I help runners and ultrarunners strengthen their mind, improve their running, and overall mental wellbeing.
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U.S. residents only.
Reach out to start a free consultation
I want to hear about what you care to work on. Let’s see if we would make a great team.
I mostly work with
- Worries and managing negative thoughts
- Feelings of sadness
- Feelings of being stuck
- Burnout/Fatigue
- Perfectionism
I work with people who (my clients are awesome, by the way!)
- Are ready to make changes.
- Willing to learn and try new things (your old ways of going about things may no longer be serving you).
- Understand that there is some time commitment involved. About 15 minutes to three hours per week.
- Completes resources and worksheets that I send (at least some of it).
Is working with me right for you?
| DOES THIS SOUND LIKE YOU? | IMAGINE THIS… |
| Wasted your money on race registrations and you don’t show up at the race because you’re feeling scared and have a lack of confidence that you’ll be able to get through the race. | Run your race with confidence and be able to handle the lows that the race may throw at you. |
| Dropped out of your race because your mind wasn’t in it or your mind caved in under the pressure of the race. | Know how to get in the frame of mind to race and be able to cope with the pressure, so that you can race less stressed. |
| Searching for your limits and need to strengthen your mind. | Have a set of mental tools and strategies, so that you’re better equipped to push yourself. |
| Difficulty fighting the “inner demons” during hard training or a race. | Win with positive self-talk. |
| Spend too much time on tasks or projects trying to get them perfect in order to attempt to control a future outcome. | Being able to acknowledge the root of your concerns, minimize perfectionism, and set boundaries with yourself and those unhelpful behaviors. |
| You’re stuck in a fixed mindset and have low self-esteem. | Foster growth mindset by challenging your negative beliefs about yourself. |
| Spending too much energy on other people and find yourself frequently drained. | With relationships in mind, set appropriate boundaries with those people, so that you can take better care of yourself. |
| Need support building resilience. | Learn and grow from challenges. Improve how you manage and stay balanced during difficult times. |
| Lack energy, self-care is lacking. | Feel great with more energy to train. |
| Stuck in a cycle of unhealthy habits and having trouble reaching your goals due to slipping back into those habits. | Recognize patterns, disrupt the cycle, and replace the unhealthy habit with a healthy one. Crowd out the unhealthy habits with healthy ones and you’ll see yourself getting steps closer to your goals. |
| Unsure about what goals to set or how to appropriately set a goal. | Feel excited about your goals and following your dreams. Know how to make your goals doable and organized. |
| You feel like “why bother?” because progress is slow and it feels like you’ll absolutely never be able to reach your goals. | Be able to keep the process and progress in mind. You can reframe your thoughts to reflect the progress that YOU HAVE already made. Believe in yourself. |
| You put too much pressure on yourself for making mistakes. | Know the negative impact that that pressure and negative self-talk has on you. You can feel better about yourself and accept forgiveness. |
| Trouble finding where to place your focus with everything going on in your life between work, family, friends, and training. | Find better balance between all of the different areas of your life and train efficiently and effectively with the time that you have. |
| (Women’s issue) Feeling very down, bothered or challenged because you are pregnant or are currently planning a family and cannot train or race like you are used to. | Know that you’re not alone, that your feelings are valid, and find out what you can do right now. |
| Struggling to find motivation to workout and eat healthy. | Identify what’s most important to you and get the ball rolling with actionable steps. Lean into your “whys” for being healthy and for racing. |
| Would like support discovering meaning and how to use it to fuel training and racing. | Train and race for you! |
| Trouble getting into the frame of mind to race well. | Have better understanding of your barriers and be able to keep your head in the race. |
| Have difficulty believing in yourself because of what others have said to you in the past or from something else you went through. | Learn from your past and put it behind you. Build self-esteem by taking a step towards your goals. Believing you can achieve your goals will follow. |
| Lack connection to your body and staying present causes you to miss signals that you need to eat or hydrate. | Learn about the benefits of practicing mindfulness and apply them to keep you in-tune to what your body needs. |
| It’s hard to stay positive. | Shift the brain’s default settings by stating positive affirmations. |
| Would like to work on visualizing your goals. | Find visualization strategies that best suits you. Maybe this is creating a vision board or practicing a race day visualization. |
| Stressed out and unhappy when it comes to trying to keep after your goals and juggle everything else going on in life. | Happiness equals success. Identify what truly makes you happy, fit more of it into your journey towards your goals to reduce stress. Find balance. |
| Become overly disappointed with slow progress and beat yourself up over it. | Manage disappointing thoughts and reassess your process. |
| Feeling angry, frustrated, or depressed because you’re injured and can’t run or ride. | Reframe your thoughts surrounding the injury and find what you CAN DO to change how you’re feeling. |
| Constantly comparing your results or body to other athletes and feeling terrible about yourself. | Be able to celebrate and love yourself where you’re at. |
| Weak immune system due to stress, but can’t afford to be sick. | Eating healthy and exercising because you have the time and energy. |
What is a mindset?
- Have you ever dropped out of a race or given up on something because your head was in the wrong space?
- Have you ever fought thoughts or “inner demons,” as we call them in the ultrarunning community, during a run or “hard effort” exercise?
- Is your mind set to fixed or set to growth?
Your mindset is a set of beliefs that shape how you make sense of the world and yourself.
It influences how you think, feel, and behave in any given situation.
Our thoughts can shape how we behave, so in order to achieve our highest goals, we must know how to manage the mind.
What is resiliency?
Getting comfortable with being uncomfortable. Resilience is a habit, a skill, and a mindset that can help you manage and keep your balance during difficult times.
“Through repetition of things you don’t want to do, you build mental armor.”
David Goggins
It is learning and growing from the challenges that we face. Adopting a flexible mind in life’s situations.
Creating a shift in the way that you think is a process, it takes time, patience, attention to detail, and hard work, just as dialing in athletic abilities.
The mind is a muscle and we must exercise it in order to create resiliency.
Topics, strategies, and approaches
- Improve day-to-day mental wellbeing.
- Build better habits.
- Incorporate mindfulness
- Learn emotion regulation strategies for stressful situations.
- Set challenging, yet attainable goals.
- Discuss motivation
- Address body image thoughts or concerns.
- If you feel concerned that you have an eating disorders, let’s discuss it, so you can find help. I am informed on eating disorders. I cannot treat ED via coaching.
- Talk about you! Who are you, besides a runner? – parent, sibling, entrepreneur, community member… What else do you do, and how does it impact training for races or vice versa?
- Coping with injury and setbacks.
- Managing disappointments, like “Did Not Start” and “Did Not Finish”.
- Self-beliefs
- Juggling priorities and time management.
- Are you actively trying to find a mental health professional? I can assist!
- Are you searching for a running coach? I can provide pointers on how to go about finding someone who’s a good fit and what questions to ask the coach when interviewing them for fit.
- Mental strategies and mindset for racing.
- Positive affirmations or swearing during races? Both?!
- Training and race day visualization.
- General training and racing concerns and race day worries.
- Happiness. What is it? How to get more of it.
- What might you do if you encounter a problem during a race.
- Building trust with yourself.
- Improving self-care, self-esteem, and self-compassion.
- Knowing when to push yourself and when to be kinder to yourself.
- Why’s and meaning behind what you do. Passion. Using that as support and drive.
- The unique situations and challenges that women face in sport. Being a parent, pregnancy, miscarriage, dealing with periods during races…
- On top of talking, I do provide resources and homework.
Phew!!! … I need to sit down, where’s the chair?! Hopefully, this paints a picture of the good stuff that we can cover.
Reach out if you have questions or want to schedule.
I look forward to learning about what you’d like to work on.
What others say
Two ways to work with me
50-60 minute session: $90
20-30 minute session (check-in): $55
Reduced fee (ask about it)
50-60 minute session: $70
NOTE: THIS IS A NON-CLINICAL SERVICE
My professional disclaimer
I own and operate two businesses, Finish Stronger Counseling and Finish Stronger Mindset and Mental Wellness Coaching.
For legal and ethical purposes, I need to keep counseling and coaching separated.
I am a National Certified Counselor and Licensed Professional Counselor, providing counseling services via telemental health.
As a counselor, I specialize in working with runners and endurance athletes, but will work with anyone who is a good fit for my counseling service.
My other areas of focus as a counselor include anxiety, trauma and eating disorders.
My counseling private practice is located in Pennsylvania, where I’m licensed.
Coaching is non-clinical, so it’s not medical or counseling advice.
My mental wellness information is from evidence-based research, coming from several thousand hours of continuing education, and from my personal experiences of using it for years.
All of my mental wellness content, talks, and workshops are for informational purposes only and are not counseling.
If I determine that my mindset and mental wellness coaching services aren’t best for you, I’ll gently recommend that you seek services from an appropriate professional.
Also note:
I support ultrarunners. I am a seasoned ultrarunner and an assistant run coach, but I’m not an athletics coach, certified personal trainer or running coach (though I do have some knowledge in these areas).
What “Finish Stronger” stands for.
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