About LifeWalker Coach
Hi,
I’m Gloria Walker, LifeWalker Coach, and I am passionate about
helping my clients live their best and most authentic lives while
successfully navigating the challenges of when life gets in the way.
Have you ever found
yourself in a situation where life got in the way of your plans and
you felt powerless? I did, and it was a doozy! After going through a
number of major life upheavals within 18 months, including the
terminal illness and death of my mother, my husband’s lay-off and
subsequent months of unemployment, and leaving my dream career to
move back to California to deal with both of those life
circumstances, I was left with the task of piecing my life back
together.
The only problem was, the puzzle was unfamiliar and most of
the old pieces no longer fit. Suddenly I was in
the position of having to reinvent myself at a very disorienting
period in my life and I had no idea where to begin, not even close…
If I had known at the time
what a life coach was and could do for me, the process of piecing
things back together would have been so much easier. The intuitive
process and powerful tools of coaching would have saved me A LOT of
time, effort, and grief!
Once I discovered life
coaching, I knew I had to help others going through what I did to
avoid so many of the pitfalls I experienced and the delays to healing
and making real progress.
There is a better way than going it alone!
My background in the
corporate world and higher education has given me a broad perspective
and diverse set of experiences that allow me to be effective in a
variety of situations and in working with my clients to achieve real
results, whether personal or professional. I
incorporate powerful life coaching tools and techniques, professional
and personal assessments, and a variety of other tools (business and
general) to create and facilitate a coaching experience tailored to
your specific needs and goals.
Whether personally or
professionally, it’s your life path and LifeWalker Coach can help
you be passionate and powerful in it, while ensuring you do so in a
way that honors who you are and allows you to live authentically.
The Traditional Bio
Gloria Walker, PhD is a
Martha Beck Certified Life Coach, educator, and writer with a diverse background, including years
of experience in both the corporate world and academia. She has a BA in German minoring in International Business, a MA in International Affairs with emphasis in International Business, and a PhD in Political Science specializing in Comparative Politics and International Relations.
Gloria landed in the
insurance industry working for third party administrators and a large
insurance carrier after completing her master’s degree. Eight years
later, she decided to leave the corporate world, and return to
academia to pursue her dream of earning her PhD in Political Science
and becoming a professor. After earning her doctorate at UC Davis,
she secured a tenure-track position at a small private liberal arts
college in Louisiana and spent four years living her dream.
Unfortunately, life got in
the way of her plans, and family commitments required she leave her
academic position. After moving back to California and teaching as an
adjunct professor for a year, Gloria decided this was not the
direction she wanted to take and began the process of refocusing her
career and finding a new path.
Although she loved being
in the academic environment, there were aspects of the job she never
really learned to love, including grading, committee work, and the
publish or perish atmosphere for advancement and promotion. What she
did love was teaching, synthesizing complex information in ways that
made it more accessible to students, preparing lectures and talks,
and last, but certainly not least, advising, guiding, mentoring, and
empowering her students academically, personally, and professionally.
A seemingly random phone
call from a former student she hadn’t spoken with in nearly five
years asking for help with her grad school application set Gloria on
the path to becoming a life coach by making her realize she could
take what she loved most about being a professor and leave the rest
behind.
There was another way.
Helping people find their way in this wonderfully crazy world in which we live is truly a
passion for Gloria, and the skills and practice she developed over
the years as a supervisor, teacher, and advisor translate very
clearly into being a life coach. It turns out life was leading her
here all along…