As a highly qualified and experienced psychotherapist, I thought I had already grasped all the necessary concepts for how people change, grow and create awe-inspiring lives. Yet when I came across Integral Theory, I found a model that enlivened, challenged and supported me into greater fullness of being and perceiving. I have always loved drawing on an abundance of different theories and approaches to support change and growth in my clients. Integral Theory offered me an expansive framework that could hold and tie together those eclectic models into a unified and powerful whole.
“The word integral means comprehensive, inclusive, non-marginalising, embracing. Integral approaches to any field attempt to be exactly that: to include as many perspectives, styles, and methodologies as possible within a coherent view of the topic.”
Ken Wilbur
Training as a certified Integral Coach has also provided me with a way of working that is more outcome focused than my therapeutic ways of working. It is a deep approach that leads to profound changes, lasting development and increased capacities in whatever area of life in which my clients wish to improve.
I trained with Integral Coaching Canada (ICC) which is ICF accredited.
“Over the past 10 years ICC has emerged as one of the premier schools in the world for professional coaching. They have a rigorous methodology that combines embodied perspective taking, presence, and powerful conceptual distinctions.
Coaches use five elements to support their own personal growth and to work with their client’s development. Typically it takes an individual two years to complete the certification process and become an Integral Coach®.
ICC has a strong reputation for demanding a great deal from their coaches-in-training, which includes each trainee committing to an integral life practice that includes meditation, body work, journaling, and reading. They are the only coaching school I am aware of that incorporates developmental psychology (e.g., Robert Kegan’s subject to object theory) as the spine of their methodology. This alone gives ICC a tremendous advantage over other schools because their approach is built on extensive psychological research about how and why humans transform and integrate new capacities. In fact, ICC’s application of the integral framework is one of if not the most sophisticated uses of integral principles in any context or field.”
Sean Esbjörn-Hargen Ph.D.
Jo Byron-Russell 