Pathways for Life

My name is Christine Stocker-Gibson and I run Pathways for Life, a performance development enterprise supporting individuals, families and businesses to inspire personal excellence and shape new directions.

Our Mission is to inspire individuals of all ages to greater self-knowledge and self-belief so they can enjoy their unique creativity, release their energy and find new opportunities to shine.

My unique selling point is 20+ years expertise in shaping not-for-profits and developing people to create new energies which raise their performance

I have developed Break the Cycle coaching, a confidence building-behaviour changing-motivational coaching programme which is flexible enough to suit individual 1:1s, families, small groups or staff teams.

I am also working with local communities to create teen mentoring forums to develop and nurture creative life opportunities.

• Break the Cycle workshops & family activity days:
• Workshops use NLP based techniques and spiritual exercises to build confidence, take responsibility for self and others, strengthen relationships, change negative mindsets.
  
• Family activity days also incorporate learning a creative skill, eg basic sewing for a clothes makeover session, or parent & child music writing, or storytelling or poetry classes./
• Executive mentoring & team performance coaching & supervision for SMEs and voluntary organisations.
  
• Stress Free Budgeting motivational workshop (currently for a tenant resettlement service) explores how different personality types manage their finances, & provides user-friendly techniques & tips for managing stress, goal setting and keeping on track.
  
• HomeCoach is Pathways pilot family coaching project working with parents and children of all ages in their own homes to raise self esteem, resolve behavioural and relationship tensions and shape new life opportunities.
  
• Evidence shows there is a real need for home-based family coaching (ie private, contained and non-stigmatising support delivered in a timely and supportive way to facilitate emotional maturity for the family members and demonstrate good citizenship. HomeStart had its foundations in the same philosophy but caters only for families with under 7s. Familiesí problems do not end at 7!/
• Pathwaysí HomeCoach family mentoring works equally well with teenagers and young adults and is an inexpensive alternative to family disintegration!/
• Jump! is a dance club with an active anti-bullying ethos to be launched at Ramsey Youth Centre in February. Project funding is being sought for recruiting & training volunteers to become Befrienders, also confidential teen & family mentoring provided by experienced practitioners.
• Neural Network is a creative peer network for practitioners from psychology disciplines & corporate training willing to cross-fertilise ideas and share resources in the interests of developing new projects across the East of England & London.

Christine Stocker-Gibson

Christine Stocker-Gibson MBA NLPP DipPC

Whatever you do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius and power and magic in it! (Goethe)

2008 was an eventful year both for my coaching enterprise, Pathways for Life, and for me, Christine Stocker-Gibson. From its inception as a confidence building & parent coaching practice, and through exploring the different disciplines of cognitive development it has grown quickly, tailoring mentoring projects and behaviour-change programmes for some pretty dynamic local voluntary organisations, and colleges, who are helping the adults and families they support to break negative cycles of behaviour so they can blossom in renewed confidence.

Nationally, it seems more public funding is becoming available for emotional learning projects as government policies encourage the involvement of voluntary & community organisations and social enterprises in delivering early intervention activities to improve parenting skills, children & young personsí development, and reduce social isolation.

Iím sure none of us need further convincing of the terrible impact on our society which results from abandoning the futures of our most vulnerable young people ñ but two recent political statements say it all!

The Prince of Wales Trust issued a sombre statement in the first week of January 09 stating ìÖ.there are thousands of young people who desperately need support. Often, young people who feel they have reached rock bottom don't know where to turn for help." uk.news.yahoo.com.

And the latest cross-party research "Early intervention: good parents, great kids, better citizens" launched by The Centre for Social Justice & The Smith Institute in December at the Houses of Parliament captures the public mood to help Britainís struggling families before they fragment into dysfunction, rather than at crisis level, urging new ways of managing our public services.

Morally, socially, strategically and financially we know it makes sense! There are many dedicated services able to bring energy and expertise to strengthening families by empowering them to break out of their negative spiral, to achieve more. I aim to be part of that!

Here, in the East of England, there is a new mood of collaboration in the voluntary sector, eager to share examples of best practice and innovation, some of which it has been my joy to take part in:

• EEDAs Ideas Exchange conference: Redefining Profit for the 21st Century in Newmarket
• The Enterprising Women conference in Royston (where I knobbled a high profile potential speaker!)
• Letchworth Wellness Centre seminar on building strong business collabations (nice people, great food)
• Together for Recovery seminars at the Saxongate Centre, Huntingdon (great collective energy)
• University of Hertfordshireís Business Centreís mentoring & coaching programme.

On a personal level, ë08 was outstanding!

• Achieving my NLP Practitioner Diploma, and beginning a Corporate & Executive Coaching qualification to update my earlier MBA.
• Taking over the running of my Women in Rural Enterprise (West Cambs) business network has gained me some good friends as well as opening doors to embryonic business opportunities, and raised my business credibility both as MicroCoach with the Social Enterprise East of England Agency (SEEE) and as a leadership coach.
• Through a combination of good luck and serious research I have built promising relationships with some excellent organisations, whose work I admire and hope to contribute to in the future:
• The Foundation for Compassion & Wisdom ñ whose wonderful child development materials I am trialling as part of my family HomeCoach programme. (www.essential-education.org)
• DCSC Counselling in Schools programme
• University of Hertfordshireís Business Centreís Coaching &Mentoring programme
• The creative Discover storytelling Centre in Stratford for parents and children www.newham.gov.uk

So now I am on a mission to bring the life-changing benefits of personal performance coaching to my community by way of local services, schools, as well as the traditional business sector.

• confidential teen & family mentoring provided by experienced practitioners.

Itís probably obvious that I believe passionately that the powerful benefits of personal development coaching should become a mainstream community service, replicated to meet the needs of neighbourhoods, wherever needed, providing relief to families in distress and strengthening social responsibility.

And so said Thomas Paine, in The Rights of Man - as far back as 1791!

"Revolutions create genius and talent; but those events do no more than bring them forward. There is existing in man, a mass of sense lying in a dormant state, and which unless something excites it to action, will descend with him in that condition to the grave. As it is to the advantage of society that the whole of its facilities should be employed, the construction of government ought to be such as to bring forward, by quiet and regular operation, all that capacity which never fails to appear in revolution.î

Thank you for taking the time to read this.

If you have an interest in exploring the benefits of coaching & mentoring, or would like to know more about volunteering as a befriender, a mentor, or sponsor, I would love to hear from you.

Tel 01480 406998 or 07738 479153/ christine@pathwaysforlife.co.uk
www.pathwaysforlife.co.uk