MY STORY - rewriting shame into courage
My name is Victor. It means “OVERCOMER”.
I now coach others to find hope and courage. Below is my story.
On the left was me before 40. I was 82kg. On the right is the current me. I am now between 67-68kg.
Before I was 40. I was on the round side, struggling with shame and with lots of insecurities. It was largely invisible to me or I was possibly living in denial. And finally, I had a huge breakdown.
My blood pressure hit 200. I was having weight issues and my back pain was constantly bothering me. As a co-founder of a business, I was burnout. The team I was leading was often on the receiving end of my emotional outbursts. I was also struggling in my marriage of 12 years.
It finally reached a tipping point. And I decided to take a hard stop from work.
During my sabbatical, I rediscovered God’s love for me and went through a healing journey in the emotional domain. That created a profound shift. I also went on a health program and lost weight. I went through marriage counselling and my marriage slowly took a turn. I also signed up for an ontological coaching course as part of my pursuit in personal transformation.
FROM SHAME TO COURAGE
Since end 2020, I felt I have made a deep emotional shift from a mood of SHAME to one of COURAGE and purpose. The journey to healing is a process. I often felt like I needed to dig deep for courage to face up to my past. I initiated conversations with people I have hurt. I initiated conversations with people I felt hurt by. Through a slow and difficult process, I found healing.
My marriage has rejuvenated and my wife and I have drawn even closer than before. I now experienced a deep sense of closeness to my three kids. On the physical front, I lost substantial weight and my back issues disappeared. On the career front, I decided to switch from focusing on training to focusing on coaching. I found a new joy and meaning in coaching others towards creating a sustainable transformation in their lives, just as I have experienced.
The change was summed up by my wife: “I felt like I have married a different man.”
👉🏻 MY personal MISSION STATEMENT
I bring clarity, hope and courage to empower others for breakthroughs
👉🏻 MY APPROACH TO COACHING: iNCREASE OUR ADAPTIVE INTELLIGENCE
▶ Since 2015, I have been a Gallup Certified CliftonStrengths Coach. I work with individuals and teams to explore and engage their strengths in different contexts.
I actively use the Strengths-Based Approach to Coaching - The more we use our strengths, the more energized we are.
▶ Part of my story of transformation involves me becoming a Newfield Certified Ontological Coach in 2021. I began coaching individuals and teams to identify their moods (the invisible emotional habits) that underpins performance.
I actively use the Ontological approach to Coaching - When individuals and teams shift their moods from unhelpful ones to empowering ones, the results are higher level thinking, better quality conversations, and sustainable levels of performance.
SUMMARY: I now combine both approaches to help individuals and teams to INCREASE THEIR ADAPTIVE INTELLIGENCE. By being able to use our strengths and to shift our moods in an agile manner, we are able to adapt to dynamic challenges that we faced.
👉🏻 my pRACTICES AS ICF CERTIFIED COACH
▶ As an ICF Certified Coach, I have clocked over 1,100 coaching hours and 3,000 hours of facilitation workshops. Through the people work, I have impacted over 12,000 adults and 16,000 youth
▶ I am currently an ICF Certified Advanced Certified Team Coach (ACTC) and Professional Certified Coach (PCC)
👉🏻 The WORK Experiences that have shaped me
▶ From Nov 2022- Jun 2024, I was the resident Team Coach at Motion For Impact, helping the company grow from 12 to 25 full time staff and responsible for coaching each staff in well-being and performance.
READ: Case Study on the impact as Team Coach.
▶ Nov 2020 - Sep 2022, I worked in Capelle Consulting as a Learning Designer, focusing on creating leadership development, team development and digital transformation programs to meet the needs of the clients we serve.
▶ In Dec 2014, I co-founded Strengths School with Jason Ho. We led a team of full time employees to bring CliftonStrengths workshops and leadership development training into companies and schools in Singapore and Asia. I stepped away from the business in Jan 2020 to take a sabbatical.
▶ As an entrepreneur, I’ve pitched, sold, designed, led and delivered over 100 leadership and people development projects in the Corporate sector and acquired significant sales and project management experiences.
▶ After a couple of years in Corporate Real Estate, I took a step of faith and joined Church of Our Saviour as a full time Youth Pastor. My responsibility was to provide pastoral care for a group of 400 youth. I mentored and counselled young people, preached weekly, organized youth camps and outreach programs, designed and delivered leadership development training programs and led overseas mission trips. Thought it might be a 1 year stint but God has other plans. I stayed from mid 2006 to March 2015.
TRAININGS AND CERTIFICATIONS I HAVE INVESTED INTO
GALLUP WALL OF FAME - AWARDS GIVEN BY GALLUP
GALLUP GOLD AWARD - Dec 2015
GALLUP PLATINUM AWARD - Nov 2016