Becoming a member of Common House Shelly Vann is usually the one asking the questions and listening closely. As a life coach, it’s her job to probe and learn what’s holding her clients back. Or, in Shelly’s words, she’s there to quiet “the little voice in your head that tells you how wrong you are and how many times you've screwed up.”

We were thrilled that Shelly took the time to share a little bit more about her journey to quieting her own inner critic and finding the confidence to pursue coaching full-time.

Before becoming a certified life coach in 2008, Shelly was offering empathy and advice on the playground and in the cafeteria. “When I was a kid in middle school and junior high, my friends would come to me with their problems,” she recalls. “And I don't know why that started. But I think I was able to detach enough from their situation, to where I could actually see it from several different angles, and offer them some good advice that would work instead of being in the situation with them.” That ability to be objective has remained integral to the way she coaches someone through a challenging situation or season of uncertainty. “When you're in the situation, it’s difficult to solve it.. And that was the thing that I really liked. I felt like [those kids] opened up to me and left feeling like they had been helped.”

That desire to help others never really went away, but first, Shelly had to help herself find direction. She grew up in Kansas and attended college at Kansas State for a couple years. But as she puts it, “Things didn’t go according to plan.” So, seeking clarity and direction, she enlisted in the Army. "I didn't know what to do. And so I thought that would be a good way to get redirected…and then I ended up in the Army for 13 years.”

Eventually, Shelly danced her way to Chattanooga. Literally. “Chattanooga is the first place I moved to just because I wanted to be here — not for a relationship, or for a job. I discovered Chattanooga when I was contra dancing, which is something that nobody's heard about,” Shelly jokes. This somewhat obscure style of dancing is similar to square dancing. There’s a fiddler and upbeat music keeping lines of partners weaving around each other with intricate footwork. It looks chaotic at first glance, but if you were to look down on the dancers from above you would see beautiful patterns in perfect harmony. Maybe that’s a metaphor for life. It’s easy to feel like you’re out of sync with the music and bumping into everything. Partnering up with someone like Shelly can help you see the patterns and find your groove.

Even though she had been coaching since 2008, the pandemic caused Shelly to shift her priorities and pursue her passion full time. After working from home for a while, she came to Common House seeking a dedicated work space. But, she wasn’t sure about joining a social club. “But when I heard that, no, they want everybody to be able to come here, I was very interested. It was a curiosity about what's it going to be like, and meeting people, meeting forward thinking people. Having a place to come and work and just kind of see what it was all about.”

Since becoming a member of Common House Chattanooga in June of 2021, Shelly has enjoyed making connections. One day at the gym, Shelly struck up a conversation with a videographer. He was looking for a life coach; she needed someone to help her create content for her social channels. Who needs LinkedIn, right?

When she’s not offering guidance to her clients, you might find Shelly relaxing by the pool or collecting her thoughts in the reading nook on the second floor. And if you’re interested in life coaching, you can connect with Shelly on Instagram at @shelly.l.vann.

MEMBER FOCUS: Shelly Vann