Case Study: Ariell Ilunga

What were your 3 biggest challenges/blocks/issues before working with KP Coaching?

“I was operating out of fear most days: fear of letting go, fear of accepting my reality, fear of stepping into my authentic self, fear of facing who I really am, where I came from, where I'm going. So I'd held on to a job that was so deeply tied to this false identity I had formed, and I was just unable to unravel myself from it without your help.” 

What did your daily life look like before working with KP Coaching?

“I was high functioning,  I was just not aligned. I was this unaligned, high-functioning human. I was operating from a place of "You've got to DO" and a task list and a routine. But it's really interesting how you can be aligned and clear in one area of your life, and a complete jumble jumble mess in other areas. I'd say I was clear on mothering and how I wanted that to look and feel, and what needed to happen on a day-to-day basis. I was very unclear, very scrabbled, when it came to work.”

Why did you choose KP Coaching?

“It does take a lot—a lot—of practice and rewiring, and I would not have been able to do that without coaching, without you. Just drawing my attention, becoming more aware of it, of the way our brain works, our default settings. And learning that I do have a choice—I do have a say in how I live in my own body (i.e. my head and my feelings) and kind of reclaiming my body and my brain for me. So I think without coaching it would have been extremely difficult to connect those dots. I think one of the lessons was, ‘Be mindful of your thoughts.’ and I was like, ‘I am never going to be able to do that. It's a runaway train in there!’ And now I can! It's really interesting. Now I can, and I'm very aware of what's happening in there.”

What does your daily life look like now after working with KP Coaching?

“I have less anxiety in my day-to-day, so when it does come up, I have more bandwidth and I'm not exhausted. Instead of like, when you're living in fear constantly, you're just worn out all the time. And so now I'm able to restore, and when something scary comes up, I'm not exhausted dealing with it. And I can be clear, like I don't have to come at it with this mindset of ‘I'm so exhausted, let me just do whatever to make it happy right now.’ I'm able to think critically, and apply different perspectives, and sit with it, and not become completely overwhelmed by it. Because it feels more rare than it did before. 

“Fear is different. The fear in the beginning was so much about outside, societal expectations and pressures, and it was very noisy and clangy. And now, because I'm doing the things I want to be doing and they're brand new, it's scary! But there's a huge difference in the fear that comes from making choices to live your life for yourself, than when you're living your life for everyone else and everything else. So that's kind of the biggest difference - I was living part of my life for other people's expectations (granted, none of those were particularly real! A lot of them were made up). But now I'm living my life for myself. And it's just a different type of fear - even the fear's more aligned. 

“Because if you're in a scary meeting, let's say—doing that one scary thing is so different than having this entire narrative that it's all scary, every moment of the day. Because you're living in fear. So how I deal with it differently—I'm still learning!—but I would say it's easier because I have less fear in my day-to-day. I'm not giving my power away to fear-based thinking, or to the problem or the situation or the issue – I can be in control of me, and that's it.”

Did you break through those challenges? What are the results?

“I'm able to make decisions now because I trust myself more. And now that I've eliminated a lot of the unnecessary negative noise, I can hear myself clearly and loudly. It's easy to make decisions because the next best thing is just more obvious—because a lot of the noise is gone and I trust myself more.

“It's definitely changed things. I'm just moving from a more deeply aligned place. I'm able to know if something serves me or not, or serves my goals, my greater good. All of that becomes more clear, and I feel like I'm making good choices! Because I'm moving from a better place. It’s liberating to trust myself. It feels lighter, for sure. Like not having to ‘have a conference call with all my feelings at the same time’—it's like it's just less people at the table for decision making.”