Services for Individuals

The process of coaching allows you to enter into a relationship that focuses on the skills and actions needed to successfully accomplish your personally-relevant results. The primary focus is on creating actionable strategies and necessary outcomes for achieving specific goals in your work or personal life. Coaching works by identifying opportunities for development, based on your strengths and capabilities.

Alaya Consulting utilizes the Integral Coaching methodology developed by New Ventures West. Integral Coaching subscribes to a holistic view of people and organizations—believing that all aspects of the person or organization must be addressed in order to make lasting and sustainable change. The tools developed cannot be compartmentalized into personal or professional, rather Alaya Consulting will teach you strategies for problem solving and growth that will infuse all areas of your work and professional life. Whether working with teams, organizations, individuals or leaders, we help clients build competencies, skills and awareness to generate positive, transformative change across all areas of life.

Alaya Consulting serves clients on a temporary basis, careful not to create client dependency. The process focuses on developing specific outcomes defined for each individual that provide a clear focus and create a standard by which the effectiveness of the work can be judged. The specific outcomes always aim to develop long-term excellence within individuals that become self-correcting and self-generating.

  • Long-term excellence requires the development of lasting competencies that are relevant across all areas of life instead of simply short-term solutions to an immediate goal that has narrow applicability to other areas of life. It also includes a sense of fulfillment that what you are doing and how you are living is worthwhile and meaningful. A sense of fulfillment is important not only for individuals but also organizations. When teams, leaders and employees experience fulfillment and meaning, they are more loyal, committed and productive.

In order for excellence to become long-term individuals must become:

    1. Self-correcting so that you can continually observe discrepancies between intended and actual outcomes, notice when you are off track and make adjustments to align your intentions and actions; and
    2. Self-generating so that you have the ability to continuously renew yourself and your resources and notice new blind spots that prevent you from generating possibilities and attaining our goals.

With these broad aims in mind, Alaya Consulting applies the rigorous methodology of Integral Coaching to design a program with your specific needs in mind.

Making a cognitive shift is only part of the picture when trying to change habits, attitudes, beliefs or work styles. To make lasting and sustainable changes, the physical body must incorporate the cognitive learning. Thus, Alaya Consulting has developed a unique approach that is systematic and innovative, uniting Integral Coaching and traditional consulting techniques with the wisdom of somatics.

Somatic theory recognizes that we experience and express life through our phsyical body. Therefore, if we want to change who we are, how we are perceived, and the impact we make in the world, we need to change how we physically move through the world. In other words, to effectively change our habits and patterns, we must embody change on a physical and somatic level.

For example, when we stand with our arms crossed and our shoulders hunched we are giving a message to ourselves and others that we are intimidated, scared, and closed off to possibilities. Through the use of somatic practices, we learn to become aware of and change our physical stance and embody physical qualities of leadership, clarity, balance, stability and strength. Our beliefs and perceptions start to shift in accordance with the physical body and we become great leaders and effective individuals.

Because a somatic approach bears powerful and unique results, Alaya Consulting incorporates somatic principles, when appropriate, through the principles and theories of the Feldenkrais Method and various types of Qigong practice.

The Feldenkrais Method is a somatic method with a rich philosophy addressing how individuals learn, designed to develop physical awareness and facilitate choices about how to be physically present in this world. Qigong is a Chinese self-healing method, that builds awareness, mental clairty and phsycial stability and deeply explores the mind/body connection.

Sarah Kowalski, J.D., certified Integral Coach, is a personal, executive and wellness coach dedicated to helping individuals and groups effectively attain leadership skills, business goals, career satisfaction and personal fulfillment. As a former litigator, Sarah uses her experience and understanding of the legal profession and business world, to help individuals skillfully navigate the corporate world, identify blind spots that are preventing total success and maximize personal productivity and growth. She regularly works with clients on a broad range of competencies such as decision-making, problem solving, efficient delegation, effective communication and feedback, stress tolerance, work/life balance and career path strategies. She is well-versed in recognizing and addressing communication styles that impede productivity and morale, the struggles of maintaining work/life balance, and the pressures of becoming a more senior attorney or manager faced with new responsibilities and expectations with little or no training.

As an attorney who transitioned into her own consulting business, Sarah is particularly dedicated to working with individuals in the midst of career transition and transformation. Whether it is a shift within a corporation, a similar field, or a radical transition to another profession, Sarah supports individuals to develop the skills necessary to find and succeed in a new role. She also loves guiding people to pursue their dream career or life pursuit by helping them recognize the road blocks and develop the courage and practical steps to take action.

Making a cognitive shift is only part of the picture when trying to change habits, attitudes, beliefs or work styles. To make lasting and sustainable changes, the physical body must incorporate the cognitive learning. Sarah combines her experience in the corporate world with substantial knowledge of somatic body practices to help her clients develop the physical qualities of leadership, balance, strength and stability. Thus, Sarah promotes deeper learning and lasting, embodied change because she addresses the body’s underlying habits, attitudes and approaches. Sarah utilizes her training in the Feldenkrais Method and Qigong to address and improve body language, posture and muscular tension patterns that affect ones ability to effectively deal with stress, communicate effectively, as well as influence ones credibility, and perceived or actual competence.

Sarah has been interested in the factors that foster health, fulfillment and well-being for much of her life. She graduated Magna Cum Laude from UC Berkeley with a Bachelors of Arts in Psychology and Anthropology. Her interest in health policy and bioethics drew her to study law. She graduated Magna Cum Laude from Santa Clara University School of Law and passed the California bar in 1998. She was a litigator at the prestigious law firms of Cooley Godward LLP and Farella, Braun + Martel before becoming a certified Integral Coach through New Ventures West. She is now a certified a Practitioner of the Feldenkrais Method and is licensed to teach Awareness Through Movement lessons. She has completed a course in Business Mediation Skills Training and is a graduate of the Hoffman Process. She is a member of the Professional Coaches and Mentors Association, the Feldenkrais Guild of North America, and an inactive member of the State Bar of California.

Sarah has coached attorneys at Farella, Braun + Martel; Baker McKenzie; and Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton LLP and The Kimpton Group, as well as all levels of executives, managers, business owners, and professionals such as a CFO, Executive Director of a non-profit, a Vice President of Finance for a financial services company in Moscow, and an engineer/manager at Cal-Trans. She has also coached small business owners seeking direction and refinement of their vision and business skills across a variety of industries.

Sarah lives in San Francisco, California. She has a rigorous Qigong and Feldenkrais practice. She enjoys Cuban salsa dancing, and singing in her spare time.