Today we’d like to introduce you to Victoria Kopp.
Victoria, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
I am a passionate advocate for all things uplifting. I am also the founder of Victory Life Coaching. While my journey was not drawn in a straight line, I am grateful for every experience and detour life proffered me. My life has been anything but boring and I get to remind myself of this fact frequently.
Becoming the business owner of Victory Life Coaching began when I had my first Psychology class in the 11th grade. I fell in love with the idea that people can have their internal wounds healed with the proper information and care. I set out to learn as much as I could about the subject and I had set my mind to healing inner wounds as my life mission.
At this point, you see, I had several of my own internal wounds I wanted to care for and heal. I had been molested by my friend’s father. My best friend had quit speaking to me. I had lost several of my friends in car accidents. And up until this point, I had been a sheltered child. In order to deal with the pain I was uncertain how to process, I turned to substance use, cutting, and rebelling as often as possible. To think that there was a solution to all of my inner turmoil, and then I would get the privilege of helping others find their own solutions, made my heart sing with joy and relief.
I graduated high school at 17 years old and started university that same summer as a psychology major. However, a slight shift in plans materialized when I pulled in front of an Army recruiting station to check the oil in my purple 97′ Toyota Celica. The recruiter sold me dreams of learning resume building skills, having my training count towards credits on my college transcript, and to top it all off, being able to pay for college with the GI Bill. A few quick months of training, a possible deployment, and a 5-figure sign on bonus! What 19 years old could turn that down? I joined the Army Reserves as an 88H cargo specialist. I’m not entirely sure what cargo has to do with psychology, but it had the shortest school and I thought it would be fun to operate heavy machinery in order to pay for my dream career.
I think that Army training was some of the best mindset training that any individual could receive. I knew that their goal was to break us down and being competitive I wouldn’t let them win. I was the soldier in the sandpit yelling at everyone to abate their tears and get pumped, while we literally threw sand on ourselves and ran sprints until our legs wanted to give out. I woke up like Emma Stone in the movie Aloha, “I’m jacked for today!”. That is until I broke my hip. It took a lot of wind out of my sails to have an inoperable leg and have to follow behind everyone on crutches. But nevertheless, I stubbornly and miraculously completed Basic Combat Training with everyone else.
As soon as I had completed all of my training to become a US Army Reservist I already knew the unit I was assigned to was deploying. I came out of qualification training to begin deployment training. I was in Afghanistan for approximately ten months. Three months into boots-on-ground, I was assaulted by a fellow US Army soldier that I barely knew. I received 16 stitches in my head and was reassigned from one Afghanistan base to another, much to my relief. This experience and the trial that ensued only fueled my desire to find a better way for people to heal and become the best versions of themselves. The soldier that assaulted me had been hospitalized for Schizophrenia before enlisting. During the entire trial process there was no required mental health treatment put into place for this man that was clearly in need of it. How could we fail each other so immensely?
I came back home and lived several more lives, used plenty more substances, and was so self-loathing it made perfect sense to me, in that state of mind, that this was just how life was going to be. Until I came across a fantastic life coach whose approach was nothing like what I had been learning in my pysch classes. She helped me see the world as it could be, as it should be, and empowered me to take chargeback of my life. This kind of work was what I had been searching for since my junior year of high school.
I have been willing to put every resource I possess into my life coaching career and continue to do so. The powerful shifts I see in people’s attitudes and feelings towards themselves through coaching literally changes their entire life and how they treat everyone in their life. There is nothing that I stand by more passionately than finding your trustworthy source of empowerment. Victory Life Coaching was created in the hopes of being just such a place.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
When I first began life coaching, I was so ecstatic about what kind of results it can yield that I basically assumed everyone would want it. It was an in-depth, studious road for me to learn how to advertise, market, and generally publicize myself. It’s a road that I am still gleefully perfecting, but in the beginning it threw me off a little.
I was going to networking events several times a week and doing my best to post on social media with little to no feedback because I wasn’t hitting my target market with the correct information. It was a struggle for a time.
Alright – so let’s talk business. Tell us about Victory Life Coaching – what should we know?
Victory Life Coaching is truly designed to help people believe in themselves and to believe that the best version of their life is attainable. I specialize in helping women overcome the roadblocks in their life holding them back from achieving their best life. I truly want people to feel safe and empowered. Life coaching is an extremely personal choice that you really have to be ready for. I would like for people to make this choice without feeling pressured to do so.
Is there a characteristic or quality that you feel is essential to success?
The most important thing to my success is making sure that I stay in tune with what progress my clients are making. I never want to allow myself to become too busy or too overwhelmed that I cannot compassionately check on my clients and their successes. I want to be more than just present for them and with them during their sessions.
The second most important thing to my success is providing my clients with enough tangible tools that they no longer need to see me on a regular basis. I would love for everyone who comes to me to receive exactly what it is they need to live a happy, productive, healthy life with the people they love and who love them most. In other words, I want each client to come to a place where they are safe and comfortable enough to live their best life in effective communication and effective action with themselves and their loved ones, no longer needing coaching to do so.
Pricing:
- Free Consultation
Contact Info:
- Website: http://bit.ly/VictoryLifeCoaching
- Email: Victoria@vlcbyvictoria.com
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