Aviation Operations, 1995 to 2004
University of Sedona
Anger, relationships, career, spiritual fitness
Before you commit to anything
Some problems don’t look like problems from the outside.
You lost your temper over the dishwasher again, and you watched your kid’s face change. You and your partner are having the same argument you had in March, almost word for word. You’ve reread the same email four times because you still can’t make the decision it needs. Sunday evening starts at four o’clock now.
None of that is a crisis. None of it is fine, either.
That gap — functioning, and quietly worn down by it — is where most people start looking for a life coach in Reno. Not falling apart. Just done with going through the motions.
Doc Bunny’s Ki Builder works on exactly that, in person in Reno and online across Northern Nevada.
A life coach works with you on what you want to change next, using structured conversation and accountability rather than advice or treatment.
The difference between coaching and a good conversation with a friend is the second half of that sentence. Your friend listens. A coach listens, then holds you to what you said you’d do about it.
It runs as a partnership rather than a service you sit and receive. The agenda is client-led — you decide what the hour is for, and Bernice makes sure the hour earns its place.
That’s usually the missing piece. Not information, because most people already know roughly what needs to change. Follow-through, and the momentum that comes with it.
A session is ninety minutes of someone paying complete attention to your situation and asking the questions that get you to your own answer. Bernice calls it discovery, not recovery. You’re not here to be fixed. You’re here to work out what you actually want, and then to build the habits that get you there.
The International Coaching Federation, the profession’s global body since 1995, defines coaching as “partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process.” In plainer English: you do the thinking. Your coach makes sure the thinking goes somewhere.
Dr. Bernice Sykes — also known as Doc Bunny — is a certified life coach, Army veteran, mother, workshop leader and founder of Doc Bunny’s Ki Builder. Based in Reno, Nevada, she works with clients across Northern Nevada and virtually worldwide.
She holds a PhD in Holistic Life Coaching from the University of Sedona, in conjunction with the University of Metaphysics.
Before coaching, Dr. Sykes served in the U.S. Army for more than nine years, from 1995 to 2004, working in Aviation Operations — scheduling and dispatching tactical aircraft missions. She began her professional coaching work in July 2018, founding 19SeventySix Coaching before expanding into Doc Bunny’s Ki Builder.
Her Ki Builder method supports the whole person: mind, body, emotions, daily habits and spiritual life. Depending on what you need, the work can draw on meditation, breathwork, attitudinal healing or trauma-informed movement. She also offers restorative travel, and genealogy support for people tracing something back after a DNA test or an adoption record. She works with veterans, first responders, professionals, older adults, and people facing major life changes.
What makes her different is the mix — military discipline, spiritual study, and whole-person coaching. She does not offer quick promises. She helps you understand the problem, build a plan, and take steady steps toward peace, power and purpose.
Life coaching provides measurable shifts in clarity, confidence, and productivity. The 2025/2026 ICF Global Study shows that people now value “measurable change over more content”.
Coaching at Doc Bunny’s Ki Builder covers seven areas, starting with anger management in Reno and running through to leadership and spiritual work.
Most people arrive with one of them and find a second one underneath it. That’s normal, and it’s part of the work
Anger management classes in Reno plus one-to-one coaching — for a short fuse, snapping at people you love, and learning your triggers before they fire.
For couples and individuals stuck in the same argument: communication, boundaries, people-pleasing, and repairing what keeps breaking.
For a career plateau, a pivot, or the decision paralysis of a job that stopped fitting. Clarity first, then a plan you'll follow.
Your inner foundation, built deliberately. Meditation, breathwork and practices for peace, clarity, and reconnecting with a sense of purpose you've lost track of
For managers and founders in a leadership transition: sharper decisions, stronger emotional intelligence, and the parts nobody trained you for.
A safe, unhurried space where movement meets recovery — releasing stored tension and rebuilding the connection between body and mind.
Workshops and corporate training for teams and events, built around resilience, emotional regulation and practical leadership
Wellness coaching is the part people ask for when nothing is technically wrong, nothing is really working, and the disconnection is hard to name.
We offer a safe, healing space where movement meets recovery. Our trauma-informed yoga practices help you release stored tension, restore body-mind connection, and build resilience gently guiding you toward wholeness and inner calm.
It looks at the whole person rather than one goal. How you’re sleeping. What your stress load actually is. Which daily habits are quietly running the show. Some of it is somatic — the tension your body is still holding from a season you thought you’d finished.
This isn’t a workout plan and it isn’t a meal plan. It’s the slower work of putting yourself back together in a way that holds.
Life coaching and therapy answer two different questions: therapy works on what happened to you, and coaching works on what you do next.
A lot of people who call have already done the talking part.
Maybe you’ve been to therapy. Maybe you’ve read the books. Maybe you’ve spent years working out exactly why you’re like this, and you can explain it better than anyone.
Then Tuesday comes round, the same thing happens again, and knowing why doesn’t stop it.
In therapy, you’d look at where the anger comes from. What was modelled for you growing up. What’s still sitting underneath it. That work is real, and for some people it’s exactly what’s needed.
With a coach, you’d look at the ten minutes before it happened. What you felt building. What you’ll do differently next Thursday when that meeting comes round again. What you’re going to say to the person on Monday morning.
One is about understanding it. The other is about changing what happens next. Plenty of people do both.
If it’s the second one you’re after, that’s the whole of what Bernice does.
| Coaching | Therapy | Consulting | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Looks at | What’s next | What happened | What to do |
| Works on | Goals, habits, follow-through | Healing, diagnosis, treatment | A specific business problem |
| Who can offer it | Anyone — credentials are voluntary | Licensed clinicians only | Anyone |
| Gives you | Questions | Treatment | Answers |
The mix is unusual. Nine years of Army discipline sitting underneath a doctorate in holistic life coaching: structure and follow-through on one side, spiritual and somatic work on the other.
Most coaches run one of those. The Ki Builder method runs both at once. That’s why one client can work on a temper and a sense of purpose in the same three months, and it still feels like one piece of work.
The second difference is what she declines to do. She won’t sell you a block of sessions on a first call, and she’ll tell you plainly if coaching isn’t the right tool for what you’re carrying.
And if what you’re carrying needs clinical treatment rather than coaching, she’ll say so on that first call — not six sessions in.
Our 4-step process is designed to help you find a life coach near me for adults with zero pressure.
A "discovery call" to see if coaching is the right fit for your goals.
A deep life audit to set primary objectives and build your 3-month roadmap.
Weekly or bi-weekly meetings (in-person or Zoom) to work through "inner homework".
A "discovery call" to see if coaching is the right fit for your goals.
The mix is unusual. Nine years of Army discipline sitting underneath a doctorate in holistic life coaching: structure and follow-through on one side, spiritual and somatic work on the other.
Most coaches run one of those. The Ki Builder method runs both at once. That’s why one client can work on a temper and a sense of purpose in the same three months, and it still feels like one piece of work.
The second difference is what she declines to do. She won’t sell you a block of sessions on a first call, and she’ll tell you plainly if coaching isn’t the right tool for what you’re carrying.
And if what you’re carrying needs clinical treatment rather than coaching, she’ll say so on that first call — not six sessions in.
Coaching works best for people standing at a turning point, and the shape of that turning point changes a lot depending on who you are.
Burnout, imposter syndrome, perfectionism, and the specific loneliness of being the person everyone else brings problems to. Overwhelm that doesn’t lift on holiday.
Executive coaching works on decisions, emotional intelligence, and the gap between how capable you are and how capable you feel.
Academic pressure, identity development, self-doubt, and the enormous weight of being asked at nineteen what you want to do forever. Plenty of them are choosing a major at the University of Nevada, Reno and quietly panicking about it.
Coaching here is mostly about lowering the stakes enough to think clearly — and building the agency to make a decision and live with it.
The largest group Bernice works with. A life coach for women usually gets called at a midlife hinge point — a divorce, a return to work, a last child leaving, a career that stopped fitting.
Often the presenting problem is time. Underneath it is usually years of saying yes: you were the reliable one for so long that nobody thought to ask what you wanted, including you.
Some people look for a female life coach for exactly this reason — they want to be understood without having to explain the shape of it first.
The work is quieting the negative self-talk, testing the limiting beliefs sitting underneath it, and rebuilding your confidence in your own ability to act.
Bernice served nine years. She isn’t guessing about what a transition out of uniform does to a person’s sense of identity, structure and usefulness.
This work covers the parts that don’t show up on a discharge form. Anger with nowhere to go. A civilian workplace that feels slow and pointless. The question of who you are once the old role is gone and the new role hasn’t arrived.
Co-parenting, caregiving, a move, a loss, retirement. The seasons where work-life balance stops being a phrase and becomes the whole problem — and you’ve disappeared from your own calendar.
Your first session starts with a free 30-minute call, and nothing is agreed until you’ve had it.
Life coaching in Reno typically runs between $100 and $250 a session, with packages priced lower per hour.
Most people don’t book one session. Change takes a few months, so a three- to six-month block usually works out better value than paying as you go. The structure is what produces results, not the individual hour.
Will insurance cover it? Almost never. Insurance covers licensed clinical treatment, and coaching isn’t that. Worth knowing before you call rather than after.
What it costs to find out: nothing. The first half-hour is free, and if coaching isn’t right for you, Bernice will say so on that call.
Doc Bunny has a great way of challenging an old way of thinking and replacing it with positive thoughts. I’ve dusted off my old dreams and now I’m just going for it! Thanks!
I wanted to get out of this slump I have been in and I found Doc Bunny’s Ki Builder just in time. By learning about taking life’s moments one step at a time, I’m ready to take this journey. Thanks so much!
Doc Bunny has a great way of challenging an old way of thinking and replacing it with positive thoughts. I’ve dusted off my old dreams and now I’m just going for it! Thanks!
Doc Bunny’s Ki Builder has been my sanctuary for spiritual growth. Their coaching is a transformative experience. Thank you for your services.
Doc Bunny’s Ki Builder works with clients across Reno, Sparks and Northern Nevada, and online for anyone further out.
In-person sessions are in Reno. Bernice also works with clients across Washoe County — Sparks, Carson City and around Lake Tahoe — and virtually with people across the country and overseas.
Booking begins with one free half-hour conversation — no payment, no commitment, and no obligation to continue afterwards.
Tell Bernice what’s going on. She’ll tell you honestly whether coaching is the right tool for it, and if it isn’t, she’ll point you somewhere better.
Individual sessions are typically $100 to $250. Long-term packages (3-6 months) offer the best value for sustained change.
Look for coaches with ICF credentials and deep experience in your specific niche, such as career pivots or retirement.
Yes. Our life coaching sessions are available online via video call. You’ll get the same personalized support and one-on-one attention from the comfort of your own space.
The duration depends on your goals. Some clients see progress in just a few sessions, while others choose ongoing coaching over weeks or months for sustainable growth. We recommend starting with a consultation to create a plan that fits your timeline.
A life coach is not a therapist, so they don’t treat clinical anxiety. However, they can help you manage stress or issues triggering the problem, plus develop coping strategies that support mental wellness alongside therapy if needed.
