Neuroscience
Why coaching and neuroscience?
Everything we do is controlled by your brain.
Every decision, emotion, thought and action.
Our logo was inspired by this passage from William James, the great American psychologist:
‘Nature in her unfathomable designs had mixed us of clay and flame, of brain and mind, that the two things hang indubitably together and determine each other’s being but how or why, no mortal may ever know’.
The bright flickering and fascinating flame is our awareness and subjective experience.
Where does it come from?
From the material of the brain.
Psychology describes and tries to understand the flame.
Neuroscience describes and tries to understand the candle that produces the flame.
We need both.
What is neuroscience?
The study of the structure and function of the nervous system and brain and their relation to behaviour and learning.
What do coaches need?
We need practical applications.
We can’t understand ourselves or our clients without knowing something of neuroscience.
Psychological models are being rewritten all the time as we know more about how the brain works. We need to not just stay informed and credible, but also to use these insights in the best way.
Coaching is incorporating more and more neuroscience.
But there are two traps to avoid…
First – dressing up the same old self-help ideas in a white coat.
Second – learning the Latin names for the brain parts and only using the vocabulary without the practical applications.
The more we know about the brain, the more we can understand our thoughts, emotions and actions.
And the more wonder and respect we have for the incredible complexity of our felt experience.
