By Stephen Horst, ERG Coach

“There’s work, and then there’s life.”

Everyone says it, and to a degree it’s true. Work is one thing, life is another, and never the two shall intertwine. But there is a very real sense in which this kind of separation isn’t possible because…well…we’re human. And that’s not all bad.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not bringing my mom in to work. But if I’ve noticed anything since I finished training at the ERG, it’s been a positive change in my life outside of the office. And the strange thing is it doesn’t surprise me – not in the slightest –because the whole point of our programs is to fundamentally change a client’s life. So why wouldn’t that happen to me as well? I remember one of the first graduations I witnessed in the office: it was a client who had had severe frontal lobe damage resulting from a very serious injury. By the end of his program, he was able to print out directions to a friend’s house for a party, get there on time, and get home safely –none of which he could do before on his own. If that’s not a success story, then nothing is.

Yes, better grades, getting into college, acing that SAT/ACT/LSAT/GRE etc. has great value, but it’s all rather peripheral –the result of a deeper transformation. The real goal is to empower the client fundamentally so that he or she will be able to achieve what they desire in life. Whether that’s work, school, home, sports, or anything else –it’s all just the pieces that make up living.

What I am pursuing in my own life has, on the surface, very little to do with what I do at the ERG. At least that’s what I thought initially –“It’s a job.” But the transformation I have seen in my students has mirrored a transformation in me, a kind of self-empowerment, and it is nothing short of amazing to witness my own growth alongside my clients’ growth.

Henry Ward Beecher once said, “We should not judge people by their peak of excellence; but by the distance they have traveled from the point where they started.”

And I couldn’t agree more.