For several years now Cindy’s faithful presence has helped me discover — and step into — the wise and effective woman I am becoming. Encapsulating what I’m going through in just a few words, today Cindy crystallized my experience as “disengaging the shame” and “dealing a death blow to loneliness and isolation.” Cindy is a gifted coach.
I’ve worked with Cindy as my coach for almost 4 years now. My partnership with her has helped me to identify areas where I am stuck or not quite sure how to move forward with thought patterns, trust issues, developing good communication skills, improving relationship skills – just a whole wealth of things. It stretches me in new ways that I wouldn’t jump into without someone alongside me like this.
I am so very thankful to God for bringing Cindy into my life for such a time as this. I lost my husband suddenly and Cindy has walked this journey of loss and grief with me from the very first day. I would come to our conversations with sorrow and needing God to speak to me for comfort or direction and He always spoke to me through Cindy. After every conversation, I was always blessed, encouraged, comforted, and ended our conversations with a new mindset. After 2 years, Cindy is still helping me deal with so many things other than loss and grief. I don’t know what I would’ve done without her help through her coaching skills, knowledge and above all, allowing the Holy Spirit to be the center of our conversations. She is an amazing Life Coach!
I was coached by Cindy and it was a wonderful experience filled with new discoveries. In the beginning, I was expecting her to give me answers to my problem but instead, she asked me thought provoking questions that made me think about my situation regarding the issue I was struggling with. I have learned about coaching a few times and I have coached others before, but I gave them advice or answers to the problem rather than leading them to find their own issue and find solutions to the problem themselves.
Do not hesitate if you are considering hiring Cindy as a coach or mentor coach. She has exceeded all my expectations! Her strong communication and friendliness is evident from the minute you connect with her. It is clear, she is genuinely interested in helping her clients succeed. Cindy is flexible, yet demonstrates a strong sense of confidence that creates a peaceful and balanced coach/client atmosphere. I love that she gives me plenty of time to ask questions that help fill in the gaps of learning that lead to more confidence in my coaching ability. She will challenge you in all the right areas. Without a doubt, one of the best experiences with a coach I’ve had throughout my coaching journey.
Hiring Cindy as my mentor coach was truly one of the best learning experiences in all my coach training. While her knowledge of the core competencies is excellent, teaching me how to implement the competencies in real life coaching situations is where she really shines. Her warm, encouraging approach helped me gain the courage to experiment with my own unique style while still staying within the ICF guidelines. I would not hesitate to recommend Cindy as a mentor coach and would give her a 5 star rating!
Cindy coached me through one of the most challenging eras during the early stages as a solopreneur. Her guidance helped me evaluate my mindset and explore further in-depth to uncover the real obstacles that were insurmountable. Her ability to deliver coaching and to provide resources during our brainstorming discussions proved invaluable. Cindy’s uncanny ability to connect helped me. She is a remarkable coach, and I highly recommend her services.
Cindy, as my life coach, has helped me confront the difficult pertinent questions and embrace the not so comfortable issues and territories with objectivity and ease. It has helped me unpack and discover real deep and meaningful outcomes, which in turn, help me interact with colleagues and team members in a more inclusive, understanding and authentic manner. Coaching has helped me explore and discover the ‘extra mile’ in my leadership style.
Coaching with Cindy has really helped me think through some issues that I hadn’t taken time to process on my own. It’s allowed me to take actionable steps to move past hurdles with more ease as opposed to struggling through unknown events.
Cindy asks questions that help you see your life and work from a bird’s eye view in terms of how it is shaped by and impacts others. With this gained perspective, I’ve been able to drill down to apply better understanding of myself and others in everyday contexts. It’s relevant, practical, and beneficial. Regularly participating in this coaching relationship helps me process and put language to things that are both challenging and life-giving. It helps me align my priorities and relationships with the way I feel God has called me to live out my gifts, both as a leader and a teammate. In our coaching relationship, we’ve addressed everything from parenting to big decisions to work responsibilities. It’s all relevant because it all impacts how we’re able to live and be in the world, as leaders, pastors, parents, and spouses. It fosters a holistic approach to living faithfully.
Coaching with Cindy has provided a good environment for my wife and I to take a step out of the busyness of everyday life and assess whether or not we are actually accomplishing what we have set out to do. Coaching has not only helped us identify our strengths, it continues to help us identify how to combine our strengths with those of others and leverage them toward a common purpose.
Working with Cindy as my coach has provided enough space to explore and discover for myself who I am, and how God has made me to serve him and others – She gives me what I need: a place to work it out for myself, yet not by leaving me alone to do it. She truly listens, and asks questions that take me “further up and further in,” (C.S. Lewis) down the path to discovery. Instead of sharing her own story, she helps me uncover the truth about mine. And not only about my bumps in the road behind, but restored hope in the future to come, through my own exploration and discoveries.
I have had some rough patches in my life where I didn’t know how to think, how to act, how to move forward. I have been to a couple of professional counselors, and they helped to get some of the stuff, the deep stuff, the stuff hidden far away, out and unlocked. The problem was that once the “stuff” was unlocked, I didn’t know what to do with it. And, I really didn’t need nor want anyone giving me pat answers that either I wouldn’t remember or that really didn’t fit with me.
I came to learn a bit about the benefits of having a life coach – someone who could help me wade through my “stuff” to identify goals and develop actionable plans to achieve them. Someone who would listen to me, ask me those questions that maybe I didn’t want to ask myself, then listen to me some more when I came up with my own solutions and action plans. Cindy agreed to be my coach. She listened to my current situation (there have been several “situations”!), helped me to identify my own limiting beliefs and obstacles, and helped me to come up with a custom plan of action to achieve the specific outcome I was aiming for. Cindy’s gentle, empathetic listening, her wise guidance and ability to painlessly pull things out of my heart, and her nurturing spirit encouraged me towards the self-growth I never thought possible (I guess because I know myself so well). She also provided gentle accountability, following up on our previous conversations and action plans.
Honestly, I could not recommend another coach more highly than I do Cindy Schmelzenbach. She is the cream of the crop, the best of the best, and the cherry on top.
I have had quite a number of coaching sessions with Cindy, through which she has helped me navigate my way through some deep grief, uncertainty and anxiety. Cindy has led me to discover the resources that I already have within me and around me to draw from. I have learned to create margin for myself where I need it and also to protect that. I have learned to fear less and overcome more through Cindy’s encouragement to actually activate what I know I can do to move ahead. I have moved from what has been an unknown space into something new where there is now hope and competence. Cindy’s coaching has empowered me and supported me, and I am so very grateful for her!
