“Steam work” is the work you do both in a coaching session, and on an ongoing basis to increase flow, meaning, and purpose in your life. The method I prefer for stream work is Jungian coaching with a focus on dialogos.

Jungian Coaching uses principles from Carl Jung’s work, including respect for the unconscious elements of a person, an understanding of the influence of archetypes, and awareness of the power of non-rational experiences such as dreams and rituals, to facilitate individuation.

Dialogos is a dialogue that allows a kind of flow that is similar to the flow defined by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. During Jungian coaching the openness to “depth” and the intention to clarify and reveal the wishes of the client’s deepest callings reliably creates flow. This is because plumbing the depths of your psyche for wisdom is engaging and challenging, two of the factors needed for flow. I believe that finding that wisdom is both possible and likely for most people, fulfilling the third requirement for flow. Dialogos allows “collective intelligence” to emerge. In other words, dialogos opens up insight that neither participant could reach alone. This is why Jungian Coaching is described as a partnership.

The heart of this special type of dialogue is the practice of asking perceptive questions designed to help strip away unconscious avoidance and self-deception. It can be described as the practice of moving a dialogue from exploration and clarity into insight and a shifted perspective.

The key distinction is that ordinary conversation is based on an exchange of information. Dialogos is seeking to uncover information not known to either person consciously. It also tends to move people from having questions to living questions¹. Dialogos is what happens when two people enter the state of unknowing together and something genuinely new emerges between them that neither knew consciously.

A Jungian coach is helpful in this as few people have the opportunity to practice depth work on their own. It is important to understand that the coach doesn’t deliver insight to you, but instead a coach will participate in dialogos with the specific intent to help you uncover hidden aspects of yourself and get in touch with the various parts of your psyche. In this way you get in touch with your own inner wisdom.

Stream Work is also informed by Internal Family Systems Theory and the spiritual insights from my long study of wabi sabi — "nothing lasts, nothing is finished, and nothing is perfect.”

More on Flow

Stream work is intended to create better flow in your life. This occurs when you examine unconscious aspects of yourself that were repressed or rejected and create a better connection to your True Self.

Techniques such as unburdening of parts and individuation improve inner communication between your parts and allow your thoughts and creativity to flow more freely.

The flow of dialogos is similar to the flow you experience when you feel rapt attention and enjoyment because you are fully immersed in energized focus, often oblivious to the passage of time. Psychologists discovered that this kind of flow is experienced most when you, 1. face a challenging or complex task you 2. have confidence you can complete. Much of life is challenging and complex and our wounds, anxiety, and depression can prevent this kind of flow. Stream Work in this scenario involves identifying the information, techniques, and skills you need to face the challenges with confidence. Sometimes the biggest factor is the the empathic support of a coach who has practiced these skills.

Individuation

A big component of stream work is individuation, a process first described by renowned Swiss psychoanalyst, Carl Jung.

Jung – Carl Jung contributed foundational ideas to psychology such as introversion and extraversion, the shadow, the collective unconscious, archetypes, complexes, synchronicity, and individuation. Jungian coaching is designed to enhance and support the individuation process.[1]

The Individuation Process – Jung identified the first half of life as a time to adapt to society, form an identity, and achieve external goals. Traditional counseling and coaching can be a big help during this phase of life. He said the second half of life is a time for individuation, the process of becoming aware of your unconscious and shadow elements and integrating them into a balanced psyche. By exploring your triggers and hidden parts, you can resolve catches and heal wounds that keep you stuck. The process of individuation can connect you to resources within yourself to weather storms and grow throughout your lifetime. Jungian coaching is particularly well suited to people doing this work in the second half of life.

Meaning – The work of Dr. Todd Pressman reveals that loss of meaning is one of our 5 core fears. He explains that without meaning there is a sense of emptiness and being cut off from life. University of Toronto professor John Vervaeke identified a crisis of meaning as a big cause of depression and anxiety in the current age. The good news is that a crisis of meaning gives you the opportunity to explore new practices and traditions to help reacquire your relationship with your true Self and in so doing, map out a path to a meaningful life.

Spirituality and Science –Psychiatrists and Psychologists tend to favour a scientific approach to mental health. Those of us in the dynamic psychology tradition appreciate this approach and focus on integrating scientific discoveries with intuitive and spiritual aspects of human life. We question older medical models that pathologize and medicate, even when we recognize the benefit of medication and therapeutic techniques like cognitive behavioural therapy.

Many people have experienced life in a repressive religion and have grown to distrust anything spiritual, but often grieve the loss of the positive aspects of a faith tradition.

Having spent many years within Christianity, while also exploring other traditions such as Buddhism and Stoicism, I now take an integral view. Integral theory[2] lets us value both spirituality and science, identifying where we can make breakthroughs to integrate them and also leverage them for personal growth and development.

If you are interested in exploring these topics further, I will soon be offering coaching sessions based on this approach. Reach out to me at stillstreamcoaching@outlook.com for more information.

[1] “The purpose of a Jungian coach is to honor the individuation process.” - Handbook of Jungian Coaching by Akke-Jeanne Klenk.

[2] A model of development based in the research of Clare Graves, and popularized in such theories as Spiral Dynamics.

This article is under development.

Type 1 - Better Flow

Creative and energetic flow is often impeded by unconscious aspects of yourself that were repressed or rejected early in life for social or survival reasons, but that over time have become a obstacle or impediment.

Stream work involves individuation, the process of examining these shadow elements so that they can be accepted and embraced. Often what is required is a shift in perspective to see the repressed elements through the eyes of compassion and understanding. Other times wounded or exiled parts can be brought into a better relationship or connection to your True Self. Techniques such as unburdening of parts and reassignment of roles can improve inner harmony and allow your thoughts and creativity to flow more naturally.

Another kind of flow is that feeling of rapt attention and enjoyment when you are fully immersed in focused activities, often oblivious to the passage of time. Psychologists discovered that this kind of flow is experienced most when you face a very challenging or complex task, but a task you have confidence you can complete.

Dr. John Vervaeke recently said, “When you are in the flow state, the egoic self-image drops away because all of that talk in your head about maintaining your egoic self image — how do I look? How am I doing? Am I failing? Am I succeeding? What are they thinking? All of that goes silent. This is a defining feature of a flow state. And yet, what doesn’t go away is your agency. In fact your agency and your experience of the world are enhanced. And what that shows you is the ego is lying to you when it tells you that it’s self image is yourself.”

This important distinction between your ego’s sense of self, and your True Self, is discussed in How Parts Relate to Self:

I will also be writing more about this in the upcoming post, “True Self.”

Flow in this sense, then can increase both our experience of being in the world, and reduce our anxiety or depression by taking our attention off of the source of our anxiety or depression.

Aha!

Dr. Vervaeke discusses how flow comes from a cascade of insights. With Aha moments and insight, we have the sense of “optimally gripping the world” or seeing reality deeply. He says that the more you experience flow, the more you have a sense of meaning in your life. See Dr. Vervaeke discuss this idea:

Lets face it, much of life is challenging and complex and our wounds, anxiety, and depression prevent flow. According to this idea, our life can be deeply meaningful if we feel up for the challenge. Unfortunately many of us are lacking the confidence and so the complexity and difficulty of life isn’t an opportunity for flow, it is just a series of difficult experiences.

Sometimes the biggest factor that makes the difference in these situations is having an empathic reflective coach who can remind you of your strengths and help you focus on the resources you have within you to succeed. In this sense, coaching is about helping you build both skills and confidence in order that your life can flow.

Type 2 - The Mercurial Sage

The second type of stream work is the work of the “stream enterer.” In Theravāda Buddhism, a stream enterer (a sotāpanna) is a person who fully understand the Four Noble Truths and have committed to being a good, kind, compassionate person. The path they take is one of abandonment and letting go. Letting go of the idea of a permanent self, letting go of misgivings and doubt, and letting go of attachment to rules and vows. Conversely, they embrace a unity view of all things, faith in the spiritual endeavor, and development of a principled approach to ethics within a community of fellow stream enterers. This is, of course, my interpretation of the meaning, uncoupled from the historic and cultural language.

What is important about Stream Enterers, is that they have had “direct, irreversible insight into the nature of reality.” This experience of seeing reality deeply is one that I have sought much of my life. The stoics have a word for decisive philosophical conversion - epistrophē. It is the moment a person genuinely grasps that virtue is the only true good. Before that moment, you’re fumbling in the dark. After it, you’re oriented correctly, even if imperfectly. This idea is also captured in Plato’s cave analogy when the prisoners turn and begin moving towards the light, and in the Christian tradition of metanoia.

Ichnographically, many of these traditions place the entry of water as a central image, with it’s connotations of washing, cleansing, and flowing. In the Buddhist tradition water symbolizes purification, fluidity, and the dissolution of rigid ego-boundaries. In the Christian tradition it symbolizes dying to the old self, referred to in some traditions as the false self, and emerging out of the water to a new life.

One problem with both traditions is that they mark this transition as one into “the true view” or even “the truth,” and this idea that one traditions has the “really right” view of things leads to a sort of arrogance about the group that is counterproductive for true personal and spiritual growth.

However this pitfall can be avoided with the model of the mercurial sage. The sage in ancient Greek and pagan traditions, was someone who achieved a complete, stable alignment of reason and virtue — analogous to full liberation. But sage as a designation was almost impossible to achieve in these traditions, and so was sidelined under the growing theology of Christianity.

Socrates is widely recognized as having a balanced, if radical, view of the sage. He saw the sage as an ever-learning individual who’s love of wisdom keeps them humble and engaged in the pursuit of deeper understanding.

Dr. Vervaeke’s “After Socrates” series explores the Socratic model in great detail.

For the purpose of coaching, the idea of the sage is an abiding template that can guide the stream enterer to a more expansive end. Several traditions have a form of the mercurial sage.

• The Confucian junzi (exemplary person) who is always in a process of self-cultivation, never declared complete;

• The Jewish model of Torah study, where argument and re-reading are themselves the spiritual practice — the talmid hakham (student of the wise) who never stops being a student;

  and

• The Christian mystic’s apophatic tradition — knowing God precisely by un-knowing, by recognizing that every concept falls short of the divine.

If you resonate with any of these traditions, or with the idea of a life of closer apprehension of reality, then stream work may be for you.

In the tradition of Socrates I don’t claim to have answers, but I do claim to have found methods and techniques for going deeper in to this mode of being.

Are We Really Made of Parts?

In the 1980s Dr. Richard C. Schwartz began developing the Internal Family Systems (IFS) model and it has become the most popular “parts” therapy today. In his early work with patients who had eating disorders he heard them say things like, “a part of me believes that the thinner I am the more attractive I am,” or “when I overeat, a part of me says I’m weak and unlovable.” Dr. Schwartz took the “a part of me” part seriously. Maybe it was just a part of the person that thought or felt that way, and he became curious about that part — why did it think that way, and why was it so influential in the person’s life?

In 2000, he formed the Center for Self-Leadership, later renamed the IFS Institute, to promote the model in clinical, counseling, and coaching practices. Since then the model has become the most prominent alternatives to behavioral and cognitive treatments that dominate the space due to their effectiveness.

The fundamental idea of parts was proposed as far back as the influential book, Man and His Symbols, Edited by Carl Jung in 1964. In part 1 of the book Jung wrote about dreams, “It is on such [dream] evidence that psychologists assume the existence of an unconscious psyche — though many scientist and philosophers deny it’s existence. They argue naively that such an assumption implies the existence of two “subjects,” or (to put it in a common phrase) two personalities within the same individual. But this is exactly what it does imply — quite correctly.” He goes on to say that this state of division within the individual is not pathological, but quite normal and the result of the development of consciousness.

Dr Michael Sebastian in his paper, “Exploring Psychological Multiplicity in Jungian Psychology, IFS, and Schema Therapy,” points out that “William James, in The Principles of Psychology (1890), described the self as inherently divided, noting that individuals often experience conflicting desires and voices within their inner worlds. This fragmentation, he argued, was not necessarily pathological but a natural aspect of human psychology.”

Many remember cartoons from the 1960s depicting an angel and demon figure perched on a person’s shoulders trying to convince the person to follow his desire, or follow his principles or values. I suspect this experience of division within ourselves goes back further than these references, we find suggestions of it in scriptures and literary works thousands of years old.

Schwartz’ unique contribution was to bring Morton Mendel’s Family Systems Theory to this inner community. Schwartz identified a dynamic between the parts and a way to better integrate the “committee” that is us. The technique involves respectful dialogue with each part and building trust in what has come to be recognized as Self with a capital S.

Kenneth Gergen, in The Saturated Self (1991), argued that our ability to have different parts allowed individuals to let “different selves” emerge depending on the context and situation. Indeed protector parts can get very good at protecting us, and nurturing parts can get very good at parenting, and so on.

Parker J. Palmer in his book, “A Hidden Wholeness,” discussed the fact that we have this divided self, noting that we recognize it most when there is a separation between our inner truth and outer role. He calls this the “gap between our onstage performance and backstage reality.” Jung identified this reality as a distinction between our personas and our inner self. And when he said self, he envisioned something like an inner solar system where various parts orbited a central identity that later writers have called the true self or, you guessed it, simply Self with a capital S.

Self with a Capital S

In Chapter 3 of A Hidden Wholeness, Palmer explores the idea of the true self, saying, “We arrive in this world undivided, integral, whole. But sooner or later, we erect a wall between our inner and outer lives, trying to protect what is within us or to deceive the people around us. Only when the pain of our dividedness becomes more that we can bear do most of us embark on an inner journey towards living, “divided no more.””

Palmer used the idea of the Mobius strip to reveal that the two “sides” of the strip continue to co-create each other as we move around the strip. There is a wholeness, even as there are two sides. This is a nice way to understand how we can be “us,” or “who we are” as an individual. We (plural) as one (unity).

Thomas Merton, in New Seeds of Contemplation, describes when God discovers the divine identity in us, “At that moment the point of our contact with [God] opens out and we pass through the center of our own nothingness and enter into the infinite reality, where we awaken as our true self.” This is a realization that God sees God’s essence in all things, but also personification can be understood as a natural product of consciousness, both God’s and ours. In this sense, our self is selves all the way down.

A Critical Mass of Self

In an article on the IFS institute website[6] Dr. Schwartz describes his discovery of a calm compassionate Self behind the parts of several of his clients. He writes, “When they were in that calm, compassionate state, I’d ask these clients what voice or part was present. They each gave a variation of the following reply: “that’s not a part like those other voices are. That’s more of who I really am. That’s my Self.” He goes on to describe working with another client and how his own inner parts raised fears and concerns until there was a breakthrough in which the client’s own compassionate self was revealed. It is a deeply warming and encouraging account of Dr. Schwartz’ persistence and how his own centering in “Self” with a capital S creates a therapeutic trust. Dr. Schwartz writes that over the years he has, “come to trust the healing power of what I’ll call the Self in clients and in myself. When there’s a critical mass of Self in a therapy office, healing just happens.”

In an interview with Tami Simmon for Sounds True, Dr. Schwartz explained, “… that’s the way I’ve come to see Self, that it isn’t individualized; it’s not this little particle inside of us; but that actually, it is a field or a wave; and that when you enter that (and mystics have entered that for years; people can enter that these days through psychedelics often or meditating) you lose the boundaries around your individual body actually a lot of the time, and enter that field, you do feel this enormous connectedness and sense that we aren’t really different, we aren’t disconnected in the way we have been. And that then if you can bring that awareness, that C word, connectedness, back into your individual, body-bound Self (which is a lot of the impact I think of psychedelics now) it really changes many things in people’s lives, just that knowledge that we’re not these isolated little units.”

In the original article mentioned above, Dr. Schwartz says it another way, “Though they used different words, all the esoteric traditions within the major religions – Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity, Judaism, Islam – emphasized their same core belief: we are sparks of the eternal flame, manifestations of the absolute ground of being. It turns out that the divine within – what the Christians call the soul or Christ Consciousness, Buddhists call Buddha Nature, the Hindus Atman, the Taoists Tao, the Sufis the Beloved, the Quakers the Inner Light – often doesn’t take years of meditative practice to access because it exists in all of us, just below the surface of our extreme parts. Once they agree to separate from us, we suddenly have access to who we really are.”

Dr. Schwartz says we can tap into Self at the very core of our being to provide a “deep keel for our sailboat in the storm,” This core, when we are grounded in it, keeps us centered in what he calls “… the deep ground of our being…” a term popularized by Paul Tillich.

Is Schwartz saying that the self at the core of our being, the Self with a capital S, is God? Perhaps not as some theists might conceive it, but I think he is suggesting something along those lines. For Schwartz (and perhaps Jung, Merton, and Palmer too) the Self with a capital S is a field in which we all participate and that connects all of us. Less an individual being, and more a universal presence manifesting or embodying the 8 Cs of the theory.

If Dr. Schwartz is correct, and I think he is, the coach and therapist’s job begins with an intention to heal and stabilize their own inner system to allow Self to flow freely.

As a Coach I will:

• make enough space in my life for this work, and allowing enough time to build an ecology of practice around the 5 P’s.

• hold space for others to experience a greater flow of Self, and to experience the healing power of the 8 C’s.

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References - the C’s and P’s

The 8 C’s and 5 P’s

The 8 C’s of IFS are the core qualities of the Self:

Calmness: Emotional regulation for a strong stable systems that feels safe and can not be easily disrupted with turmoil, noise, or agitation.

Curiosity: Fascination, interest, and attention to novel or wonderous objects, situations, or experiences from an inquisitive desire to know and understand.

Clarity: A sense of seeing and understanding things and situations accurately and without confusion, gaps, or blind spots. In the context of coaching, it is seeing your parts and their roles without being overwhelmed by emotions or a desire to look away.

Compassion: The deep feeling of sharing the suffering of another that inclines or motivates a person to give aid or support or show mercy. It is essential to foster towards our parts as part of the process of affirming the effort and cost to fulfill their role.

Confidence: The feeling of assurance or certainty, especially in an ability, such as the ability to lead the internal system.

Courage: The state or quality of mind that enables one to face danger with self-possession, confidence, and resolution. In this context it is the inner fortitude or strength to face combative, vulnerable, or resistant parts or difficult emotions.

Creativity: The ability to bring into being novel or original ideas, stories, and objects, including the creation of innovative solutions and responses, such as new jobs for parts to do and unique ways that parts can resolve internal conflicts.

Connectedness: being bound together, joined, or united and the way in which things make contact, form networks, and form part of a whole. In groups it is the sense of belonging through social interaction and sharing. Internally is is a sense of unity and harmony within your parts.

These qualities are not just concepts—they are somatic signals (body-based experiences) that indicate when you are accessing your true Self. When you embody the 8 C’s, you’re no longer reacting from protective parts but leading from your authentic core. The Self is considered un-damageable and already present, even when obscured by trauma or stress.

The 5 P’s

Dr. Schwartz also frequently references the 5 P’s of IFS that he says embody the qualities of the Self:

Presence: Being fully aware and grounded in the present moment, observing internal experiences without judgment or the urge to fix.

Patience: Allowing each part of the system time to express itself, recognizing that healing unfolds gradually and requires space.

Persistence: Committing to the work even when it becomes difficult, consistently returning to the process with gentle, compassionate engagement.

Perspective: Stepping back to see the bigger picture, understanding parts’ roles and intentions within the whole system without getting caught in their immediate reactions.

and,

Playfulness: Approaching the inner world with lightness, curiosity, and creativity, which helps reduce resistance and encourages openness.

Types of Flow

The term flow was popularized by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi in the 1970s. It refers to a state of deep concentration and absorption in an activity, and this because of a balance between the challenge of the task and the skill level you have for that task. When there is a balance, meaning you are confident you can meet the challenge, you experience optimal engagement and intrinsic motivation.

Dave Evans suggests that this state lies in a sweet spot between anxiety and boredom. If your skill is not sufficient, you experience anxiety (it is too hard!) and if the task is too easy for you, you experience boredom (I need something more challenging).

Evans, working out of the Stanford Life Design Lab he co-founded, has extended the idea of flow, noting that meaning arises not from future achievements (the completed task), but from full participation in the present moment (the flow state).

Flow, therefore, offers an “intense experience of being alive,” making even mundane tasks meaningful if we can change the way we view them. For a good introduction to Dave Evan’s work, try the podcast at Good Life Project.

Flow World vs. Transactional World

Evans contrasts the “flow world,” which values presence and experience, with the “transactional world” focused on output and impact. Much of life is framed by transactions. For example going to work to receive a paycheque. Transactions and the measures of performance that determine how much we can transact, has a dark side. It is called the cult of productivity, a kind of brain washing that is deeply imbedded in western culture. Much of the “rah rah” style of coaching has been directed at goal setting and goal achieving, trying always for maximum impact. Such work is important, we all like to feel able and competent, but the world of impact has overshadowed the flow world of “presence.”

Evans, who led the design of Apple's first mouse and is a Consulting Assistant Professor at Stanford University, is no stranger to maximum impact. He made a name for himself with excellence in design and productivity, and has worked to balance high achievement with “simple flow” — what he describes as engaging with reality in the current moment. Rather than it all being about peak performance, he invites us to see the compliment, something I paraphrase as Deep Presence.

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Deep Presence?

How does one cultivate deep presence in your life?

Both psychology and spirituality have long recognized the value of deep presence for healthy communities and individuals. This is sometimes described as, “the practice of the presence,” “holding space for others,” “mindfulness,” and other terms that emphasize setting aside ego-focused activities for truly “being”.

Join with the Flow

P.T. Mistlberger in his book, Rude Awakening, says that the word translated as Zen, Cha’an, and dhyana are sometimes translated in English as meditation but, “In fact [the original] carries complex meaning, denoting various levels of progressive deepening of meditation, but the essence of the meaning of the word is to ‘join with the flow’ of each moment. This is a key insight because in the realm of experience, there actually is no ‘now’, because all is in perpetual flux, perpetual change, like a moving river. The only thing static is consciousness itself. To meditate, in the true sense of the word, is to move beyond the constant change of existence, into the immutable and crystal-clear nature of pure awareness.”

This Buddhist idea of joining with the flow is in alignment with Evans’ work. Life is a perpetual flux, full of change and uncertainty, and so, much of the time, we will not feel up for a task. This can often be because of a lack of confidence, or because we have suffered a series of defeats.

Stream Work Coaching focuses on both the impediments to confidence and competence, AND how to face the disappointments of life that come with “failures” and setbacks. By refocusing on “being” as the priority, the pressure to always “do more” is given a clarifying container. When we are able to simply be present, we can join in the flow and experience the same sense of engagement that comes from high ability and challenging tasks, but with a second layer of awareness.

This decision to consciously enter the flow, and feel the flow, is a practice, like meditation or exercise, or playing a musical instrument, with the difference that the sense of flow is not some far off reward for hard work. Instead it is a shift in perception, and a shift in values. Even in failure there can be flow, even in stillness there can be a sense of movement. Flow, in this wider context, is the movement of attention and intention between doing and being. Both are part of the whole.

Flow in this deeper sense, is matching ourselves to the movements that provide meaning and purpose to us, while also acknowledging that we must face life’s challenges, whether we have the skills or not.

Flow of this kind, almost always starts as a trickle. But the more we make a channel for it, the more natural it becomes; and little by little, we open a path so that flow can occur more often.

Dr. Tracy Foose says we should reframe anxiety, “not as a frailty, but as the biological scaffolding of empathy, humility, and restraint.” While many of us feel concern about the rise of anxiety and worry about the deleterious effect of it on our children and grand-children, she argues it’s the only thing still holding us together:

Her message has significant ramifications for people with anxiety. She writes, “My years spent in [my role as Director of the Anxiety Disorders Treatment Program at UCSF] taught me that we are wired for fear and anxiety and the more we attempt to rid ourselves of these emotions the stronger they become. When we sit with our fear and anxiety and ask, "why are you here?" these emotions cease to act as tormentors and take on their intended role as protective messengers: helping us become wiser, stronger, and aware of goals and direction we did not know were there.”

Let that sink in — anxiety is a protective messenger to help us be wise and strong. As a fellow highly anxious person, I discovered this role for anxiety only after 30 years of suffering. It was the Welcoming Prayer that taught me to welcome all my feelings and that once welcomed, anxious parts can be my biggest allies.

I also relate to Dr. Foose’ admonition, “Highly anxious people just have a harder time feeling certain they know a thing for sure, but this keeps them more intellectually humble, open-minded and less vulnerable to black and white, zero-sum thinking.”

She references this study: Convergent Neural Correlates of Empathy and Anxiety During Socioemotional Processing; and this one: Computations of uncertainty mediate acute stress responses in humans to explain that Bayesian learning makes Highly Anxious people more accurate in their predictions of future events. Bayesian learning is commonly used to discuss how to build more robust neural networks and artificial intelligence. Is it possible that highly anxious people have been selected for over time because their neural tendency to remain uncertain has given them an edge in predicting and avoiding the dangers of modern life, especially social dangers associated with targeted media manipulation?

In other words, do highly anxious people just have better bullshit detectors?

Perhaps.

But we can also mis-apprehend our “gift” and seek to avoid the unsettling consequences of anxiety, the heightened vigilance, second guessing, and exhaustion that comes from being constantly revved up by it. Dr. Foose explains that this can lead to an Anxiety disorder:

And anxiety disorders reduce our effectiveness in the world. So it is good to learn how to manage our anxiety and build a life that doesn’t fight against it, but integrates it.

If you are highly anxious, take heart, feel seen and heard, and welcome your unique ability to see and predict reality. In the moment of a panic attach or crippling sense of shame over what you are feeling, take a step back and give yourself some patience and support.

The long term project is to weave together an ecology of practice that helps you leverage the power of anxiety. This is what Dr. Foose is getting at when she talks about character:

I can affirm that character is not a simple fix, but it is a long term benefit. A benefit not only to those around you, but in the end to yourself. Anxiety has given you more humility, accuracy in predictions, empathy, and sensitivity to others suffering. As Dr. Foose says, we need as a society to stop rewarding insensitivity, arrogance and irresponsibility, and take narcissists off the stages. What we need now are Highly Sensitive Highly Anxious leaders who have learned to dial down, or balance out their anxiety with self compassion and an strengthening ecology of practice.

Thanks for visiting Still Stream Coaching. To help decide if this service is right for you, I created the following pages:

Coach or Counselor?

Is Stream Work right for me?

Fees and Packages

What Is Stream Work?

“Stream work,” refers to two specific types of work. The first is work you do to create better creative flow, better engagement with what matters to you, and better feelings of focus and connection. The second is work you do to increase meaning and purpose through a series of developmental exercises.

Does any of this sound familiar:

• “I feel like I’ve run out of inspiration”

• My passion is gone, I’m just going through the motions now”

• “I’ve achieved a lot, why do I feel empty?”

• “I don’t know what I actually want anymore”

• “I’m just dragging myself to work these days”

• “Have I lost my sense of direction?”

If so, you are not alone. Many of us are experiencing these feelings now. In fact it is so common that University of Toronto professor Dr. John Vervaeke has produced a series about it.

How do you restore your passion, enthusiasm, and sense of meaning and purpose? I was able to do it in my own life, and I think I can help you do the same, but there is a reason I picked the word “work” for my coaching method, “Stream Work.” Short term solutions exist to get you back on track quickly, but unless the underlying mis-alignment is addressed, you might go from activity to activity only to find the spark gone again.

Type 2 Steam Work involved a slightly or significantly courageous look at your values, your achievements, and your inner world to see if you are living with authenticity or if something else had been driving you.

The Goal of Stream Work Coaching

My goal as a coach is to support people to experience more flow in their life, both to increase their engagement and effectiveness, and also to deepen the journey into wisdom and service. If this sounds like something you would like to try, reach out to me (stillstreamcoaching @ outlook.com) to arrange a free 15 minute consultation, or check out one of the links mentioned above.

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