Leah grew up in the American Midwest in a religious Jewish home, and like most young women in the Orthodox community went to Israel following high school. But as often happens, one year turned into four years, which turned into a lifetime. Like so many young adults do during their “gap year” in Israel, she fell in love with the country and went on to pursue her higher education there.

Seminary ignited her passion not only for learning but also for educating – she wanted to create a Judaism which was accessible and open minded, making it attractive to the next generation of Jewish young people. But, after studying in seminary for four years and achieving a teaching certificate in Jewish studies, Leah remembered that her lifelong goal was to be a psychologist. So, after seminary she went on to university.

She completed her undergraduate degree at Hebrew University and then went back to the US to pursue her master’s and doctorate degrees. She really wanted to be on the “cutting edge” of the field and she knew that New York was the place to do that. She ended up staying in the US much longer than she had planned, but she’s been back in Israel for 17 years now, that is her home.

Many people maintain the belief that life coaches are therapist wannabes who don’t want to actually do the work to get a degree in psychology. But for many that couldn’t be further from the truth. Dr. Leah has a doctorate in psychology, so why on earth did she become a life coach?

Then many years later she moved her family to Florida to train with him. Before doing that, she had looked up programs in New York and New Jersey, which were in her area, but they all seemed superficial. She was looking for something more. So she contacted the coach and asked him to train her privately. After her training, she went back to New York and set up her practice as a Coach and never looked back. That was 20 years ago.  

A few years after setting up her practice in New York, she returned home to Israel. While taking a course in marketing for women, in one of the sessions they did a SWOT analysis. SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. This process can be applied in many different ways for different organizations and individuals. But in the course, they were doing this SWOT analysis for their industry, and Leah was applying this to the coaching field. What did she write was the greatest threat to the coaching industry? “Badly trained coaches.”  When she looked down at her paper, she had the sudden realization that she had to do something about this, because it’s destroying the industry and it’s wrecking the name of people like herself and her mentor, who are so well trained and doing such deep and sacred work. Three months later the Jerusalem Coaching Institute was launched.

The Institute only accepts a few students each semester because Leah believes very strongly not only in carefully screening potential students, but also because it’s a mentorship as much as a training program. It’s about building a relationship with those you are learning from, and that can’t be done on a large scale.

Most coaches go into the field because they want to help people, they want to serve, which means that many coaches have difficulty “selling” themselves. But at the same time, coaching is a big business because in spite of the fact that it’s a difficult business model – coaching by definition is designed to be short-term, which means you are constantly working yourself out of a job so to speak, and yet, that’s the reason that it’s a billion dollar industry – when done well, it works better than most forms of therapy, and people like that. Most people don’t have the money or patience to be in therapy for 10 years, coming out at the other end of it maybe understanding why they are the way they are or why they feel the way they do, but still feeling that way. That’s often when people decide to try coaching instead. It can accomplish in a very short time what therapy often doesn’t even over a period of decades.

When you get results like that, people come.

Does that mean she makes less money because of it? Yes, she probably does, but Leah says she sleeps really well at night, and almost all her business is word of mouth because people see that she puts 150% into helping her clients as quickly as possible. They do great, and then they refer others to her.

But Leah doesn’t spend all her time building her business. She is an avid scuba diver and loves to travel. And this past summer Leah traveled to Rwanda to volunteer. She taught teachers, social workers and university students coaching and empowerment techniques to use with youth at risk.

So her advice to the woman who sees a need in the world but isn’t sure she can do it, would be to start by evaluating what her core values are, what talents and gifts she possesses that she could use to accomplish the task. Then to visualize how life would be different once that project is in place. Finally, to figure out who the people are in your life that can support you in your journey, and in fixing what needs to be fixed or creating what needs to be created. Leah firmly believes in the power of community.

Americans tend to be focused on being independent – doing things on your own. But we are created to be in community – we need each other. We start with our families and move outward. So, it’s important for every woman to use the power of community to create a support network of those who will help her as she builds her dream.

The Jerusalem Coaching Institute’s website is www.jerusalemcoachinginstitute.com and Leah can be reached by email at drleah.lifecoaching@gmail.com or by phone at +972-2563-1481 (Israel) or +1 212-362-7510 (US).