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By Chris Chittenden

Human beings live in a world of language. It is important to recognise we do not just use language to describe what we observe in the world, we also use language to create the world in which we live. As part of our use of language, human beings love to generate stories or explanations about the world they observe. In fact we cannot help ourselves, it is constitutive of the linguistic being we are. 

Take for example, the phenomenon of the sun appearing in different parts of the sky during the day. From where we stand on Earth, it appears the sun moves across the sky and so the early story human beings developed about this phenomenon was the sun revolved around the Earth. We still language this story with words such as sunrise and sunset where the assumption of motion is with the sun. This story was accepted as true for many years until a significant amount of evidence did not fit with the story and Copernicus put forward a new story - the Earth rotated around the sun. Even then the story was the Earth went in a circle around the sun. Once again over time, evidence came to light that did not fit the story and a new story was developed. There is value is each of these stories, but also limitations. We would not have been able to put human beings on the moon if we still believed the sun rotated around the Earth. 

So it is with all phenomenon that we observe. We create a story about it so that it makes sense to us. Even if a phenomenon seems to not fit remotely with any of our stories, we still give it a story such as magic or a miracle.

What has this all got to do with you? Many people lose sight of the distinction between their story and the observed phenomenon and collapse the two into one. In other words, they believe their story about the phenomenon is the phenomenon. As a result, they limit the possibilities they can see and, as a result, the actions they can take. For example, if you say that "my business is losing $10,000 a month because of the world economic conditions", and you do not see that the "world economic conditions" is your story about what is happening, then you limit the possibilities you can take. The phenomenon is your business is losing a certain amount of money, but if you "know" the answer is "world economic conditions" and feel powerless to change that situation, then you may not take any action in other domains. 

This is where consultants and coaches become important. When you engage a consultant to help you deal with a problem and you say, "My business is losing $10,000 a month because of the world economic conditions", they may question that data about how well your business is doing as a starting point, but a good consultant will certainly question your story about why your business is not doing well. They will explore other stories and in doing so potentially open up new possibilities for action. A coach will do something similar in terms of stories you might have about yourself or others.

Being able to recognise the difference between the phenomenon and the story can be a powerful way of unlocking possibilities and generating change. If you are always able to observe the distinction between the two you will find that possibilities for more effective action will appear.

Copyright © 2001 Chris Chittenden