distinctionsT h e Q u a r T e r l y N e w s l e T T e r f o r C l i e N T s a N d f r i e N d s o f

Summer 2012

Loss: Get Used to It and Be Happyby James Flaherty

Yes, it’s true; every moment is a splendid, wondrous un-folding of the endless mystery of being. When we are

present and tuned in, we can feel this directly. The world is luminous, lit from the inside and deeply beautiful. No one needs to convince us. We simply have to calm ourselves enough to make direct contact with what is always right in front of us, within us, surrounding us.

Embedded in the nature of the endless unfolding is unre-peatability. No one, nothing, ever shows up the same way in the next moment. Sometimes we notice: the bird we have been listening to with rapt attention flies away, the flaming orange ball of sun sinks into the ocean, the last intricate notes of the fugue fade into silence.

Sometimes we don’t: we gaze into the mirror and wonder what became of our youth, our child goes off to university the day after we push her on the swing, all our friends suddenly start retiring from their jobs.

Our noticing or not does not defray or slow the flow of moments, each poignantly unique.

As you read this now, can you feel the moment shifting and fading?

We humans have always been dealing with loss because it is happening every moment. For millennia, we have attempted to capture a moment, pass on what the moment showed us or find ways to transcend it:

• We painted pictures of animals and the hunt in caves 40 or 50 thousand years ago.

• We built colossal pyramids 10 or 15 thousand years ago (a more realistic date than the one often given).

• We established dynasties, carved out countries, fought wars.

• We wrote haiku, played drums, danced as the ancestors did.

Practice of the Quarter............................3Poems of the Quarter...............................4Book of the Quarter.................................6

Happenings................................................. 7New Graduates........................................10Course Calendar......................................11

INDEX

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N E W V E N T U R E S W E S T

• We invented mathematical/sci-entific formulas.

• We carved, then painted, then photographed coronations, wed-dings and deaths.

• We wrote poems and plays and novels and biographies and memoirs and diaries and letters.

• We partnered and had children and tried to give them know-how or wisdom or virtue or money.

• We posted on our Facebook wall or blogged or tweeted.

• And we…

What did you do today or this week or with your life to capture the moment, pass along its impressions or transcend it?

What parts of your life are explained by your rela-tionship with the passing moment of continual loss?

I think that not only all spiritual traditions but all lasting philosophical traditions have attempted to deal with the undeniable, unchangeable, flashing moments of loss that make up our human lives.

Here’s what one of the greatest scholars of the West-ern philosophical canon, Pierre Hadot, has to say: “Linked to the meditation upon death, the theme of the value of the present instant plays a fundamen-tal role in all the philosophical schools. In short it is a consciousness of inner freedom. It can be sum-marized in a formula of this kind: you need only yourself in order immediately to find inner peace by ceasing to worry about the past and the future. You can be happy right now, or you will never be happy. Stoicism will insist on the effort needed to pay attention to oneself, the joyous acceptance of the present moment imposed on us by faith. The Epicurean will conceive of this liberation from cares about the past and the future as a relaxation, a pure joy of existing; ‘While we are speaking, jealous time has flown; seize today without placing your trust

in tomorrow.’ This is Horace’s fa-mous laetus in praesens, this ‘enjoy-ment of the pure present’…”. [From Philosophy As a Way of Life by Pierre Hadot, 1995 Blackwell Publishing, Malden, MA, page 69]

The Stoics urge us to pay very close attention and watch whenever our heart/mind starts to worry or tries to protect us from what’s happening.

The Epicureans alternately implore us to relax and to feel deeply into what underlies every arising expe-rience to the exquisite pleasure of simple existence.

What is your method?

That is really my point. It’s very easy for us to read spiritual or philosophical or poetic writings and nod our head when we are reminded that each moment is soon irreplaceably gone.

But how are you living? What are you postponing or avoiding or attempting to hold on to? Your hap-piness fully depends upon your answer. No circum-stance will ever bring happiness because even if it is wonderful in the moment, it soon…—well, you get the point.

The chance to grow up, to be mature, to come into your own, follows from your answer. How will you respond? How will you work with your clients in facing the most fundamental truths about our hu-manity?

The poems book and practice of the quarter take up these topics from different angles. I hope they fortify your inquiry and resolve.

Take care of yourself.

Love,

© New Ventures West® 20�2

(continued from p.1)

2

Relating to the passing moment: What is your method?

Part 1

Please do this self-reflection for 2 weeks before you move on to part 2.

Instructions: Please stop twice per day and ask yourself the following questions. Please take some brief notes so that you can begin to notice patterns.

During this period of time:

• How did I respond in my thoughts and actions and words to a moment that I liked?

• How did I respond in my thoughts and actions and words to a moment I did not like?

• Did I attempt to hold on to, postpone or avoid:

- any experience or

- any event or

- any relationship or

- any communication?

Part 2

Please do the following self-observation for a month after you have done part 1.

Instructions: Whenever you notice yourself attempting to hold on to, avoid or postpone any ele-ment of your experience or action, please ask yourself the following questions:

• What experience could I become aware of more acutely right now that would allow me to embrace the moment?

• In what ways could I relax my body/heart/mind that would let me fully embrace the moment?

• What am I learning that I can take forward into the next moment?

P R A C T I C E O F T H E Q U A R T E R

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P O E M S O F T H E Q U A R T E R

Poems by Mark Doty

Grateful for their tourof the pharmacy,the first-grade classhas drawn these pictures,each self-portrait tapedto the window-glass,faces wide to the street,round and available,with parallel lines for hair.

I like this one best: Brian,whose attenuated namefills a quarter of the frame,stretched beside impossiblelegs descending from the ballof his torso, two long armsspringing from that samecentral sphere. He breathes here,

on his page. It isn’t craftthat makes this figure come alive;Brian draws just balls and lines,in wobbly crayon strokes.Why do some marksseem to thrill with life,possess a portionof the nervous energyin their maker’s hand?

That big curve of a smilereaches nearly to the rimof his face; he holdsa towering ice cream,brown spheres teeteringon their cone,a soda fountain gifthalf the length of him—as if it were the flag

of his own country held highby the unadorned black lineof his arm. Such naked supportfor so much delight! Artless boy,he’s found a system of beauty:he shows us pleasureand what pleasure resists.The ice cream is delicious.He’s frail beside his relentless standard.

This salt-stain spotmarks the place where menlay down their heads,back to the bench,

and hoist nothingthat need be liftedbut some burden they’ve chosenthis time: more reps,

more weight, the upward shoveof it leaving, collectively,this sign of where we’ve been:shroud-stain, negative

flashed onto the vinylwhere we push somethingunyielding skyward,gaining some power

at least over flesh,which goads with desire,and terrifies with frailty.Who could say who’s

added his heat to the nimbusof our intent, here wherewe make ourselves:something difficult

lifted, pressed or curled,Power over beauty,power over power!Though there’s something more

tender, beneath our vanity,our will to become objectsof desire: we sweat the markof our presence onto the cloth.

Here is some halothe living made together.

Brian Age Seven

At the Gym

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The intact facade’s now almost black in the rain; all day they’ve torn at the back of the building, “the oldest concrete structure in New England,” the newspaper said. By afternoon, when the backhoe claw appears above three stories of columns and cornices,

the crowd beneath their massed umbrellas cheer. Suddenly the stairs seem to climb down themselves, atomized plaster billowing: dust of 1907’s rooming house, this year’s bake shop and florist’s, the ghosts of their signs faint above the windows lined, last week, with loaves and blooms.

We love disasters that have nothing to do with us: the metal scoop seems shy, tentative, a Japanese monster tilting its yellow head and considering what to topple next. It’s a weekday, and those of us with the leisure to watch are out of work, unemployable or academics,

joined by a thirst for watching something fall. All summer, at loose ends, I’ve read biographies, Wilde and Robert Lowell, and fallen asleep over a fallen hero lurching down a Paris boulevard, talking his way to dinner or a drink, unable to forget the vain and stupid boy

he allowed to ruin him. And I dreamed I was Lowell, in a manic flight of failing and ruthless energy, and understood how wrong I was with a passionate exactitude which had to be like his. A month ago, at Saint-Gauden’s house, we ran from a startling downpour

into coincidence: under a loggia built for performances on the lawn hulked Shaw’s monument, splendid

in its plaster maquette, the ramrod-straight colonel high above his black troops. We crouched on wet gravel and waited out the squall; the hieratic woman

-- a wingless angel? -- floating horizontally above the soldiers, her robe billowing like plaster dust, seemed so far above us, another century’s allegorical decor, an afterthought who’d never descend to the purely physical soldiers, the nearly breathing bronze ranks crushed

into a terrible compression of perspective, as if the world hurried them into the ditch. “The unreadable,” Wilde said, “is what occurs.” And when the brutish metal rears above the wall of unglazed windows --where, in a week, the kids will skateboard

in their lovely loops and spray their indecipherable ideograms across the parking lot -- the single standing wall seems Roman, momentarily, an aqueduct, all that’s left of something difficult to understand now, something Oscar

and Bosie might have posed before, for a photograph. Aqueducts and angels, here on Main, seem merely souvenirs; the gaps where the windows opened once into transients’ rooms are pure sky. It’s strange how much more beautiful

the sky is to us when it’s framed by these columned openings someone meant us to take for stone. The enormous, articulate shovel nudges the highest row of moldings and the whole thing wavers as though we’d dreamed it, our black classic, and it topples all at once.

P O E M S O F T H E Q U A R T E R

Demolition

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B O O K O F T H E Q U A R T E R

Instinctual Intelligence: The Primal Wisdom of the Nervous System and the Evolution of Human Nature by Theodore Usatynski

This book explains in both technical and narrative fashion what physiologically happens to bring us out of the present moment. The author is a scholar and practitioner so that his writing is ac-cessible, practical and reliable.

The text starts off with a somewhat rigorous explanation of the physiology of our instinctual nervous system. The information is essential for coaches, parents, teachers, managers or anyone dedicated to the support and development of people, including themselves.

The reader can get into as much detail as s/he wants as the author references the most up-to-date work in cognitive research and gives ample references for additional study. The boiled-down, es-sential version is that our nervous system has two operating sys-tems: the sympathetic, which readies us for action by increasing blood flow, dilating our eyes, releasing certain hormones and so on, and the parasympathetic, which slows us down, calms us down, and in most severe cases shuts us down.

Our childhood socialization was in every case a unique mixture of the firing of the parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous systems, which leads to our current-day ability to face what is coming towards us, or be overwhelmed, or unfocused, or oblivious, or the many other ways we dysfunctionally respond.

The author then uses several startling examples of how this plays out in the lives of famous people including Abraham Lincoln, Madonna, Oprah Win-frey, and the Navy SEALs, among others. If the technical informational was less than compelling for you, you’ll likely be enthralled here.

But best of all the author teaches us a method for undoing our childhood ner-vous system conditioning. I have tried if myself, done it with clients individu-ally and in groups, and it is safe, doable and very effective.

You will understand yourself and work with clients differently after you read this book. A wise and abundant resource.

—James Flaherty

© New Ventures West® 20�2

Summary

Scale 1–5

Usefulness

Accessibility

Rigor

Potential toChange Reader

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HAPPENINGS

Dancing Into Being: A conversation with Sarita Chawla on the 2012 Master ClassEach year, senior faculty member Sarita Chawla designs and leads a two-day Master Class for graduates that deepens their connection to themselves and their work. Here, Sarita talks a bit about what went into developing this year’s course, titled “The Poetics of Coaching: Unveiling the Mystery of the Human as a Work of Art.”

What inspired this year’s topic?

In all of my years of working with people, I have found that what inspires—and is therefore is retained in the heart—is something that awakens the soul. We must be jarred a bit and then stirred up! Poetry and art have the power to stir and touch the liminal, or the threshold between states. It provides a moment of timelessness, spacelessness and a loosening of one’s sense of self.

Poetics brings about the soft, wide angle vs. zeroing in with a microscope or a telephoto lens. It reminds me of the lines from Rilke’s Eighth [Duino] Elegy: “[moving] in eternity, as streams do. / We never have pure space in front of us, / not for a single day, such as flowers open / endlessly into.”

Imagine the Sufi dancers! In their dancing, they arrive at a state of fluidity. In the dissolution and disorientation, a fresh breeze gives a whiff of newness, birth and possibility.

How can our coaching reach a level of mastery when we begin to approach it from this perspective?

A way of thinking about it is that we are less and less rigid in our points of view and how we hold our clients and ourselves. Mastery is dancing with the emergent. It is living and working with our clients from the deep knowing that life is living through us, pulsating and ever-changing. We see and work with our clients as though they are a magnificent, unfolding masterpiece.

How would you say poets and artists aid us in this?

The artists that reflect back to a culture what the culture is in the middle of. Picasso did that so exquisitely in Guernica. I recently saw the Damien Hirst exhibit at the Tate Modern in London. His work is disturbing; awakening. I loved one of his quotes: “In an artwork I always try to say something and deny it at the same time.” Death is a motif, but represented in an awakening way. This is what great art does.

What works of art are effecting you most deeply these days?

Dali has always been a favorite of mine and I feel so fortunate to have been to the Dali museum, his house and wife’s castle in Spain. He paints and sculpts the stuff that dreams are made of. An Indian artist I love is M.F. Hussein. In his later years he dared to paint nude Indian goddesses and was exiled, dying in Dubai for his audaciousness!

I have been reconnecting with Rabindranath Tagore, the Nobel Laureate from India. Like Rumi, Hafiz and Meera, he writes love poems to the beloved. There are many others of course!

How might students of the course expect to undertake this rich exploration?

There is an old Greek notion of poiesis, which means “to make.” The word has the same derivative as “poetry.” Heidegger used the term “bringing forth” to express the same idea. It is the blossom blossoming, the tadpole becoming a frog. The moment when one thing becomes another as it crosses a threshold. It is what happens when the borders of our lives are unhinged.

We will practice and experience this poetic way of being in many modalities. Inquiry, music, poetry, movement and whatever else is wanting to dance us into being. n

2012 Master ClassWashington DC, October 4-5San Francisco, October 29-30

Tuition: $475Prerequisite: Completion of the Professional Coaching

Course or Integral Coaching Principles

Learn more and register here.

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HAPPENINGS

A stone-paved medieval town in Italy, replete with stray cats and quiet streets, is where the New

Ventures West PCC leader retreat took place this May. The secluded location was chosen to foster the retreat’s goals of deepening faculty connections and fomenting discussion on the work of New Ventures West. Italy was also “closer to home” than San Francisco for many of sixteen faculty members, who traveled from countries including India and South Africa to this obscure, picturesque hamlet.

It was the first time some of us met fellow leaders from around the world. We spent each day in workshops designed by fellow faculty. (Imagine something a bit like summer camp, but replace crafts and teen crushes with a developmental focus and a dose of soul-searching.)

One question we considered: What is the work of New Ventures West beyond coaching? The values we espouse, the way of being we embody—how can these show up throughout our lives, communities, and activities? How can we bring forth these teachings beyond the definitional confines of what we call “coaching”?

One response came from Steve March, who has been crafting an approach called “Integral Design,” which incorporates the philosophy of Integral Coaching into life more broadly. Steve also led a moving session on the messes that the world is confronting—environmental,

social, and political—and invited us to not turn away from what is difficult and challenging.

We also discussed the 2013 New Ventures West Conference, and how to shape it as a rich offering for graduates to continue their development. (Do you have some ideas about this? Please let us know by taking the Conference Survey below!)

Personally, the retreat for me was an invitation to stay connected, both with others and with my deepest intentions. How can I keep in contact, despite distance, time, and distractions? One answer I’ve found since the retreat is by

giving more: not waiting for others to ask before I pro-actively offer to help, and making more time to contribute what I’ve learned so far to the group effort.

What keeps you connected? A worthwhile question, whether you’re in Italy or East Bay! n

Postcard from the Leader Retreat: “Integral Design” and Italian Catsby Arden Pennell, NVW faculty member

Wanted: Your Input on the 2013 ConferencePlanning is underway for the 2013 New Ventures West conference. The intention of this event is for our global community to gather together and be inspired, rejuvinated, and more deeply in touch with our calling as coaches. We’d love to know what would make this a meaningful experience for you—themes that resonate, speakers you’d like to hear from, and more. Please take a few moments to complete a short survey and let us know what you think.

Please contact us with questions or if you wish to volunteer for any part of the conference planning!

Save the date! May 13-15, 2013

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HAPPENINGS

Changing o’ the RegistrarOur beloved Mary Putterman, who has been keeping multiple plates spinning as registrar for a dozen years, is leaving at the end of August for Davis, California, where her partner will be getting his PhD at UC Davis. Her friendly, warm, easygoing nature will be sorely missed by staff, faculty and students. Please join us in wishing her well as she moves into her next phase of life.

Amber Crawford-Idell, former administrative sorceress, has been promoted to registrar. Mary is spending the summer imparting her

knowledge to Amber, whose own creativity, calm and prowess ensures that she will keep all the balls in the air with the same mastery as Mary has.

Farewell MEM, Hello Maya! Maryellen Myers, Director of Graduate Development, is off to Dallas, Texas, where she’ll finally get a chance to put her six pairs of cowboy boots into action. Professionally, she’ll be contributing her expertise as coach, consultant, trainer, and leader at Stagen. For nearly eight years, she has been keepin’ it real for the grad community and keepin’ NVW real in the coaching world. Happily she’ll stay connected with us in her role as recording coach for the PCC. She’d love to hear from you—drop her an e-mail at memyers [at] mac [dot] com.

Stepping into the role of Grad Director is Maya Hiersoux, a PCC grad (2010) and coach who helps clients discover their passion in life. Maya has transitioned quickly and gracefully into her mission of building a healthy, vibrant community for our graduates. When she isn’t busy working or coaching, she can be found playing in Lake Tahoe’s great outdoors, spending time with friends and family and continuously learning.

And in other staff news .... Christy and Vegar Svanemyr, Directors of Undergrad Development and Communications respectively, are moving from Salt Lake City to San Francisco this summer. And if that wasn’t a big enough change, they’re expecting their first baby in early October. Congratulations to the Svanemyrs!

Hellos and GoodbyesHere at NVW HQ, the winds of change are blowing. Big gusts are sweeping in new faces and carrying familiar ones off to new adventures. As we say goodbye and honor two amazing women whose long tenures here have kept the place efficiently and spiritedly chugging for years, we welcome two superstars who have heroically swooped in to man their posts.

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Congratulations and welcome to our recent grads!

Gini Beck, Seattle, WA Margery Berkson, San Francisco, CA

Betsy Butterick, Los Angeles, CA Bernadette Christiansen, Vadnais Heights, MN

Julie Cullinane Smith, Mill Valley, CA Rose Jolis, Seattle, WA Ken Kirby, Davis, CA

Debra Kopelman, Berkeley, CA George Leftwich, Newport Beach, CA

Rekha Mahadevan, Fremont, CA Mella McIntosh, Granite Bay, CA

Laura Miller, Seattle, WA Mary Mosham, San Jose, CA Linda Pearson, Oakland, CA

Barbara Pressman, Mountain View, CA Polly Ragusa, Redwood City, CA Bea Rataj-Arestad, Portland, OR

Battling superegos at home and abroad. Sarita Chawla brought her popular Thwarting the Inner Critic course to London last month. This fine-lookin’ group of 15 newly liberated souls consisted of PCC grads, current students, and a few newcomers. Where to next, Sarita?

First-ever Copenhagen class is going strong! PCC “H” just completed their second session in Copenhagen, led by James Flaherty. Thanks to student Erika Cwiek (first row, far right) for this great photo.

New Ventures West around the world

HAPPENINGS

Special Event in Chicago: “Stepping into Your Calling”

What is life asking of me? Our response to this question reveals a great deal about who we are and what is ours to do in the world. During this illuminating half-day event, senior faculty member Sarita Chawla will guide you in an exploration of your unique calling, or vocation, and how to bring it more fully into all parts of your life.

This event is open to newcomers and seasoned coaches alike. Gain a deeper understanding of Integral Coaching® and come away with valuable insights about your work with clients and your own life.

Chicago, Saturday, August 4 9 a.m. - 1 p.m.

Cost: $35Learn more and register here.

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FREE PROGRAMSCOACHING ROUNDTABLEOne-day introduction to Integral Coaching and an opportunity for graduates to reconnect and discuss a new coaching topic.

San Francisco September 15Cost: Free

VIRTUAL ROUNDTABLEFree one-hour teleclasses on topics germane to Integral Coaching. All calls take place from noon-1 p.m. Pacific Time.

August 2 with Sarita Chawla Topic: “The Persistence of Resistence”Cost: Free

MEET THE LEADER CALLFree one-hour calls hosted by leaders of the Professional Coaching Course. All calls take place from noon-1 p.m. Pacific Time.

August 16 with James FlahertySeptember 20 with Steve MarchCost: Free

FREE COACHING AS A GUEST CLIENTSpend a half or full day being coached by a highly trained student. Experience Integral Coaching® firsthand and come away with fresh insights and practices.

Copenhagen Full day October 6San Francisco Full day October 6 Half days Nov. 9, 10 Singapore Full day September 15Cost: Free

COACH BUILDING BLOCKSSPECIAL EVENT: “STEPPING INTO YOUR CALLING” A transformative half-day exploration hosted by Sarita Chawla. Open to all.

Chicago August 4Cost: $35

COACHING TO EXCELLENCETwo interactive days on the foundations of Integral Coaching.

Boston September 18-19Chicago August 21-22 November 13-14San Francisco September 19-20Singapore September 10-11Washington DC November 27-28Cost: $695 in the U.S.**See our website for international pricing

COACH AS ENTREPRENEURBuild your business as a coach by finding your unique gifts and developing your skills and way of being as an entrepreneur.

San Francisco November 2-4Cost: $1,495

THWARTING THE INNER CRITIC Designed and led by senior faculty member Sarita Chawla, this popular class is open to the general public.

San Francisco December 12-13Cost: $675

COACH CERTIFICATIONTHE PROFESSIONAL COACHING COURSECertification program for independent and corporate coaches. The next year-long programs begin:

Chicago October 2012London November 2012 Montrèal (in French) October 2012San Francisco September 2012 November 2012Singapore March 2013Cost: $9,500 in the U.S.**See our website for international pricing

GRADUATE PROGRAMSMASTER CLASS WITH SARITA CHAWLAA powerful program for grads on a topic relevant to our coaching work and own self-development.

Washington, DC October 4-5San Francisco October 29-30Cost: $475

BOOK STUDY GROUP WITH JAMESMonthly conference calls with guest authors applying current texts to Integral Coaching.

Quarters begin January, April, July, OctoberCost: $375/quarter

Visit our website for a full list of courses taking place around the world

INTEGRAL COACHING PRINCIPLESStudy with the founder of Integral Coaching®! This instensive three-day exploration of the methodology is designed for current coaches, counselors, and HR and OD professionals from all schools of training.

San Francisco, October 23-25Cost: $1,275 ($175 discount when you register one month in advance)

C O U R S E S C H E D U L E

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