The Hidden Dangers of Hierarchical Helper-Seeker Relationships

You're always at the centre of your own growth journey

#authenticrelating  #autonomy  #sovereignty

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All episodes can be found at https://truthandtranscendence.com

All about Catherine/Being Space/Freedom of Spirit/Pellowah & Transformational Coaching at https://beingspace.world

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What we discussed:

00:58  Coach is the wrong word

01:59  Counterproductive hierarchy in helping professions

03:23  You are at the top of your growth hierarchy

04:54   Officer class school training

05:58   We can all remind ourselves of our sovereign choice

07:45   The danger of giving our autonomy away

09:10   Professional helpers - resist the temptation to take over

#selfresponsibility         #discernment        #owningourpower

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction and podcast overview

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hi, I'm Catherine Llewellyn, the host of the podcast.

Speaker 1: 0:03

You can find out all about Truth and Transcendence on truthandtranscendencecom and you can find out all about me on beingspaceworld, where you will find my online coaching offering, as well as my UK-based workshops the Freedom of Spirit Workshop for Liberation and Empowerment, the Pellewa Radical Shift in Consciousness workshop for spiritual expansion, and transformational coaching for exploring the mind-body-spirit connection on the expansive path. You can also support the podcast by actually making a donation. I hope you enjoy the show. Welcome to Truth and Transcendence. You can find all our other episodes on truthandtranscendencecom. I was thinking this morning about the word coach. I thought does that word seem to imply that someone else is in charge, that the coach is in charge setting the direction for the relationship? And I thought is there another word that's a bit more the tone I would prefer? And I thought facilitator. I thought no, facilitator also sounds like they are the ones having something happen, albeit facilitating, ie making it easier. And then I thought therapist yeah, still the same problem. Mentor yes, obviously the mentor is older, wiser, cleverer, more well-informed in some way. And it just struck me that even in the personal growth, spiritual expansion world, word guru as well comes to mind, teacher, all these words. They imply a hierarchy where a person who's looking to grow or expand is lower down in the hierarchy than the person who's trying to help them to do it. And I thought that's really counterproductive, because what we're implying there is that in order to get any help or support or assistance, we have to give up some of our autonomy, we have to let go of some of our sovereignty and give that away to somebody else, give them some of our power, some of our choice, making Either that or it's implying that that other person already has the authority and we are simply submitting to that or recognising the truth of that, which is also equally sinister, an unhealth alter, in my opinion. So I thought, well, why is this? Where does this come from? And, of course, it comes from all of the models that most of us have grown up with the teacher, the parents, the greased, the leader, the guru, the thought leader. All of these terms imply a hierarchy where we are lower in the hierarchy and they are higher up, and I haven't discovered a really good model that switches that around, that says well, actually, the person who's looking to grow and expand and transform their lives is actually at the very top of the hierarchy in their own life and always will be. And all of these other people who could be drawn in or invited to assist, to support, to inform, to advise, to empower, to help in all sorts of ways, to help in all sorts of ways that all these people can be invited in, to be of assistance, but without in any way denying that top of the hierarchy position of the person themselves in their own lives. So that's what most of us have grown up with, that's what most of us have been taught.

Speaker 1: 4:08

And why is that? Well, it's partly because, from an economic point of view, it's much more expensive to run education whereby everyone's encouraged to be autonomous, because it's more difficult to measure the results, it's more difficult to make sure that certain things get covered, it's more difficult to get funding for it, and so on and so forth. But there is a model whereby people are educated as children to consider themselves further up the hierarchy, but unfortunately they are taught to consider themselves higher up the hierarchy and therefore other people are lower down. And I'm talking about the officer class training that happens in some of our schools, certainly here in the uk, which is where it's said well, yes, you're a child. Yes, the authorities know more than you. Yes, the experts know more than you. However, you know more than all the people who didn't go to these private schools and public schools. So, therefore, you are better than they are. You should be in charge of them. So I'm talking about a class division, but even within that class division that is actually shored up and kept in place by an external authority, albeit imaginary, an external authority that gives veritude to that and that says that that's the way that it is.

Speaker 1: 5:34

So what do we do about this? Well, we can't really change the prevailing culture that we're in the society that we're in. We can do that in small pockets, we can do that in our family, let's say, or if we're in a group, we can actually choose to embody something different from that. But the thing we can do that we can all do is to remind ourselves of our own position in our own lives, which is at the top, or central is actually a better way of putting it. We are central in our own lives. So what that means is we are the ones who make the choices. We are the ones who expand, who grow. We are the ones who choose to look outside of ourselves if we wish to, and get some support and some assistance, and that we make sure, when we do that, that we're not giving away our autonomy and our sovereignty. We make sure, when we do that, that we don't bring someone in let's say it's a coach or a trainer or a mentor or a spiritual teacher, whatever it might be. We see if we can resist the temptation to follow the conditioning which would actually lead us to giving up the responsibility for our lives over to these other people, which, of course, is going to end up in resentment and failure because it's not based on reality, because they actually are not responsible for our lives.

Speaker 1: 7:08

But this is a danger and I've done this myself, and the time when it's most possible to do this, most likely to do this, is when we are engaging with somebody who says I'm here to help you really embody your own sovereignty, really embody your autonomy, and this is how you do it. I'm here to help you really embody your own sovereignty, really embody your autonomy, and this is how you do it. I'm going to tell you how to do it, I'm going to tell you what your purpose is in doing it. I'm going to provide the leadership for this, which means, essentially, I'm going to take over, which is ironic because what they're supposed to be doing is helping you to expand and grow within your own context. So that's the danger.

Speaker 1: 7:52

The danger is that we are seduced by what appears to be somebody who has all the answers, or a structure that has all the answers, and we go oh, thank God, I can now give responsibility to that entity, that person, that structure, that organization, that modality, that ideology, that philosophy or even that political perspective, because that falls into the same danger set. And, of course, the problem with that is that we then disempower ourselves, because when we give our power away to those situations, we're taking it away from ourselves. So the trick is to be really diligent about this and get help from whoever we want it, be judicious about it and be judicious about the framing of the relationship, the framing of the context for what's being done. And if you feel yourself starting to give away responsibility to the external person, entity, organisation, modality, faith, whatever it might be, draw back, take a breath, regroup, come back in and reset. Take a breath, regroup, come back in and reset. And, of course, on the other side of it, for practitioners, coaches, teachers, leaders, gurus, all of these people. What we all have to watch out for is when that person's gazing up at us with faith, hope, respect, appreciation and trying to give us responsibility for their lives. So for us, the risk is of accepting that and then causing a problem for everybody down the line.

Speaker 1: 9:38

So I hope you've enjoyed that conversation. I hope you found that interesting. Please do keep spreading the word. Tell your friends, give us a five-star rating. Thank you for watching and listening. Have a great week and I'll see you next time. I hope you enjoyed this week's episode. It really helps if you give a thumbs up, a five-star rating, a review and share with your friends. If you're looking for transformational coaching or an intensive transformational weekend workshop experience, I can help with that. You can actually help the show by making a donation. Until next time, take care.