Everybody Hurts?
HELEN MURPHY & NICK PELLING meet up with a wellbeing coach
Do you ever struggle with what might be called your psychological balance, to the extent that constant anxiety is driving you to consider desperate measures? I suspect we all know that kind of feeling. Indeed, there seems to be an epidemic of angst in this country right now. And what the NHS offers in this area is at best patchy and often non-existent. And yet out of this bleakness, some individuals are finding ways to turn their pain into something transformative for others.
We caught up with one such person – Lauren Magic – one of the new generation of what are often called ‘wellbeing coaches’. She explained that this is someone who has been through difficult “lived experience” and therefore feels able to pass on some hard-won wisdom to other people. She clarified: “I am not a clinical therapist.”
The key difference between clinical therapists and wellbeing coaches is that the latter share and use their own experience whereas clinical therapists insist on maintaining ‘professional boundaries’. In talking to Lauren we soon realised she’s not one to hide behind boundaries. “What I try to do is give people tools to be able to help and empower themselves to heal – and to let them know, simply, that they’re not alone.” There is an extraordinary combination of sensitivity and tough-mindedness about Lauren, and that is probably why her practice is expanding rapidly.
But, what was it in her own experience that led her through such a difficult journey? From the age of about thirteen she suffered from endometriosis – a painful condition that is so physically debilitating that it’s almost impossible to function normally. But as Lauren explained, it’s not just that it’s physically crippling, but that it eats away at your mental stability. She slowly discovered that the health service could do very little to help, either with the physical or the psychological torments of the condition. She had to research extensively to find her own way out of her maze of problems. Out of that has come deeply – and even bodily – ingrained knowledge. A knowledge that she now uses to help others.
In her work practice she employs many types of therapeutic approach, both on a one-to-one basis and in small group workshops or healing circles; she takes care to tailor her techniques to individuals. She takes people through sessions on meditation, work on their inner child, issues around co-dependency and boundaries and a range of other ways of thinking about inner issues. “I want people to be able to sit with their own feelings and even forgive themselves.”
Much of what she offers is accessed online, which is, in many ways, an ideal platform for socially fragile people. Interestingly, she says that many of the people who come to her are men, although women are equally responsive. It seems that Lauren’s structured approach, with its emphasis on tools and skills, appeals strongly to all people searching for help, rather than being dumped on a waiting list.
In an age when many people in this town are not waving but drowning, it seems that Lauren is a possible lifeline out there.
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