Jen Paterno is one of the coaches that we found this month and we did a little interview with her. She impressed us with her honesty and expertise.

She started her coaching career in 2004 when she found herself naturally inclined towards training and development, particularly in the hospitality industry. Over the years, she honed her skills in leadership, professional development, and restaurant management. However, what truly mattered to her was helping her team members discover their passions and paths in life. In 2017, she transitioned to coaching, prompted by her COO’s recognition of her coaching potential.

She overcame many challenges in her life, stemming from a tumultuous upbringing and abusive relationships, which fueled her commitment to emotional growth and personal development. This dedication culminated in significant self improvement in 2020, aligning her with her coaching mission.

She prioritizes genuine connections with her clients, emphasizing compatibility. Her clients experience profound shifts across various life domains, from health to business and personal growth. Jen’s clients benefit from profound paradigm shifts, with her coaching extending into various life domains, including health, business, relationships, and personal growth.

Meet Life Coach Jen Paterno:

Name: Jen Paterno

Pillar: The Spirit, The Mind

Who is this coach for: Anyone who wants to adopt a paradigm of success.

How they can help: By using various tools and techniques like the Energy Leadership Index and CliftonStrengths assessments just to name a few, as well as many frameworks of coaching depending on the client’s needs.

First of all, how are you and your family doing after these Pandemic times?

My dogs and I are doing wonderful.

I am fortunate enough to have few complaints from the pandemic.

I was able to continue to work throughout the worst of it and to have remained healthy for the majority.

How did the coronavirus pandemic affect your clients? Did it affect you at all?

When the coronavirus took over the world, my coaching practice was extremely niched, I was working only with leaders in the hospitality space who were struggling to achieve work and life harmony.

My interest in this space was based on a very real issue many hospitality organizations face: Great leaders leave because they do not feel that they can have a life outside of the shop.

As someone who succeeded at “having it all,” I deeply wanted to help others do the same.

Sadly, the reality of the pandemic left most restaurants and hospitality groups clinging on for dear life with no extra investment dollars to bring in coaching and personal development work.

While hospitality folks are still some of my favorites to work with, I realized very quickly that niching could and would be super problematic for me.

Truth be told, I never wanted to be in a box.

I was simply following advice I had been given by a business coach, “fall in love with your ideal client.”

While this is great advice, it is only part of the formula for success.

What I would now say is, yes I AM in love with my ideal client, but not so much so that I don’t appreciate the other fish in the sea.

My practice is currently niche free with my only true desire being to coach from and to a place of true authenticity.

What are the biggest lessons that you learned in this pandemic?

Connection is the most critical need, skill and capability that we have as humans.

I have developed the deepest, most enriching relationships with people that I would never had had the time to connect with if life didn’t challenge us to think differently.

These relationships continue to grow and thrive today, and I am so grateful that these people entered my life at a time when I was ready to take it all apart and put it back together differently.

Do not underestimate the human need to connect. Ever.

The Origin:

Tell us about you, your career, how you started with your coaching career?

I started my coaching career in 2004, but at the time had no idea.

I found myself inexplicably drawn to the world of training and development, specifically in the hospitality space.

For the next 13 years I would work my way into various roles writing leadership and professional development workshops, operations and systems training and opening new restaurants all over the United States.

This work was amazing, and yet it only scratched the surface of what was important to me.

What has always mattered most to me is leaning into my ability to work with the people on my team to uncover what they are passionate about and the road to experiencing more of that “thing.”

Because of the nature of the industry, I found myself engaging in these conversations with folks that ran the gambit from high school students to adults with many more years of life experience than me.

This added a level of richness to our conversations that I could not have ever anticipated.

In 2017, I chose to explore life outside of hospitality and took a role in the Media and Advertising industry.

It was early in this role that my COO said to me, “You know, Jen, you’d be a really great coach. You should look into getting certified.”

Within a few months I had enrolled at iPEC and began what would turn out to be the journey of my lifetime.

What was your biggest obstacle that you had to overcome in your life that made you who you are today?

My parents were very young when I was born, 19 and 21, and as such, were not incredibly emotionally mature.

They just hadn’t had the time to grow up themselves.

In essence, I have always been a kid raised by kids.

While they did they best they could, I never learned how to properly name and process my emotions the way some other kids did.

Later in life, I found myself in a pattern of entering very abusive long term relationships.

I experienced physical, sexual and emotional trauma at the hands of people I loved very much.

These events paired with a general lack of emotional regulation led to an adult who became super emotionally reactive.

Additionally, I developed awful anxiety that really peaked when I entered my 30s.

In 2020, I was six or seven years into another relationship that did nothing but wreck my mental health, sense of self and purpose.

At this point in life, I had finished my coach training and was taking on clients AND I was recognizing that something just didn’t feel right about my life anymore.

After another meaningless fight over a day with my family ruined, I made an impulsive decision to end that relationship and dig my heels into my own personal work.

I was in therapy 2x a week, I hired a coach and I started SSRIs for my anxiety.

I really started to unpack the patterns of emotional reactivity and bad behavior I had been mirroring from the people around me.

I was deeply dedicated to this work.

If coach training in 2018 was the start of my new journey of a lifetime, June 2020 to June 2021 was a visit to one of the natural wonders of the world, it pushed me to a level I only vaguely believed existed.

The Coaching Style:

How do you innovate with coaching your clients?

My biggest innovation in coaching my clients comes from what I call my “uncommon” start to my professional career.

At the time, working full time in restaurants was by and large considered “not a real job.” (If anyone reading this still feels this way, I am comfortable telling you directly that you are sorely mistaken.)

The hospitality industry gave me the unique opportunity to learn skills through experience and practice that my future colleagues, clients and acquaintances were only learning in books.

While the rest of the world was digesting theories involving communication, relationship building and problem solving, I was learning them real time as situations arose, and failing real time in some of those situations.

This makes me an incredibly agile and grounded coach.

I provide my clients space to stretch, encourage them to try things that may seem unusual and often make up various exercises and frameworks on the fly.

As a coach, I am not afraid to try new things, so there is honestly nothing that is off the table in our sessions (unless it is outside the realm of coaching and best suited for therapy).

What’s unique about your coaching approach?

It doesn’t get more cliché than this: ME!

I could write about my session structure, my lack of marketing planning, various frameworks I’ve developed and taught, etc.

The reality is, none of that stuff matters unless you and I connect, and that connection cannot be forced.

Step one is talking to prospective clients to decide if we are a match, and we BOTH have to feel it.

If not, that’s great!

I have a long list of different coaches that I recommend.

I try my best to make recommendations that are specific and aligned to what I have learned about each client.

I want to work with clients that are drawn to me and I to them. It’s that simple.

What benefits do your clients get after working with you?

My clients experience lasting paradigm shifts.

We don’t just coach surface level.

We dig into what changes they really want to experience, the sky is the limit!

I’ve worked with clients on everything from health and wellness, business, relationship, life and energy coaching.

We go where you want to go and you write the roadmap.

Some specific client wins include launching new small businesses, integrating daily habits, releasing decade long limiting beliefs, writing books and overall just shifting perspective.

I offer text based support between sessions and a sliding scale for payment.

My goal is to make coaching work for my clients, not to convince them to go into debt in order to work for me.

In addition to coaching, I offer learning experiences, team workshops, consulting and various assessments to support the process.

Do you use any specific tools to be efficient with your clients?

I use the Energy Leadership Index, CliftonStrengths assessments and a number of frameworks and exercises that have proven successful time and time again with my clients.

Technologically, I utilize WhatsApp between sessions and I am in the process of exploring an iOS and Android app experience as well as transitioning to a new CRM platform that will hopefully make connection easier.

The Impact:

If you had a super megaphone that, when you speak into, the whole world will hear your message, what would you say?

!! BE YOUR FUCKING SELF !! the world needs you.

What is the greatest lesson you have learned in your life?

I am more than “enough” exactly the way I am.

Everybody needs someone else’s story.

This is not something I grew up believing.

This is something I learned through sharing bits and pieces of myself, sometimes very messily.

I am not for everyone, and that’s okay because I don’t need to be.

The people who are meant for me, will find their way to me and vice versa.

There are billions of people on this planet.

You don’t need (or want!) them all. I promise.

Your final thoughts?

The coaching industry can be murky, one of the things I feel MOST passionate about is shedding light on the importance of working with properly trained coaches.

Specifically, I will always recommend folks look for ICF certified coaches, as it’s important to make sure we as coaches are not playing in someone else’s sandbox (especially a therapists!).

Coaching is a helping modality when used properly, but also a hurting modality when mis applied.

I run a free webinar once a month dedicated to shining a light on what coaching is and more importantly what it IS NOT.

There is no sales pitch, my goal is just to make sure people feel equipped to make the right choices before investing in a service.

Where Can You Find Jen Paterno?

If you liked this interview and you would love to adopt a new more successful paradigm, go to www.noperfecttime.com and see how Jen can help you do that.

If you’d like to connect more personally with her, you can do that through LinkedIn and by sending her a message there. It was an honor having this interview with her.

Amy Shearer is one of the coaches that we found this month and we did a little interview with her. She impressed us with her positive personality and dedication.

She spent a decade in retail but faced burnout in her 40s, prompting a shift towards coaching focused on nervous system health. Today she helps clients combat burnout and prioritize self care with her 90 day Healing program.

She incorporates somatic work to address issues like anxiety and stress, but what makes her approach stand out is her intuitive, flexible nature. Rather than relying on a fixed methodology, she creates a safe, trusting space for her long term clients to work on issues such as people pleasing and overthinking, resulting in significant life transformations.

She customizes her approach to cater to each client’s specific needs. She is a certified Life and Success Coach and she is trained in various modalities like NLP, EFT, breathwork, and somatic stress release. Here is what she said.

Meet Life Coach Amy Shearer:

Name: Amy Shearer

Pillar: The Spirit, The Mind

Who is this coach for: Anyone who wants to get rid of their people pleasing tendencies, connect deeply with their real self, stop overthinking, and get the right tools to prevent burnout.

How they can help: By using various tools and techniques like NLP, EFT, Breathwork, Somatic Parts Integration, and Somatic Stress Release, just to name a few.

First of all, how are you and your family doing after these Pandemic times?

We are good!

We feel, like many, that the pandemic offered an opportunity to reevaluate our lifestyle, specifically where we were living and how we were spending our time.

We moved in November of 2020 from Brooklyn, NY, to Kingston, NY.

Kingston sits between the Catskills and the Hudson Valley.

The majority of the shifts that we needed to make revolved around adapting to a lifestyle in the country and making new friends.

After almost three years, we have found our flow and feel a part of this community.

How did the coronavirus pandemic affect your clients? Did it affect you at all?

For my clients, many of them were experiencing a heightened sense of fear.

I was very fearful initially, especially during the lockdown in NYC.

Reflecting on it now, I see it as a time of deep sadness and fear that taught incredible lessons about resiliency, the power of hope, and our need for connection.

What are the biggest lessons that you learned in this pandemic?

The timeframe of the pandemic aligned with my spiritual awakening, and there were so many lessons!

Wow!

And in the end, it all came down to learning to trust myself and to surrender.

Release the control of what you think should happen, and trust yourself that all will work out.

Getting to that place takes some serious work, and I’m now opening myself up to helping others find this place of peace.

The Origin:

Tell us about you, your career, how you started with your coaching career?

I grew up loving fashion, from dressing Barbie in the latest style to going to the mall with my mom, I was constantly learning about trends and immersed in retail.

After graduating from college, I first went into finance, became a Peace Corps Volunteer, became a French trained chef, and finally landed in retail.

Ahhh, home!

Over 15 years, I experienced every level of role on the store side of the business and spent ten years in executive leadership roles.

The job was exhilarating, and many companies I worked for became like family to me.

And then, in my early 40s, something started to shift within me, and I found it harder and harder to find the energy to keep up with the pace of retail.

No matter the role, retail is challenging.

It’s one of the top industries for burnout.

I had no idea how to support my stress and endless to do list.

And it brought me to complete emotional and physical exhaustion.

In July 2019, I left my career and took six months to begin the healing process.

Then, in January 2020, I became a certified Life and Success Coach and was certified in many modalities.

Initially, I focused on coaching individuals on their careers and potential career pivots.

Over time, it became apparent that I needed to teach the tools I was learning to support my nervous system and emotional health.

I created a 90 day Healing program for 1 on 1 clients in early 2022, and it took off!

I’m now bringing what I know back into the retail sphere in the form of workshops and, in the short future, a leadership program built around healing and nervous system health.

What was your biggest obstacle that you had to overcome in your life that made you who you are today?

As an only child raised by a single mom, I prioritized being “a good girl” and tried to do as much on my own so I wouldn’t be a burden.

Early on, I became a people pleaser, and I have since learned that I’m a Highly Sensitive Person (HSP).

I picked up on everyone’s emotions and learned ways to adapt to avoid confrontation.

Eventually, this is what led to my burnout.

This behavior hindered my overall well being, career, health, and relationships.

I worked with a therapist and multiple healers to de condition the ‘people pleasing’ and to learn to honor my needs.

Shifting this behavior and using somatic tools focused on the nervous system and emotional regulation healed my burnout.

The Coaching Style:

How do you innovate with coaching your clients?

I love this question because I didn’t realize that I was innovating with them. Ha!

I think it all comes down to responding to their needs.

My work includes somatic (body) work, and the techniques used to help with anxiety, stress, and emotions depend highly on the person.

Recently, after a few clients came to me with the same struggles around time management, I realized its connection to burnout, which sparked an entirely new aspect of my work.

Now, I’m integrating productivity tools and habit creation into my 90 day program.

What’s unique about your coaching approach?

Due to the nature of the healing work that I share, I don’t become attached to a strategy or methodology for each session.

This approach requires me to listen to my intuition, to be adaptable, and to connect with each client deeply.

Most clients in my circle are long term clients who have been with me for over six months.

We work on people pleasing, overthinking, and overgiving, which requires establishing a container of deep safety and trust.

When we have safety, significant life transformations occur.

What benefits do your clients get after working with you?

Clients regularly comment that they feel a deeper connection to themselves and feel empowered by the tools I teach them to integrate into their everyday lives.

I’m here on this planet to teach and share what I know from my healing experience and provide healing resources.

Do you use any specific tools to be efficient with your clients?

I have been certified in multiple modalities, including NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming), EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques), Breathwork, Somatic Parts Integration, and Somatic Stress Release.

Mostly, I use one component of these modalities in each session with a client, depending on their needs.

The Impact:

If you had a super megaphone that, when you speak into, the whole world will hear your message, what would you say?

It’s OK to rest!

What is the greatest lesson you have learned in your life?

The greatest lesson was also the hardest pill to swallow. Gulp.

When I left my Vice President role in 2019, I left angry and frustrated at everything about retail.

I blamed retail for all of my unhappiness.

I needed to realize that while there may be untenable practices within the retail sphere, it came down to how well I supported myself and honored my needs.

And herein lies what most of us need to learn.

We are responsible for creating our happiness.

Your final thoughts?

Nothing to add.

Where Can You Find Amy Shearer?

If you liked this interview and if you would love to get rid of people pleasing, connect deeply with yourself and get all the tools you need to prevent burn out, go to https://therecreated.com/ and see how Amy can help you.

You can check what type of intuition archetype you are here.

If you’d like to capture a glimpse of her coaching, follow her Instagram account.

If you’d like to connect more personally with her, you can do that through LinkedIn or by sending her a message on her Email [email protected]. It was an honor having this interview with her.

Linda Lalicata is one of the coaches that we found this month and we did a little interview with her. She impressed us with her expertise and confidence.

She started with a background in biology and teaching, but soon she discovered a passion for psychology and chose life coaching as her path, guided by the advice of her counselor cousin. She says that choosing that path was probably the best decision of her life. Overcoming self doubt and the emotional scars of a rocky family relationship, she embarked on a path of personal growth and education, eventually becoming a successful coach.

She has a flexible approach, tailored to each client’s needs, incorporating techniques like NLP and positive psychology to create not just helpful but also enjoyable coaching sessions. She works mostly with women helping them gain self confidence and feel empowered so they can achieve their career goals.

She empowers her clients by uncovering their strengths and core values, enabling them to overcome obstacles with ease. Here is what she said.

Meet Life Coach Linda Lalicata:

Name: Linda Lalicata

Pillar: The Spirit, The Mind

Who is this coach for: Women fo want to gain self confidence and feel empowered so they can achieve their career goals.

How they can help: By using the ICF method and various tools and techniques like NLP and positive psychology, just to name a few.

First of all, how are you and your family doing after these Pandemic times?

Everyone in my family is doing very well.

My husband had the virus last summer, but recovered very well once he went on medication.

We were fine during the quarantine because we are homebodies anyway.

The hardest part was not being able to go out to dinner, because enjoy that.

I am a pretty good cook, so I just cooked more.

How did the coronavirus pandemic affect your clients? Did it affect you at all?

I did have one client during the pandemic, and she was not a very social person.

The pandemic was almost like a blessing to her because she did not have to make excuses to her parents about preferring to stay home with her children rather than go out with friends.

In my case, I was busy studying.

I was still training online with iNLP Center, and I had not yet graduated from FIT.

The timing was perfect, I had no excuse not to study since we couldn’t go anywhere!

What are the biggest lessons that you learned in this pandemic?

I learned that if you are given the gift of time, no matter where it comes from, use it wisely.

Too many people squandered it by becoming lazy and depressed about having to stay isolated.

I practiced my instruments, worked on my studies, worked out more, and finished art projects.

Yes, the pandemic was terrible, but you should always try to find the bright spots in the darkness.

The Origin:

Tell us about you, your career, how you started with your coaching career?

It is a long story, but I will shorten it up the best I can.

My background is biology and I teach at Bronx Community College.

The students there have problems that run deeper than just having academic issues.

I wanted to learn how to help them overcome some of their struggles, like time management and concentrating on their studies rather than wasting time and energy in the wrong way.

I decided to go back to school for psychology and graduated two years with top honors from Florida Institute of Technology.

I loved it so much, I wanted to do more with it, but did not want to become a therapist.

My cousin, who is a counselor, suggested life coaching.

I have never regretted it furthering my education and feel it was one of the best decisions of my life.

I am still busy trying to build my client base, but I do have too terrific clients right now.

What was your biggest obstacle that you had to overcome in your life that made you who you are today?

I had a very rocky relationship with my family that left me a bit emotionally scarred.

My husband is great and always encouraged me, but I did not believe in myself.

After high school I did not know what I wanted to do.

I thought I wanted to be a vet, but I am far too emotional for that career.

I would have been crying all of the time!

I worked mostly as an administrative assistant, which can often be a thankless job.

It took a long time, but I finally began to realize I was pretty smart.

As a child I was compared to my sister, who was a great student.

I just gave up trying to compete and relied on my looks instead.

I thought I was dumb, but I was actually so ambivalent about school that I was coasting along and not trying at all.

I was popular with my teachers and fellow students, but I was no scholar.

The Coaching Style:

How do you innovate with coaching your clients?

I work primarily with women who are trying to further their careers, but have challenges with family, friends, and other life challenges.

I help them uncover their strengths and core values so they can build on them, so they get ahead quicker and more successfully.

I help them find their inner warrior so they can overcome challenges with grit and grace.

I’m also looking to expand my business to include B2B, working with human resources to help them improve their work environment.

I have heard from far too many assistants that they don’t always feel respected by their superiors, that they are not given the information needed to do a good job because their boss has a chip on their shoulder.

That is no way to run a company, and yet many big name firms still hire people that are insensitive, arrogant, and crude because they know how to bring in the big bucks.

It leads to a revolving door that bleeds money.

Assistants will only take so much before they walk.

It is very costly to do a search, and then train new employees.

There is a better way, train employees from the top down proper communication skills and create a more nurturing environment where everyone wants to do their best, not the bare minimum to get a paycheck.

What’s unique about your coaching approach?

I try to tailor my coaching approach to each client.

I am trained in the ICF method, but I have found it is not right for every client.

Some prefer a more back and forth approach rather than being questioned.

I don’t know if it is unique, but it works.

I use NLP when appropriate, as well as positive psychology techniques.

I think other coaches try to be too much like therapists.

I think the sessions should not just be helpful, but fun.

I know I have done my job well if a client comes to a session stressed and practically in tears and they leave laughing and smiling and feeling better about themselves and their lives.

What benefits do your clients get after working with you?

They feel empowered and confident.

They learn how to use their gifts to be more successful and they become more resilient.

If they face a setback, they can take it as a learning curve, not a failure.

Do you use any specific tools to be efficient with your clients?

I do use some techniques that I always use when I first work with a client.

I have them take an assessment online to discover their strengths.

You would be surprised how many people don’t know their gifts.

I also have a method to help them find their core values.

One of the main reasons people get so stressed at work is that their company’s values don’t align with their own.

If someone is very empathetic and their office is cutthroat, they will never be happy there.

I also know numerous NLP strategies that can be quite effective.

The Impact:

If you had a super megaphone that, when you speak into, the whole world will hear your message, what would you say?

That women are powerful and smart and deserve to be heard and respected.

They should be paid the same salary for the same job as a man, get the same amount of respect, and they should not have to change their personalities to please other people to get ahead.

What is the greatest lesson you have learned in your life?

This is not an easy question.

It might be that if you don’t believe in yourself, you won’t get anywhere.

Your career won’t move forward, your relationships will suffer, you won’t ever reach your full potential.

It doesn’t matter what others think, if you don’t have confidence and the ability to make mistakes and learn from them, you will stay stuck in place.

Your final thoughts?

Yes, I do have some final thoughts.

I think that the world of coaching is growing and needs to have some regulation.

While I am not sure if we need to be licensed the same way as therapists do, it would not be a bad idea to need certification before starting to practice.

Right now, anyone can say they are a life coach.

They keep their fees extremely low, and many people are taken in and end up wasting money.

It is one of the reasons that many people have negative views about the industry.

If someone is serious about coaching they will take the necessary steps to getting training and certification.

Where Can You Find Linda Lalicata?

If you liked this interview and if you would love to unleash your confidence, feel empowered, and embrace your gifts to be more successful in life, go to https://www.resolvedself.com/ and discover how Linda can help you.

If you’d like to learn more about her coaching, follow her Instagram and Facebook.

If you’d like to connect with her more personally, you can do that through LinkedIn or by sending her a mesage on her Email [email protected]. It was an honor having this interview with her.