Paul and I embarked on a course to coach me towards a position that entails far more responsibility and accountability, and consequently demands far more from me than I have ever had to produce in the past.

I have spent a great deal of the last 12 years of my life struggling with an anxiety disorder, and consequently, my levels of confidence have been very low at times. This has presented Paul with far greater challenges than I think he had foreseen when he accepted the role of coach and agreed to help me rebuild my confidence and, subsequently, my productive usefulness within society.

We started down this road in September 2011 and plan to complete the first phase of the journey by the end of 2014. The progress that I have made on the road to gaining my confidence back, during the past 13 months, has helped me get through possibly the most challenging year of my life to date. I started studying to complete a BSC in Informatics through UNISA, have been completing many other shorter technical, analytical and business-oriented courses, and have had possibly the busiest 3 months of my working career during July, August and September this year, without having a single anxiety attack. This is mostly thanks to the coaching methods employed by Paul and his persistence and wisdom employed in guiding me through the minefield of challenges faced during the last year – guidance in dealing with conflict situations, difficult people and extreme work situations.

All-in-all, I have to thank Paul for challenging me and making me grow as a person, being extremely patient when I digress and vent my anger over some work pressures, considerate for allowing me as much freedom as possible to pursue my goals, and understanding when I simply have to say no.

I am most fortunate and most grateful that I experienced a profoundly life changing, coaching with Paul. The coaching sessions helped me with important life skills; it awakened areas of my consciousness that I never thought I would explore.

During my consciousness journey I learned how to evaluate the “self” and it definitely taught me that it is good to get out of my comfort zone, because this is when change occurs and with this change, new opportunities presents themselves.

Before I started the coaching sessions with Paul, I was in a state were my thoughts were more negative and quite often I was frustrated. I have since grown because of the coaching sessions to a state of positivity.

I feel equipped to deal with my challenges. As a result of this, I was gifted with opportunities both from a personal and career perspective.

What I find most interesting was that even though Paul and I knew each other in South Africa, it was only until we went to the US together that we started talking about consciousness coaching. Maybe this in itself is a lesson, that consciousness is not just an internal journey, but it is also a physical journey.

Over the past two to three months, I underwent a series of Consciousness Coaching sessions with Paul. I found the coaching sessions to be interesting, and an excellent way of working my way through any issue to find an appropriate solution.

I believe that it is an empowering method of working, as it is not based on someone telling you what you are experiencing, giving advice or solutions, etc, but someone who can help to guide you to your own solutions, that works best for you as an individual.

Having to commit to achieving my goals is also a great motivator to stick to whatever those goals are, as even though I am not judged according to whether I achieve them or not; they are set in my consciousness and therefore I have a greater chance of sticking to the commitments made. I also really enjoyed the information nuggets presented at each session. There was something to learn from each of them.