Frequently Asked Questions

If someone is looking to make changes in their life for the better, they may benefit from hiring a coach. A person will hire a coach to get to the core of what it is that they truly want or need and develop a plan with actionable steps to achieve specific goals in any aspect of their life. Coaching assists in getting the client from where they currently are to where they want or need to be.

Coaching focuses on the present to help move people forward in the desired direction by asking powerful questions, establishing accountability, determining desired or needed outcomes, and designing plans with actionable steps to achieve those outcomes.

Coaching helps someone determine what it is that they really want or need and how to obtain it. A coach guides the client to their own answers, accountability, and actionable steps to achieve success. Any area of one’s life can benefit from a partnership with a coach of certain expertise.

A consciousness coach provides their clients the fundamentals of life coaching while also integrating and enhancing conscious connection that the client wishes to achieve. A developed plan with actionable steps is tailored toward implementing and achieving these specific results in their lives. As in all types of coaching, the client is guided and empowered to their own answers and truth that is specific for them.

Spirit, Energy, and Consciousness are intimately related. Spirit comes from the Latin word spiritualitas. Spiritualitas comes from the noun spiritus which means ‘the breath of life’. The root word of spiritus is spirare which means to breathe, to blow, and to live. The root ‘ality’ in general is the characteristic nature or essence of something. Therefore, spirituality literally means the essence of living, to LIVE. To live, energy and consciousness are necessary, in fact, consciousness is energy, and energy is consciousness. Energy can neither be created nor destroyed, only converted into one form to another.

In this view, ‘spiritual’ is a broad term that can be applied to all aspects of life, it is life itself. The essence of life, value, and focus has been represented by various terms including but not limited to the universe, source, God, supreme being, divine, creator, eternal, and higher power.

Spirituality has also been defined by theologian Sandra Schneiders as “the experience of conscious involvement in the project of life-integration through self-transcendence toward the ultimate value one perceives“. Integration is to bring together multiple parts to function as one. Transcendence is to rise above or go beyond the limits. Consciousness coaching brings the essence of life into central focus of the coaching partnership. 

Solscience defines consciousness coaching as “working toward synchronizing the many parts of the self to go beyond limitations and boundaries to find more wholeness, and as a result sustainable bliss, the essence of living”. Central to this approach are the meaning, purpose, and core values of the client. 

Dr. Blacktop is a Certified Spiritual Coach (CSC) through Life Purpose Institute.

Emergence occurs when one is observed to have properties its parts do not have on their own, properties that emerge only when the parts interact with a greater whole. Simply the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. What many might call “spiritual”, “mystical”, “energetic”, “conscious” effects, experiences, and/or processes can also be referred to as emergent phenomena. Some may use the term “spiritual emergence” while others may use the more universal term “awakening”.

Emergence (“awakening”) is the remembrance and rediscovery of who you truly are; consciousness having a human experience, not a human being having a conscious experience. It is the realization that you are connected to and one with all that is. This goes beyond your thoughts, beliefs, conditioning, mind, body, identity, and ego. One perceives beyond these to find a much deeper and meaningful personal truth that is in direct relationship to a power greater than themselves.

Spiritual Emergence has been defined within the field of non-ordinary awareness and personal transformation as “the movement of an individual to a more expanded way of being that involves enhanced emotional and psychosomatic health, greater freedom of personal choices, and a sense of deeper connection with other people, nature, and the cosmos. An important part of this development is an increasing awareness of the spiritual dimension in one’s life and in the universal scheme of things” (Grof & Grof, 1990).

The term ‘spirituality‘ has been used to describe situations that involve personal experiences of certain dimensions of reality that give one’s life and existence in general an experience that feels sacred, holy, or out of the ordinary (Grof & Grof, 1991). The term spirituality is very broad and what one considers to be spiritual is specifically defined by each person. 

Each person’s emergence, awakening, or transformative experience/process is specific and unique to them. More people are reporting varying degrees of emergent experiences and processes, and some can be more challenging than others.

Consulting helps the client find answers by providing advice, suggestions, and/or information to move forward and execute a plan.

The main difference between coaching and consulting is that in coaching the client is guided to their own answers and truth, while in consulting the client is provided the answers. In consulting the answers are in the consultant. In coaching the answers and truth are in the client. Both approaches can be beneficial to move forward and execute a plan and depend on the clients’ goals, circumstances, and intent.

If the client simply does not have the knowledge and needs to apply it consulting is a good approach. If the client wants to develop their own abilities to find their own answers and truth, then coaching is a good approach. In consulting the client is dependent on receiving the critical content, in coaching the client is empowered to find it themselves.

Counseling is about working with the client on healing deep emotional issues that usually arise from the past

If someone is finding difficulty in functioning in their daily life, is stuck, and has a substantial block in their ability to move forward from past experience(s), counseling is appropriate.

Coaching is not a type of therapy. Counseling therapy focuses on the past to achieve alleviation and resolution of deep emotional issues that can lead to an ability to focus on the present. Coaching focuses on the present to get to the core of what is truly wanted or needed and develops a plan with actionable steps to obtain success. In this way, counseling and coaching can be great aides to one another in moving a client forward in a healthy productive way.