Name: Laura Deming
Title: Counselor and Coach
Business Name: International Counseling and Coaching
Niche/Specialties: Life coaching; career and executive coaching. Also providing counseling: transition counseling for expats who are coping with personal, relationship and career changes (including relocation and cultural adjustment), TCKs, stress and anxiety management, assertiveness training, and mixed-nationality couples counseling. Client groups include accompanying spouses, diplomats, corporate managers and academics.
Expat Experience/Life Experience: It’s hard for me to separate these two! I am originally from California, but I have spent much of my life outside the U.S. in South America, Europe, Asia, Africa and the Middle East. I grew up as a Third Culture Kid, attending international schools in Singapore, Switzerland, Liberia and Argentina, and as an adult I continued to travel and live abroad. Early jobs included teaching ESL in Stockholm, working for the Hilton Hotel chain in East Africa, and managing a coastal trading business in West Africa. Later I added writing to the mix; my expat fiction has been published in the U.S., UK, France, Belgium and South Africa. At 40 I re-careered and became a counselor and coach. I spent a number of years in Phoenix, Arizona, where I divided my time between working in private practice and teaching at a local community college, before returning to expat life. I opened my first foreign-based private practice in Berlin, Germany. I have also had a practice in Beirut, Lebanon. I currently have offices in Berlin and in Honolulu, Hawaii. I work extensively with expatriates (teens, adults, and couples) from diverse cultural backgrounds, both in person and by phone and skype worldwide.
Languages Spoken: English and Swedish.
Accomplishments: For details about some of my professional accomplishments please see my website’s “About Me” page at www.internationalcounselingandcoaching.com. On a personal level, my proudest accomplishment is probably that I’ve always tried to “walk the talk.” Like all of us I’ve made my share of mistakes along the way. But I have very few regrets because the paths I’ve taken, and the people I’ve met on those paths, have all helped me to grow and enriched my life.
What I Love About Working in This Niche: I love the infinite variety of working with people from so many different backgrounds and cultures, and I love what I learn from each of them.
Coaching Style: Warm, focused, direct, practical–and hopefully with a little humor thrown in!
Favorite Coaching Tool: Perhaps the general tool that stems from my background as a cognitive-behavioral therapist: helping clients identify and change the negative, self-defeating beliefs that can hold them back and prevent them from achieving their dreams.
Why Clients Choose Me As Their Coach: I think it’s because they sense I’m on their side, with no judgment or personal agenda.
A Tip for My Niche: “For peace of mind, resign as general manager of the universe.” Understand and accept what you can control, and what you can’t. Try not to waste your time and your emotional, mental and physical energy worrying about things you can’t control. Life is too short. (For 11 more tips, please see the current blog entry on my website.)
Contact Details
Email: info@internationalcounselingandcoaching.com
Website: www.internationalcounselingandcoaching.com
Phone: 808.675.6353
