Sylvia Worsham is an inspirational speaker, a turning points coach and a mastermind trainer for professional men and women. She describes her mission as helping professional parents navigate change with confidence, joy and faith: “My number one value is integrity.”
As a healthy woman in her mid-30s, Worsham was a single mother working long hours in medical sales and dealing with guilt and shame she felt from her divorce. Suddenly, she had a serious health scare in the form of a pulmonary embolism. “It scared everyone, including the doctors,” Worsham says. “It was a turning point in my own life and after that I decided to dedicate myself to the service of others. I’m grateful that my new path fills my cup.”
Originally from Brownsville in South Texas, Worsham describes herself as “a full-blooded Mexican.” Her father was a physician and her mother was a homemaker. She earned a Bachelor’s degree in International Studies and French from Austin College. She now has a six-year-old daughter and a 15-year-old son and lives with her second husband Donnie in Austin.
Worsham explains the current focus of her coaching career: “In childhood, when you encounter a significant emotional event or trauma, your subconscious mind stores the feelings associated with such an event. At the time, your mind forms a pattern of behavior to protect you from the trauma.”
She describes how as time goes on, many people become responsible for self-sabotaging behaviours: “When the feeling shows up anywhere in their life, the pattern operates on automatic pilot. My clients are completely unaware of their actions, they experience a feeling and then they subconsciously react to it.”
Examples of self-sabotaging behaviours include an achiever pattern, a perfectionist pattern and a security seeker pattern (there are seven patterns in total). Worsham concentrates on assessing her clients’ habits and beliefs so that she can identify which repeated patterns of behavior and limiting beliefs are keeping them stuck in their careers and in their role as parents.
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Due to COVID-19, she currently meets her clients virtually via Zoom or for outdoor hikes. Her sessions are twice a month for six months or a year, with each session lasting 90 minutes. She also offers more intensive weekly coaching for a six-week period. She jokes that her goal with coaching to navigate change is “to work myself out of a job.”
Aside from coaching, Worsham is a keynote speaker and a soon-to-be-published author. Her first book is about navigating change and transition — a topic particularly applicable to people’s lives during the pandemic.
She also supports the charity Doggies for Dementia Foundation. The non-profit organization’s primary focus is to increase awareness of dementia. Doggies for Dementia captures candid photos of those affected by dementia surrounded by their loved ones and their family pet. Worsham has a personal connection to the cause.
On her YouTube channel, her Focus Friday and Mindful Monday videos are designed to empower those who want to navigate change with clarity and purpose to succeed in the competitive business world. She also has a video series for Spanish-speakers who want to better connect with their clients and accelerate sales. Worsham’s current clients have often watched her YouTube videos or seen her social media posts before reaching out to her for one-on-one coaching sessions or keynote addresses.
“My focus is on happily achieving versus achieving to be happy,” she says.
