Why is my business called Blue Feather Coaching? The story behind the name.

It's a question I get asked fairly often, usually after someone's worked with me for a while and feels comfortable enough to finally ask. The honest answer involves redundancy, a slightly sceptical version of me, and an actual feather on my lawn.

A shock to the system

Back in 2016, I was made redundant. I'd occasionally joked about how nice it would be to have some time off - garden leave, more time with the children, a pause - but when it actually happened, it didn't feel like a gift. It felt like the ground had shifted. Who was I, if not the job title I'd had for years? What did I actually want to do next? Could I even change direction at this stage?

If you've ever left a long career, whether by choice or otherwise, you'll probably recognise that particular kind of unmoored feeling. Knowing what you're good at is one thing. Knowing what you actually want is a different question entirely, and most of us aren't given much practice at answering it.

A book, a feather, and a fairly stubborn experiment

A friend, only half-joking, suggested that maybe I'd brought the redundancy on myself, by overthinking it before it happened. He introduced me to the idea of the "Law of Attraction" - the idea that focused thought can shape what happens to you. I wasn't remotely convinced, but I was curious enough to read into it.

The book I picked up told the story of someone who'd started small, manifesting a blue feather, before moving on to bigger things. So, slightly sceptically, I decided to try the same experiment. I pictured a blue feather. I thought about it on and off for days.

Nothing happened, and I was fairly ready to write the whole thing off as nonsense.

Then, on a quiet afternoon in the garden, there it was - sitting in the middle of the lawn.

An actual, genuinely blue, iridescent feather.

What it taught me

I'm not going to tell you I became a committed believer in manifestation overnight. What I took from it was something more practical: that having real clarity about what you want, and paying proper attention to it, changes how you move through uncertainty.

That was true whether the feather "worked" by magic or by making me notice things I'd otherwise have missed.

When I set up my own business shortly afterwards, the name was an easy choice. Blue Feather felt like the right reminder - that clear intention and focused attention genuinely change outcomes, even if the mechanism isn't mystical at all.

Why it still fits the work I do now

That's ultimately what coaching is, in practice. Most of the business owners I work with already have the experience and the technical skill. What they often haven't had is the structured space to get properly clear on what they actually want their business to become, and the accountability to keep paying attention to it once the day-to-day takes over again.

So no, I don't ask my clients to go looking for feathers. But I do ask them the same underlying question that redundancy forced on me back in 2016: what do you actually want, and are you paying proper attention to it?

If you'd like to talk that through, book a no-obligation call — no feather required.