Coaching practices for Using Your Strengths

Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Using Your Strengths, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.

Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

• I already know what I’m good at, but I only ever use those strengths in the same few familiar places
• I spend so much energy trying to fix my weak spots that my days feel like a grind against my own grain
• I’m trying to reach this goal by white-knuckling through the exact things I’m worst at, and it’s draining and stalling
• I want to know what my real strengths actually are
• I know there are a couple of things I’m genuinely good at, but I use them just to get by

Practices that may help

1. Use a signature strength in a new way each day for one week
   Apply one of your top character strengths to a context or relationship where you don’t normally use it.
   VIA Character Strengths, Made Practical
2. Use your signature strengths in a new way
   Identify your top character strengths and deploy one of them differently each day.
   Positive Psychology, Made Practical
3. Set goals that build on your signature strengths
   Design goals that let your top strengths be the primary vehicle rather than your weak spots.
   VIA Character Strengths, Made Practical
4. Identify your core strengths through your own history
   Find the recurring threads in your best moments to name the strengths that are actually yours.
   Life Review and Reminiscence Therapy
5. Bridge from signature strengths to purpose
   Identify the top two or three things you do better than most people and trace how they can serve something larger.
   The Life Crafting Intervention: Scripting Your Future Self
6. Spot and name character strengths in others
   Notice and explicitly name the character strengths you observe in people around you.
   VIA Character Strengths, Made Practical
7. Map how your strengths distort under stress
   Identify the "overuse" and "underuse" of each signature strength — how they show up when you’re at your worst.
   VIA Character Strengths, Made Practical
8. VIA Character Strengths, Made Practical
   Peterson and Seligman’s VIA Classification identifies 24 character strengths organized under six virtues, and multiple randomized trials find that using your top "signature strengths" in new ways reliably increases well-being and decreases depressive symptoms. The effect is most robust when strengths are deployed in engaged, relational ways — not just recognized but actively applied.
9. Take the VIA survey and identify your signature strengths
   Discover your top five to seven character strengths using the validated VIA survey.
   VIA Character Strengths, Made Practical
10. Identify your dominant leadership strengths — and lead from them
    Know which of the four leadership domains you naturally operate from and amplify it rather than trying to be equally strong in all four.
    Strengths-Based Leadership, Made Practical

Describe your situation in your own words to search the complete practice library.