THE CLEARING

Reflections on Being and Becoming

“Life Coaching is a Grift”
David Perry David Perry

“Life Coaching is a Grift”

This is a response I got recently to some outreach I’ve been doing on LinkedIn:

“Life/business coaching is a grift.”

Years ago, while training and then starting my business as an Ontological Life Coach, I might have balked at these types of messages and wondered if there was some truth in them. I might have let myself get carried away by the fear that there was no market for what I was doing. 

After numerous conversations with other coaches, I understand that it’s not unusual when starting out to wonder if coaching is a real business and career.

But in the years I’ve been in business as an Ontological Life Coach, I’ve helped 100’s of people and gotten a lot of feedback on the positive impact I’ve had on the lives of my clients. 

Read More
Breaking Up With Your Comfort Zone and Getting Into Action
Coaching, Self-care, Comfort Zone David Perry Coaching, Self-care, Comfort Zone David Perry

Breaking Up With Your Comfort Zone and Getting Into Action

Things that are new and stretch you beyond your perceived limits are in and of themselves, uncomfortable. These goals and pursuits may even induce anxiety or terror depending on how far outside of your comfort zone you’re traveling.

When striving to make significant changes in your life, it’s important to create structures, processes, and habits that will help move you through the fear and unease of being outside your comfort zone. These structures will maintain that you are taking action toward being the new person you are striving to be, even in the face of discomfort.

Read More
HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS
David Perry David Perry

HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS

The end of the year can be a very challenging time for many.

The combination of year-end deadlines at work and the stress of the upcoming holidays (vacation plans, kids, shopping, hosting guests, etc.) makes this a very difficult time.

Most people place a great deal of significance and meaning on the holidays. Others try to ignore them completely.

Here are some of the challenges and opportunities of the holiday season to pay attention to.

Read More
Growth Doesn’t Look the Way You Think
Coaching, Self-care David Perry Coaching, Self-care David Perry

Growth Doesn’t Look the Way You Think

When you think about your future and all the things you want it to include, you likely forget about all the peaks and valleys involved in growth. It’s easy to see where we are now and the destination, and then draw a straight line. Growth is not linear. But even more than that, growth itself is not a destination: it’s a process (and a practice).

Read More
The Things You Can Control & Change: The Circles That Determine Highly Effective People
Coaching, Self-care David Perry Coaching, Self-care David Perry

The Things You Can Control & Change: The Circles That Determine Highly Effective People

How much time do you spend trying to control things you cannot control? Maybe it’s your child, the speed of the washing machine, or the rush hour traffic.

There’s an idea that I discovered called the circle of influence. The idea behind this is that there are certain things that are within our control, things that we can influence.

And then there is the circle of concern. The circle of control is full of excuses, victimization, and blame. This circle has things we cannot influence, but we often still concern ourselves with.

The proactive approach to life is to spend more time focusing on the things we can change and influence.

Read More
The Path To Success Is Being, Not Doing
Coaching, Self-care David Perry Coaching, Self-care David Perry

The Path To Success Is Being, Not Doing

If I asked you to think about what success is, you might tell me what it looks like.

“Financial security, a nice car, a family…”

So I want to challenge you to consider what success feels like.

Maybe it’s confidence, happiness, being in touch with your spirituality…

The difference between doing and being is the biggest factor in success. I’ve used my BE-DO-HAVE model with countless clients and helped them shift into feeling their success.

This post covers how success is actually obtained.

Read More
5 Tips for Conquering Overwhelm
Coaching, Self-care David Perry Coaching, Self-care David Perry

5 Tips for Conquering Overwhelm

You’re overwhelmed because you’re confused.

When your mind isn’t confused, when tasks and priorities are clear, there’s no overwhelm.

When your mind is focused, overwhelm is absent.

The problem is that stress ensues as we start to feel overwhelmed. And the more overwhelmed you feel, the more stress you create for yourself.

This is a vicious cycle. One that we’ve all felt at some point in time or another.

Read More
Your Survival Mechanism Keeps You Safe, And Prevents You From Thriving
Coaching David Perry Coaching David Perry

Your Survival Mechanism Keeps You Safe, And Prevents You From Thriving

“Keep it secret. Keep it safe.”


In that famous line from “The Fellowship of the Ring”, Gandalf strictly advises Frodo to hide the Ring of Power and not mention its existence in order to keep it safe from enemies.

Isn’t this how many of us live our lives? Keeping our own power hidden in order to stay safe from failure or embarrassment.

The irony is that if you truly understood this power, you’d realize there is no point in hiding it from the world.

Read More
Catching My Self Sabotage
Coaching, Business David Perry Coaching, Business David Perry

Catching My Self Sabotage

One way our survival mechanism keeps us in our comfort zone is by sabotaging our own efforts to achieve more.

Any time we go about up-leveling our game, we will run directly into our internal saboteurs. We will attempt to sabotage our own big game or next level. This is simply the survival mechanism at work trying to keep us safe.

Read More
Surpass Your “Upper Limit Problem” and Create Being
Coaching David Perry Coaching David Perry

Surpass Your “Upper Limit Problem” and Create Being

We all have the opportunity to be many things in this world, but unless we are working in alignment with our most authentic dreams and goals, a job title and a business license isn’t going to be enough.

You stand just before your Upper Limit embodying exactly who you are in this moment. All of the accumulation of action and progress you have made up until this point. You are the living manifestation of all the beliefs that you have about yourself and the world around you.

Read More
The Other Side of Your Comfort Zone
Coaching David Perry Coaching David Perry

The Other Side of Your Comfort Zone

Most people are living a default life – you can predict where they’ll be in a few years by looking at how things have been going for them leading up to now.

In many cases, this is difficult for people to recognize due to the fact that they’ve been running on autopilot for so long.

This is why coaches prioritize empowering clients to challenge the status quo, or, in this case, the inertia of the default life.

Read More