One-on-one life & recovery coaching · Trinity County, CA & virtual
Steven Elliott offers direct, compassionate coaching for people working on sobriety, breaking destructive patterns, rebuilding after a damaging relationship, or finally following through on the change they keep postponing. Honest conversation, practical steps, and someone who will hold you to them.
The 28 years describes Steven's personal sobriety. It is not a promise or prediction about anyone else's results.
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You don't have to fit all of these. One is usually enough to be worth a conversation.
Knowing something has to change and actually changing it are two different things. The distance between them is where coaching does its work.
What we work on
Every area below is coaching, accountability and practical support — not diagnosis, therapy or medical care.
Recovery-oriented coaching from someone who has lived it: structure for the day, honest check-ins, planning for the situations that historically knock you off course, and steady accountability while you build a life that doesn't require the escape.
If you've come out of an emotionally, psychologically or narcissistically abusive relationship, coaching can help you name what happened in plain language, rebuild boundaries and self-trust, and make decisions from your own judgment again.
Motivation is unreliable. Systems and accountability aren't. We set the commitment, agree on what "done" looks like, and then actually review what happened — including the weeks it didn't happen.
For the season where the old plan stopped fitting. We get specific about what you actually want, what you're willing to trade for it, and the next handful of moves that would make it real.
Repairing trust, holding a boundary with someone you love, or deciding what a healthier version of a relationship would require from you. Practical, honest, and focused on the part you control.
If meaning, faith or a personal spiritual practice matters to you, it belongs in the conversation. No required belief system, no program you have to join, no sermon — just your values, treated as something worth building around.
The approach
Plenty of people will tell you everything is fine. A few will tell you what's wrong with you. Neither one helps. What helps is someone who will sit with the truth of your situation without softening it and without holding it against you.
Steven won't do the work for you. He'll help you get honest about the work that needs doing.
About Steven
Steven Elliott understands reinvention because his own life demanded it. Before he got sober, he was an intravenous drug user. That chapter ended 28 years ago, and staying on the other side of it has been the ongoing work of his adult life.
He also spent roughly 25 years as a client in psychotherapy. That's personal experience, not a professional credential — but it means he knows firsthand what it's like to keep showing up to difficult internal work year after year, long after the novelty wears off.
For about 27 years he worked in California's medical cannabis field. He went into it because it was framed around compassionate care for people who were suffering. Over time he felt the culture shift toward profit and away from the people it was supposed to serve, and he became disillusioned with where it had landed.
That forced an honest question: what actually matters to him? The answer had been in front of him the whole time. Helping people has always been the throughline — the friend people called at 2 a.m., the steady voice of reason, the person who walked alongside others trying to get and stay sober.
Life coaching is how he does that on purpose now: lived experience, a direct communication style, and a firm belief in personal responsibility, put to work for people who genuinely want their life to look different.
How coaching works
This is a real sequence, not a slogan. Sessions cycle through it as your situation changes.
We start with what is actually happening — not the tidied-up version, and not the catastrophized one. You can't plan a route without knowing the starting point.
Which outcome, boundary, habit or decision matters most right now? We name it clearly, in words specific enough to know later whether it happened.
Insight that never becomes action is just entertainment. We turn it into a short list of concrete moves you can make before the next session.
You apply the plan. We review what actually happened — honestly — adjust what didn't fit, and keep moving. Then back to step one with better information.
Coaching can give you perspective, structure, accountability, and tools and suggestions drawn from Steven's experience. It cannot make your decisions or carry them out. You remain responsible for your own choices and for putting the plan into practice. Results differ from person to person, and no particular outcome is promised.
Honest fit
Coaching works when it's matched to the moment. If it isn't the right fit today, that's worth knowing before you spend money on it.
None of these mean you're beyond help. They mean a different kind of professional should be the one helping you first — and coaching may make sense later, alongside that care.
Steven Elliott Life Coaching provides coaching, accountability, lived-experience-informed peer support, education and personal-development services. That's the whole scope, stated plainly.
It is not:
Steven does not diagnose conditions, prescribe treatment, prescribe medication, recommend medication changes, or provide medical detox guidance. His personal sobriety and his own years in psychotherapy are lived experience — not a license, degree or clinical credential.
If you are considering stopping or changing your use of alcohol, benzodiazepines, opioids, prescription medication or any other substance where withdrawal may carry health risks, speak with a qualified medical professional first. Withdrawal from some substances can be dangerous. Coaching is not a substitute for that medical judgment.
If you are in the United States and experiencing a mental-health, suicide or substance-use crisis, call or text 988 to reach the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. If you are in immediate danger or experiencing a medical emergency, call 911 or your local emergency service.
Outside the U.S., contact your local emergency number or crisis service. This website and Steven's coaching practice are not monitored for emergencies.
Questions people actually ask
No. Steven is not a therapist, psychologist, psychiatrist, physician, licensed addiction counselor or any other licensed clinician, and coaching is not clinical treatment. What he offers is coaching: honest conversation, perspective, practical tools and accountability, informed by his own lived experience. If you need diagnosis, therapy or medical care, that requires a licensed professional, and Steven will say so.
He offers recovery-oriented coaching and accountability, drawn from 28 years of his own sobriety and from years of walking beside other people working on theirs. That can mean structure, honest check-ins, planning around high-risk situations and steady support. It is not addiction treatment, detox or medical care, and it does not replace a treatment program, medical supervision or a clinician. Many people use coaching alongside those things rather than instead of them.
No. There is no required religion, belief system or recovery program here. Steven has his own spiritual interests, and if faith, meaning or values are important to you, that can be part of the conversation. If they are not, coaching works the same way without them. You will not be asked to adopt anyone else's framework as a condition of working together.
No, and that is the point. Steven believes the thing a person most needs to hear is often the thing they least want to hear. He will say it directly, without dressing it up. He will not say it to shame you, embarrass you or win an argument. Direct is not the same as harsh, and honesty here comes with respect attached.
No. No honest coach can guarantee an outcome, because the outcome depends mostly on what you do between sessions. Coaching supplies perspective, structure and accountability. You supply the decisions and the follow-through. Results differ from person to person, and nothing on this website should be read as a promise of a specific result.
Sessions can take place by phone, through virtual or chat-based options where offered, or in person depending on location and scheduling. Steven is based in Hayfork, in Trinity County, California, and in-person sessions are easiest in that area. Elsewhere in California and beyond, remote sessions are the practical option. The format is worked out when you book.
Possibly. Virtual coaching may be available elsewhere in the United States and, in some cases, internationally. Whether it makes sense depends on your location, what you need, scheduling and time zones, and whether coaching is the appropriate kind of support for your situation at all. Availability is not guaranteed in every place, and Steven does not hold professional licensure in any jurisdiction. Reach out and ask.
No. Coaching is not crisis support, and this practice is not monitored around the clock. If you are in the United States and in a mental-health, suicide or substance-use crisis, call or text 988 to reach the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline. If you are in immediate danger or facing a medical emergency, call 911 or your local emergency service. Outside the United States, contact your local emergency number or crisis line. Coaching can come later, once you are safe.
Nobody is going to hand you a different life. What you can get is a clear look at what isn't working, a plan you actually believe in, and someone who will keep asking whether you did it. If you're ready for that conversation, book a session.
Prefer to write first? Email [email protected] or use the form below.
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Use this if you'd rather ask a question before booking. Steven reads these himself. This form is not monitored for emergencies.