the guide

I'm Luke.This work chose me.

I'm a certified life and leadership coach, GiANT Worldwide 100X Leader, and 5 Voices practitioner, with five years of professional coaching and more than a decade sitting with people through the significant moments of their lives.

Luke Haythorpe, founder of lil' bird coaching
Certification
GiANT Worldwide Certified Coach · 100X Leader
Frameworks
5 Voices Practitioner · Workplace Training & Assessment
Based
Bay Area, CA · Melbourne, Australia
the story

Before coaching full-time, I spent years in ministry-based leadership, working with young people on identity, purpose, and questions that don't have tidy answers. That shaped how I show up in a coaching conversation: patience, willingness to stay in the uncomfortable parts, and a conviction that people are more capable than they've been told.

I tried a lot of different ways of helping people before landing on coaching. What settled it: people own the change when they find it themselves. Advice tells you what to do. Coaching helps you discover what you already know and trust it.

That's what lil' bird is built on: a real conversation between who you are right now and who you're becoming, with someone in your corner who's actually paying attention. No borrowed script, no system to perform.

who I work with

My clients are usually in the middle of something: a career shift, a relationship transition, a quiet identity question that's hard to name out loud. They're not broken. They're at a crossroads, and they've often been trying to figure it out alone for too long.

—Considering or mid-career change with no clear landing yet
—In a relationship or life transition that's shaken their sense of self
—Wrestling with questions of identity, purpose, or faith
—Doing fine on the outside, quietly struggling on the inside
—Stuck in a pattern they can see but can't seem to break
—Ready to go deeper than advice and do the actual work
what tends to change

Every person's journey looks different. Here's what people consistently say shifts, often in ways they weren't expecting.

01
Confidence
Not the performed kind. The kind that comes from knowing who you are and trusting that it's enough to move forward.
02
Clarity
A sense of direction that feels like yours, not borrowed from someone else's expectations or timeline.
03
Forward motion
Challenges that once felt impossible start to feel navigable. Often not because circumstances changed, but because you did.
04
A story that makes sense
The thread connecting where you've been to where you're going. Most people have never seen it laid out. It changes things.
how I work

I'm not here to give you answers. I'm here to help you find yours and hold the space steady while you do. The best coaching works because you own every move. I'm not the expert on your life. You are. My job is to ask the question you haven't been able to ask yourself, and stay in the room when the answer gets uncomfortable.

I bring GiANT Worldwide and 5 Voices into every engagement as a lens, not a script. They help us see how you're wired, how you lead yourself, and what's driving the patterns you're in. With the Inner Compass assessment, we often get to something real quickly.

This is coaching, not therapy or advice. Both of us mean it, so the conversation actually goes somewhere.

ready when you are

The first step isjust showing up.

You don't need it figured out first. Start with a First Flight: one session, no commitment beyond the conversation.

Book a First Flight → All starting points