Paths Beyond Ego

...the spiritual agenda is paramount, which is the conversion process. Whether we know it or not, we're all transforming, because we're hungry for the opposite of our vice... Helen Palmer

A key question for coaches is how to balance clients' immediate needs with our knowledge of their transformational potential. Sometimes they don't know to ask for what they really need. 

This path is not easy, often blocked by what Kierkegaard called "tranquilization by the trivial." For many years, passages from Paths Beyond Ego: The Transpersonal Vision have inspired me to engage my clients' spiritual hunger: 

"Growth involves movement into the unknown and often requires surrendering familiar ways of being. Consequently, we tend to fear growth. The tragic result... is that we actually deny and defend against our greatness and potential... What are the common characteristics of profound transpersonal experiences? The words vary but people's accounts worldwide agree that a central realization is penetrating insight into one's nature or identity... Undertaking this process is regarded by the great wisdom traditions as the highest goal and greatest good of human existence... A common characteristic of higher development is that our identity or ego changes, eventually losing the sense of solidity and separateness and becoming transpersonal" (pp. 110 - 114).

Here's how one of my clients describes her own process:

"The word transformation gives me a bit of trouble because I think of transforming from something to something, which is a one-shot deal, and that's not how I've experienced it in my life. I think of an evolution of consciousness that's endless. Transformation is a word we use in the West because we want to get someplace.  There is a grand scheme and there’s no manual. It comes a paragraph at a time. It’s what your heart is calling you to do.

"In the process of our evolution we have things that block us, that get in the way. Leonard Laskow speaks of treasured wounds. So for me the exploration is seeing how I've held things that kept me from moving forward. 

"What has changed most in me is not blaming myself as much. I went from 'It’s all my problem,' to 'It’s not at all my problem' and digging in, to becoming an observer of all that, seeing how it unfolds, not judging. I’m happier now than I’ve ever been. I’m lighter, more present. I still get caught, but I get 'uncaught' quicker."

"K" is for Krishnamurti

The devil and a friend were walking down the street, when they saw a man stoop to pick up something from the ground, look at it, and put it away in his pocket.

The friend said to the devil, "What did that man pick up?"

"He picked up a piece of the truth," said the devil.

"That's a very bad business for you, then," said his friend.

"Not at all," the devil replied, "I'm going to help him organize it."

This was a favorite story of Jiddu Krishnamurti, fondly remembered as "K" by community members of the Krishnamurti Centre in England, where I worked as a co-op for two weeks some years ago.

K maintained that "Truth, being limitless (and) unapproachable by any path whatsoever, cannot be organized, nor should any organization be formed to lead or coerce people along a particular path."

Imagine the paradox Krishnamurti then faced: trying to teach the unteachable. He came to this pathless path years after being "discovered" in adolescence by leaders of the Theosophical Society and groomed to be the World Leader of what later became the Order of the Star.

After experiencing his own process, a state of clarity I would call presence, he realized he could only embody the teaching by not being a leader. His proclamation met with dismay within the Order, but to me is the ultimate example of "walking the talk":

"I do not know how many thousands throughout the world -- members of the Order -- have been preparing for me for eighteen years, and yet now they are not willing to listen unconditionally, wholly, to what I say... You use a typewriter to write letters, but you do not put it on an altar and worship it." (Proclaimed leader in 1912, disbanded the Order in 1929).

Krishnamurti frequently claimed that the great religious teachers had come not to found religions but to destroy them, and throughout his life he asked questions of his audience to lead them toward discovering the path within themselves. This is good advice to us as coaches: 

"In oneself lies the whole world and if you know how to look and learn, the door is there and the key is in your hand. Nobody on earth can give either the key or the door to open, except yourself."

Change or Die?

What if a well-informed, trusted authority figure said you had to make difficult and enduring changes in the way you think and act? ...Could you change when change really mattered? Alan Deutschman, Change or Die.

Deutschman's book is based on his coverage of a 2004 IBM Global Innovation Outlook conference, where thought leaders from around the world explored solutions to major social problems and estimated the odds as nine to one against change, even when remaining unchanged could be life-threatening. He outlined three major criteria that promote change:

Relate, Repeat, Reframe

People who want to make significant changes in their lives need support and emotional reinforcement, they have to repeat new learning until it becomes habit, and they must come to view the desired outcome through a different lens (joy, for example, is a more powerful motivator than fear). 

Of course we help clients reframe limiting beliefs and experiment with new behavior, checking in repeatedly to acknowledge progress or explore barriers. And I've always known change is easier and more likely to be permanent when supported by co-workers, friends, and/or family. However, I did assume the coach/client relationship provided sufficient support to sustain desired changes. 

Lately, though, I've been thinking about two clients with the same personality style who came to me for similar reasons -- both are female, both perfectionists who felt unliked at work. Both were in their early fifties when we started our coaching relationship, both extremely intelligent and with great desire to maintain their high standards in a way that inspires rather than intimidating and annoying others. I like them both very much and I think I've given my very best to each. During our coaching hours both have shown major shifts in their thinking, experimented with new behaviors that brought more positive responses from others, and felt they were making significant progress. Neither any longer shows old behavior patterns in interactions with me.

One has developed new friendships at work, become more intimate with her husband, deepened her relationships with friends, and  achieved the leadership position she aspired to. During the same period of time the other, whom I equally respect and admire, has been dismissed from several jobs. Admittedly their professional fields are entirely different; however, the second client says she can't seem to see herself when she slips into the old pattern of being harsh and judgmental.

So I asked myself what the differences might be, and I think one key is that the woman who's changed so happily has a long-term marriage and a long-term best friend. Her husband has also been coached, has been open to changes in their interaction dynamics, and helps her think through any problems she's experiencing. Also, she and her best friend talk regularly, are mutually supportive around personal or work issues either is having, and together rehearse different ways to respond. 

The other client is single and engages with her friends primarily around mutual interests rather than looking inward with the goal of mutual development. Because the old patterns don't show up with me, we aren't able to "catch" them together. So she doesn't have the day-to-day support of someone who can lovingly confront her when she slips into her old ways. We explored how she might surround herself with people who know her desire to change and can provide a mirror to her ongoing behavior, and she's decided to sign up for a week-long self-development workshop. 

No matter what, she'll live. But I'm cheering for her to live the life she wants.

In AWE of the Process

There are many "how-to" books on leadership, management, and coaching, lists of all kinds for the 10 principles of this or that. I've done the same and published a variety of steps for specific aspects of behavioral change. 

But what about the bigger picture, the nature of change itself? I've written elsewhere about first- and second-order change, how coaches who address only conscious goals and overt behavior can unwittingly reinforce the worldview a client brings to the table and subvert the intended change.

Einstein once said, "Problems cannot be solved by thinking within the framework in which the problems were created." Our task is to help clients see how their worldviews operate and how to break free of the patterns those worldviews create. The question of "how" is elemental. Asking "why" can lead down many paths and take months or years to answer, possibly never satisfactorily. Discovering with your clients how they enact their patterns will illuminate where to intervene and promote significant change.

I've provided a frame of reference for my clients with the acronym "A.W.E."

1. Awareness of their unique patterns of motivation and behavior. This can be discovered in ordinary conversation; with models such as the Enneagram, Tilt365, DISC, MBTI; or feedback from others who know or work with you.  
2. Watching how those patterns operate. Your clients learn to hold full awareness in the present, notice their flow of thoughts, and accept their experiences without judgment or attempts to control.
3. Experimenting with pattern breaking so their choices are free, energizing, and fulfilling. Even a small, symbolic change can shake up someone's worldview so much the old way of thinking no longer computes. Keep these points in mind when you co-create fieldwork to break old patterns with new responses:

• Understand the client's worldview deeply.
• Make sure there's a mutually agreed-upon definition of the desired change.
• Collaboratively design tasks that will reframe the client's view of the problem.
• Once any part of a pattern is shaken up, look for spontaneous changes from your clients.

Same Music, Different Beat

In an Erickson Foundation newsletter article, Jeff Zeig described learning to play the tin whistle (the Irish Penny Whistle) after a lifetime of not playing a musical instrument. 
 

"This practice has been highly instructive to me and has changed my teaching style. To experience the ways a simple tune can be embellished has altered the way I understand hypnosis. Music and hypnosis have structural similarities since both are based in changing people's perspectives, states, and emotions, particularly through using innuendo."

Years ago I took tennis lessons one summer, working particularly on my backhand. A few months later I played nine holes of golf with my boss at a golf retreat in Florida where we were facilitating a leadership workshop. As we approached the first tee I joked that I'd see him at the putting green, because I tended to slice the ball and I'd be off in the rough to the right. After I'd made a couple of straight drives he said, "I thought you told me you sliced the ball." I was surprised, but didn't make a connection to the tennis lessons until I played ping-pong with friends a few weeks later and realized my game there had improved, as well.

Transfer of learning is an important concept for coaches because we only have our clients' attention for a snapshot of time before they go out into the world to either keep doing what they've always done or do something different. So their generalizations to everyday life depend on the parallels we help them draw or embed in the coaching experience itself.

The parallels can be direct, as when clients agree to practice on their own something you've experimented with together and to report back how well it works in a variety of settings. A more subtle learning transfer occurs within the nature of the coaching relationship. Several of my clients, when asked to use one word to describe their vision for 2012, have come up with words like "fun," "play," "flow," and "creativity." I see this as my call to make sure our sessions are fun, playful, creative, and in the flow.

How will your coaching sessions this year help clients transfer their learnings to everyday life?

The Sweet Spot

Dr. Bast underscores how the Enneagram is an especially helpful tool in teamwork, helping team members to non-defensively appreciate each others' differences and communicate more clearly. Enneagram Applications.

A common U.S. business leadership type, described by Robert Kaplan in Beyond Ambition as the "striver-builder," is personality style Three in the Enneagram. According to Kaplan, "This type specializes in building up organizations (to gain) high regard from the world. Their parents expected a great deal of them, and they internalized those high expectations." Their key motivation is to distinguish themselves, and leadership is an integral part of their drive toward success.

People with this leadership style want to look good. On the plus side, they have a supreme focus on results and excellence. But this same quality can generate competitiveness and a tendency to disregard others' input. Because they typically may not be introspective, it's an important aspect of coaching striver-builders to nourish their interior life so they see how ambition, image-consciousness, and self-promotion are driven by unconscious patterns.

When you coach high-achieving clients to do this inner work, they retain their gifts of confidence and energy while becoming more communal. Kaplan adds, "In the best cases, striver-builders also come to a personal acceptance of their limitations; they learn to get satisfaction out of committing themselves fully to something or someone outside of themselves."

The paragraphs above are from one of my articles in Enneagram Applications, the originals written almost 15 years ago. As I read them now, from the vantage point of 15 more years of coaching experience, I find that summary overly serious.

The "sweet spot" is a term commonly used in baseball but also holding a broader meaning as a metaphor. In a qigong class, we learned a rather difficult form where the knees are bent and the body is turned so that one knee rests behind the other. In the beginning it felt a bit like the game "Twister," but suddenly I was outside the physical effort, experiencing a sense of "rightness" and "fit." When I tried to describe it afterwards, my teacher said, as if this happens every day, "Oh yes, you found the sweet spot."

Instead of framing as "serious work" your clients' efforts to release their unconscious patterns, help them lessen their burden and seek their sweet spot.