Watch a skilled coach and the striking thing is how little they say. The session is mostly you talking, punctuated by short questions that keep landing slightly to the side of where you expected. These are the five that do most of the work, and they are worth stealing whether or not you ever hire anybody.
1. Compared to what?
Used whenever a judgment arrives with no reference point. I am behind. I am not doing enough. I am bad at this. Behind whom, measured how, over what period. Most people cannot answer, and the pressure drops audibly the moment they try, because the sentence turns out to have been a feeling wearing the clothes of a fact.
2. Always?
Never, everyone, always, nobody. The absolutes are where the story is hiding, and a single counter-example is usually enough to crack one open. Not to win an argument. To show the speaker that the rule they have been living under has exceptions they already know about.
3. What would happen if you did?
Note what this is not. It is not why haven't you, which produces defense. It asks the person to describe the actual consequence of going ahead. Said out loud, the consequence is nearly always smaller and more survivable than the unnamed version, which was doing its damage precisely by staying vague.
4. How would you know?
For goals that are really moods. I want to be healthier. I want things to be better at work. What would have to be true by Friday for you to say this worked? If nothing observable would be different, there is no goal yet, only a wish, and wishes cannot be worked on.
5. One to ten, how committed are you?
Asked at the end, about the specific action just agreed. Anything under eight is a plan that will not happen, and the correct response is not encouragement. It is to shrink the action until the number moves. This single question is the difference between sessions that feel good and sessions that change the week.
Notice what is missing
None of them start with why. Why makes people defend themselves. What and how make them think.
Why did you do that puts someone on trial, and they will spend their answer building a case rather than looking at the thing. What made that feel like the right call at the time gets you the same information and leaves the person free to be honest about it.
Using these on yourself
They work alone, with two caveats. Write the answers down, because thinking them produces a much vaguer answer than writing them does. And do not skip the fifth: the temptation when coaching yourself is to agree on something ambitious, feel good, and never look at the number.