Maxine Croft
As my final exams approached for my degree in Psychology, I felt a sense of panic about what I was going to do with the rest of my life. What career path should I follow? I had a complete blank and felt lost about which direction I should go in. I had really enjoyed studying psychology but I did not want to become a psychologist.
It was my mother who suggested that as I had always done well in drama, I should perhaps apply for drama school. I loved performing but also felt completely overwhelmed by the idea of actually 'putting myself out there' as an actor. However, I took the leap and no one was more surprised than me when I got a place.
I found drama school tough, full of highs and lows but there were some truly memorable moments. Quite often whilst watching contemporaries pull off some wonderful performances, but I was constantly questioning my ability and what I was doing there. It was when I left drama school that I really began to understand what a difficult industry acting is to establish yourself in. So much passion and determination everywhere you go, but so little opportunity. After many years as a 'jobbing' actress I realised I wasn't really progressing. Each year seemed the same, full of promise at the start, and then a carbon copy of the year before. It revolved around appearing in stage productions, followed by months of temping work. It seemed like an impossible cycle to get out of as each production brought with it the promise that 'this could be it', the break that I had been waiting for. However, with hindsight and years of coaching and personal development under my belt, I also realise that I was terrified of success. I was like a car revving itself with the hand brake on, and then mystified as to why I wasn't getting anywhere.
What would happen if I were to become successful? What would change? What would be expected of me and would I be up to it?
I was putting in enough effort to convince myself that I was really trying, but I was also holding myself back. And this is something that a lot of us can do. Although it can manifest itself as self-sabotage, that is not our intention when we are holding ourselves back. Our intention is simply to keep ourselves safe. It took many years until I realised that although I loved acting, there was another part of me that I had been ignoring. It was only when I decided to ask myself some big questions about what I really wanted in life, that I realised that I had a deep desire to work with people. I had never really understood what coaching was, but in that moment I felt drawn to research what it was all about.
Since then I have been on a journey of discovery into how we can change our innate thoughts and beliefs about what is possible in our lives. I realised quickly that different tools are required to help a person to release old fears from the past, and become all that they want to become. For this reason, I focus much of my work using a process called EFT to help individuals to release fears and programming that are not serving them, and feel safe to create the reality that they want.
I qualified with Distinction from the Coaching Academy as a life coach and am also a certified NLP Practitioner and EFT Practitioner. I have an MA in Psychology from Edinburgh University.