How can you practice psychology coaching without a license?  Do you need a degree to help depression coaching clients?  It actually depends on what you want to do.  For many depression coaching clients a few NLP coaching tips will make a dramatic impact in the way they live.  These NLP strategies are often grouped into psychology coaching, which really helps your clients make choices in how they want to use their brain.

Reframing a Clients Beliefs is Powerful NLP Psychology Coaching Tool

Richard Bandler, who is one of the founders of NLP and often is studied in psychology coaching, described a former client of his in his book, “Using Your Brain for a Change.”  This client told him that he had been depressed for 16 years.  Bandler goes on to explain that it’s impossible for people to remain in one state for that long.  People study meditation for years before they are able to stay in one state for even an hour.  In psychology coaching if you take what people say at face value, you give it more validity.  A depression coaching NLP tool would be to reframe this client’s belief and suggest that he was probably only truly depressed for 24 hours during that 16 year period.   During that period Bandler’s client had also been in sleeping states, angry states, and probably even happy states.  According to Bandler, “You can cure people of what they’ve got, and discover that they never had it.”  This is a powerful tool in depression coaching.

Help Your Depression Coaching Clients by Revealing How They Get Into a Depressive State

Another psychology coaching tool that you can use specifically for depression coaching is to find out what your clients do to get into a depressed state.  Once you know how they do it, you can teach them how to do it differently to get another result.  Do they visualize specific scenes or replay memories? Or do they talk to themselves?  Is it in an obvious way, or in such a subtle way that it has a powerful hypnotic effect?

Psychology coaching and depression coaching are not about understanding the reasons people are depressed, but to empower them to control their states and get the results they want.  NLP techniques to change states can be very effective as well as helping clients find alternative ways to get their needs met at a higher level.  But this is an area where you need to understand warning signs that would indicate that your client needs additional help from a licensed professional.

Colette Seymann

JTS Advisors Bi-Designated Strategy and Accountability Coach