Life Coaching

One of the most important distinguishing factors between psychotherapists and coaches is that psychotherapists are trained to help people who are facing mental illnesses, and coaches are not. Even though a great deal of stigma exists around mental illness, mental health problems are more common than ever, impacting about one in four Americans at some point in their lives.

Psychotherapists are specifically trained to treat mental illness and are educated and practiced in a wide variety of therapeutic approaches to help you deal with and diminish your symptoms. Coaches, on the other hand, generally do not have any of this training.

If you are seeking help for a common mental health problem such as depression, anxiety, or post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), psychotherapy is the way to go.

Coaching is more focused on helping you achieve your future goals, while psychotherapy tends to have more of a past and present focus, especially on understanding what elements of your past life and present life are contributing to your thoughts, emotions, and behaviors right now.

Many coaches should be able to help you understand how the past contributes to your present, and psychotherapists can help you achieve your future goals.

The focus in psychotherapy is more on healing from the past, while the focus in coaching is more on getting you to where you wish to be next.

Because psychotherapy is about treating a mental health problem, it may be covered by your insurance company if you meet the criteria for a mental health disorder and the insurance company deems psychotherapy medically necessary to help you get better.

This also means that, for your insurance company to cover therapy, you generally need to be officially diagnosed with a mental health condition.

Coaching is typically not covered by health insurance because the focus of coaching is not on treating an illness.

In order to legally provide psychotherapy, an advanced degree (like a master’s degree, a PhD, or a PsyD) and a state license are both required.

To obtain a license to practice psychotherapy, therapists need to meet certain criteria, which include an exam and a certain number of supervised hours of practice.

While there are many certification programs for coaching, there are no governing boards for life or success coaches.

Despite a lack of a governing board in the field of coaching, many coaches offer tremendous services and some originally practiced as psychotherapists.

But unless they have some kind of counseling degree and are licensed in their state or the states in which they offer services, coaches cannot legally provide psychotherapy.

Psychotherapists face more restrictions than coaches in terms of where and how they can offer services.

They must be licensed in the state in which they practice; for example, while coaches can work throughout all the United States and internationally.

Psychotherapy is more traditionally offered face-to-face in an office, while coaching happens frequently over the phone or via the internet.

Even so, some psychotherapists offer services over the phone or via the internet and some coaches have offices in which they see clients.

In fact, online therapy has been steadily growing in popularity.

Some coaches choose to meet with clients in a public setting, which is usually unheard of for psychotherapists.