Irina Popa-Erwin is a one-of-a-kind life coach who has achieved incredible success as an athlete, as an entrepreneur, and as a life and leadership coach. She is the only former professional multi-medalist athlete in the world who has established herself as a renowned life, career and executive coach. Irina has taken her discipline, experience and expertise from her time as an athlete and successful entrepreneur, and translated it into her coaching practice, where she helps individuals and organizations of all sizes to achieve their goals, maximize performance, and become champions in their personal and professional lives.

Short Bio

Irina Popa-Erwin is a Romanian-born former professional gymnast who was born on March 19, 1981, in Oradea, Romania, Central Europe. Despite facing several health issues while growing up, Irina was determined to become a professional gymnast. She worked tirelessly and trained under some of the top coaches in the world. Irina's hard work and dedication eventually paid off as she participated in national and international gymnastics meets, winning several medals.

Irina was not naturally gifted at gymnastics, but her willpower and dedication helped her achieve her dreams. She spent twice as much time in the gym as anyone else and eventually became one of the top multi-medalist professional gymnasts. Over a period of twelve years, Irina won a total of 9 Gold Medals, 2 Silver Medals, and 2 Bronze Medals.

Unfortunately, at the age of 21, Irina had to make the difficult decision to retire from gymnastics due to health conditions and injuries. Despite her short-lived career, Irina's dedication and hard work continue to inspire many young people today. She serves as a reminder that with hard work and determination, anything is achievable.

Irina's story is one of resilience and determination. After feeling lost following her time in gymnastics, she decided to pursue a BA Degree in Literature and Psychology, hoping to find meaning in her life. Her hard work paid off, and in 2004, she founded her own International Recruiting and Consulting Company. Drawing on the lessons she learned in professional sports, Irina helped over 1,800 people to improve their personal and professional skills, careers, and ultimately change their lives for the better.

For Irina, helping others was a way to fill the emptiness she felt after retiring from gymnastics. It gave her positive energy and purpose, and she continued to pursue this passion with vigor. In 2004, she had the opportunity to meet Jim Rohn, a world-renowned life and business philosopher, and motivational speaker. After years of working with Jim Rohn and learning the "happy life's secrets", Irina changed her life and business philosophies. She found her true purpose in life - helping people - and founded The NYC Life Coach in 2004.

It's clear that Irina's journey has been one of overcoming obstacles and using her experiences to help others. Her story is an inspiration to anyone who may be struggling to find their way in life, reminding us that with hard work and determination, we can achieve great things and make a positive impact on the world around us. 

Irina Popa-Erwin has an impressive background that has led her to become one of the most influential leaders in the life-coaching industry. With her unique background and experience as a successful entrepreneur on two continents, Irina has become one of the most sought-after coaches in the world. Her clients range from the average person to top achievers and a select group of people in various cities around the world, including New York, Beverly Hills, Los Angeles, Miami, London, Paris, Milan, Rome, and Barcelona.

Irina's coaching style is tailored to the individual needs of her clients, and she provides them with the tools and strategies they need to achieve their goals and lead a fulfilling life. Her expertise in life, career, and leadership coaching has helped many people overcome their obstacles and achieve their dreams.

Irina was a professional athlete, which instilled in her the values of dedication, focus and excellence from a young age. As an adult, she faced significant challenges, including the loss of her partner and unborn child, and a 72-hour coma that nearly took her life in New Jersey, USA.

Irina's extensive background in sports has given her a unique perspective on the importance of physical and mental health, and she has worked with clients from all walks of life to help them achieve their own personal goals. Her approach is centered on building a strong foundation of self-awareness, self-esteem, and self-care, which are essential components of a fulfilling and successful life.

Based in both New York and Beverly Hills, CA, Irina has a diverse client base, including athletes, entrepreneurs, executives, and individuals seeking to improve their overall well-being or their company’s performance. Her compassionate and empathetic nature, combined with her years of experience and expertise, and complemented by Jim Rohn mentorship, make her a sought-after life and leadership coach in the industry. Irina's ultimate goal is to help her clients unlock their full potential and live their best lives, both personally and professionally.

Irina's journey to becoming a successful coach is truly inspiring. Starting from scratch, she has worked her way up to becoming a mentor for some of the most prominent names in the worlld. Her unique style of coaching, which combines soulfulness with directness, and a high intuition has helped her clients achieve their goals and reach new heights.

What sets Irina apart is her vast life and business experience, Jim Rohn mentorship and sports achievements, which all led her to a unique ability to truly empathize with her clients. Having gone through her own struggles to succeed, she understands the challenges that her clients face and the hard work required to overcome them, which cannot be read from books or learned in seminars. Her own success story is a shining example of her teachings - that with the right guidance, true confidence and gratitude, anything is possible. Irina's impact on the lives of those she coaches is truly immeasurable. She has helped so many people achieve their dreams and realize their potential. Her unwavering belief in her clients and her ability to inspire them to be their best selves is a testament to the power of coaching and the human spirit.

Irina Popa-Erwin has been featured in many interviews, such as Bronxnet, Fox 5 and CBS NY, The Insider, NY Times, IMdb, City of Beverly Hills, Patrick McMullan, Business Insider and boasts a worldwide client list that continues to grow. Today, Irina Popa-Erwin is an accomplished life, career, and leadership coach, inspiring and making a positive impact in people's life, every single day.

A 30 Minutes Coaching Consultation Could Change Your Life

Long Bio Summary

The NYC Life Coach is a worldwide professional coaching company founded in New York City in 2004 by former professional multi-medalist gymnast, Irina Popa-Erwin. Irina's future in the world's stage of accomplished professional life and career coaches started very early, at 6 years old, with her first mentor, a renowned Romanian gymnastics coach. Many medals later, Irina continued to learn about life from her aristocratic aunt, a respected teacher and library director. Growing up, Irina was fortunate to learn business at the highest level from her uncle, a co-owner of one of the largest travel company in Europe. At just 23 years old, Irina was ready to take the world by storm and built her first business, an international recruiting company. Shortly after founding her first company, Irina lost her fiancé in a car accident, followed by a miscarriage, and shortly after that her body decided to turn the lights off and went into a deep 72 hour coma, somewhere in New Jersey.

After waking up from the coma, Irina fought a long and hard fight, but she became one of the 1% of those that recovered completely from a similar coma, and she did it without using any medications. The older and wise person that saved her life was so impressed with her strength and unbreakable will that became her life and business mentor. Irina lost everything, her company, fiancé and baby, which led her to do the next best thing: build a bigger, stronger and more impactful company, The NYC Life Coach, right in the heart of the "city that never sleeps", New York City.

Today, Irina Popa-Erwin is a successful accomplished life, career and executive coach. At The NYC Life Coach, Irina Popa-Erwin helps her clients to realize their true potential through life, career, leadership, and wellness coaching that taps into her unique background as a former professional athlete, mentored by Jim Rohn, complemented by a vast coaching experience with over 3,000 clients.

Based in both NY and LA, Irina has a diverse client base, including athletes, entrepreneurs, executives, individuals, and top achievers seeking to improve their personal life and professional performance. Her high intuition, complemented by a compassionate and empathetic nature, combined with her years of experience and expertise, make her a sought-after life and leadership coach in the industry. Her goal is to help her clients unlock their full potential, and find their purpose, to live their best lives, both personally and professionally.

"Here, at The NYC Life Coach, our mission is to help people reach their full potential, and make the world a better place, one person at a time." - Irina Popa-Erwin said.

Published on March 19th, 2018.

Long Bio

Growing up, Irina was always struggling with her health, but that didn't stop her to become a professional gymnast (mid 80's to high 90's), competing at national and international gymnastics meets under top coaches in the world. Irina wasn't the most talented gymnast in her group, but she was so ambitious and so passionate about gymnastics, and loved it so much, that she was always the first gymnast in the gym and the last one to leave the gym. After many years of hard work, dedication, sacrifices, and overcoming human limits, as she was training 6 days per week and 8 hours per day, and also attending daytime school, Monday to Friday from 8 AM to 2 PM, where she had to be an A+, B+ student, Irina became one of the best gymnasts in Europe.

During her 12 years career in gymnastics, Irina won nine 1st place titles, two 2nd place and two 3rd place titles at the national and European meets. Irina knows pressure and she understands what it takes to succeed, personally and professionally, with or without talent or skills. As a gymnast, you have only one chance to shine, to win, after years of unimaginable training. But Irina also understands what it means to 'retire' from what you love the most. Retiring from gymnastics at just 18 years old, was one of the most painful and toughest transition that she has ever had to go through...

After Irina retired from professional gymnastics, she felt lost, like any athlete, until she discovered her second passion, helping people better their lives, which was also placing her in the spotlight while offering her the recognition and fulfillment she was missing so much, just like when she was winning medals in gymnastics. Irina's family was also filled with successful business people, executives and top achievers, whom often "dragged" her to business meetings with world renowned resorts executives, at an early age. Her uncle, whom was a co-owner of the second largest travel company in Europe, was the first person that "dragged" Irina for the first time at a business meeting when she was just 14 years old.

Irina was professionally coached physically and psychologically since she was 6 years old, and she was exposed to the highly competitive business world when she just turned 14 years of age, and all this led her to found her first company in 2004, an International Recruiting & Consulting Company. Before founding this company, Irina met the famous Jim Rohn in Philadelphia, PA, a world renowned Business Philosopher and Motivational Speaker. Jim Rohn became Irina's mentor, and after years of working with Jim Rohn, and learning some"life's secrets", she changed her life philosophy and discovered what she really wants to do for the rest of her life, which is to help people. Jim Rohn was also the one that inspired Irina to found The NYC Life Coach, later on.

Irina founded the recruiting company at just 22 years old, seeking the same recognition, love and "cheering" that she has enjoyed while being a gymnast. She was hoping to get all that "cheering" by helping others reach their true potential, personally and professionally, and live a better life every single day. Within months of opening the doors, Irina brought into the company her younger sister as a partner, then hired several people, and she quickly learned how to be a great leader and how to build a big and powerful enterprise. In less than one year, Irina and her sister were leading almost 2,000 people towards professional achievement and success. During the next few years, Irina developed her life and leadership skills, and became one of the best leaders in the industry, which later helped her to become an outstanding executive and executive coach.

Irina's international recruiting and consulting company was placing people from different countries into exchange programs located in the USA and various European countries. As the company become very successful in less than a year, Irina realized that one of the main keys of her business's success was the fact that she was coaching every professional that she worked with by using her natural born skills, everything that she learned in gymnastics and helped her to become a champion, she also used the experience that she gained from attending those executive meetings.

Irina was actually practicing life coaching, leadership coaching, business coaching and motivational coaching with each participant into her business program. Irina and her sister helped people to transform their lives and to adapt to a new country, culture, language, job and a new temporary life, often on a new continent and a foreign country. Irina has led, managed and coached almost 2,000 students and professionals with ages between 18 and 54 years of age to adapt, work and reach their personal and professional goals while being abroad in a foreign country. The international consulting company came with tremendous challenges and unimaginable stress that formed, shaped and prepared Irina for the next stage in her life, New York City, and later on, The NYC Life Coach. 

In 2005, Irina had everything, a loving husband-to-be, pregnant with a beautiful girl, and was running a successful international business. Unfortunately, everything changed soon when her husband-to-be died in a car accident along with his brother, and the grief caused her to lose the baby. She was lost, so she did what thought was best, she went to visit one of her mentors in New Jersey. Due to unimaginable shocks, one after another, and tremendous stress, Irina’s body went into a deep coma for the next 74 hours.

Mr. Erwin saved Irina's life, and helped her to completely recover without becoming addicted to medication - only 3% of those that recovered from a similar coma, have managed to fully recover and do it without becoming addicted to medication. Irina has lost everything that year, and had to start over, had to reborn. She started rebuilding everything from scratch in South Carolina, and in 2009 she moved to New York City with her spouse. Irina was facing a new challenge, New York City, but she fiercely start building her business and creating relationships, and soon everybody around loved her, but nobody knew her story. Irina perceives life in a way that's completely unique. Her experience as a professional gymnast led her to the conclusion that coaches act as the largest influence in someone's success, both personally and professionally. And as an international businesswoman and entrepreneur, mentored by Jim Rohn, she's learned that a set of fundamental leadership skills can propel executives to greater success, no matter the situation.

Irina Popa-Erwin had her ups and downs, her fair share of bumpy roads and heavy winds, but that's what made her what she is today. Irina is the only life and business coach in the world that was a professional multi-medalist gymnast and mentored by Jim Rohn, and has such an extensive life and business experience.

Irina founded The NYC Life Coach in the city she has always loved, New York City. Considering Irina's unique background, filled with some of the most renowned coaches in the world, and her experience as a successful entrepreneur on two continents, it wasn't surprising that ten years later Irina Popa-Erwin became one of the most sought after life, career, and executive coaches among a select group of people in New York, Beverly Hills, Los Angeles, Miami, London, Paris, Milan, Rome, and many other cities around the world. Due to her continuous success by always exceeding expectations, Irina has expended her practice and reach by opening a second office on the west coast, in Beverly Hills, CA. In New York City, Irina has been a Motivational & Leadership Speaker for 150 to 500 people every month. Her clients are coming from every walk of life and almost all industries: finance, legal, real estate, investment, sports, medical, entertainment, insurance, media, health & fitness, hospitality, just to name a few.

Aside from gymnastics and helping people, Irina Popa-Erwin has always had a dream since she was just 4 years of age, which is about to come true as she is in the process of publishing her first book. It will be a book like no other books, which will redefine the entire coaching industry. It will be a unique combination between central Europe's discipline and the west personal development, harmoniously translated into inspiration for anyone that will read it. Irina's life is truly a novel that can inspire anyone, regardless of financial and social status or age.

Published on May 13, 2014.

A 30 Minutes Coaching Consultation Could Change Your Life