Supporting the integral personality
This is an extract from my book “Developmental Coaching”
Warren Bennis wrote in relation to organisational integrity, “The integral personality…I am talking about a kind of unity – of purpose, goals, ideas and communication – that makes three musketeers, Three Musketeers. It’s a merging of identities and resolves into a coherent and effective whole.’ If you had to sum it up then, this could well be the higher aim as a Developmental Coach. In other words, maybe it is to bring an individual through the process of learning and development to a point where they are integrated. With all the usual fractions of the perfectly normal personality, this may take some time, but it is time well spent. Integration will manifest in the realms of the mind, behaviour and the individual’s operation within the cultural and social domains. It covers all areas of their life and for you as a coach, to aid the growth of another human being must be the one of the greatest gifts of the post-modern world.
So what will it look like? In Experiential learning, David Kolb says, “…integrity is a sophisticated integrated process of learning, of knowing. It is not primarily a set of character traits such as honesty, consistency, or morality.’ In the same way that Vaillant discussed the higher level of adaptations, the mature mechanisms, Kolb sees that something emerges at a higher stage of ego development. When someone becomes an ‘integral person’, their integrity has come about through a ‘learning process by which intellectual, moral and ethical standards are created.’ In Kolb’s view, the ‘pinnacle of development is integrity. It is that highest level of functioning that we strive for consciously and even unconsciously, perhaps automatically, to reach’. Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is a well-known model that suggests that there are different requirements, i.e. needs, at different levels. When one level is satisfied, the next level of needs emerge. The movement from the needs that keep us alive, such as food and water, develops into the needs of safety and shelter. From there the need to ‘belong’ emerges, and then comes the requirements of self-esteem, initially gained from others and later generated within ourselves. The final stage in Maslow’s model is that of self-actualisation. This is what we are really talking about for Developmental Coaching at the highest stages. For you as the coach it will be about considering the individual’s needs and whether they are currently following an appropriate route to satisfy them. In one coaching case I remember, the coachee indicated they were seeking to self-actualise when in fact they hadn’t satisfied their lower level needs. When they eventually focused on dealing with the adaptations that were holding them back, and over time, the coachee managed to satisfy their lower level needs such as having a stable job, a place to live and good relationships. The higher levels may seem more appealing, but in fact they are only available as a natural consequence of the self moving through the other levels. As Wilber says in Sex, Ecology and Spirituality, “you first have to have molecules, then cells, then organs, then complex organisms – they don’t all burst on the scene simultaneously…the growth occurs in stages.” He continues, “The more holistic patterns appear later in development because they have to await the emergence of the parts that they will then integrate or unify, just as whole sentences emerge only after whole words.”
With different needs emerging at different levels we can see that by having a more complete view of the coachee’s development, including their level of consciousness, adaptations and needs; the coach can identify much better where the coachee ‘is at’. This in turn allows the coach to choose an appropriate approach for that stage. For the coachee the stages of needs are built on the previous stage, not negated by it. In the same way that a cell needs molecules to exist, a coachee must still have their basic needs satisfied after moving to a higher level of need – an individual cannot live on self-esteem alone! If at any stage a coachee becomes fixated by a wanting to be at a higher stage, then the coach’s role is to gently firm up the foundations to allow them to achieve that level over time. Most often when the more fundamental needs are met there is a sense of relief for the coachee as the restriction will also be released. If, for instance, the coachee was seeking Enlightenment, but can’t pay the bills, they will find enormous freedom from reacting against materiality when they begin to embrace it (even just a little). In a different case the coachee may be seeking the approval of others (a ‘what if?’ stage need as people are still dependant on others for their own identity) and find that they are having difficulty moving on. The coach may help them find ways to develop beyond this need in the ways we have already discussed. It is when the translations fail, ‘I’ve tried everything’, that the transformation can occur.
Here is a question that occasionally will come up: with one of the aims being the development of the coachee to ever higher stages, does the coach themselves have to be integral, or have an integral personality, to start with? In short, the answer is yes and no. Yes, it is preferable that the tour guide knows the environment; but no, the coach too is developing through the process of their coaching. Just like the example of the car and the road influencing each other when talking about a dialectical process, the coach and their coachees develop together. It is certainly unnecessary for the potential coach to hold off coaching until a point that they consider themselves to be integral – as long as they have an integral view, they can develop themselves to have an integral way of being. The integral personality is not that common, but it could be. Part of the purpose of this section is to show more signs of the integrated self, the integral personality. But Developmental Coaching is a set of principles that can be applied by anyone at any level of being. Someone at a ‘what if?’ stage can still be living an integral life, working to advance their lines of development within the four domains of life (see session 7) without being at a ‘what what if?’ stage, where the integrated personality is likely to truly emerge. In the same way, the Integral Coach can coach with an integral view, including the four domains (4 Quadrants), levels of consciousness, adaptations etc, and still be working towards being integral themselves.
There are several elements that can be brought together to show what it means to be this integral personality. This should prove useful when you have clients ready for this discussion. These factors include self-direction, cognitive complexity in relationships, pro-activity and rich life structures. The ability to be the author of one’s life story, not just the passive recipient to it is essential as an emergent quality. It is quite likely that this will begin at the ‘full what if?’ level (full formal operational) but become fully ‘real’ as the personality becomes consolidated at an integral level. There is also the “increasing complexity in one’s conception of personal relationships” – their relationship with the world is, Kolb continues, “transactional, in that they are proactive in the creation of their life tasks and situations and are shaped and molded by these situations as well”. He also sees that the life structures mirror the complexity of the integrated personality. There is a greater amount of spontaneity in the life of the integrated personality as they are less bound within themselves to follow the normal constructs of day-to-day living. Interestingly, they experience less stress than those without an integrated personality despite their complex lives.
Looking at this another way, the integrated personality is able to bring together what Kolb calls the four learning styles. Kolb talks of two modes of grasping experience – one is through direct experience, concrete experience, and the other is through “symbolic representations of the experience”, i.e. abstract conceptualisation. The first is grasping through doing, the second is grasping through building an internal model of experience. Kolb also talks of two modes of transforming. The first is through intentional reflection and the other through extensional action. I know what you are thinking? How the heck do I use this?! Well, from this we can see that we as individuals tend to favour one style of thinking – concrete, reflective, abstract or active i.e. one of these four. Yet it is the flexibility to move between styles that increases as the personality becomes more integral. We have already suggested that one way of seeing ‘integral’ is in the individual’s movement to higher levels of development (across more lines) and using higher level adaptations while bringing together the parts of the personality. Re-read the paragraph above once again and you will see: you can grasp through doing/model building and you can transform through reflection/action. Flexibility of thinking, doing and being is all crucially important. So when you are coaching you want to consider what the coachee is actually doing/being/thinking with all the approaches and models with which you are working.
Communication
This session I like to also focus on communication with others. Some of what I will say will sound very basic indeed but we will come onto some case studies later. Sometimes we need to remember so much of coaching is about appropriate communication. First we will use the example of you, as the coach, yourself to start building the scene. We know a coach needs to be a good listener. It is when the coach notices not just the coachee’s ‘surface’ replies/comments but looks at the deeper structure, they will reach further into the coachee’s world. The coach’s ability to notice subtle shifts in the coachee’s language use, voice tone and body language will determine how effectively they can react in a one-to-one situation. Alongside the coach’s ideas about the coachee’s internal structure (built up through the methods in this book and all the other approaches they have learned as well), moment to moment the coachee will also display to the world what is happening through their verbal and non verbal communication. In one coaching situation, a very subtle unconscious twitch of a muscle to the side of the coachee’s eye prompted me to ask, ‘There seems to be some concern in going for that goal. If there was, what would it be?’ This encouraged the coachee to voice their hidden concerns. From here I was able to encourage, ‘hold’ and support the coachee as they began exploring how a negative feeling about approaching a senior at work would hold them back. This acuity was supported by the coachee knowing that their adaptive needs were likely to hold them back in that situation. They would rather have repressed and denied the issue even though there was desire to deal with the situation. The ability to spot such subtle leakages of our internal thoughts and feelings can make a coaching session go far smoother than if they are missed.
As an example, in one coaching situation, I remember the coachee was feeling very tired and run down. This can happen; life is life. As the coach I had to understand this first. There is no point forcing someone into a positive state of mind when they think they have good reason to be in that state Instead, it was through changing my usual voice tone, which tends to be a little authoritative (well, I have my moments), to a softer tone that stepped in time to where the coachee ‘was at’. This shift in tone helped the other person to be ‘OK’ where they were at. They had been concerned that the coach would try to ‘jolly them up’ and this at the time was not wanted. Over the course of an hour the unobtrusive approach was able to quietly move the coachee’s state into a better one. This in turn led to the coachee actually shifted their body language and voice tone in a way that picked up the pace of the dance. In effect it was a simultaneous change both myself and the coachee reciprocated in the relational exchange. This “motion” in the situation came from understanding and support that allowed the coachee to take a movement on. Body language in a coaching context needs only a few words – be mindful of other’s reactions to you and change yourself accordingly. This is how you must display your congruence and authenticity externally.
In a similar way the coach may choose to use the language that the coachee uses when describing their current, past or future situations. When the coachee feels understood they will open up more; when they feel misunderstood they will close down. Getting someone’s language wrong is a great way to blow a relationship but getting it right often goes unnoticed. In one coaching exercise I used in a training, people were asked to differentiate three words. In the coachee’s world these three words had different meanings; to the coach they had the same meaning. One coach found that even though they saw ‘organisation, business and consultancy’ as falling under the same banner of ‘business’, the coachee had a very different meaning for each one. The most important aspect of their organisation was “human resources”; most important for the business was profit and loss; and most important for the consultancy practice were the consultants’ skills. This seemingly subtle differentiation that people have in their own worlds (created with its own language) must be respected and appreciated for the exchanges to go as smoothly as possible.
On a different language note, once the relationship has developed to a suitable point, the coach may choose to drop in slightly more technical language, such as lines of development, as this might get the coachee’s interest and recommended reading may then follow. It is this ability to gently open the coachee to understanding themselves even better that will gain generative results in the coaching relationship. The coachee may move on and bring the coach a great richness of understanding, or they may begin to coach others as they learn explicitly how the coach had been thinking about their development.
I often find this session, if not Session 5, is the time to add in some additional skills. So, in a way, you want to be aware of all the existing ones you have in your toolbox, especially in relation to communication skills. People have truly started to “know themselves better” and it can be very handy for them to have some new approaches to play with. I tend to include Paul Ekman’s work on micro-expressions – coachees tend to love this as they feel they have accessed a great hall of wizardry! Also, frame setting (including pre-frames, reframes and out-frames) and much NLP language (such as Meta and Milton patterns) find their merry way as well. These areas are well documented in many other books so I will let you explore which ones you feel would be useful for a coachee to receive at this point. When they experience a tangible difference in e.g. managing the context of a situation instead of having someone manage it (using frame setting) they will get a boost that the hard work is paying off.
Feedback and relational exchanges
At this point we must spend a few moments looking at the role of feedback both in relation to this model as well as in a coaching or business context. This is something, at some point, you are bound to be asked about as in our culture people have become quite used to ‘giving other people feedback’ as if it is something helpful to do. In the narrow remit of appropriate and inappropriate behaviour and in task-focused situations it can be useful, but in many other situations it is not. The brain is not a ‘feedback friendly’ organ, or rather instead of there being a ‘looping’ function between the neurology in the brain (where information is received and integrated), there is only a one way flow. In most cases the individual cannot actually do anything with feedback they receive. It is the neuron’s ‘looping’ ability, or ability to integrate, that turns what would otherwise be feedback into something that the individual can work with. Furthermore, the neurology of some individuals is constructed in a way that prevents the necessary exchange occurring, so giving of feedback would be a waste of time. In the same way (for those that know Spiral Dynamics), giving feedback when someone is at ‘red’ (con-op) is taken as a very real threat to their sense of self. In fact, it can be damaging to all parties especially if individuals scurrilously give feedback to each other like, ‘My feedback to you is that you didn’t design that brochure to a high enough standard’ and a response of ‘You never give me the money I need to design it better.’ Both are feedback, but it won’t help the relationship. This ‘feedback to feedback’ approach is likely to ‘get people’s backs up’ (or fire off people’s lower stage adaptations) and is not an exchange – it is actually uni-directional, uni-directional from both sides. And it is when the feedback from life hits into your own concerns and pathologies, it will actually hold you back.. With an exchange (or using the neurological term of Edeleman, ‘re-entry’) the person can take the information and adapt themselves with it. It is then they can move on.
I mention this because feedback for most people is not useful (outside the specified contexts) and, in coaching in particular, it can be useless at best and lead to many relational problems at worst. So, in terms of communication, as we are discussing in this section of this session, you may want to discuss this principle with the coachee. People resist feedback!
Case studies:
Below are some case studies that shine light on how communication is essential for individuals to understand at a deeper level.
In Jenny’s case, I found out the importance of respecting and understanding someone’s own internal world. It was a quiet reminder that we all have our own idiosyncrasies that come from our uniquely-wired neurology and resultant mind. Jenny was working as a personal assistant when she finally decided that she had had enough of the restriction on her life. The phobia that she had had from a very young age was leading her to become increasingly neurotic at work as well as home. She would make a joke out of it, but searching for spiders in her bed every night was no longer how she wanted to live. She decided to seek help. But the change in her life that is worth mentioning is not what you may think. Curing the phobia was less interesting than a comment she made in a later coaching session when she related the story of her meeting with the therapist. She explained that as she was asked by a therapist what happened when she heard the word ‘spider’, she cringed and her stomach ‘turned’. The therapist then asked whether she had any positive associations with the same word. Instantly she said ‘no’, but then she smiled and said that it was actually her brother’s nickname as a child. It was a day or so later (and now recalling the wonderful associations of her brother and her own childhood together when ‘spider’ is ever mentioned) she was doing a crossword. In a coaching session she explained thinking through a clue, asking for a gemstone that is 5 letters. She went through emerald, diamond… and then thought ‘topaz, yes’. ‘Why’, she thought, ‘do such beautiful things have such beautiful names – and nasty things have nasty names?’ It didn’t take her long to realise that we construct our meaning through our language and that the names themselves are just the juxtaposition of letters. It was a clear glimpse for the coachee into how she was constructing her world through the use of language and associated, personal meaning.
The next two case studies are contrasts.
The first situation was when Ben decided to show his book idea to a friend. She responded with great enthusiasm and encouraged him to send it to an agent who she was in close contact with. The agent, however, was less enthusiastic and rejected the idea. This was the first blow to his confidence, but the second fateful blow came from his friend’s husband when he said, ‘It is clear you cannot write.’ As all parties in this case were held in high esteem by Ben, he took it to heart and put the manuscript back into the bottom drawer. But that was not all, sadly, he also put his emerging dream of being a writer in that drawer at the same time.
In contrast, when one coachee was deciding whether to follow the ‘bottom drawer route’ for his own books, his coach said, ‘You must keep on writing. Just get it out, keep studying and you will get there. You have a gift – all writers do.’ The ‘it’ he spoke of was an array of varying books from self help through to business and the affect on the coachee was to feel the blind faith in himself may not be quite so blind after all. A few carefully chosen words from a respected person who has the necessary authenticity can turn a person’s life around. In the first case, Ben took to heart the opinions of two people – one of which was not a writer – and Ben’s new coach is aiding him moving on from his old beliefs. In the second case, the coachee was myself.
Modes of support
This next section is ideally placed in one of these later sessions and is especially useful when the motivation to achieve life’s goals has been lacking or undermined. What many coachees really want is the support and motivation of a good coach. And there you are.
They want to feel there is someone waiting on the sideline, feel there is a friendly voice down the phone and be able to relate about the human experience and what it is to be a person. When someone starts feeling a lack of confidence they may start retreating from their goals, or only make a half hearted attempt to achieve them. When their results are not as good as hoped, the person’s confidence can be even more undermined. On an internal level, the less mature responses will then tend to surface, and the coachee will tend to feel unsupported by life itself. Under these circumstances, the job of the coach in relation to motivation is to encourage and praise, often in an understated way, even the smallest of achievements. If the coach can break the negative circle of confidence leading to poor results leading to reasons to support low confidence, they can assist the coach to move on. If the coach is respected by the coachee, even a few words pointing them in the right direction can make all the difference – as coach, do not underestimate the potency of your role.
It is because the role is so important that makes a high degree of consistency of character, approach and content essential. When the coach can show the coachee consistency in these areas, they will feel supported even more. This is no truer than in the area of emotions. If the coach stabilises themselves, they can influence the emotional state of the coachee. This can help to move someone from, for instance, a de-motivated way of being to a motivated way of being. Another influence the coach can have is to help the coachee to find their passion. This can be tied into their life plan and purpose, but is more to do with the one or two things that give them a glint in their eye when they talk about it. Nothing will motivate more than the chance to actualise one’s dreams. The question now turns to what is the nature of the goal and what support do they need to get them there.
As we discussed earlier, competency is governed both by ability and the perception of ability (now and in the future). Due to the internalised view of their competency, “people tend to avoid activities and situations they believe exceed their coping capabilities, but they readily undertake challenging activities and pick social environments they judge themselves capable of handling” says Albert Bandura. Essentially we need to consider the interplay of challenge and support – people grow best when they experience sufficient challenge alongside an appropriate amount of support. The support model can be used to reflect whether aspects of someone’s life are lived in a way to give the best opportunity for growth and development:
High challenge
1 Scary – can become defensive and 2 The right balance for development
hostile
Low support High support
3 Dull and boring – no growth 4 Comfortable and easy – no growth
Low challenge
Looking at each box in turn you can see that there is an effect on a person’s experience of the situation:
1 is when the person is out of their depth.
3 arises when the challenge does not stretch the person – they become bored.
4 the person may feel temporarily ‘comfortable’, but they are not developing.
2 is the only area where the person has true potential for growth, whether it is in a sport, a hobby, the work environment etc. Here the person can experience the urge to push themselves that little bit further because they have confidence that there are support structures in place. For example, a sports coach encourages sportspeople to perform within their full limits – the coach’s skill is to know what conditions are needed to deliver the balance between challenge and support. The same applies in the workplace – if a mentor who knows the job well aims to help an individual, they will allow the individual to grow with the level of task that is required of them. As we mentioned earlier, they need to consider both the external and the internal factors. The question for both the individual and the coach becomes, ‘How can we help adjust the person’s internal conceptions of self and aid in performance enhancement?’ Psychologist Bandura points to four main ways:
Most effective is success
It is the ‘mastery experiences’ in performance that build a strong sense of ability. Failure creates doubts. Even when there are setbacks, this strong self-certainty will help create perseverance which can, in turn, create positive performance.
The second method is by modelling
It is when we see people around us succeed that we can often feel inspired and interested. From these people we can also learn skills. Negative modelling can have the opposite effect.
Social persuasion
Social persuasion can be seen as coaches, mentors or skilled practitioners. As Bandura says, these people “do more than simply convey positive appraisals. In addition to cultivating people’s beliefs in their capabilities, they structure situations for them in ways that bring success and avoid placing them prematurely in situations where they are likely to experience repeated failure.”
Enhancing the individual’s physical status and reducing stress levels
People often read their bodily states of stress as undermining their performance. Changing the individual’s stress level will alter their perception of their potential competencies and actual competencies.
When it comes to support, the balance must be right. While the role of the Developmental Coach may be to assist in helping all four of these areas come into fruition, overly supporting the individual with unnecessary help can cause them to lose their sense of competence, i.e. competence can easily turn into incompetence if the conditions are not optimal. For example, if a highly skilled person is put in a role that has an inferior label, they will find it more challenging to perform to their usual skill level. Similarly, competition can also affect performance. This is clear in the realm of sport where belief about another’s competency can lead to psychological games as well as physical ones (and of course, they are not separate). If an individual expects a difficulty, they are more likely to perform less optimally.
Types of support
The method of support depends largely on the activity. As a Developmental Coach, you do not have to support every area of a coachee’s life, but you might support them in gaining the support they need. For example, if the coachee is:
an active sportsperson, you may be able to support them in finding a sports coach to develop their innate talent
developing good business acumen, you might point them towards a course of study that could take this further
So the role of the Developmental Coach is not to be all things to all men, but the very fact that the approach is integral means that it will not necessarily exclude any area of the coachee’s life.
Looking at the lines of development I have chosen, support may come in many different forms. The idea is to get you thinking about what else needs to be in place for the coachee to achieve their goals and dreams.
Cognitive
This includes the ability to ‘grasp’ within the areas of mathematical thinking, logic, reasoning etc, so support could be to direct the coachee to a good teacher, good books, courses etc.
Affect (emotional)
This relates to how the individual feels, including their feeling about other people’s perceptions of them. For example, a group of friends or a business that stretches the individual can change the way the person feels about themselves and the way they feel about other’s perception of them.
Interpersonal skills
This relates to relationships with others (which together with affect are similar to ‘emotional intelligence’). People can achieve support through mentors, teachers, friends etc that helps them develop their relationships to greater depth.
Financial
This relates to abilities to provide for one’s needs. Bank managers, advisors, books, achiever friends etc can provide assistance to develop this line.
Worldview
This is the appreciation of the difference between cultural perceptions. Reading about the dynamic changes in developing countries, culture and religion assist understanding and development. This is a huge area of potential study and can really push the developmental boundaries. If you take on Buddhist practice for instance, you may learn more about a Tibetan worldview – rather different to that in the West.
Meditative awareness
This is the practice of concentration and awareness practices. A community and teachers are especially useful (if not essential) in developing meditative awareness. With support structures in place you will be able to move on in the practice at a good rate; many don’t ever really undertake meditation as they don’t have proper instructions. Expert support here will make the difference.
Natural talent and ability
This may include linguistic capability, musical talent etc. People usually need a mentor or coach to take a natural ability further.
Physiological development
This is sporting ability, physical awareness etc which can be aided through a coach, teacher etc. For instance, for safety it is important to develop a sport with someone who has a high degree of skill beyond the individual’s own.
Moral development
This includes a person’s level of concern for others. Spending time with people who have a high level of care is support for developing this line. Increasingly we can see social networks being used to express and enable support for others as well. Technology has allowed ease of this value to emerge and be acted upon.
So whatever a person’s chosen activities, more support will help them deal with the challenges that can arise. By developing with the support of another, people grow further and faster, and feel able to test out possibilities. It can also make it more fun.
To recap, if the coachee feels they have even a slight need to increase their development in any area, as coach you should begin to think which line of development they need to focus on to move on. For example, if someone is constantly running into financial difficulties, then their financial line needs extending; is lacking in confidence and self-esteem, then their emotional line needs development; is tackling a task which is technically too difficult for them, then their cognitive level needs developing to enable them to get a better ‘grasp’; has an attitude that their own well-being is all that ever matters and people are reacting against this, then their moral development may need extending, and so on. In this session, if you choose, this can be used as an exercise to start bringing it all together. This is when things become more integral.
Four areas
As a Developmental Coach looking to support someone in creating the life they want, you will usually need to focus on four main areas. Applying a little of the content of the next session’s 4 Quadrant model, there follows a condensed version of some of the lines of development that exist within these quadrants, i.e. body, mind, relationships and money. This model will support your internal thinking when coaching because using it shows any areas in the coachee’s life that are not being considered or developed. This is almost a minimalist model (in comparison to certain other areas of the book) but it should be viewed in terms of the appropriate support that can be given. These are the minimum conditions that need to be set up in life. Whether using the GROW model, or a life plan, this should give some guidance about to what to look for in a coachee’s life and whether the conditions are accordingly set up. This session then is the start to thinking about the “spread” of a person’s life activities. You may find yourself nudging them in some new directions of which they hadn’t as yet thought.
Body
Good health is clearly an important element for almost, if not, everyone. But so often, and echoing the words of Carly Simon, we don’t know what we have until its gone. Good diet, exercise such as gym or hatha (physical) yoga, physical activity such as walking, cycling and gardening are all aspects of good physical health. If a person is able to deal with a condition through medical treatment or alternative treatment they might, in the case of a back problem, find themselves considerably enhancing their life quality. For those without a physical focus, they may not initially see the benefits, but they will be felt soon after taking the appropriate actions. Dietary concerns are also paramount and a sensible eating regime certainly sets up the conditions for a healthy body.
Mind (and emotions)
They need to be thinking in a way and at a level that will aid their movement in life, as we discussed. Also, dealing with appropriate emotional responses, including the line of development called ‘affect’, as well as the adaptations and sub personalities all need to be considered. When a person is more emotionally balanced, their quality of life can generally be improved.
Relationships
A good approach to developing healthy and kind relationships is essential and this includes increasing the breadth of concern one has for all types of people. So often fulfilment in life will often come from our interactions with others. It can be lonely being successful when you don’t have anyone to enjoy it with.
Financial
You may be surprised to hear that the fourth condition is money. You need to earn enough to allow you to have the activities you want in your life. In a Western society, working on this aspect of life will resolve many of the difficulties you experience. If you look at many of the problem areas in people’s lives, how many of them are connected to money issues? At this point in 2012 when recession looms once more, this is truer than ever. When people work with this area of life, they set up the right conditions to do the work in many of the other ones. Also, in another way (and as we are seeing these areas as integral) if someone improves their emotional or relational abilities it is almost certain to have a positive impact on this fourth condition of money.
