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Jump for My Love

Last weekend we dusted off the Love Actually soundtrack because it was time to jump for my love… the festive edition of Voice Dialogue Facilitator Training for Coaches.

One of the things I treasure most in my work is not only delivering training, but being part of a wider team of crew, facilitators, and assessors. There’s something profoundly special about being in a room with exceptional trainers, where transformation is visible, and where shared language creates shared understanding.

In the personal development space the term “lifechanging” gets banded around a lot, but honestly, it is the word that people keep returning to when describing Voice Dialogue. It changes them, their clients, their relationships, their parenting, their leadership. Because once you understand the inner worlds you’re made of, everything looks different.

• Imagine having two chronic health conditions and being able to regain 30-50% of the time and energy you spend on tasks. This is exactly what Dr Kat Fish did when she met her Perfectionist. Listen on iTunes │ Spotify
• How about overcoming your fear of public speaking to make it an integral part of your new role? That’s exactly what Kate Marshall did when she could manage her Pleaser’s fear of rejection and ridicule. Listen on iTunes │ Spotify

Things that felt impossible suddenly become not just possible but reality.

We All Have Different Selves

Most people hear different voices in their heads. This is completely normal.

One self says, “Go for a walk at lunchtime.” Another says, “Sit at your desk and get through your inbox. People are waiting.”

Whichever voice is strongest in the moment determines the action you take.

As children we try on many selves. Which ones become dominant depends on safety, family dynamics, culture, expectations, personality, and the unwritten rules we absorb. Over time, only a few become the primary selves that run the show.

Here are the ones I see most often in clients struggling with the weight of pressure/responsibilities, challenging dynamics or people at work, or self-confidence.

The Pusher

Do you live in permanent go-mode? Always busy, always striving, always pushing?

The Pusher loves achievement and success and hates stillness. It swallows down emotions because there is too much to achieve and no time to feel. It blurs boundaries, masks exhaustion, and breeds resentment. Resting feels like breaking its rules.

Do you have a first-class Pusher running your day?

The Perfectionist

The Perfectionist sets impossibly high standards. It loves order, hates mess, and insists things must be done right or not at all.

At work it teams up with the Pusher, pushing you to overprepare, overdeliver, and oversacrifice. Or it teams up with the Protector Controller to procrastinate, because starting feels too vulnerable.

Feeling less than perfect breaks its rules, and it will do anything to avoid that feeling.

The Pleaser

The Pleaser wants people to be happy with you at all times. It struggles to say no. It avoids conflict. It needs to be liked.

A simple diagnostic:

• What are you doing that you don’t want to be doing?
• What are you not doing that you do want to do?

If you can answer those, the Pleaser is probably in charge.

The Protector Controller

This self wants safety above all else. It prevents exposure, newness, risk or emotional discomfort.

As Dr Shefali writes, “Pleasers want to show the world how good they are, whereas controllers want to show the world how competent they are.” Both are trying to answer the same internal fear: “Am I good enough?”

Anything that feels vulnerable breaks its rules.

The Rule-Maker

The Rule-maker loves structure, certainty, and sticking to the script, even scripts that no longer make sense. It speaks in “shoulds,” “musts,” and “have tos.”

When strong, it creates rigidity, judgement and all-or-nothing thinking.

The Inner Critic

The Inner Critic is the harshest of all. It monitors all the other selves and punishes you when you break their rules. It tells you you’re not good enough, not doing enough, not being enough.

At its extremes it can become crippling. Even at mild levels it erodes confidence and self-trust.

The Inner Critic and Rule-maker have an interesting relationship: one tells you you’re better than others, the other tells you you’re less than. Many people have both operating at once.

Why This Matters

These selves aren’t problems. They are strategies you developed for survival, and to belong. But when any of them drift into the unhelpful range, they begin running your career, your relationships, your confidence and your choices, often without you even noticing or feeling like you have a choice.

Voice Dialogue coaching allows you to gain awareness of these selves and to regain real choice in your behaviours, actions, and responses. This is exactly what I do in my 121 coaching.

☕ Reflective Journal Prompts

• Do you recognise any of these selves and which are the strongest?
• What phrases do your strongest selves often say to you?
• If you were able to wave a magic wand, what would you like to be different?

If today’s Coffee & Notes resonated, and you are interested in joining my free Psychology of Selves workshop in January 2026. Respond with the word SELVES and I’ll add you to the wait list for priority booking. There will be a maximum of 99 spaces available.

Keep opening up,

Hannah

P.S Want to refine, optimise, and leverage your current position in 2026 or be the person job descriptions are created and written for. Here’s how I can support you:

• 📖 Step 1: Take the Career Accelerator Scorecard
• 💻 Step 2: Join the next Intentional Careers™ Workshop (2 different dates in December)
• ➡️ Step 3: Book a free 1-2-1 Strategy Session
• ✨ Step 4: Review 121 Coaching or Apply for Career Design Mastermind. Cohort 11 starts January 2026. Only 5 places remaining.

P.P.S. Now booking 2026 keynotes, workshops and events (online and in-person). Let’s move beyond compliance and dismantle systemic barriers, starting with the honest conversations we’re not having. Find out more