Guide to Building Anti-Oppressive Coaching Practices

As a life coach, you may feel called to support others in finding purpose, building resilience, or living more aligned with their truths. But holding that space with care and responsibility means looking closely at how your practice shows up in a world shaped by injustice. Coaching that doesn’t acknowledge power, systems, or lived experience can miss the mark.

The start of a new year invites us to go deeper. In places like New York, where January brings cold, quiet mornings, it's a natural time for inner work and recommitment. This season is a chance to reflect on how we offer care, whose wisdom we center, and what kind of healing spaces we want to build. For those of us facilitating change, embracing anti-oppressive practices is not just possible, it’s necessary.

Honoring Your Lived Experience and Lineage

Our stories matter. The way we coach is shaped by the communities we've been part of, the ancestors we carry, and the systems we've walked through. We don’t show up to this work as blank slates. We carry lived experience, emotion, and teachings that deserve a seat at the table.

It’s helpful to start by naming what has formed us. Think about the places and people who raised you, the cultural values you grew up with, or the moments you realized something needed to change. Bringing those pieces into awareness can act as a compass.

For many, reclaiming ancestral knowledge becomes part of that. Learning about traditional ways of healing or listening to family stories can remind us that we’re part of something larger. When we root our coaching in that remembering, we don’t have to follow dominant models that center urgency, competition, or hierarchy. We lead from somewhere deeper.

Shifting from Expert to Co-Creator

Anti-oppressive coaching starts with humility. It’s not your job to have all the answers or to fix what someone is carrying. Trust is built by being present, not by performing expertise. Clients aren't problems to solve, and you're not there to control their outcomes.

Instead, think of yourself as a partner in the work. You bring tools, perspective, and care. They bring their own wisdom, intuition, and rhythms. The relationship works best when it is mutual and consent-driven.

To support that, create space for choice in every part of the process. This can look like:

• Checking in before starting each session to see what they truly need that day

• Offering different ways to move through the work and letting them choose what fits

• Letting people opt out of questions or exercises without any pressure

Trust grows when people feel safe to pause, question, or say no. When coaching becomes a shared space rather than a top-down experience, healing finds room to breathe.

Naming the Systems That Impact the Work

Healing doesn’t happen in isolation. We live in a world where oppression often shapes how people see themselves and what they believe is possible. Many clients are carrying impacts from systems like racism, colonialism, ableism, or patriarchy. If we don’t name them, we risk making healing feel like a personal failure instead of a collective wound.

A coaching space that holds awareness for these truths lets people be more fully human. It makes space for grief that isn’t just individual but cultural. It honors the strategies people have used to survive. And it shifts the story from “What’s wrong with me?” to “What have I had to carry just to get here?”

At the same time, we have to keep turning the mirror toward ourselves. Where do we hold unexamined privilege? Where might we miss something because it's outside our lived experience? Staying in this reflection is part of our work. Not to feel guilt or shame, but to move with more care.

Reimagining Success, Growth, and Productivity

A lot of coaching is still hooked into ideas of accomplishment that come from capitalist thinking. Hustle harder. Produce more. Never stop growing. These messages can feel heavy, especially if you or your clients are already stretched thin or carrying deep fatigue.

Anti-oppressive coaching offers a different pace. It lets people define success for themselves, in ways that fit their values, culture, and capacity. Growth might look like rest. It might look like setting a boundary or not striving every second.

Here’s how we can begin to shift coaching toward restoration:

• Invite reflection around what “enough” feels like, not just what’s next

• Normalize slowing down, pausing, or saying no as valid forms of growth

• Design goals and structures that account for real life, not just ideal performance

By respecting slower rhythms, we’re not lowering expectations. We’re honoring dignity. This brings sustainability back into the practice, for our clients and for ourselves.

Holding Yourself Accountable Through Community and Reflection

Anti-oppressive coaching isn’t something we master once. It lives in relationship, reflection, and repair. Staying accountable means we remain open to feedback, even when it’s uncomfortable. It means we keep learning, listening, and adjusting.

None of us get it perfect. What matters is how we respond when we miss something or cause harm. That’s why it’s helpful to build regular practices of reflection. Journaling, ceremony, peer dialogue, or supervision can all be part of that.

Here are a few ways to support accountability within your practice:

• Join communities that align with social justice, so you’re not doing this work alone

• Take time often to check your own edges and assumptions

• Practice making space for hard conversations with clients or peers

This isn’t about shame. It’s about care. Staying accountable helps us protect the safety and agency of those we serve, and it helps us stay connected to our own truth.

Keep Growing into the Practice

Being a life coach committed to justice work isn’t a destination. It’s a living, breathing relationship with the world, with your clients, and with yourself. With every season, every inner shift, we’re invited back into that practice with fresh eyes.

Growth doesn’t always look dramatic. Sometimes it’s subtle. A shift in how we speak. A pause before offering advice. A moment of repair that wasn’t easy but felt clear. All of it matters.

When we stay grounded in care, humility, and truth, our work ripples outward. Coaching becomes not just a career but a form of justice, where healing isn’t separate from liberation, where we all get to come home to more of ourselves.

At Cynthia Santiago Borbon, we know that aligning your coaching practice with justice and care is not always simple, but it is deeply possible. We’re here to support those who feel called to grow a grounded, liberatory approach that honors both lineage and lived experience. If you’re ready to deepen your impact as a life coach and hold space that feels restorative and real, we invite you into this ongoing work with us. Reach out when you’re ready to connect.