The History of Metaphor in Change Work

For as long as humans have had speech, we've been drawn to stories. Story-tellers and bards were honored and respected, their tales and poems used to teach, explain, and/or entertain. Harvard Business School leadership guru John Kotter said,

Over the years I have become convinced that we learn best – and change – from hearing stories that strike a chord within us... Those in leadership positions who fail to grasp or use the power of stories risk failure for their companies and for themselves.

You know from personal experience how some stories have affected you, changed your attitude, inspired you, provided hope. So, the time-honored therapy tradition to use stories for healing is no surprise. A therapeutic metaphor can help clients gain the personal resources and enhanced world model they need to be able to handle their problems. Typically, as in the general history of storytelling, the therapist decides what story or metaphor will have the greatest effect.

There's also a growing interest in listening for a client's metaphor and running with it, while still staying alert to a direction that might resolve the problem. I used this more client-centered approach with a client who said she always felt "like the new kid on the block" when with her colleagues. I entered her metaphor by saying, "OK, I'm here with you. You've just moved in, and you're the new kid. What's that like? What are the other kids doing? How do they treat you? What are some ways you can get them to include you?" Notice how, even though we were both in the client's metaphor, the form of my questions kept me in charge of what direction to take. I was eager to find a useful outcome, and we did find one when she said, "They want to play with some of my cool toys!" She was then able to recognize "cool toys" in her current repertoire that helped her feel more comfortable with colleagues.

More recently, I explored symbolic modeling. Instead of the coach determining the direction of clients' metaphors, open-ended questions preserve clients' terminology and facilitate their self-discovery and self-development: "And being like a butterfly is for you...?" "And when does (your words)....?" "And then....?" "And just before that....?" The facilitator's questions are called "clean language," meaning they're not compromised by left-brain theories of where to take the session; the questions typically follow the client's lead.

Symbolic modeling theory has a formal structure, however, so the emphasis still leans toward tools the helper brings, which keeps the left-brain processes in gear. In the past few years I've moved into a more right-brain use of metaphor where I follow the client's lead, trusting that wherever we go will lead to a healing place.

The Enneagram: A Compelling Vision

Susan Olesek's TED talk on behalf of the Enneagram Prison Project (EPP), Both Sides of the Bars, is the most compelling Enneagram presentation I've ever seen, for her own transparency, for her clarity and vision, for her compelling examples, for her intelligent presentation, and most of all for the power of her presence. This is the finest example of how life-changing the Enneagram can be in the hands of someone on an authentic spiritual journey. See also this Forbes article about Olesek's work.

Creative Listening

In the executive summary of Theory U: Leading from the Future as it Emerges, Otto Scharmer writes:

Why do our attempts to deal with the challenges of our time so often fail? Why are we stuck in so many quagmires today? The cause of our collective failure is that we are blind to the deeper dimension of leadership and transformational change. This 'blind spot' exists not only in our collective leadership but also in our everyday social interactions. We are blind to the source dimension from which effective leadership and social action come into being. ("Addressing The Blind Spot of Our Time").

To access the source dimension, Scharmer suggests we slow down our listening, moving from the limitations of downloading ("Yeah, I already know that") and factual listening (the scientific approach, noticing what differs from what you already know), and even past empathic listening (knowing how the world appears through someone else's eyes), to generative listening (attending to the emerging field of future possibility).

Know Thyself?

At midlife I met my devils. Much of what I had counted as blessing became curse. The wide road narrowed, the light grew dark. And in the darkness, the saint in me, so well nurtured and well-coiffed, met the sinner. Connie Zweig, Prologue, Meeting the Shadow: The Hidden Power of the Dark Side of Human Nature (Zweig & Abrams -- Eds.)

When I was in college I wrote our dorm's script for the annual skit competition. The theme was "Know Thyself," drawing from the many sources for which that concept is key. Right now I can only remember biblical and ancient Greek references, and that we lost to a much livelier and less heady skit.

I was, of course, onto something that would lure me toward self-realization my whole life. But it wasn't until I was well into midlife, with only glimpses of my shadow self, that I began to truly engage with "the great burden of self-knowledge, the disruptive element that does not want to be known" (Meeting the Shadow, p. xxi, Introduction).

For the past few years I've been intrigued by Peter A. Levine's somatic experiencing approach to resolving trauma. Trauma is most obvious in severe cases such as the PTSD we've read about in war vets and victims of sexual abuse. Practitioners are now finding a similar freeze response in any situation of thwarted survival energy, such as the "normal" events of childhood that require tamping down our natural responses because of real or perceived threat, where we don't feel safe unless we hide from or conform to childhood situations.

The SE approach facilitates the completion of self-protective motor responses and the release of thwarted survival energy bound in the body, thus addressing the root cause of trauma symptoms.This is approached by gentle guiding clients to develop increasing tolerance for difficult bodily sensations and suppressed emotions.

I've recently found someone to help me deepen access to those most unknown parts. I'll give one example, noting that we don't have to understand any of this. No need to analyze, to know how or why certain aspects have been hidden. In my case, I had often expressed surprise that I'd never felt shame. I could be present to clients who experienced shame but, with one exception, I had no felt sense of it. I didn't particularly want to experience shame, and I don't know what triggered it for me this time, but two days after a session with my SE therapist, I awoke swimming in shame. She had given me the resources to stay present to any unfreezing and, though it was pretty awful, there was a difference this time from the earlier occasion linked above: I was also feeling excited, because I know all children are shamed to some degree ("How rude," "You're embarrassing me," "What a trouble-maker!") and I'd felt guilt ("my actions were bad") but now finally was finding shame ("I'm bad") more accessible.

The somatic experiencing approach is not one, I believe, that we can do fully on our own. I had tried to do so for several years after first reading Levine's In an Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness. Any self-work vs. engaging with an SE-trained therapist is similar to the difference between rubbing your own neck and shoulders and having professional deep tissue massage.

What we can do on our own are some of the exercises suggested in Meeting the Shadow. These self-initiated actions can take you a long way toward knowing yourself:

Solicit Feedback from Others: This is one of the most effective ways to gain insight into your personal shadow, though it can be threatening. Learn how to listen and take in feedback that surprises or hurts you. When more than one person describes the same trait, especially, explore their observations more deeply.

Examine Your Projections: Whenever you have a strong like or dislike of someone else, examine them closely enough to identify the trait that pushes your button. The qualities you especially like or dislike are likely to be projection, a fairly accurate picture of your personal shadow.

Examine Your "Slips": Slips of tongue show aspects of shadow we wouldn't dare express consciously. Slips of behavior can be even more revealing. Think of a time when you said or did something that later dumbfounded you. A more subtle "slip" is discovering that others perceive you in a completely different way than you see yourself (see #1 above). This is information about an unknown part of yourself.

Consider Your Humor and Identification: What's said in humor is often a manifestation of shadow truth. Behavior that might otherwise result in fines or imprisonment can bring hearty laughter. People who deny or repress shadow may find few things funny. Notice when a joke or cartoon makes you laugh.

Study Your Dreams, Daydreams, Fantasies: Shadow may appear in your dreams as a figure of your gender or some opposite aspect of yourself, even in a form you fear and want to escape. Observe closely its actions, and attitudes, and words. When you're awake, where does your mind go, what images invade your thoughts? In these fantasies and daydreams are opportunities to know yourself, especially in ways that are difficult to accept consciously.

Following the Metaphor

(Two coach clients practicing with each other)

What would you like to have happen?

For me, I think it's about being busy. I'd like to be busy.

And what is 'busy' like?

Maybe it's like canoeing down white water rapids instead of being stationary in a lake; an element of movement, like going down a slide. An element of movement, some sort of slide downhill.

And is there anything else, when you talk about this movement downhill, is there anything else about that?

Well, it's invigorating, it's fast. Instead of the rapids, it's a picture of a slide, one of these slides you see shooting downwards, changing direction, the whole element of speed, excitement, uncertainty. 

So when you have this element of speed, excitement, and this uncertainty, is there anything else about that?  

It's fun; it's enjoyable. Yeah, it's fun.  

And what is it about 'fun'?  

Because it's happening so quickly you can't quite control it, but you can; you're on the edge. I think that's what I like about it. Time goes quickly, minutes go quickly. I think it's the quickness of speed that gets me.

Is there anything else about that speed, where time moves quickly?  

Well, the key is the angle of the slide. Unless it's angled a certain way it stops; the angle of the slide is critical. 

And what's that 'angle' like?  

It's quite steep, but it's also not the same angle all the time; it'll change, it'll slow you down a fraction, then speed you up; it's always busy, you can never predict it; it's happening fast.

You've got this angle of this slide, and it's steep, and you can't predict it, and it's happening fast?

Like a roller coaster.  

Like a roller coaster. Is there anything else about that?

I can see things coming toward me clearly. And the busyness and the speed of it is what I want. It's not something I'm trapped in; it's something I've chosen to go in; so in that way it attracts my desire for busyness. 

And reflecting this desire for busyness, what is that 'busyness' like?  

I suppose it's like wanting something but not knowing if you can create it. 

It's like wanting something but not knowing you can create it. So what is that like? Is there a feeling in there, a picture? 

I got a picture of jumping on climbing walls and not being able to predict if there's anywhere to put your feet and your hands. A bit like being spider-man but not knowing, if you throw yourself against the wall, if you'll stick. 

When you're spider-man and throwing yourself against the wall, is there anything else? 

It's like not knowing which wall to start with. It's being unsure of knowing which wall to start with. 

And not knowing which wall to start with; can you say more about that? 

Yeah, it's very unsettling. 

Anything else about 'unsettling,' when you don't know which wall to start with?

Yeah. It means you can procrastinate a hell of a lot.

And what is that procrastination like? 

A feeling of sluggishness. 

And how does that feeling of 'not knowing which wall' connect with that 'invigorating fast slide'? 

It's completely opposite. They're the antithesis of each other, and I'm often in the middle.  

And when you're in the middle of not knowing which wall and that invigorating fast slide, what is that like?  

That's like being in a hot country and a cold country at the same time. It's very strange.  

Anything else about 'that kind of 'strangeness'?  

It's very difficult to gauge where you are at because you go from one extreme to another, from a fast slide to a slow-down.

And is there anything else about that 'slow-down'? 

It's like the opposite of the slide, still in the slide, but you have to move yourself in the slide. 

So where are you when you're between the rock wall and the slide? 

I'm not in the slide. The slide is where I want to be. The rock wall is hard work.

And when you're on the rock wall, what needs to happen for you to get to the slide?  

It's like one of those bridges in Harrison Ford movies, Raiders of the Lost Ark, one of those bridges that connect the two.  

What's that bridge like? 

It's quite wobbly. It's safe but you've got to keep your balance. 

And is there anything else about this wobbly bridge'? 

I think you need to be steady. 

Steady like what? 

Steady means a good rhythm. 

A rhythm. 

Yeah. A rhythm of intention; a rhythm of A to B, a rhythm of certainty across the bridge. 

And is there anything else about this rhythm of intention? 

I think it's just a rhythm where you need to make a decision and move to a place that's consistent. 

And can you do that? 

Yep. I'm doing that as we're talking. It's a lot longer than I thought it would be. It's taking a lot longer, and elements get in the way of crossing the bridge so it's not as easy as it might seem. But it's going to the right place. 

You're going to the right place when you're on this bridge that's sometimes a little wobbly? 

Yeah, it's uphill going to the slide. 

And what happens now on this uphill going to the slide? 

I quite enjoy the view, actually. This view is quite interesting. 

Where is this interesting view? 

It's actually going into space now. The bridge is in space and I'm looking into stars as I seem to walk endlessly, going up this bridge. 

And is there anything else about these stars and walking endlessly?  

It's a very different picture, a very enjoyable picture, a very motivational, inspirational picture. It's not a slog, actually a really enjoyable walk. It's a HUGE distance, a hundred times more than I originally pictured it, and it's an incredibly enjoyable walk to the stars

So can that incredibly enjoyable walk up this bridge to the stars, can that happen now?  

Um hmmm. 

What needs to happen for this walk into the stars? 

It's happening. I can see myself walking along. 

Anything else? 

It's like a Stanley Kubrick movie, out in space with music. 

And with this walk up to the stars where there's space and music, where is the 'busyness' now?  

Well, the busyness is quite a long way off. It's a matter of how long it will take me to get to the busyness. 

So a long, long time. Is there anything else about that? 

It would be better if the busyness were closer. 

What is the bridge to the busyness like? 

The bridge is quite easy to walk on; it just seems like a long, long bridge, stretching out into the far, far distance.

You enjoyed the bridge when it went from point A to point B from the rock wall to the slide and when it went up to the stars, and the bridge seems really long.

Yes, never-ending.

Never-ending. So what needs to happen for that bridge to shorten?

I've just seen a sign, "Go this way."

Which way is 'this way'? 

To the right. 

And what is on the right? 

I think it's more of a solid platform that leads to the slide. 

And this platform -- what is this platform like? 

It's very solid, takes you from a bridge that's quite solid, where you know you're getting closer to the slide. 

So with this wobbly bridge and then this solid, supportive platform, what happens to the 'busyness' now?

It starts to happen because I'm near the slide. I can hear it, I can feel it, I can see the angle; I'm at the starting point of the speed. 

So can the busyness happen now? 

Yes. 

What happened right before you stepped onto the platform? 

I think it's the rhythm on the bridge getting a little bit quicker; a number of things on the bridge have interconnected and come together, a natural speeding up of things at that point, speeding up, integration, coalition, absorption, all these words, starting to gel. 

Anything else about that speeding up, that integration right before you step on the platform? 

That also coincides with the inner integration of things happening. 

And what's that like when the inner integration happens? 

It's a bit like when the wall has footholds. You know it's right. Your body knows it's right. You've got an internal sense of it being right. It feels right. 

Is there anything else about that internal sense of when your body knows 'it's right'? 

There's an excitement about it. It feels good. Just about to step on that platform. 

Where is the busyness? 

In my feet.

Can the busyness happen now, that's in your feet? 

Um hmm 

OK, I want to check in with you. How are you with ending here? 

Good. 

Breaking Up Is Hard to Do

We love our egos, don't we? We get along so well together. And what a relationship! It’s been life-long, predictable, we’re safe—more or less. 

OK, fine, we get angry, we feel hurt, we challenge our constraints but, oh, the seduction of familiarity. 

And, typical of any long-standing relationship, breaking up is difficult—no matter how strong the desire to end it.

I’ve coached many clients to observe and break free from habitual patterns. But I must admit, for them and for me, ego much prefers to wear its mask.

Years ago I was scheduled to be in a workshop where I'd be videotaped describing my lifelong change process, and one of the questions would be about Enneagram style Nine’s fundamental belief: I don't deserve to exist. Though I didn’t consciously feel this way about myself, I knew the story was in there somewhere, and spent weeks prior to the workshop being mindful of clues to that belief. Slowly, I began to see evidence.

As a small example, I became aware how fast I read, even when enjoying fiction or poetry for pleasure. I heard, as if magically radioed in from my past, Mary is such a good girl. She does exactly what she’s told and she does it quickly. I remembered being praised for how many books I could read in a week. That expanded to memories of being praised at work for how quickly I completed projects. I saw how this fed my unconscious story: If I do things quickly, people will praise me, I’ll feel worthwhile, and deserve to exist. 

But I didn’t experience the belief, it was still an idea. This continued up through and past the workshop — interesting insights, a deeper level of awareness, a new perspective on coaching clients by looking for their fundamental stories. Still, I hadn’t yet experienced the truth of my story.

Several weeks later, I received the DVD of my interview, eagerly turned it on, and boom! I saw myself as fat, old, and BLAND. I was completely crushed. I could not identify with that woman on the screen!

For a full day my ego danced around looking for ways to accept the external evidence that contradicted my self-image. I read about strategies for embracing growing old. I considered following the path of aging boomer artists Alice and Richard Matzkin (The Art of Aging: Celebrating the Authentic Aging Self) and painting a self-portrait, warts and all — still feeding the story by trying to refute it: I am worthwhile as I am! 

Then, on the second day, I experienced the fundamental story that had been deeply unconscious until that moment. I am worthless. I don't deserve to exist. I felt it down to my bones, my heart was full of shame, and I knew it to be true.

On the third day, I fell through. The phrase fell through is inadequate to capture the experience. I can, however, describe my reaction when I again viewed the DVD of my interview. I felt compassion and even delight, a feeling akin to Oh, so that’s the body and mannerisms my soul is riding in. 

Since then I've seen significant changes in myself. My defensiveness dissolves more quickly — and in a way that’s very different from tamping down feelings — a sensation of lightness, each molecule more alive. 

I’m not saying I’m transformed, of course. In the immortal words of Valentine Michael Smith from Stranger in a Strange Land, “I am only an egg.” 

Om

To a yogi, no symbol is more powerful than the syllable OM, as witnessed by these words from the Mandukya Upanishad:

OM: this eternal word is all what was, what is and what shall be.

In the Sanskrit letter the long lower curve represents the dream state, the upper curve stands for the waking state and the curve issuing from the center symbolizes deep, dreamless sleep. 

The crescent shape stands for Maya, the veil of illusion, and the dot for the transcendental state. 

When our individual spirit passes through the veil and rests in the transcendental, we are liberated from the three states and their qualities.

Living Ourselves Into New Ways of Thinking

We stand in the middle, living and fully accepting our reality, neither taking this new awareness on from the power position nor denying it for fear of the pain it will bring. We do not think ourselves into new ways of living. We live ourselves into new ways of thinking.  Richard Rohr, Everything Belongs

We've all had peak experiences, times when we were washed with a sense of clarity, of deep appreciation, of being at one with the universe. Perhaps you were watching the sunset from a sailboat, or feeling unconditional love from someone who matters to you, or being present at the birth of a child, or hearing a piece of music that touched you deeply. 

This awareness need not be serendipitous. You can invite it.

Rohr suggests that when trapped in "the ways things are" we have to allow ourselves to be drawn into sacred space, to remain on a threshold where the old world is left behind but we're not sure of the new one yet. In this realm, where we hold a naïve awareness, everything belongs: darkness and light coexist, paradox is revealed.

In our everyday world, what we think we know is a world we've made up. In what Rohr calls the "second naïveté," that everyday world falls apart and a new one is revealed. In this return to simple consciousness (beginner's mind), "we are finally at home in the only world that ever existed." 

Some years ago I was entranced by the film Little Buddha, about a boy who might be the reincarnation of a revered Tibetan teacher. The acting was reserved and there wasn't much action or character development. Why it so appealing to me? Probably because it spoke to some of my personality patterns, an attraction to being Buddha-like. 

People feel safe with my peaceful nature. But one of my most difficult patterns to release has been the tendency to avoid conflict, the only path to real relationship. (Who are you dealing with if I agree with everything you say, if I distract myself from my own agenda, if I don't set clear boundaries about what’s important to me?)

Suzanne Zuercher (Enneagram Spirituality) writes of active contemplation, not passive surrender to the process, but carrying a posture of awareness, intention, and readiness throughout our daily lives: awareness of our habits of attention and how they play out uniquely for us; intention to invite our unknown and disowned parts to come forth, and readiness to take specific actions that shift our focus of attention: doing the things most difficult for us, staying present without avoiding or denying or projecting blame. 

When we remember to be present with naïve awareness, with beginner's mind, we can live ourselves into new ways of thinking.

An Unconquerable Soul

Others who saw the film "Invictus" (Latin for "unconquered") may have been moved - as I was — to re-read the poem by William Ernest Henley that in the film inspired Nelson Mandela during his 27 years of captivity as a political prisoner.
 
Most potent for me in Henley's poem are the lines "I thank whatever gods may be / For my unconquerable soul."

I found myself asking what was the source of Mandela's gift, his own unconquerable soul, that his depth of compassion allowed him to bring two former enemies together with such certainty and courage? He personally had suffered greatly for his beliefs, and yet he found a way to be so completely present that he changed the meaning of "unconquerable." In his actions the word had nothing to do with war metaphors of "beating" or "winning." His "unconquerable soul" instead was an unquenchable flame.

Mandela modeled what all of us — and especially our world leaders — must be able to do. He moved through his own grief to a larger space where innovative ways of thinking are possible.

Now we grieve for Mandela himself. May we also hold the space that is beyond grief for a world where we welcome our brothers and sisters.

Think in the Beauty Way

In Be Careful What You Pray For, Dr. Larry Dossey describes the Navajo belief in the power of words, the importance of positive thinking and speaking in "The Beauty Way."

Dossey, a physician and researcher who has helped bring credibility to alternative therapies and to spirituality in medicine, distinguishes between 'loosely coupled systems' and  'tightly coupled systems.'

A lawnmower's gasoline engine is a loosely coupled system -- the parts are relatively autonomous and can be individually replaced when they malfunction. Far too many physicians treat their patients as if a physical malfunction is much like a faulty lawnmower part. Instead, human bodies are tightly coupled systems and highly interdependent.

So while doctors don't usually intend to do us in, the harm is nonetheless real when they make such pronouncements as "You're a walking time bomb" or "There's nothing more I can do." 

In contrast, researchers at Dartmouth Medical School have found the factor most highly correlated with survival and a positive post-operative course after surgery is the degree of spiritual meaning in a person's life. 

Whatever crisis you face, medical or otherwise, think in The Beauty Way. Ask yourself: 

How can I participate in my mental and physical health and not be a victim?

What is my purpose?

What is meaningful to me?

How might I make a difference in the world?

A Rose is a Rose

A rose is a rose is a rose. Gertrude Stein, 1922.

Behold: the rose:

Pay close attention, be fully in the moment. This is mindfulness.

The inexpressible beauty of nature reminds us we, too, are organic.


We are not mechanical, not race cars, we do not need to "go from zero to sixty in sixty seconds" to prove our worth.

... glory does not stay / And early though the laurel grows / It withers quicker than the rose... A.E. Housman, To an Athlete Dying Young,

So, as you go through your day:

• Engage in each task with full attention, without anticipating the next task.
• When you read something interesting, take time to let it sink in.
• Notice your body's responses; at the first sign of tension take a deep breath, relax. 
• If you're hungry, fully taste every bite; stop when you're full, appreciate that feeling as well.
• When you realize you've been rushing around, stop and smell the roses.

Dancing to a Larger Dance

Guest post by Tim Flood:

In The Presence Process Michael Brown argues that significant, authentic change can only be achieved by a full excavation of the psyche -- from external projection, back through behavioral and intellectual biases, to the emotive patterns that have kept the whole show up and running.

Though this may be old news, it comes alive again with presence as its vehicle and with metaphors bridging between behavior, thought processes, and emotive patterns. Presence is the nurturing receptivity essential to what Brown calls our witness-observer, and metaphors are the language of presence.

A transformative metaphor reduces resistance to zero by including and accommodating our complex emotional, intellectual, and physical patterns. Metaphors are the voice, the song, and the dance of the witty, kind, and intelligent inner observer. 

Listen for the rich and various ways people express themselves in metaphor:

I don't want to get to the end of my life and find that I have lived just the length of it. I want to have lived the width of it as well. Diane Ackerman

Now listen for your own metaphors. Be present to yourself.

The Pattern That Connects

"Premonitions open us up to each other and to the greater world... they show that we are part of something larger than the individual self, that we are an element in the great pattern that connects." Dr. Larry Dossey

The opening story of Malcolm Gladwell's Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking should convince even the most skeptical that there are ways of knowing beyond the ability to make logical connections:

"A team of experts with state-of-the-art measurement tools took more than a year to assure the authenticity of a supposedly ancient Greek statue the Getty Museum of California was going to purchase for $10 million. Then several art experts looked at the statue and knew instantly it was a fake. One said he "heard" the word fresh, which seemed odd to him, but on further examination he realized the statue was too "fresh" to be that ancient." (David Brooks, New York Times).

We all have the capability to access these versions of a "sixth sense" although many shy away from that possibility, especially those who fear the unfamiliar. Even the word premonition carries an aura of foreboding - that something "bad" is going to happen.

When we're fully present, however, the possibilities are neither good nor bad, we're simply open to a broader context of knowing, a larger "mind" or "field" as others have named it. One of my experiences is described in The Archives of Scientists' Transcendent Experiences.

Whether you experience this knowing as a feeling in your bones, an image, or a nagging thought, it is saying to you, in Larry Dossey's words, "Wake up. The evidence for a larger world is staring you in the face."

Sand Mandalas

What is the essence of presence? Perhaps it is having no desire to control. Thus the sand mandala.

Now often demonstrated by the Dalai Lama and groups of Tibetan monks, the ceremony begins with chants, music, prayers, and then pouring millions of grains of sand in bright colors from a metal tube called a chakpu. The finished mandala is about five by five feet in diameter, and takes three to five days to complete.

The creation process concludes with a consecration ceremony, and then... they dismantle the mandala!

For those of us who have become attached to our creations (our life, our image, our successes) this is astonishing, and we have much to learn.

Formed into traditionally prescribed Tibetan iconography that includes geometric shapes and historical Buddhist symbols, the sand mandala is a tool to consecrate and bless the earth and its inhabitants. The dismantling of the mandala symbolizes the impermanence of all existence.

Beyond Stereotypes: Presence in Law Practice

True presence is absent of preconceived notions, and that includes stereotypes. Among others, lawyers have suffered from innumerable jokes that caricature them in stereotypical ways.

So I am delighted to say the best definition of presence I've found was created by CUNY Law Professor Victor Goode and Jeanne Anselmo, RN, author of chapter 15, "Relaxation" in Holistic Nursing: A Handbook for Practice.

Their presentation, "Law in the Service of Human Needs: Social Justice and Contemplative Practice," defines presence as a contemplative skill:

"Therapeutic Presence assists students and attorneys to bring a centered, grounded, open, aware, active, concerned connection with one's self, one's client and the environment. It is not detached, nor is it numbing out, but rather is remaining as fully present as possible in the face of chaotic, difficult and challenging circumstances."

To achieve this state, we develop awareness and trust in our own purpose and process, self care and self reflection, and deep listening. Borrowing from Goode and Anselmo's presentation, these steps are key:

• Ground Yourself: Stand comfortably, breathe deeply and drop your breath to your center of gravity in the lower abdomen.
• Center Yourself: Connect to your intention for the interaction and your deeper commitment; allow your personal and professional resources to arrive in the moment (spontaneously vs. planned).
• Listen Deeply and with Compassion: Seek to understand the other person without judgment.
  

To Goode and Anselmo: Bravo, Brava!!!

Leadership Presence Assessment

Assess your leadership presence below, as defined in Leadership Presence: Dramatic Techniques to Reach Out, Motivate, and Inspire:

• Being Present: Are you completely in the moment and flexible enough to handle the unexpected?
• Reaching Out: Are your relationships with others developed through empathy, listening, and authentic connection?
• Expressiveness: Do you express feelings and emotions appropriately by using all means of expression (words, voice, body, face) to deliver one congruent message?
• Self-Knowledge: Are you accepting of yourself, authentic, and living your values in your decisions and actions?

I Saw Myself

I saw myself
a ring of bone
in the clear stream
of all of it

and vowed
always to be open to it
that all of it
might flow through

and then heard
"ring of bone" where
ring is what a

bell does

Lew Welch