Over the past two decades of coaching, I’ve noticed some significant shifts in the Coaching world.

Clients are no longer just bringing goals and dreams. They’re bringing nervous systems shaped by chronic stress, burnout, grief, loneliness, and a deep ache for safety and connection in a world that feels uncertain, emotionally charged and polarized.

What if people are showing up not for achievement first, but to feel steady enough to begin again or keep going?

What if coaching, at its best, isn’t about performance and goals, but about meeting people where they are—offering embodied presence and co-regulation and helping them build the internal resources, capacity as a life skill and relational safety needed to move forward with a stable foundation of clarity, and connection to themselves and others?

In 2026, one of the most vital training options for coaches is trauma-informed coaching certification—rooted in neuroscience, nervous system regulation, relational and embodied presence, and heart-centered care—to build the skills and tools to truly hold space for complex feelings and conversations.

From Performance to Presence: What I’ve Seen Change Since 2006

When I began coaching in 2006, most conversations were about outcomes, performance, peak productivity, solutions to problems, mindset, positive psychology, and what action step came next.

But somewhere along the way, especially after 2020, I noticed a deeper current in how my clients were showing up. Clients still had visions and goals. But now they also struggle to maintain the capacity and optimism to pursue those goals, carrying tension in their shoulders, tightness in their chests, and questions they are not quite sure how to name.

They were What If Wonderings things like:

• Why do I feel so stuck when I’m doing everything “right”? 
• What if I’m stuck feeling like this forever?
• How do I show up for others when I feel so drained? 
• What if I let down the people I care for?
• What if I just can’t keep up with life anymore?

The truth is, coaching has always been about change. But these days, the meaningful change most people seek begins with feeling safe inside themselves, let alone with others.

Coaching Culture, Bypassing, and the Longing to Be Seen

Over the years, I’ve witnessed a version of coaching that’s all sparkle and speed.”Cheerleading”
Good vibes only. Hustle harder. Manifest more.

Unfortunately, people came to coaching expecting clarity and left with a longer to-do list and an expectation that if they just took one aligned step the path would be easier.

In a post covid world, many of us don’t want one more “mindset shift.” What we want, what clients need, is someone who could sit with their full humanity, without trying to bypass their inner truths.

What if coaching didn’t mean pushing through?

Trauma-Informed Coaching meets this deeply human need because it doesn’t bypass struggles. It meets them gently, honestly, without trying to up the ante or “fix them.” 

What I See Behind Social Masks

Many of my clients are highly functional. They’re professionals, leaders, parents, and caregivers. Out in the world, they show up and look like they are holding it all together.

On the inside? It’s often a much different story.

They’re tired. Tired of “toeing the line”, of pretending, of “faking it till they make it”, tired of wearing a mask of “I’m great” when inside they are feeling worn out, tired to the bones, facing symptoms of chronic stress, feeling unseen, unfilled at their core. What if they didn’t have to pretend?
What if the coaching room was one of the few places they could be seen? Fully real, hanging on, struggling to get by?

Behind the constant drive for productivity is loneliness. Behind the smile, uncertainty. Behind the goals, a question:

Is it possible that a coaching container is a place where we can witness, hold space, be present to the human “Being’ness” not just agents of doing.

What I’ve Noticed About Neurodivergence and Nervous Systems

In the last few years, I’ve noticed more clients naming experiences of ADHD, late ADHD diagnoses, autism, sensory overstimulation and overwhelm, frustration and exhaustion, and burnout. Their stress is both mental and emotional, and it’s showing up in their bodies and nervous systems.

For many, these discoveries are less about diagnosis and more about finally understanding themselves.

Many have spent a lifetime trying to adapt to environments that weren’t designed for how they think, feel, or relate. What if we honored those adaptations rather than pathologizing them?

Trauma-informed coaching slows down enough to say: Of course, that’s how you learned to cope. Let’s begin there—with compassion.

Why This Training Matters in 2026

Clients want to bring their whole selves to coaching, and we have the opportunity to meet them as they are.

What if part of our job as coaches is to become fluent in nervous system cues—in the signals of overwhelm and the body’s cues of stress, not ok’ness and hypervigilance? What if our soulful presence and elevated Trauma-Informed Coaching lens can provide real, meaningful paths into growth, not of career and performance, but growth in resilience, in capacity, in connection and community?

What if the future of coaching isn’t about having more tools, but about having a greater lens and skill set to be more present to the humanness of our clients’ experiences?

Trauma-informed training gives coaches the lens and skills  to:

• Recognize dysregulation instead of mistaking it for resistance
• Offer choice, pacing, and presence instead of urgency and pressure
• Ask questions that honor not just goals, but the human being-ness behind them
• Stay within the scope of coaching and know when deeper support is needed

For new coaches, this builds a powerful foundational set of skills—a way of holding a safe container for the coaching conversation.

For experienced coaches, it deepens the craft and shares another deeply human lens, one that is both hopeful and trauma-informed.

In my experience, it also brings us back to what coaching was meant to be all along: a partnership rooted in trust, safety, presence, and care.

The Risk of Performance-First Coaching

In leadership and organizational spaces, coaching is still frequently framed as a way to increase productivity, even as loneliness deepens, mental health leaves rise dramatically, and dissatisfaction continues to spread.

What if we asked different questions?

• What is this person’s capacity right now?
• How can we support the human instead of the spreadsheet
• How can we gain ecological capacity and resources?
• What would shift if they felt more holistically supported?

These are the kinds of questions trauma-informed coaches learn to ask. Not to action or fix someone but to truly notice, witness, hear, and understand.

What It Really Means to Move the Human Spirit

The heart of trauma-informed coaching isn’t just skills, a lens or a technique.
It’s a way of being, led by presence and compassion.

One that offers:

• Presence that’s steady enough to hold what’s real
• Curiosity that honors complexity
• Compassion that doesn’t shrink from hard truths
• Awareness that listens to the nervous system—the brain, mind, and body connection—as much as the words.

What if the most powerful thing we offer isn’t advice, but safety and presence?

When clients feel really met, they begin to soften. Defenses lower. Insight emerges. Hope, growth and progress can begin.

And something essential starts to feel possible again.

Your Next Step

If this resonates, and you’re wondering what if you and your clients would benefit from a trauma-informed lens and skill set—if you would like to learn to coach this way—there’s a community of like-minded coaches doing this at Moving the Human Spirit.

→ Explore the Trauma-Informed Coaching Certification Level 1—our ICF-accredited, live training that supports coaches in cultivating presence, compassion, and nervous system awareness from the very first session.

Or simply email nikol@movingthehumanspirit.com to share where you are, ask questions, or explore whether this is the next right step for you.

What if… this is the kind of coaching the world needs most right now?
And what if… it starts with us?