Antonio Esposito has completed his coach training journey with TCA in 2015 and since then, he’s been helping and supporting individuals by offering coaching, training and personal development services.
One year later he took his mission to the next level by founding ‘The Thinking Mind Coaching’ that offers personal development services and last year co-founded I-BUSINESS Live Training, a transformational company born with the mission to help entrepreneurs.
We caught up with Antonio to find out more about his story, his mentorship experience and inspiring lessons we can all learn from.
"My training journey at The Coaching Academy was life-changing, and it was great to think that my experience could potentially help many others to become successful certified life coaches."
What is your coaching niche and why did you choose it?
I mainly work with women who need help to overcome emotional traumas such as fears, anxiety, and negative thinking patterns. I help people who want to be more in control of their emotional responses and develop the so-called Emotional Intelligence. I also work with women struggling with eating disorders and obesity issues.
I have chosen those niches because I had to deal with emotional struggles for most of my life. Fear, negative thinking patterns, low self-esteem, and long periods of depression, was my daily life. I've also struggled for many years with serious obesity issues and a variety of eating disorders.
How did you start volunteering as a Mentor for The Coaching Academy and why did you want to take on this challenge?
It was casually. At the end of October 2016, almost two years after completing my two certifications as Life Coach and NLP Practitioner, an email came from The Coaching Academy saying: "Become a Coaching Academy Mentor. Your Colleagues Need You".
Immediately I have seen it as a fantastic opportunity to give something back. My training journey at The Coaching Academy was life-changing, and it was great to think that my experience could potentially help many others to become successful certified life coaches.
As I believe in the never-ending process of studying and learning, mentoring was also an opportunity for me to learn a new skill, and, at the same time, refine my coaching and communication skills.
100 hours of volunteer mentoring is a fantastic achievement! What was one thing mentorship changed in your own life that you didn't expect?
The rewarding part of being a mentor is the sense of clarity, empowerment and motivation that each student achieves by the end of almost every mentoring session.
Hearing a mentee saying: "it's great to feel encouraged, motivated and supported by someone that knows the journey and the hardships, and that it's here to offer unconditional help" and seeing the impact of our help in other peoples lives is, to me, is the best reward we can receive.
Mentoring taught me the importance of giving unconditionally without expecting anything in return. I believe "time" is the most precious asset we have in life. Using it with purpose and meaning helping others in their journey is the most meaningful activity we can do on this planet.
"Becoming a life coach is much more than just a training process; it's a life-changing journey, a journey where we have to be our own first clients."
Whilst we understand that you are supportive of all your mentees, can you give us an example of when in your opinion a mentee coach has overcome significant odds to succeed (or done particularly well)?
I mentored a student struggling with serious self-esteem issues and deep limiting beliefs in completing her training journey as a life coach. I shared many of my struggles with and all the fear and the pain I had overcome during my training journey.
She has booked a few mentoring sessions with me, and in each one, we talked about the importance of the emotional WHYs behind her desire to become a certified coach. It was amazing to see her changing, improving and moving forward in her studies. The way she was pushing herself despite the fear and the self-imposed limitations was for me very empowering. It was an honour for me to help her and to be the testimony of such fast progress.
Tell us about a mentee that challenged your perceptions about what it means to be a successful coach.
I also remember a student that once asked me: "What was your biggest challenge of becoming a life coach?".
Well, for me, as an Italian living in the UK, my biggest challenge was believing in my ability to learn and communicate in English. I hated my strong Italian accent, and I doubted that I could complete the course and become a coach. I had to be honest with her saying that I was still struggling in my communication skill. In fact, at the time, I was taking English lessons to reduce my accent.
She listened to my story, and she said: "if you want to be successful in life, you need to be yourself. Don't try to become someone you are not, as you are perfect the way you are.
It was a light bulb moment to me. Those words helped me to see how self-critical I was and pushed me to change direction. I learned to appreciate more who I was with all the good and the bad. The shift was massive, and the impact on my personal and professional life was outstanding.
If you could go back in time to the person you were before attending the free two-day foundation event, what would you tell them?
I would say, don't worry, do not panic. Do not try to be someone else, and don't try to copy anybody else. Leverage on your unique features and focus entirely on your unique journey. Enjoy it, have fun and make the most out of each day.
The advice I give to every student I work with is to relax and take one step and one day at the time. To succeed in the journey of becoming a certified life coach, it's essential to live in the moment and enjoy each part of the training process. It's critical to recognise the daily improvements without being always over critical and use the inevitable mistakes as precious learning tools to improve.
Becoming a life coach is much more than just a training process; it's a life-changing journey, a journey where we have to be our own first clients.
We are launching our free 2021 Introduction to Life Coaching webinars. They are interactive, informative and designed to help you understand if training to be a life coach is for you.
Take positive action, project forward and plan for a year to remember for all the right reasons. Choose from available dates here.
The Coaching Academy was established in 1999, and is now the world's largest coaching school.
In that time we have trained over 14,000 people to become life coaches.
We are accredited by the International Coach Federation and the Association for Coaching, and we're rated 4.8 out of 5 on Trustpilot.
