photo credit: Andreas Øverland

What does this simple photo evoke in you?

Among other things, it reminds me of how much of our daily life is a screen onto which we project our narrative frames. Does the photo stir excitement in imagining what you might find if you climbed the stairs? Does it stir a sense of foreboding as you imagine what might come down the stairs? Or something else altogether? I’ve been vividly reminded in recent weeks of the impact of our choices in how we construct our views of people, places and events. Even though we know that this story-making is central to how our individual and collective minds work, it is not always an easy task.

I’ve come to believe, however, that the art and discipline of noticing our stories as they emerge in the moment is at the core of narrative coaching and of being more fully human. This is particularly important when we feel ensnared in events that are challenging for us. With a tip of the hat to Irving Yalom and Byron Katie, in these times I ask myself questions like, “What is the ‘story’ I am telling myself? How is that ‘story’ serving me? What do I need to release so that I can see the situation with a bigger heart and a bigger mind? What would I gain if I did so?

Waking up in a New Year

As I look out across a new year, I am reminded of a quote from the famous photographer, the late Henri Cartier-Bresson. While in Vienna recently for some holiday and lining up two projects there for later this year, I had the unexpected pleasure of seeing a major exhibit of his work as well as another of my favorites, René Magritte. Each of these artists was gifted in helping us to question how we see the world. As Cartier-Bresson wrote in 1994, “My passion has never been for photography in itself, but for the possibility—through forgetting myself—of recording in a fraction of a second the emotion of the subject and the beauty of the form, the geometry awakened by what is offered.” He describes it as a ‘decisive moment’ when the head, heart and eye are aligned along the same line of sight.

Beauty is indeed in the eye of the beholder. As you make your way into a new year, spend five minutes right now reflecting on a story you’ve recently told yourself (and perhaps others) that now feels limiting to you.

1. Where is there an opening to release your ‘narrative grip’ to make room for new possibilities?
2. What part of the story needs to be released, like a drop back into the ocean?
3. What other part of the story wants to be told?
4. What space would open up in your heart, mind and life if you shifted your frame?

Resolutions in the new year are less about grand promises and more about the daily practices of increasing our awareness and our courage in the stories we choose to tell. Every moment can be a decisive one. Peace to each of us on our journey…

photo credit: xoque

Do you ever get to the place in your work where you feel like there is too much to do, to remember, to track? I used to pride myself in being able to hold a lot at once — in my mind, for my clients, and about my work. As the complexity of our world increases almost geometrically and I find myself affected by the simple arithmetic progression of aging, I find that harder and harder to do.

I thought about this the other day in the context of launching a narrative coaching center with a team in Toronto and the first narrative design lab in Sydney. Add that to my full-time practice, research and writing projects, and a personal life — and it started to feel a bit much.  I had the chance to talk with my  friend and colleague Andrea J. Lee about my plans. In the course of doing so, she suggested that I might need to release my need to understand it all — and just do the next thing that needs doing. It was a wonderful insight that really hit home for me.

Enjoy the vista, but watch your feet

As I put this approach into practice the next day on a planning call with Toronto, there was a much greater sense of ease and grace in our conversation. What had become long lists of tasks quickly distilled into some immediate actions to take. It felt liberating. This is not about ticking lots of ‘to do’ boxes like a mouse running in a wheel; it’s about building toward something meaningful one step at a time. The era of seeing the whole picture, knowing everything about something, and planning the entire journey is over. Now, it is about doing what needs to be done next — and from there seeing what the world looks like and acting accordingly.

It’s like a good story. The magic is in the suspense of wondering what will happen next, and long arc of the plot often only becomes apparent in the end. I think our work is more and more like that. How about you? We take the steps we need to take in order to respond to and create what is emerging . . . and soon marvel at how far we have come and where we have arrived! Like stories, understanding is in retrospect, not a requirement for getting started.

If you feel stuck or daunted by all that needs to be done, ask yourself right now, “What’s the next thing that needs doing?”

Nine ethical guidelines for narrative coaches

As part of our due diligence as professionals, it is incumbent upon coaches to be aware of our own unconscious biases and preferences that shape what we see and do with people and the stories they share with us. What are the acceptable shapes of a life we find ourselves promoting based on our training, professional/business pressures and aesthetic preferences? What our preferred formulation patterns and how do they keep us from more courageously and cleanly meeting others and their stories? In closing, I would offer the following nine ethical considerations in working with peoples’ stories; they serve as the bedrock of a narrative approach to coaching:

1. Coachees expect their coach to create a safe container for their storytelling.
2. Coachees expect their stories to be heard in a nonjudgmental, non-assumptive manner.
3. Coachees expect to have their community and cultural stories taken seriously.
4. Coachees have the right to tell their own story in their own way.
5. Coachees tell and understand their story as best as they can at the time.
6. Coachees have the right to change their stories, lives and selves as they choose.
7. Coachees are accountable for the impact of their stories on themselves and others.
8. Coachees expect their coach to manage their own stories, agendas and participation.
9. Coachees expect their coach to be exemplary stewards of the stories that are told.

I hope you have found these posts helpful in giving you some practical strategies for taking a more narrative approach to your work. We are scheduling master classes in various parts of the world for the latter half of 2010 and in 2011. It looks like Zurich and London will be next. Let us know if you’d like to host one in your area. You can reach us an director [at] narrativecoaching.com

Listening narratively

Narrative coaches stay in the lived experience of the conversation as much as possible. Some of the practices they use in doing so:

1. Create a rich narrative field, notice what appears, remain connected even in silence, and actively engage with the coachee’s narration as it emerges. Invite coachees to stay in their stories as they unfold across a series of present moments. As they do so, the characters, context, and conclusions will become more apparent and available for renegotiation.
2. Help people come to their stories with less judgment in order to loosen their group on their identity and lives and provide an opening for greater awareness, more trust in themselves, more conscious choices and better results.
3. Put more emphasis on generating experiences and less on rushing to interpretation, meaning, or action. Doing so, will more likely and fully engage the whole person and create conditions more similar to what they will encounter after the session.
4. Trust that people will begin at the level at which they are ready and the critical themes will be forthcoming regardless of which stories they share first. Any story or set of stories can be a portal into the larger issues at play for people and the path to reaching their resolution or aspiration.
5. Build rapport through hemispheric resonance by starting with coachee’s preference but then invite them onto the path of change by drawing on the other hemisphere to bring in elements that were not part of the original story (Siegel, 2007).  Draw on the factual, sequential, and verbal parts of the story, largely a product of the left hemisphere and the more personal, contextual, nonverbal parts of the story, largely a product of the right hemisphere, as needed to elicit the whole story.
6. Help coachees identify narrative data from their lives that support an alternate view of who they are and how they want to be in the world—what White and Epston (1990) called “unique outcomes,” Hewson (1991) called “exceptions” and the Heaths (Heath & Heath, 2010) called “bright spots.” At the same time, realize that in order for new stories or new relations between stories to take hold in coachees’ lives, they must build on elements of familiar stories in order to ‘scaffold’ their ascendance.

Therefore: (1) help people to become more aware of the contours of their available narratives and either reframe them or their relationship to them; (2) guide them in discovering and developing new options (often hidden as gems in their own stories) and a more evolved repertoire; and (3) help them to successfully launch their new story as the basis for fulfilling their aspirations. Any story told in a coaching session, even if it has served as a transformational vehicle in that setting, must survive the ‘retellings’ if coachees are to sustain the changes they have begun.

When I am speaking on and demonstrating a narrative approach to coaching, many people are quick to recognize that it seems both quite powerful and quite different to more traditional approaches to coaching. I often get asked, “How do you do it?” Therefore, I decided that over the next few weeks I will share with you some of the foundational elements behind narrative coaching and some of the practical implications for our work. Much of this material will appear in my chapter in a forthcoming coaching encyclopedia edited by two colleagues from the evidence-based coaching program at Fielding Graduate University I helped to found. I look forward to hearing about your observations, reflections and experiences.

Narrative coaching is a body of knowledge that draws on millennia of ancient wisdom, a century of social science thinking, and breakthroughs in domains like the neurosciences to create an approach to development fitting for our times. It is a mindful, experiential, and holistic approach to helping people shift their stories about themselves, about others, and about life itself in order to create results that matter to them. Narrative coaches take a more “decentered” position in their role, a more nondirective approach to the coaching process, and a more contextual view of coachees’ identity, development and behavior.

Six philosophical assumptions which inform narrative coaching

1. People’s situated identity and their situational behaviors are mutually reinforcing and each can be tapped as a lever for change
2. The power created in the relational field between two people in coaching is more important than the specific techniques that are used
3. Margins, borders and the unconscious are more central to making meaningful change than linear plans focused on symptom relief
4. People’s own stories provide the primary material for coaching conversations and the language and vehicle for change
5. A keen awareness of the present without judgment and the ability to pay closer attention are as critical in coaching as external goals
6. The rites of passage model (a contextual frame) is more useful for guiding change than the medical model (a mechanistic frame)

A narrative approach to coaching works exceptionally well across cultures as it is less tied to western epistemologies and more easily tuned to local dynamics. It is quite useful in giving voice to non-dominant groups as part of a larger evolution in the systems in which they work and live, ie, in organizations embarking on culture change.

photo credit: drumrick

As Tina Turner asks in her marvelous ballad, “What’s Love Got To Do With It?” Along with Faith and Hope, Love serves as a third pillar for sustaining us through difficult times. As organizations and individuals contend with both the deep unknown and the daunting certainties around us, there is a strong need to return to the basics of what it means to be fully human. To do so, coaching needs to move beyond its early days when money flowed and ‘abundance’ was all the rage. Now comes the harder work of rebuilding institutions and preparing people for a future that is approaching rapidly—often with less time and less resources at hand. As with the other two pillars, Love is not a panacea but rather a fierce commitment to candor, compassion, and connection.

In teaching coaching skills to thousands of leaders, managers and professionals around the world, I am repeatedly reminding them and rediscovering for myself how the simple act of holding the other person in a non-judgmental, curious and fully attentive way is often a large part of the catalyst for change. As the Tibetan teacher Govinda observed, “It is not the audible word through which people are converted and transformed in their innermost being, but through that which goes beyond words and flows directly from [our] presence: the inaudible mantric sound that emanates from his (sic) heart.” As part of being present in this way, I see myself as a steward for the stories of others. Even though we are awash in information, options and methods, both research and ancient wisdom point to the healing value of the relationship itself.

Three ways to bring more Love into your work

If Faith is remembering why you are doing what you are doing and Hope is the foundation we need to stay the course, Love is how we make the journey. As such, here are three tips for you this week:

1. As Peter Drucker noted, “Your first task as a leader is to take charge of your own energy and then to orchestrate the energy of those around you.” You can only serve others through your work if you practice sufficient care for yourself. Give yourself an act of kindness today, random or not.
2. Recognize that every conversation is an opportunity to use your coaching skills to engage the other person in a transformative manner. Ask yourself, “How can I expand my mind and my heart in order to be more present (and open up more possibilities) right now?” 
3. Beyond our personal expressions, we can also embed Love in how we do business. One client crafted a vision for their coaching culture to include commitments that (1) anyone who is laid off will leave feeling good about themselves (to the best of our abilities) and (2) we will use such occasions to learn about ourselves and be willing to change as a result. 

Where can you bring more Love into your work? To whom do you need to be more present (including yourself)?

photo credit: gregloby

In working with my organizational clients, I am often struck by the sense that the past recedes and the future arrives ever more quickly. The net result is that people are increasingly working in a compressed sense of the present, not always the best state for decision-making or coaching. This trend is exacerbated by continuous ‘discontinuous change’ and easy access to seemingly unlimited knowledge at our fingertips in the present moment. What seems lost is the ability to place ourselves in the broader expanse of time. What can we offer our clients in such times?

Three ways a narrative approach can help

1. Becoming more knowledgeable about the connections between narrative structure and our identities and behaviors (see “The art of thinking narratively“). In many ways we are hard-wired for stories; inviting people to share their stories enables them to contextualize their experience and find greater meaning. They are no longer prone to feeling like temporal orphans, but can instead place themselves in the broader flow of time.

2. Becoming more conscious about our state and our actions in the present moment through increased mindfulness of our narrative patter. If we expect clients to be able to be able to integrate more from the past and the future into their present decisions, we need to help them develop greater awareness (of self and others) in order to do so. An expansive mind and heart enables them to engage more fully in the now.

3. Becoming more diligent in reducing the background ‘noise’ so as to more readily hear the signals from the past and future that are most likely to be relevant in the present. I did this recently with an organization in which the ever-rising ‘bar’ kept them from appreciating how far they had come on their culture change journey. We developed a visioning process they are using to define what a coaching culture would look like for them (markers for a desired future) and we built an internal discussion forum they are using to share stories of what they are doing differently now in their coaching conversations (markers from a less-desired past).

If we are to move well through this challenging time, we need to restore a sense of the flow of time even as we get better at being in the present moments in which we find ourselves. It is time for a new story of Now.

Have you ever noticed that certain stories or story lines keep returning in your life? Sometimes these returns are developmental, e.g., as with the notion of karma and the integration of shadow elements we’ve discarded along the way. Sometimes these returns are intentional, e.g., the final stage of the heroic journey as we return ‘home’ with the gains from our passage. I see this all the time with clients who keep circling back through a series of stories—all revolving around a similar theme that slowly crystallizes and the heart of it becomes clear. It is from this clarity that the deepest sense of their calling becomes apparent . . . and they now know what must be done.

Finding our way

The goal as narrative-based coaches is to be patient and present enough to let clients’ stories flow, gently guiding them along the path as it emerges.

Do you have the patience to wait
till your mud settles and the water is clear?
Can you remain unmoving
till the right action arises by itself?
(Lao-Tzu)

In the busyness of our lives, it is so easy to overlook these often subtle rhythms and patterns. As part of my own discernment process these past few weeks, I’ve been slowing down to think about the purpose of money in my life. One outcome of this process led me to Frederick Marx, a documentary film maker most well-known for his role in Hoop Dreams. In doing so, I realized that I had lost touch with the importance of place, of home, of sanctuary to me. Is not that in some ways what the innate drive for “return” all about?

Making new choices

As a result, I’ve decided to make a serious donation to help him finish his next film about Zanskar, the last remaining Tibetan Buddhist society with a continuous lineage (dating back thousands of years). The story is about two monks who are instructed by the Dalai Lama to do everything in their power to insure that Zanskar’s culture, language, and religion survive. This is a movie about their journey back to Zanskar. You can read about the 17 paths here.

What stories are cycling back into your life these days, carrying with them messages for you? What “mud” needs to settle in your life settle so you can more clearly see the next right action on your journey?

photo credit: sbblackley

The title for today’s post honors the recent death of Richard Wright, founding member of the legendary rock band Pink Floyd. In my work with clients, we often focus on creating the ‘container’ in which they can feel safe enough to openly and honestly engage in the stories they’ve long told themselves. It is from this place that they can be courageous enough to explore what else is possible. It is as if they are asked to make new choices about whether they want to add the next ‘brick’ (a story about an experience) to an existing wall or to a new path (the larger narratives we tell and live).

Are you a security guard or a seeker?

One is about security and one is about seeking. While both are important at the right time in coaching and in life, the former is often informed by our fears while the latter is generally informed by our hopes. As Ira Chernus recently wrote, “Whenever people shelter behind walls for protection, they reinforce the fears that sent them behind those walls in the first place.” While the recent economic events in the U.S. have caused many people, myself included, to pay a new kind of attention to issues of real security, I can’t help but see a need to retain our commitment to seek new paths from this place we are in.

Which story are you going to reinforce?

Narrative coaches help their clients to increase their ability to notice the “brick” in their hand and be mindful and courageous about the chocies they make in the moment as to which story they are going to reinforce. This image fits well with what we know neurologically in terms of how habits are formed through the reinforcement of certain neural constellations.

There are certainly times when we all need a healthy and reassuring dose of stability and security, particularly in times of duress and change. However, there is a great need in these times of extraordinary flux to equip clients to fully step onto the pathes in front of them—even those that are not fully formed yet.

Where are you putting your “bricks” today as you think about your most significant experiences and contacts? Are you adding to the walls around yourself and/or others — or are you using them to extend the paths toward what is possible?

photo credit: stopjessica

In reading a speech by Bill Moyers the other day, I was reminded of a old story from the Native American tradition.

There was a tribal elder who was telling his grandson about the battle the old man was waging inside himself. He said, “It is between two wolves, my son. One is an evil wolf: Anger, envy, sorrow, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego. The other is the good wolf: Joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith.” The boy thought this over for a minute, and then asked his grandfather: “Which wolf wins?” The old Cherokee replied simply: “The one I feed.”

While there is certainly something to be said for learning how to tell stories for the purpose of inspiring and leading others, most of our behavior each day is driven by the stories we tell ourselves in the moment. These narrative patterns are built up over time and reinforced with the stories we verbalize to others, but they are open to change over time. This is a large part of what narrative coaching is about.

The first task is to notice which story seems present in the moment. In this pause, and the space that opens up, new stories become possible. For example, I can ask myself in a difficult moment whether I am being guided by fear or by love. I can ask myself whether a given reaction brings me closer to or farther away from being more enlightened. In doing so, I often notice where I am attached to a story that does not serve me (or others).

Which wolf are you feeding today?