions you as the discoverer. It assumes that the answer is not fully formed and that it will emerge through exploration.

This distinction has important implications for autonomy. When you rely heavily on advice, especially external advice, you may begin to doubt your own capacity to navigate your life. You may look outward for direction, reassurance, or validation. Even when the advice is helpful, this pattern can weaken your sense of agency over time.

Self-inquiry strengthens that agency. It encourages you to trust your ability to engage with your own experience thoughtfully. You are not passively receiving answers; you are actively generating them. This does not mean you reject all advice. Rather, you relate to advice differently. Instead of accepting it wholesale, you might ask: “Does this resonate with me?” “How does this fit with my situation?” “What part of this, if any, feels useful?”

In this way, self-inquiry can include advice without being dominated by it.

Emotional Impact

There is also an emotional dimension to this distinction. Advice, particularly when it is unsolicited or harshly delivered, can feel invalidating. It can suggest that your current experience is wrong or that you should already know what to do. Even your own internal advice can have this effect. When you tell yourself, “You shouldn’t feel this way,” you are, in essence, rejecting your present reality.

Self-inquiry, by contrast, begins with acceptance. Not approval of everything, but acknowledgment. It says: “This is what is happening right now.” From that place, it becomes possible to move forward without the added burden of self-rejection. This acceptance often creates a sense of relief, which in turn makes constructive action more accessible.

When Advice is Useful

It is worth noting that advice is not inherently bad. There are situations where clear guidance is appropriate and useful—learning a new skill, navigating a well-defined problem, or benefiting from someone else’s expertise. The issue is not advice itself, but the overreliance on it, especially in areas that require personal meaning-making, emotional nuance, and value-based decision-making.

Self-Coaching in Practice

Self-coaching, as a practice, leans heavily toward self-inquiry because it aims to cultivate an internal process rather than a set of external answers. It recognizes that your life is not a standardized problem with a universal solution. It is a dynamic, evolving experience that requires ongoing attention and thoughtful engagement.

One way to integrate this understanding into your self-coaching practice is to notice your default tendency. When you face a challenge, do you immediately reach for advice—either from others or from your own internal “shoulds”? If so, you might experiment with pausing and shifting into inquiry.

Instead of asking, “What should I do?” you might ask, “What is this situation asking of me?” Instead of saying, “I need to fix this,” you might say, “I want to understand this.” These subtle shifts in language can lead to significant shifts in experience.

Conclusion

Over time, you may find that self-inquiry leads to answers that feel more aligned, more nuanced, and more genuinely your own. These answers may not always be simple or comfortable, but they tend to carry a sense of rightness—a feeling that they fit your life as it is actually being lived.

Ultimately, the difference between advice and self-inquiry is the difference between being told and discovering, between following and understanding, between imposing and uncovering. In the context of self-coaching, this difference matters deeply.

I hope that you’re enjoying this series. Please check out the Noble ManhattanExistential Wellness Coach Certificate Program and my latest books, Brave New Mind and Night Brilliance.

Check out Eric Maisel’s transformative courses in collaboration with Noble Manhattan—designed to elevate your coaching journey.

Creativity Coaching Program

Existential Wellness Program

Relationship Coach Training

The post Weekly Coaching Tip: The Difference Between Advice and Self-Inquiry appeared first on Coaching Blog.

Hello Everyone


We wanted to let you know that our weekly motivational calls will be on pause until May 21st and we encourage you to mark your calendars for what promises to be an exceptional session.

The upcoming topic will be: “Setting Boundaries In Life: Who you let in, shapes who you become” — A CPD Lecture for Qualified & Student Coaches.

This discussion will be both insightful and inspiring, focusing on the importance of boundaries in shaping our personal and professional lives. It is designed to provide practical guidance and meaningful reflection, an opportunity you will not want to miss.

To keep that momentum going, we invite you to revisit the recording of our last meeting, where we shared valuable insights and uplifting stories. You can access it here:

Thank you for your continued dedication and enthusiasm.

We look forward to resuming our call  and continuing this journey of growth and inspiration with all of you.

Warm Regards

Noble Manhattan Team

The post We Will Be Back !! – Dont Miss Our Next Inspirational Session on May 21th appeared first on Coaching Blog.

During the spring and summer of 2026 I’ll be presenting a series of posts on the art and practice of self-coaching. I think you’ll find this series valuable for your own purposes; and, if you work with clients, in your work with clients. Please enjoy! You can always reach me with comments and questions at ericmaisel@hotmail.com

Adopting a self-coaching mindset is less about learning a set of techniques and more about inhabiting a new orientation toward yourself and your life. It is a shift in stance—a way of standing in relation to your thoughts, your feelings, your challenges, and your possibilities. Where many people live as reactors to their inner and outer circumstances, the self-coaching mindset invites you to become a participant, an observer, and a guide.

At its heart, this mindset begins with a simple but transformative reframe: I can relate to my experience differently. Not control everything. Not eliminate discomfort. Not perfect myself. But relate differently. That difference in relating changes everything.

From Identification to Observation

One of the foundational elements of the self-coaching mindset is the move from identification to observation. In everyday life, it is easy to become fused with your thoughts and feelings. If a thought arises—“I’m not good enough”—it can feel like a statement of fact. If anxiety appears, it can feel like a command to withdraw. In this fused state, there is little room to maneuver.

The self-coaching mindset gently inserts distance. You begin to notice: “I’m having the thought that I’m not good enough.” “I’m feeling anxious right now.” This may sound like a small linguistic shift, but it creates psychological space. In that space, you are no longer identical with the experience; you are in relationship to it. And relationship allows for choice.

This observing stance is not cold or detached. It is infused with curiosity. Instead of reacting immediately, you become interested in what is happening inside you. You might ask: “What triggered this feeling?” “What does this remind me of?” “What might I need right now?” Curiosity replaces reactivity, and understanding begins to replace confusion.

Responsibility and Inner Dialogue

Another core feature of the self-coaching mindset is the assumption of responsibility—not in a blaming sense, but in an empowering one. You begin to recognize that while you are not responsible for everything that happens to you, you are responsible for how you engage with what happens. This includes your interpretations, your responses, and your next steps.

This kind of responsibility can feel uncomfortable at first, especially if you are used to attributing your difficulties primarily to external factors. But it is also liberating. If your experience is entirely determined by circumstances, then you are at their mercy. If, however, your way of relating to those circumstances matters, then you have influence. You have room to act.

Adopting the self-coaching mindset also means becoming intentional about your inner dialogue. Most people have an ongoing stream of self-talk, much of it automatic and unexamined. Often, this self-talk is critical, pessimistic, or limiting. It may echo voices from the past—parents, teachers, cultural messages—that have been internalized over time.

The self-coaching mindset invites you to bring this inner dialogue into awareness and to shape it more consciously. You begin to ask: “Is this thought helpful?” “Is it accurate?” “Is there another way to see this?” Over time, you can cultivate a voice that is both honest and supportive—one that acknowledges difficulty without collapsing into defeat.

Importantly, this does not mean replacing every negative thought with a positive one. Forced positivity often rings hollow and can even feel invalidating. Instead, the aim is realism combined with encouragement. You might move from “I’ll never figure this out” to “This is hard, and I can take it one step at a time.” The difference is subtle but powerful

Values-Based Living

A self-coaching mindset also involves a commitment to values-based living. Without clarity about what matters to you, your efforts at self-coaching can become scattered or reactive. You may solve one problem only to find yourself drifting into another. Values provide direction. They answer the question: Toward what am I coaching myself?

When you are clear about your values—whether they include creativity, connection, integrity, learning, contribution, or something else—you can use them as a compass. In moments of uncertainty, you can ask: “What action here would align with my values?” This question cuts through confusion and grounds you in purposeful movement.

For example, if you value honesty, the self-coaching mindset might guide you to have a difficult but necessary conversation rather than avoiding it. If you value growth, it might encourage you to take on a challenging project despite self-doubt. If you value compassion, it might lead you to treat yourself more gently when you fall short.

Experimentation and Reflection

Another important aspect of adopting this mindset is the willingness to experiment. Many people approach their lives with a fixed sense of how things are: “This is just the way I am.” “I’m not good at that.” “That never works for me.” These statements close down possibility.

The self-coaching mindset reopens it. It treats behavior and patterns as flexible rather than fixed. Instead of assuming that a particular approach will fail, you become willing to test alternatives. You might try a new way of structuring your day, a different method of approaching a task, or a new way of communicating in a relationship.

These experiments are not high-stakes declarations; they are small, iterative steps. You try something, observe the result, and adjust accordingly. This process reduces the fear of failure because each attempt is framed as learning rather than as a final judgment of your ability.

Closely related to experimentation is the practice of reflection. The self-coaching mindset includes regular moments of stepping back and asking: “What happened?” “What did I learn?” “What might I do differently next time?” Without reflection, experience can pass by without yielding insight. With reflection, even difficult or disappointing experiences become valuable sources of information.

Reflection can take many forms—journaling, quiet contemplation, or structured self-inquiry. The key is consistency. By regularly engaging in reflection, you build a habit of learning from your life rather than simply moving through it.

Emotional Willingness and Self-Trust

Adopting the self-coaching mindset also requires emotional willingness. This means being open to experiencing your feelings rather than avoiding or suppressing them. Many patterns of behavior—procrastination, distraction, withdrawal—are attempts to escape uncomfortable emotions such as fear, shame, or sadness.

The self-coaching mindset does not demand that you enjoy these emotions, but it encourages you to make room for them. You might say to yourself: “This is anxiety. I can feel it and still take action.” Or, “This is disappointment. It’s okay to sit with it for a while.” By allowing emotions to be present without letting them dictate your actions, you expand your capacity to live in alignment with your values.

Another dimension of this mindset is self-trust. As you practice observing, questioning, experimenting, and reflecting, you begin to develop confidence in your ability to navigate your own life. This trust does not come from always making the “right” decision; it comes from knowing that you can handle the consequences of your decisions, learn from them, and adjust.

Self-trust also involves listening to yourself. In a world that is full of external advice and competing perspectives, it can be easy to lose touch with your own inner sense of what feels right or meaningful. The self-coaching mindset encourages you to take in information from others but to filter it through your own values, experiences, and intuition.

An Ongoing Practice

It is also worth noting that adopting this mindset is not a one-time shift. It is an ongoing practice. There will be times when you fall back into old patterns—reactivity, self-criticism, avoidance. This is not a failure; it is part of the process. The self-coaching mindset includes the ability to notice these moments and gently return to a more intentional stance.

In this sense, patience is essential. You are not trying to transform yourself overnight. You are cultivating a way of being that develops over time through repeated practice. Each moment of awareness, each thoughtful question, each aligned action contributes to this development.

Why does adopting the self-coaching mindset matter?

Because it changes your experience of being alive. Instead of feeling pushed around by your thoughts and circumstances, you begin to experience yourself as an active participant in your life. You gain a sense of agency—not absolute control, but meaningful influence.

It also enhances your resilience. When challenges arise, as they inevitably do, you have a framework for engaging with them. You can observe what is happening, support yourself through it, and identify constructive next steps. This does not eliminate difficulty, but it changes your relationship to it.

Furthermore, the self-coaching mindset supports a deeper sense of meaning. By aligning your actions with your values and engaging consciously with your experiences, you create a life that feels more intentional. You are not simply reacting to what happens; you are shaping your response in ways that reflect what matters to you.

Finally, it fosters a more compassionate and respectful relationship with yourself. You move away from harsh self-judgment and toward a stance of understanding and support. This does not mean lowering your standards or avoiding accountability. It means holding yourself to your standards in a way that is constructive rather than destructive.

In adopting the self-coaching mindset, you become both the student and the teacher of your own life. You learn from your experiences, and you guide your future actions. You are no longer waiting for someone else to provide clarity or direction. You are developing the capacity to generate those from within.

This is a quiet but profound shift. It does not announce itself with dramatic changes overnight. Instead, it reveals itself in small, consistent moments: a pause before reacting, a thoughtful question in the midst of confusion, a choice to act in alignment with your values despite discomfort.

Over time, these moments accumulate. They shape a life that is more aware, more intentional, and more authentically yours. That is the promise—and the practice—of adopting the self-coaching mindset.

I hope that you’re enjoying this series. Please check out the Noble ManhattanExistential Wellness Coach Certificate Program and my latest books, Brave New Mind and Night Brilliance.]

Check out Eric Maisel’s transformative courses in collaboration with Noble Manhattan—designed to elevate your coaching journey.

Creativity Coaching Program

Existential Wellness Program

Relationship Coach Training

Each week Eric Maisel provides tips on the coaching life. Come to take a look at his three programs with Noble Manhattan Coaching: a Creativity Coach Certificate Program, an Existential Wellness Coach Program and a Relationship Coach Certificate Program.

The post Weekly Coaching Tip: Adopting the Self-Coaching Mindset appeared first on Coaching Blog.