photo credit: richardmasoner
Albert Einstein once noted that, “problems cannot be solved by the same level of thinking that created them.” The same is true in working with the stories people tell us in coaching conversations. People narrate their experience based on their cognitive patterns, personal dispositions, contextual demands and the vocabulary of their social discourse. As a result, they tend to tell their stories along similar lines over time.

One of the lessons we can we take from recent research in the neurosciences is that rapport in coaching is built through the resonance between two people, a matching in which they connect using the same sides of their brain. In my work, I make the corollary point that we then foster change by connecting with the client across the channels once rapport is established, e.g. left brain modality to right brain modality. For example, I might invite a shift from their abstract description of the situation by asking them what they are experiencing in the moment.

When you feel stuck in a coaching conversation, it usually means that the client is trying to solve the “problem” at a level that is familiar to them—but is often the very construction/habit that created the issue in the first place. If this happens for you, I would suggest one of two options to help your client get unstuck: (1) rise up a level to help them get a broader perspective and see what they cannot see at their current level of narration or (2) drop down a level to help them get more of the details and enrich and embody their understanding.

Start within the frame of your clients’ stories to expand the storytelling space between you—and then invite them to move to a different level if it would free them up to gain a new perspective on themselves and/or their situation.

photo credit: indigoprime
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. I came across these words from the late Arthur C. Clarke, renowned science fiction writer, the other day and reflected on their meaning for coaching. They seemed particularly interesting given his choice to write about the future from Sri Lanka, a context where ancient battles for power are playing out in civil war. One of sources of power in using a narrative approach to coaching is that it helps individuals and groups reckon with the historical and cultural forces that shape their stories while at the same time envisioning new ones that can be told.

As I wrote about in a recent journal article, I believe a narrative approach is useful in developing ourselves as artisans who blend science and practice to meet our clients’ needs through the questions we form, the evidence we choose, and the reflexive evaluation of our performance. As more coaches develop mastery of the technologies of coaching, we may indeed move closer to the realms of magic. As I’ve also written, the language of “craftspeople” and “guilds” seems useful here. This echoes a comment from psychologist/anthropologist Brad Keeney (1990) who urged his fellow practitioners to free themselves from the tight embrace of medicalism and scientism in order to connect to the creative wellsprings of the arts.

One of the questions I will pose in moderating an upcoming panel on research at the 2008 ICF Conference is, “What can we learn at the intersection of art and science that provides better evidence to guide our practice?”

Where have you found the “magic” in working with your clients?

I am curious about the gaps between our intentions and our actions that are present at times in our lives. It is as if we are trying to wear high heels to cross the Alps. I recall a saying from Don Americo Yabar, a shamanic teacher with whom I studied in Peru in 2004, “Intent is. Intention tries. Intent is a pure, light energy having a distilled, laser-like quality.” I was also reminded of blogger Steve Pavlina’s distinction between “being” and “doing”. He wrote, “When your identity is out of sync with your goal, action is very difficult — it is doing. When your identify comes into sync with your goal, action is inspired and effortless — it is being.”

If we want people to adopt new behaviors and attain new results through coaching, we must help them build an identity from which to do so. It is about helping them to align the stories they tell about themselves (intent) with the stories they live with their lives (intention). When there is alignment, clients are more powerful and more successful. When there is alignment, goals are more likely to be fulfilled because the results are a natural byproduct of a new way of being rather than remaining dependent on continuous efforts at doing.

For example, a client who ran a large intergovernmental project was frustrated in her inability to move her leadership team in some new directions. Through our work, she uncovered both autobiographical stories and cognitive narrative patterns that reinforced a sense of herself as one who was destined to battle difficult odds to make things happen. It would be slow going if we were to attempt to make changes in her leadership approach from this starting point. Instead, our work revolved around helping her to imagine herself as one who could be at the center as opposed to the margins and as one who was worthy of ease and grace. Once she was made this shift, she moved rather quickly to change the structure of her leadership team and the project in order to optimize her leadership preferences and achieve better results.

Clients find greater power when they come from a place of grounded and authentic intent rather than crafting intentions in their mind about how things should or could be. So, if you are feeling stuck in some aspect of your work or life, look for the places where this a disconnect, a lack of alignment, between the stories you tell yourself and the results you want. It is in this fertile ground that the seeds of one’s true intent are born.

I began this blog to bring together two communities doing great work in the world: narrative practitioners and coaches. I am writing from Melbourne, Australia where I presented a workshop on narrative coaching at the International Coach Federation Australasia Conference. It has been an excellent event focused on how the coaching community can step up more fully to engage the extraordinary challenges and opportunities facing the world in this tumultuous time. We were provoked by many inconvenient truths and inspired by stories of leaders who are “giving it a go,” as they would say here, in terms of creating a world that works for all.

A big takeaway for me was the importance of the choices we make in each moment, the stories we create about another person or situation — and to reflect in the moment whether my choices add to a greater consciousness and contribution — and to choose accordingly. As Rollo May once said, “real human freedom is our willingness to pause between the events in our lives and the response we choose.” It is the disciplined art of not being swept up in the habitual stories we are told and tell ourselves, but developing the capacity to continually reframe and reconnect to a larger view. Individually and collectively, we become the stories we tell.

I will use this space to share my reflections and foster connections to help professionals and organizations work with their stories and their place in the larger narratives in which we live in order to grow into the changes that have already happened. Thanks, Christopher, for that last insight.

If you’d like to know more about our introductory or advanced narrative coaching workshops for 2008, sign up for our list under Narrative Workshops. You can be assured that your information will not be given out to others. You can also use the RSS button at the top right to add the feed from this blog.

Welcome.

David