How Is Holistic Coaching Different from Therapy?

Mental Health Coaching and therapy compliment each other!

Holistic Coaching vs Therapy: How They Differ, And How They Work Together

When it comes to mental and emotional wellbeing, people may assume that therapy is their only option to start feeling better. The truth is, therapy does play an important role in mental wellbeing, but sometimes therapy isn't enough. Holistic Coaching takes a different approach than therapy, and can be an effective and powerful tool to help people get "unstuck", especially for those who have done years of therapy and feel like they are in a rut.

Coaching and therapy serve different purposes, and can beautifully complement each other.

How Coaching Differs From Therapy

Coaching

• Forward-Focused: Coaching looks ahead. It’s about setting goals, building healthier habits, and creating a clear plan to move toward the life you want.

• Strength-Based: Coaches focus on your existing strengths, resilience, and capacity for change rather than on what’s “wrong.” You are already whole, and you are not broken.

• Action-Oriented: Sessions often end with concrete steps to practice between meetings, helping you take consistent action toward your goals.

• Whole-Person Approach: Holistic coaches integrate mind, body, and lifestyle into the conversation, bridging traditional medicine with holistic wellness.

  
  

Therapy

• Diagnosis-Based: Therapy is often centered around understanding and treating mental health conditions such as depression, anxiety, PTSD, or trauma.

• Past-Focused: Therapists help you process past experiences, uncover patterns, and work through unresolved emotional pain.

• Clinical Expertise: Licensed therapists are trained to assess, diagnose, and treat mental illness, and they use evidence-based interventions like CBT, EMDR, or talk therapy.

How They Work Together

Rather than being an “either/or,” therapy and coaching can be a powerful “both/and” tool for transformation. Here’s how:

• Therapy helps you heal the past. It provides a safe space to process old wounds, reframe painful experiences, and stabilize mental health.

• Coaching helps you design the future. Once you’ve gained insight and healing from therapy, coaching gives you the tools to build habits, routines, and goals that align with your vision.

• Integration creates lasting change. For example, therapy might help someone understand the roots of their stress or addictive behaviors, while coaching helps them implement daily practices like mindfulness, healthier eating, and consistent self-care, and identify the barriers to these practices so they can be addressed head-on.

Putting It All Together

Think of therapy as a tool for clearing the soil: removing the rocks and weeds that make growth difficult. Coaching plants and nurtures seeds of new habits, mindset shifts & lifestyle choices, and helps identify barriers to growth. Together, they can support true transformation: healing from the past while cultivating a vibrant, intentional future.