--- title: "Codeine Coaches" description: "Some coaching makes the client feel better without making them better. A coach should be a physiotherapist, not a pharmacist — building capability the client keeps after the coach has left." author: "Thomas" site: "Clapter" canonical: "https://clapter.com/writing/codeine-coaches" datePublished: "2026-05-10" dateModified: "2026-05-25" keywords: ["coaching", "leadership coaching", "dependency", "Co-Active Coaching", "Helping People Change"] wordCount: 700 readingTimeMinutes: 4 language: "en" --- > "A leader is best when people barely know he exists. When his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: we did it ourselves." > — Lao Tzu There was a client I held on to for longer than I should have. She called every other week, reliably, for almost two years. Smart. Capable. Running a team of twelve with genuine skill. And every other week, the same constellation of problems, wearing slightly different clothes. I told myself I was helping. The calls were good. She always left them feeling clearer. I always left them feeling useful. We had found a rhythm that worked for both of us. It took me longer than it should have to stop pretending I didn't know what was actually happening. Codeine is a painkiller. The kind a doctor gives you first when your shoulder won't settle or your back keeps flaring. Nothing exotic. Just a way to stop feeling the problem for a while. It interrupts the signal. Your nervous system stops receiving the message. You feel better. Genuinely, measurably better. For a while, that feels like the point. But the problem is still there. And now you need the Codeine to feel normal. And then you need a little more to feel what you felt last time. And somewhere along the way, the Codeine has become its own problem, sitting quietly on top of the original one. This is what some coaching does. It makes the client feel better after the session. Clearer, calmer, more capable. But the clarity doesn't compound. The capability doesn't accumulate. Three months later, the same conversation. A year later, still calling. Not because they are weak. Because the work was never designed to end. The best physio I ever had told me something at the first appointment. > My job is to make sure you don't need me. She explained what was happening, why it hurt, what was weak and what was overcompensating. She gave me exercises. She told me what to watch for. She treated me like someone capable of understanding my own body. Six sessions. I have not been back. That is a different model entirely. A good coach is a physiotherapist, not a pharmacist. The goal is capability that stays in the room after the coach has left. The client should be getting better at the thing. Not better at being coached. This is harder than it sounds. It requires the coach to work toward their own obsolescence. To care more about the client's independence than about being needed. To resist the pull of the recurring session, the reliable income, the quiet satisfaction of being important to someone. The client who called every other week — I never told her what I had realised. I just stopped scheduling. That was not enough, but it was what I did. That is worth saying plainly. Not as an apology, but because the gap between what this work intends and what it sometimes becomes is worth looking at honestly. The question worth sitting with, if you work with a coach or are considering it: Not whether the sessions feel good. They probably will. Are you getting better at the thing? Or are you getting better at the conversation about the thing? There is a version of this work that hands something back to you at the end of it. That makes itself unnecessary. That measures success not by how much you need it, but by how little you do. That is the version worth finding. --- To be clear: I believe in coaching. Not the kind that creates dependency. The kind that builds people who eventually outgrow the need for it. ## Two books on coaching done right - **[Co-Active Coaching](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1473674980)** — Kimsey-House, Sandahl & Whitworth. The entire model is built on the premise that the person in front of you is already capable. The coach's job is to help them access that. Not to become the answer they return to. - **[Helping People Change](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1633696561)** — Boyatzis, Smith & Van Oosten. About what actually creates lasting change. It turns out it is not expertise or clever frameworks. It is helping someone connect to their own vision of who they want to become. The best coaching should leave people stronger, freer, and needing less of you. Not more.