Health Coaching: Curiosity Instead of Judgement

Free Judgment Zone, or Judgment-Free Zone?

Years ago, I was sitting in a hair salon sharing my very frustrating online dating struggles, when my hair stylist's assistant cheerfully announced:

“Tell us more! This is a free judgment zone!”

He quickly corrected himself and said, "I meant this is a judgment-free zone!"

And I remember thinking, Nope. You had it right the first time.

If we’re being truthful, hair salons can be excellent free-judgment zones. We notice people. We make assumptions. We decide someone looks wealthy or broke, elegant or trashy, warm or unfriendly. Sometimes before they’ve said a single word.

Human beings are remarkably good at forming opinions with very little information.

Coaching has taught me to do something different. Get curious instead.

Curiosity instead of judgement:

Curiosity and judgment don’t occupy the same space very well.

Judgment says:

Why can’t you just do this?

Curiosity asks:

What is making this hard?

Judgment says:

You know what you should be doing.

Curiosity asks:

What keeps getting in the way?

Judgment looks at a behavior and labels it good or bad.

Curiosity asks what purpose that behavior might be serving, what circumstances created it, and whether it still works for the life you want now.

That is much closer to how I think about coaching today. Health coaching isn’t about judgment or perfection. It’s about curiosity, understanding where you’re stuck, building realistic habits, and creating an achievable plan forward.

People generally don’t need another person telling them what they’re doing wrong. Most of us already have a pretty impressive internal narrator handling that job. And information alone usually isn’t the problem either. We know vegetables are good for us. We know movement matters. We know sleep matters. We know endlessly scrolling our phones probably isn’t helping us sleep. We know sitting down for dinner instead of eating over the sink or in the car would probably feel better.

Knowing and doing are two very different things.

The interesting question is:

Where are you stuck—and why?

Maybe the routine you created during a chaotic season of life simply became your permanent routine.

Maybe you’re trying to change five things at once.

Maybe the goal is unrealistic for your actual life.

Maybe your environment makes the habit you want harder than it needs to be.

Maybe you’ve spent years taking care of everyone else and aren’t even sure what you want anymore.

Maybe you keep starting over every Monday because your plan requires perfection to succeed.

That is where curiosity becomes useful.

Instead of beginning with What should you be doing?, we can begin with:

What is happening now?

What matters to you?

What would you genuinely like to change?

What keeps getting in the way?

And then we make a plan.

Not an imaginary-life plan.

A your-actual-life plan.

Something achievable enough to begin, meaningful enough to matter, and flexible enough to survive a busy Tuesday.

Then comes the part that is difficult to create alone: accountability.

We check in.

What worked?

What didn’t?

What surprised you?

What felt easier than expected?

Where did you get stuck again?

And instead of declaring the whole thing a failure, we get curious again and adjust. Over time, those small adjustments become routines. The routines become habits. And eventually, many of the things that once required enormous effort simply become part of how you live.

That is the kind of change I’m interested in.

Not punishment.

Not perfection.

Not handing someone a beautifully organized list of everything they should be doing and sending them on their way.

I want to help people make their homes and routines more conducive to nourishment and connection. Sometimes that involves food. Sometimes movement, sleep, boundaries, relationships, or the way we use our time. Often, all of those things overlap.

My job as a coach isn’t to judge where you are. My job is to help you look at where you are with enough curiosity that we can understand it. Then we figure out where you want to go. And we start building a realistic path from here to there. One achievable step at a time.

Getting unstuck rarely begins with someone telling you to try harder. Very often, it begins with a better question.