The Ecology of Coaching
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the profession of coaching as an ecological act. That may sound like an odd statement to make, so let me explain. First, it’s a symbiotic relationship. In science, symbiosis is the interaction between two different organisms (typically of differing species, but let’s assume it can work inter-species as well), which live in close proximity, with advantages of the relationship working for both parties. Likewise in coaching, clients benefit from learning about themselves and moving forward in manifesting their dreams, while coaches fulfill their sense of meaning and purpose by being in service to their client.
A good coach knows that they are coaching the whole person. The topic clients want coaching on is only the crust of what lies underneath. In the early stages of the coaching relationship or early on in a session, neither the client nor the coach may know the shape of the larger agenda; the longing, passion and magnificence that lies beneath the topical crust.
The archetypal psychologist James Hillman, in his book The Soul’s Code: In Search of Character and Calling, had a theory about our deepest life purpose he called the acorn theory. Hillman described how the acorn holds the total image of the oak tree it will become. You cannot see the tree in the acorn, but the core pattern of it is there, waiting to emerge. Hillman wrote:
The acorn theory proposes… that you and I and every single person is born with a defining image…We each embody our own idea, in the language of Plato and Plotinus. And this form, this idea, this image does not tolerate too much straying. The theory also attributes to this innate image an angelic or daimonic intention, as if it were a spark of consciousness; and, moreover, holds that it has our interest at heart because it chose us for its reasons.
The oak tree is the client’s big agenda. It is their life purpose, what motivates them and brings them joy, what they’ll move heaven and earth to manifest, and why they’ve hired you. It’s their archetypal blueprint — that seminal image or resonance that is longing to bloom and be manifest in the world. Their little agenda, or the topic they bring to a session, is the breadcrumb trail that leads to the archetypal resonance. The little agenda is important because it’s the means and path to the full fruition of the inner blueprint. What happens when we keep an ear to the archetype, to the oak emergent in the acorn, is a little bit of organic, ecological magic. It is the rich soil where the client can gestate and then flower into their fullest self.
One of the most enigmatic aspects of the coaching process is the use of intuition, that gut instinct or sudden emergence of an image by coach or client that has a powerful impact on the session. Science has told us in recent years that some tree species have whole root systems that can spread for hundreds of miles underground. The roots, along with other parts of the plants, can communicate danger of disease or insect invasion, and the trees can adjust their resources to support weaker trees in their colonies. In a similar way, we humans create close connections, both consciously known or remaining under the earth of our awareness in the unconscious. Like rhizome plants that spread out shoots from their rich underground world upwards towards the nourishing sun, so too ideas, images, and insights may rise up from the unconscious of either the coach or the client. A similar image, phrase, or word may be on the tip of each persons’ tongue, and it takes just one person to name it for it to have impact. If it resonates with the client (or coach), then a powerful resource, new awareness, or deepening trust between client and coach can seed and grow into a deeper understanding or decisive action and movement forward for the client.
What we do as coaches is about becoming aware of our own human nature, our inherent resources, and our innate creative force. As coaches, we tend to the garden of our clients’ life purposes, values, and dreams, and then we watch with satisfaction as our clients take root in their own generative capacity and grow into the glorious, unique and full expression of themselves.
As a coach myself (and perhaps for you too), participating in the coaching ecosystem is as nourishing as watching the cyclical and yet unique cycles of nature every year. In these dire ecological times, it helps me to think of coaching as not separate from nature, but instead to think of coaching as a powerful reinforcement of our natural capacities for mutually supportive relationships that are creative and evolutionarily beneficial for the human species. But also, as we become our best selves, perhaps we can be of service and value to the larger, more-than-human ecosystem in which we participate.