Why I’m a Pragmatist of Personal Development

And how I help people uncover their own answers

I love personal development coaching. And I love coaching in a field that talks about consciousness and thought.

But I’m not a spiritual coach. Don’t get me wrong, I am spiritual, although I’m not going to mention the too-often-recited Pierre Teilhard de Chardin quote;

‘We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience.’

Oops, I just did.

While I’m as woo-woo as the next person as long as the next person is woo-woo, and I love talking and reading about non-duality and consciousness, I am a pragmatist when coaching my clients.

After all, as the spiritual teacher Rupert Spira says, if a client comes to you because they’re anxious, it doesn’t help them to tell them that they don’t exist. And I don’t give my clients ‘how-to’s’ or techniques to use or tools to add to their toolbox.

And yet I see clients transform their lives every day.

So how do I help my clients?

I point my clients to see how they’re constantly creating their reality for themselves minute by minute. Yes, I know that bills to pay, rent or mortgage arrears, or a relationship break up are real, but they’re the circumstances, and I want people to see that they are not their circumstances.

See how they’re experiencing their thoughts about their circumstances, not what is happening.

You’re Not Your Circumstances

I saw a client this morning, Samantha, who was up and buzzy.

It was beautiful to see, as last week she’d been down and depressed. Last week I urged her to notice the thoughts she was running about her life. As Cellular Biologist Bruce Lipton says, if you want to know what beliefs you’re running, look at your life. She felt trapped and said she had no options or control over her life.

This week everything is roses.

Samantha knew when she was running habitual, old thoughts by the feeling she was in, and when she noticed the feeling, she allowed herself to have a new thought. When you’re in habitual thinking, imagining you can think differently can be impossible. I had a client who told me that she couldn’t have a new thought.

‘Go and kick the wall’, I told her.

‘What?’

‘Go on, kick the wall. Because I guarantee you’ll have a new thought.’

She laughed and told me the following week that this showed her how easy it is to let the habitual thought go and allow yourself to notice a new thought.

Pragmatism in action.

Samantha felt very different this week, and yet nothing in her life had changed. Her circumstances were the same, so how could she feel so optimistic and excited about her life when the week before, she had felt so bad?

Because she had stopped taking her thoughts seriously, she realised that a thought about feeling trapped was no more important than a thought about cleaning her teeth. And she saw how her thoughts about being trapped created her feeling of being trapped.

I could have given her a technique to change the feeling.

She could have run the film she was watching in her head backwards. She could have changed the film from colour to black and white or removed the sound. Or she could have tapped her meridian points.

What an effort.

It’s far easier to understand that you don’t have to manage your thoughts; after all, the thought you’re trying to manage has already left the building, so you’d have to create a new thought about the old subject to attempt to manage it.

It’s far less effort and easier to cut out the middleman and go straight to seeing that you’re feeling the shadow of a thought. And you’re free to have a new thought whenever you want by letting go of the old one.

Or I could have told her that all would be well and the universe had her back, but that wouldn’t be helpful as the universe isn’t looking after you.

The Universe Isn’t Looking After You

I worked with someone very close to Stephen Hawkin years ago.

She also wrote books with him and told me how it drove her and Stephen crazy when people said, ‘the universe will look after me’ or ’the universe will provide.’

She said that when she heard this, she would ask them if they knew what the universe was. She said the universe is a big empty space where nothing much happens except the occasional violent collision, and do they think that the universe is really looking after them?

The universe isn’t going to charge in on a big white horse and save you.

The pragmatist in me points out that no one will save you. You don’t need saving.

You’re resilient even if you don’t think you are.

You exhibit resilience every single day. Whether it’s bouncing back from an argument, stubbing your toe or the dog eating the family roast while your back is turned.

So why don’t you always feel resilient?

Because resilience, like confidence, gets covered up by layers of thought.

My grandad used to tell stories about how his parents would decide to throw an impromptu party when he was a child growing up in a rough part of London. They would go out into the street and bang a wooden spoon against a tin dustbin lid to tell the neighbours about the party.

He said he never knew that the party would take place but would often wake up under a pile of coats as neighbours would come in and throw their coats on the bed without realising he was there. Your resilience is hidden under a pile of coats, or thoughts, in your case.

You don’t need the universe because you are the universe. You have your back.

As I say, I am spiritual, and whilst I enjoy losing myself in thoughts and books about consciousness and non-duality, my clients don’t need that from me.

My clients need a belt and braces approach to help them to get clarity and to realise that they already have the answers they’re looking for. My job is to help them uncover the answers.

And sometimes, they just need to metaphorically kick the wall.