Are you one of these people?

If so, pause for a moment and ask yourself the big question:

Do you like your life?

No, really, do you like it?

If you do, that’s great. But if you don’t or even if you like some aspects of it but not all of it, then it’s time to do something about it. You have a choice. The choice to continue as you are or to change. Not doing anything IS a choice.

Now, consider this. You have one life, one shot at it, every second is gone forever. And yes, there is comfort in choosing to do nothing. It’s easier. But you will be stuck in that life you don’t like.

It’s completely up to you and if you do want to do something about it, then, let’s start the journey!

First things first. What is it that you don’t like in your life? Your job? Your relationship with your partner, your kids, your relatives, your friends? Your work/life balance? …

How much do you not like it? A little? A lot? What is it that you would like to fix first?

The Life Coaching Wheel (or ‘Wheel of Life’)

To answer all these questions, a little picture will speak a thousand words so let me introduce to you the Life Coaching Wheel. (a graphical example of a life coaching wheel or wheel of life is shown above). It’s a simple tool used by all life coaches. It’s simple but very powerful because it forces you to examine the different areas of your life and will highlight clearly where the problems lie.

1. Take a piece of paper and write down 8 areas that are important to you.

Here are some examples of areas to choose from, feel free to change their names or add new labels that are more appropriate to you and your life.

• Work
• Partner/Romance Friends Career
• Home (Physical environment)
• Children
• Wealth
• Financial Prosperity
• Contribution to Society
• Fun / Recreation
• Time Management
• Personal Growth / Development
• Family / Relatives
• Work-life balance
• Spirituality (Religion, ethics, values)
• Health (Nutrition, Exercise, Stress)
• Well-being
• Vitality

2. Draw a circle with 8 lines coming from the center like spokes on a bike’s wheel.

Name each line with one of your chosen areas.

Now assign each spoke a number (from 0 at the center to 10 at the perimeter of the circle). 0 means you’re not satisfied at all with that area, 10 that you’re completely satisfied.

Repeat for each area.

3. Join all the numbers assigned on each spoke.

What you will see appearing is a shape that represents your life. Is it round? balanced? could it turn? are there peaks and troughs?

How To Use Your Life Coaching Wheel

The Life Coaching Wheel you’ve just created gives you a useful visual aid to focus in on the areas of your life you are more or less satisfied with. It should show you clearly which areas you are the most dissatisfied with.

We use the Life Coaching Wheel to choose the areas of our life we want to work on. There might be several but you cannot work on all of them at once. It is really recommended to only work on one area at a time so as to keep focus and enhance our chances of success.

Consequently, picking the area you want to work on needs some consideration.

You want an area which, once improved, will make a real positive impact on your life and other’s around you who matter to you. The area you’re most dissatisfied with isn’t necessarily the best area to start with (for example in case it is not going to be the easiest to work on or is an ‘isolated’ area).

Often working on and getting more comfortable with a certain area of our lives can help to improve other areas – e.g. working on our health or confidence could have a positive impact about feelings we have about our career – even though they seem unrelated at first.

So, bearing this in mind, the next step is to make a considered decision around a single area to work on.

Prioritize and choose the one you really want to work on, the one that will make an impact in your life.

That’s it, you’ve got it?

Now, write down what it would need to be like for that area to be a 10.

Once you’ve got this, you can use it as a starting point to set your goal. Setting your goal is of the utmost important as it’s what you will strive to achieve in your Life Coaching journey.

Use this article to help you set a good and inspiring goal: Set Yourself A Worthy Goal.