Do I need another certification before I can charge clients?

Usually, no. If you already hold a certification and work within it and your local rules, clients care most about whether you can help with their problem. More training is worth it when it adds a tool you want, and a trap when it becomes a reason to wait.

Do I need another coaching certification before I can charge?

Most of the time, you don't. Many of the people who come to Jayden and me already hold three or more certifications. They have good tools and years of training. What they don't have yet is clients.

I know that feeling from the inside. Every course I bought taught me the same hidden lesson: you're not there yet. I'd finish a course feeling a bit worse than when I started, because now I had a new list of things I wasn't.

On one of our group calls, I talked about the voice that shows up when you're scared of being judged. It sounds like this: "I need to be seen as a professional. I need to get more certifications."

That voice sounds sensible. So it keeps you buying the next course, and the one after that.

Sometimes the block shows up right at the moment of saying a price. For Yashwant, that was the hard part: "Before, for me to say £3,000, my tongue would fall back on itself." He now quotes a thousand as his minimum.

I learned all of this the slow way, on a warehouse floor.

Can I charge without formal coaching credentials?

I did. I started with no formal coaching credentials, and what held me back was mostly in my own head. Before you copy me, check the rules where you live, because some kinds of work need a licence.

Back then I drove a forklift in a big warehouse. It took me two years to make my first sale online, and it came from a YouTube video.

Once a little money was coming in, I wrote a letter to the managers asking to go part time. I even told them my grandpa shopped there every day. They said yes, so I worked Friday to Sunday and kept four days a week for the business.

Later I got coaching from someone, and soon after I made my first $2,500. Around then I saw a coach charging $500 to teach people how to do what he'd done.

I thought, I've made $2,500, so I can show other people how. I charged $500 for coaching by email. No certificate on the wall, no sales calls.

Later my mentor, Oliver, told me I could charge $10,000, even $25,000. I didn't believe him. My head filled up with reasons, like "Yeah, but I'm uneducated, no one's gonna buy from me."

I'd never done phone sales in my life. He told me what to do, and I did it anyway, scared and full of doubts. You start with the doubts still there, and you learn on the way.

These days I put it like this: "I don't need to be an expert. I'm the reluctant hero." Training still matters to me, though, and I'd never tell you to throw yours away.

Is a coaching certification worth it?

It can be, for the right reasons. Good training gives you tools, and some jobs and some places require a qualification. Jayden and I aren't lawyers, so always work inside your own qualifications and local rules.

Here's where I think a certificate fits. On one call I said, "A job does care about your qualification. However, clients don't necessarily care about your qualifications as much."

What clients care about most is whether you can solve their problem. In the same breath, I told everyone to keep studying and learning new skills.

I still study myself. As I told one group, "I'm consistently learning. I was studying today." I keep selling while I learn.

I think of new training as tools on a utility belt. An extra screwdriver or hammer is handy. I've thought about adding a body-based training to mine, and it would be nice to have, but I don't need it to charge.

So ask yourself why you want the next one. If you want a new tool, add it. If part of you believes you're broken without it, another course won't settle that part.

And when a client needs more than you're trained for, refer them to a therapist or a licensed professional. We teach that in the course. I don't enrol people I know I can't help.

That still leaves the question of which course to take next, if any.

What's the best certification for a life coach?

Usually, the best one is the certification you already have, used with real people. If a job or your local rules ask for a particular qualification, that one comes first. After that, using your tools matters more than adding new ones.

Here's a test I give members for anything that promises to get you clients. Ask whether it gets you in front of people or makes a sale. If it does neither, it's a distraction, even when it looks like work.

The people selling the next certification are running ads and getting clients. That's the exact thing you could be doing with what you already know. And you only need to be a few steps ahead of the people you help.

Some of the people with the most training say this better than I can. Eva, a licensed therapist, told us, "I've been to all kinds of trainings and certifications."

Then she said, "It makes it so simple. And it feels clean, because the ego is not in it."

Sollena, an energy tools practitioner, was already doing a lot of this kind of work with her clients. Her words were, "You and Jayden have created such a clear and concise pathway to get from point A to point B."

Joanna, from one of our cohorts, summed it up at the end of a live session: "I feel like I have all of the tools, and I just need to do the thing, and I can do that."

How does The Complete Practitioner handle this?

The Complete Practitioner is coaching and business training for people who already hold certifications. It covers what many trainings leave out: who you are when it's time to be seen, and how you get in front of people. You run the protocols on yourself first, then with clients.

Members who pass an in-depth test get a crystal plaque with their name on it. A plaque doesn't license you to do anything. The training doesn't diagnose or treat medical or mental health conditions, and serious cases go to a therapist or licensed professional.

Questions people ask