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They Spent Their Life Savings on Life Coaching
他们把毕生积蓄都花在了人生指导上
To an outsider, Billiejo Mullett is someone who has her head firmly screwed on. She’s smart and educated — a registered nurse who works for a medical insurance provider — and balances her career with a busy family life.
在外人看来，比利乔·穆利特是一个头脑清醒的人。她很聪明，受过良好的教育——是一家医疗保险公司的注册护士——能兼顾事业和繁忙的家庭生活。
In many ways, Ms. Mullett, who lives in Minoa, N. Y., seems to have things figured out, which is why she is still reeling from a life-coaching experience she describes as a “pyramid scheme” that took tens of thousands of dollars from her.
从很多方面来看，住在纽约州米诺亚的穆利特似乎把事情都理得明明白白，这也是为什么她仍然对一次人生指导经历感到震惊，她称之为“金字塔骗局”，这个骗局骗走了她数万美元。
She is part of a growing cohort speaking out about the opaque underbelly of life coaching, an unregulated industry with an often-hefty price-tag, and a significant cost reaching far beyond funds spent.
她是越来越多公开揭露人生指导行业的不透明内幕的人之一，这是一个不受监管的行业，价格通常很高，而且成本远远超出了所花费的资金。
With early roots in the late-20th-century pull toward self-improvement, life coaching broadly encompasses a program of goal-setting and talk-therapy-style sessions aimed at improving an individual’s circumstances and well-being.
人生指导起源于20世纪后期对自我提升的追求，笼统地讲，它涵盖了关于目标设定和以谈话治疗为方式的多次会谈，旨在改善个人的处境和幸福感。
Business is booming. The International Coaching Federation, the world’s largest nonprofit coaching association, estimated that the industry was worth $4.6 billion in 2022 and that the number of coaches increased 54 percent between 2019 and 2022.
这个行业生意非常兴隆。国际指导联合会是世界上最大的非营利性指导协会，联合会估计，该行业在2022年价值46亿美元，并且指导师人数在2019年至2022年间增加了54%。
Because the industry lacks standardized accreditation, it’s most likely larger — one of the dangers of life coaching is that anyone can claim the title of life coach.
因为这个行业缺乏标准化的认证，所以它的规模很可能比这个估计数据更大，人生指导的危险之一是任何人都可以自称是人生指导师。
And while many operate with integrity, providing thoughtful and structured advice to their clients to help them through challenging times, the unregulated nature of the industry can make it easy to take advantage of people.
虽然许多指导师诚信经营，为客户提供深思熟虑和结构化的建议，帮助他们度过困难时期，但该行业不受监管的性质可能使得欺骗利用他人很容易。
In 2018, Ms. Mullett was tiring of the grind of the corporate world and struggling to form a blended family with her now-husband when she discovered life coaching.
2018年，穆利特厌倦了公司的繁忙工作，正努力与她现在的丈夫组建一个重组家庭，就在这时，她发现了人生指导。
“My friend recommended a podcast, and I immediately felt that this was what I’d been looking for,” she said. “The host was talking about how our thoughts impact our emotions and our behaviors. I was hooked. ” Ms. Mullett started to watch videos on the host’s website.
“我的朋友推荐了一个播客，我立刻觉得这就是我一直在寻找的东西。”她说，“播客主持人在谈论我们的想法如何影响我们的情绪和行为。我被深深吸引住了。”于是穆利特开始在主持人的网站上观看视频。
The host, a life coach whom Ms. Mullett asked not to be named for fear of retaliation and harassment, combined the language of successful businesswomen with the promise of a new career in which women could be in control of their own work and schedule, help others and improve themselves.
这个主持人是一位人生指导师（穆利特因担心遭到报复和骚扰而要求不公开她的名字），她将商界事业女强人的语言与开辟新职业的承诺结合起来，在新的职业中，女性可以掌控自己的工作和日程，并帮助他人、提高自己。
She withdrew $18,000 from her 401(k) to pay for her first course at a leading life coach school, hoping that it would lead to a much-needed career change. The course wasn’t what she expected.
穆利特从40.1万美元积蓄中取出了1.8万美元，用于支付她在一所一流人生指导学校的第一门课程的学费，希望这门课程能带来她急需的职业转变。 但课程与她的预期并不一样。
Mullett described a confusing and low-quality program of online lessons — one hour per week for six months — in which aspiring coaches discussed chapters they had read outside of class and practiced coaching one another.
穆利特描述了令人困惑且低质量的网络课程——每周一小时，为期六个月——在课程中，充满抱负的指导师们讨论学员在课外读过的章节，并练习互相指导。
She said that students were often belittled and that questioning the wisdom of the coaches who led the course was discouraged. But Ms. Mullett remained hopeful and believed she had learned some valuable things, for example, that she had an ability to focus only on the things in her life that she could control.
她说，学员们经常被贬低，质疑课程主讲指导师的智慧也是不被鼓励的。但穆利特仍然充满希望，并相信她学到了一些有价值的东西，例如，学会只关注生活中她能控制的事情。
She had spent an extraordinary amount of money on the certification and clung to the dream that had been sold to her: earning good money while fulfilling her passion for helping others.
她在证书上花费了一大笔钱，并且紧紧抓着这个贩卖给她的梦想：在做着自己热爱的帮助他人的工作的同时赚大钱。
