I turned 60 last Tuesday and it’s time to step into my full, authentic self.

I am a life coach.

I realize that you might have been preparing for a different definition of “out.” Nonetheless, I have been hiding behind a mask, marketing myself as an exit planning advisor and family business guru since launching my practice three years ago. I do those things, and I do know what I’m doing. But there are thousands of people who have far more experience, far more training, and far more credentials to certify their expertise than I.

What I do as well as, if not better than anyone else, falls square in the life coaching space. It is my gift.

I am a life coach for the business of life.

Life coaching is why I’ve built a successful exit planning practice in just three years. And I am certain that business owners need life coaches because I see evidence of that every week in the peer groups I moderate. People are hungry for connection to souls in a similar space.

Before my birthday, I told myself that business owners were not capable of believing that a life coach could help them.

No more.

At 60, I am releasing the limiting belief that my gift is too woo-woo, too out there, too frivolous for the serious businesswoman mask I’ve been wearing for the last three decades of my life.

I’m letting my life coach freak flag fly.

the lies I told myself

Starting my coaching practice was scary on many levels. Could I earn enough money as a coach? Would people find me credible? Would colleagues roll their eyes if I published videos on social media?

I knew I deeply cared about people in transition — I had just been through decades of significant change, reinvented myself and was thriving. But I believed that when people want that kind of help they see a therapist. Life coaching would be a laughable, wasteful effort and would bring certain financial failure when I was on the cusp of retirement. Worse, it would damage my credibility as a serious leader of unity, change and progress in business.

These damaging beliefs aside, I also wallowed in self judgment. Who would hire me to help them navigate complex issues like identity and purpose?

I was just that college party girl.
I had married and divorced a hot-mess alcoholic.
I had been in and out of debt for most of my life.
I was that struggling, single mom driving a beat up minivan.
Then I married again. Divorced again. I was broke again. I was broken again.
My child struggled. I judged myself for his struggle. I imagined others judging me for it. “She was divorced twice, you know. Not stable.”
So I wouldn’t risk opening my heart to ever be hurt again. Even though I had healed that part, I thought, and really wanted someone to love. I was choosing isolation.

Clearly no one would pay me as a life coach with that resume.

Seeing courage up close

In June I traveled to Portugal to visit my business partner, Chris Evans. He moved there in the spring with his husband Matt to start their new life together. Both spent decades married to women. Both took significant risk to step into their truth.

With risk comes reward. I see it in Chris and Matt — madly in love, radiating joy. They live their truth. They celebrate it. And that attracts the right people to them. Including me.

I want that, too.

To get it, I know that I must love every piece of who I am. That means throwing out all the masks I’ve worn just to get through life.

I have earned a Ph.D. in life lessons. Everything I’ve been through prepared me for this very moment and no other combination of experiences could have created the wisdom that my life choices and patterns produced.

You can stand in your power, too.

What if all those years you spent building your business was only to prepare you to step into who you truly are?

What if every win, every loss, every vital lesson learned was setting you up to ignite a life-changing fire in your soul?

What if you need a life coach? Maybe two?

Chris and I have launched a unique peer advisory experience called Founder’s Transition Lab. Designed for business owners preparing for their life post exit, and post exit business owners who haven’t yet found their footing, this is how we do things in the Lab:

Create awareness around what we’ve suppressed.
Accept things we’ve been judging.
Make choices, consciously, in alignment with our values.
Learn to trust our choices, allowing them to evolve as we grow.
Discover and embrace who we authentically are.
Become fearless about pursuing and living in alignment with our evolving truths.
Test those truths, gaining confidence as we try things on.
All the while connecting to ideas and people in a similar season of life.
So we can learn to live fully in the present moment, completely engaged in our journeys as they unfold.

I never would have shared our process a year ago. I would have written about maximizing business value and the importance of developing successors. Those things matter, but what we do in the Lab is what it really takes to help you transition from who you are to who you are becoming.

Chris owned three businesses. I help business owners transition theirs.

We are life coaches for the business of life.

At 60, I’m stepping fully into who I am. If you’re ready to step into who you’re becoming, by all means join us in the Lab.