How To Become An Anxiety Coach + 10 Best Certifications 2024

We may receive compensation if you visit partners we recommend. Read our affiliate disclosure.

Welcome to your ultimate guide on how to become an anxiety coach.

Anxiety is such a horrible and common problem for people to deal with. That’s why anxiety coaches are in such demand. It can be truly fulfilling to help your clients cope with this problem.

Below, you’ll discover some essential tips on how to become a successful anxiety coach, including the best coaching certifications to help you thrive in this role.

What Is An Anxiety Coach?

A professional anxiety coach works one-on-one with clients who suffer from anxiety. They help them manage and overcome their most pressing symptoms. 

This is usually an ongoing process of teaching their clients some good stress management techniques. 

Initially, anxiety coaches will attempt to gain a full picture of what’s causing this problem in their clients.

From there, the coach and the client will agree on some proven strategies to help them overcome their anxiety. 

The coach will continue to monitor their client’s progress over time and help them alter their strategies when necessary.   

What Are The Benefits Of Anxiety Coaching?

Anxiety is a feeling of unease about the future. We all suffer from it occasionally, but some people are regularly debilitated by severe symptoms. 

These people might even be diagnosed with different forms of anxiety disorders such as generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder, and obsessive-compulsive disorder.

These anxiety disorders can wreak havoc on the sufferer’s daily life. 

The symptoms include:  

• excessive stress;
• irritability;
• an inability to focus; 
• constant negative thinking;
• a lack of quality sleep; 
• nausea;
• panic attacks;
• high blood pressure.

These mental and physical symptoms can stop you from living a relaxed life, enjoying a romantic relationship, thriving in the workplace, and more.

Anxiety coaching will help you to manage and hopefully eliminate these symptoms, leading to a happier and healthier life.  

How To Become An Anxiety Coach

The coaching industry remains unregulated. As such, there’s nothing stopping you from setting up and advertising a coaching business online today. 

However, if you want to be successful at regularly attracting clients for your anxiety coaching, you’ll usually need to obtain a recognized coaching certification.

I’d highly recommend you look for an ICF-certified certification program. These are regarded as the most in-depth and valuable coaching programs.

They’ll teach you everything you need to deliver effective coaching sessions and set up a professional coaching business.

There are 10 brilliant coaching certification programs recommended below.     

Skills You Need To Become An Anxiety Coach

These are the skills you can expect to learn in an ICF-accredited coaching certification program.

Anxiety Coaching Techniques

An ICF-accredited coaching course will help you to work with your clients to understand the source of their anxiety. You’ll learn invaluable techniques for stress relief, anxiety management, and general personal development.

Ultimately, you’ll gain all the knowledge needed to help your clients to manage anxiety, as well as a range of other mental health issues. 

Coaching Core Competencies + Codes Of Ethics

These are the core values that all professional coaches should follow around their clients; the staple for any coaching business. It’s important for any professional anxiety coach to understand and follow these guidelines. 

The ICF Code Of Ethics And Coaching Core Competencies are regarded as the strictest professional coaching guidelines. This is another reason why an ICF-accredited certification course is so highly recommended. The first level of ICF credentials is the Associate Certified Coach (ACC).

Marketing Your Life Coaching Business

You could be the greatest stress and anxiety coach to ever walk this planet. It won’t count for much if you don’t know how to properly set up, manage and market your coaching practice. Most ICF-accredited certification courses will give you the appropriate resources to master this side of becoming a coach.  

Can Life Coaches Help With Mental Health?

An ICF-accredited coaching course will teach you how to help clients deal with any mental health problem that they may be facing. That’s because life coaching involves guiding clients to find their own answers.

You don’t need specialist knowledge of specific mental health problems to do that, although many life coaching courses also cover this. 

An ICF-accredited coach will certainly have the skills to help clients manage stress, social anxiety and low self-esteem. 

If a client is believed to have a serious mental illness, they’ll be referred to a psychiatrist instead. 

Can A Life Coach Help With Anxiety?

An ICF-accredited life coach might not advertise themselves as a specialist in anxiety management, but you can still expect them to be fully qualified to help you overcome anxiety.  

Life Coach For Anxiety And Depression

Some life coaches might market themselves as a specialist in anxiety and depression. This may mean that they’ve taken some extra training in dealing with these issues. Most likely, they are choosing to only help clients in this area.

It’s worth confirming with the coach themselves what they’ve done to label themselves a specialist in this area. 

Related Article: Stress Coach: Ultimate Guide & 8 Best Stress Coaches

TOP 10 Best Anxiety Coach Certifications

An ICF-accredited certification will give you the foundations to become a successful coach.

These 10 courses will help you gain a better understanding of anxiety, how people manage it, and how to overcome it. 

1. Karen Day: Break The Worry Trance

This course will teach you to help clients break the cycle of worry that leads to anxiety disorders.

It will help coaches and those with anxiety learn how to deal with panic attacks, negative thought spirals, and other symptoms of anxiety. 

The complete program can be delivered over six to eight weeks, although a 4-5 day intensive session is also available. 

2. Dr. Elisaveta Pavlova: Professional Anxiety Coach Course

This free course offers a range of strategies for coaches to help clients combat anxiety.

The aim of this course is to teach and promote self-care. Coaches will learn how to create stronger relationships with their clients, so they’re able to truly get to the bottom of their problems.

There are chapters on specific situations that may cause anxiety, such as toxic relationships, abuse, and trauma. This program is self-directed so you can complete it at your own pace. 

3. iNLP: Mental Health Coach Training

This training is part of the iNLPs Accredited Coach Training Program. You’ll learn how to help a client deal with their mental health concerns, whether these are caused by a romantic relationship, a broken friendship, a lack of self-worth, or something else. Anxiety can often be a symptom of these deeper problems, and this course will help you lead clients onto a better track.  

4. The STILL Method: Become An Anxiety Coach

The STILL method is a unique and effective method for children and adults to overcome anxiety. It stands for stop, talk, imagine, listen, and learn. The course will help you to master the STILL method and make you qualified to teach it in STILL workshops.

You’ll learn about the different types of anxiety, behavioral vs psychodynamic approaches to overcoming it, plus how various mental conditions like ADHD or autism can have an impact on one’s anxiety.  

5. Linden Tree Education: LAR Diploma

This program revolves around leading clients to anxiety recovery, rather than stress management. You’ll learn how to reset a client’s neurological responses so they’re not at the mercy of their anxiety symptoms.

You’ll be able to teach clients how to deal with their perceived threats in a healthier way through proper breathing and other techniques. This is a particularly great course to help people gain relief from social anxiety.  

6. CCATP Online Course: Treat Anxiety, Panic, And Worry

This course will teach you advanced applied neuroscience for treating anxiety, panic, and worry.

You’ll learn how the amygdala and prefrontal cortex responds in anxiety patients, plus how to improve these responses. The course includes up to 18.75 Continuing Coach Education hours and lifetime access to several bonus e-books and videos. Once you’ve completed the course, you’ll be a Certified Clinical Anxiety Treatment Professional (CCATP).

7. ICHARS: PROS Anxiety Counselling Certification Course  

This course is delivered by the Institute of Clinical Hypnosis And Related Sciences (ICHARS). You’ll learn the best techniques for effectively working with anxiety, based on cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), neuro-linguistic programming (NLP), and mindfulness exercises.

This course will give you a good understanding of the role that all these techniques play,  making you a more well-rounded coach. Step-by-step guides based on scientific research will make this information easy for you to understand. 

8. CPD: Anxiety and Stress Management Coaching Certification

This course focuses on stress management techniques and how they can help a client towards their various goals. You’ll gain a deeper understanding of how stress affects the body, and various techniques to combat it. The self-directed course includes useful articles, video lectures, and downloadable stress management resources. 

9. Aura Institute: Integrative Trauma Coach Training

If you want to learn more about how somatic techniques can help clients deal with their trauma, this is the right course for you. This unique coach training will teach you more physical ways that people can deal with stress, anxiety, and trauma. On this 10-week course, you can expect to learn more about proper breathing techniques, progressive muscle relaxation, and even the best foods for trauma sufferers to consume.

10: MHASWFL: Certified Integrative Health Coach Training

This holistic mental health care program will teach you about dealing with anxiety, as well as other prominent mental health issues. You’ll learn key facts about the mind-body connections that cause the symptoms of anxiety, as well as various cognitive behavioral strategies to help people overcome them.  

Related Content: Top 25 Best Life Coach Certifications: ICF-Accredited

Anxiety Coaching Questions

Let’s round off this guide with the answers to some frequently asked questions about becoming an anxiety coach. 

What Are The Different Types Of Anxiety?

There are many different types of anxiety including social anxiety, separation anxiety, phobias, and more. The best techniques for anxiety management are very similar for each of these anxiety types though. 

How Do You Coach Around Anxiety?

The first step is for the coach and client to come to an agreement over what is causing the anxiety. From there, they can discuss proven strategies and natural ways to overcome this problem. Coaching may also include discussions around stress management, common mistakes made during anxiety management and other self-care tips. 

How Much Does An Anxiety Coach Certification Cost?

As you’ll see from the list above, the cost of an anxiety coach certification can vary dramatically. I’d recommend browsing the list above, comparing the difference between the certification course, then choosing the best option for you and your budget.   

How To Become A Mental Coach?

A great first step is to gain an ICF-accredited coaching certification. This will teach you the foundations of successful coaching and give you the credentials to be taken seriously as a professional coach.

From there, you may decide to specialize in a certain area of mental health and choose to only help clients in that specific niche.

Coaches who specialize often find themselves able to earn more money, due to a lower supply of coaches with their specific expertise.  

What Is A Stress Management Coach?

A stress management coach is one example of a coach who has decided to specialize in a specific area of mental health. They might label themselves a stress coach, a stress relief coach, or something similar.

They may have invested in a separate stress management coaching certification or taken extra steps to gain knowledge in this area. 

Perhaps they know more about the best foods or lifestyle changes to manage stress, or how proper breathing reduces stress.

It’s always best to understand what makes a specialist coaching program better than a general one, as you’ll often pay more for specialist services. This advice applies whether you’re hiring a stress coach, investing in health coaching, or purchasing relationship coaching.