MAP YOUR DEVELOPMENT
Using the developmental model in analyzing situations helps you understand yourself, your yearning, your needs, your feelings and what you can do to meet your needs and tend to your own development.
You have been learning to live according to principles—using them to help you focus, orient, and create your days. Through the underlying principle of aliveness, and then the principle of engagement/play (which is aliveness in relationship), and then with your One Decision (which is aliveness in action), and then with intention (which is aliveness with direction), you have been generating higher quality experiences. Now that you have had some practice utilizing these principles to shift the quality of your interactions and experiences, you have an opportunity to relate these principles to your development.
The Wright Model of Human Growth and Development is a structured model that incorporates Adlerian, developmental, and existential perspectives with other useful ideas and tools to aid you in your quest to maximize your experience and performance in life. The model consists of three axes for viewing your work as a lifelong learner, creating a life of MORE. You can look at it as you would at a map with a north/south axis, east/west, and altitude. The north/south axis is an axis of consciousness. It consists of seven developmental levels. The east/west parallel is an axis of relationship. It maps your relationship to every area of your life, from your body, to your self, your family, friends, work, and so on. The third axis can be likened to altitude. It is an axis of principles and choices fundamental to you living the fullest life possible.
Together, these three axes constitute a three-dimensional grid to assess growth, set goals, and help you identify and analyze problems and issues in your life, just as a map lets you figure out where you are and where you want to go. Furthermore, the model provides invaluable guidance in planning your growth and development around these goals, issues, and problems, just as a map helps you choose your route to your destination. This theory or map provides a context and focus for your developmental work at any point in your personal growth. This personal development territory map also allows you to identify where you are in your larger personal development process, at what you are aiming, and the steps necessary for reaching your goals.
You can identify the level at which you operate as well as the area of life and the principles you need to enhance in order to progress. Identifying the regressive form of a level brings insight about what you need to improve and how you can succeed in doing so. The identification of the level also gives you an idea of the principle that you need to learn to use to meet your regressive need. In this way, the model acts as a guide to help you deal with issues you face in the present.
This week, you review the developmental model and principles and start learning to map your development in certain situations and areas of life. Use of the model provides you greater awareness and consciousness to your daily choices. Consciousness is core to spiritual development, and self-awareness is a key element of consciousness. The model helps you see more clearly where you are and provides a tool to support you to make a shift. It also supports you in understanding others more, in sharing and teaching others what you are learning, and in inviting them on the journey.
One way to further your self-knowledge and service in the world is to better understand where you are stuck. The developmental model can support you in identifying where you are caught and what steps you will need to make to move ahead. It is a road map for what right action you might need to take in order to aim towards a choice that keeps you in alignment with living more purposefully. We have provided the full model with excerpts by Dr. Bob Wright. Use it as you do the assignments in this lesson to track your growth going forward.
As the model teases up developmental gaps, you can identify limiting beliefs and behaviors, feelings muted and arisen, while enhancing your vision for yourself in any or all areas of life.
Principles are like the engine that drives your car—they are the engine that drive your development. By being fully awake and alive, a child develops naturally, and in the same way, by living according to these principles, you automatically grow and develop.
The existential philosophers regarded principles and values as the cornerstones of our life project—what we call our life quest.
While each existential principle has validity in and of itself, we have found that they are correlated to developmental levels, as evidenced in the Wright Model of Human Growth and Development, developed by Dr. Bob Wright. Psychologists from around the world have remarked that our model is the only model they have seen that applies existential principles to developmental theory.
There is an ascending complexity in the principles beginning with aliveness as the most basic and foundational principle, continuing to play, and then incorporating intentionality. Intentionality adds an element of volition. Whereas aliveness is the raw foundational principle, play is aliveness in relationship to self, others, and things. There is a progression in complexity with the addition of volition in the principle of intentionality. The increase in complexity continues as we see the truth of our experience to our highest vision, including all of the previous stages and expanding to include an integrity and expression of self beyond intentionality—at which point genuineness is added to intentionality. Commitment adds yet another level of complexity, as does the principle of responsibility. Taking our cue from the developmental theorists, where the individual is able to deal with increasing complexity, we see a rough parallel between our increasingly demanding principles and the developmental process.
We have correlated the existential principles to the developmental levels. Aliveness, the foundational principle, correlates to level one (ages zero to six months). Play or engagement correlates to level two, the period of identity formation (six months to three years). Intention correlates to level three (the terrible twos—extending from eighteen months to seven years of age). Truth becomes central in level four, where walking the line between conformity and expression of truth to our highest vision is the challenge and guide for the adolescent. Commitment becomes central at level five for the young adult, and responsibility is the challenge for the adult at level six.
Map Your Levels Throughout the Week
Main Assignment
Your main assignment this week is to use the Wright Model of Human Growth and Development to map your developmental level in as many situations as you can. Each day, identify problems or situations and use the developmental model as a map to show you where you are—and where you can go. Using the developmental model in analyzing situations helps you understand yourself, your yearnings, your needs, your feelings, and what you can do to meet your needs and tend to your own development. Select situations throughout your day and determine what level you are operating from in that situation. Focus primarily on analyzing it from the first four levels of the model.
Very-Able Assignments
Read and Study the Model
Study the Developmental Model to deepen your understanding. When you’re having trouble discerning which level you are operating from, review the relevant descriptions. See the description of the levels of the model that are included with this lesson as well.
Map Your Level By Using the Areas of Life
Choose a problem, situation, or area of concern in each area of life. Use the model to analyze the problem and to make a plan of how you want it to be different. Each level relates primarily to one area of life. Try exploring one a day:
Level 1 – Body
Level 2 – Self
Level 3 – Family
Level 4 – Others/Relationship
Level 5 – Work/Play
Level 6 – Society/Higher values
Level 7 – Spirit
Create an Action Plan to Support a Change
Create an action plan to help you make changes in your life. Answer the following questions to develop your plan (using the worksheet to support you):
One specific way I want my life to be different is…
The level that I see I am in is…
The action I intend to take to make this change happen is…
I will take this action by…(date)
By taking this action, I intend to create the following results:…
The obstacles I will face are…
I will need the following resources and support:…
Map Developmental Levels of Friends, Co-workers, Family Members, etc.
Observe others’ behavior this week. What level are they operating at? What do you see? You can even use the model to map developmental levels of characters in movies and TV shows!
Are you operating from scarcity or trust?
Hunger or affirmation?
The regressive or active pole?
Identify your feelings—are you feeling fear, anger, or hurt?
What principle are you operating from—
aliveness (or deadness),
play (or disengagement),
intention (or aimlessness),
truth (or untruth/withholding)?
Decide which level you think is the primary level.
What are your needs or yearnings in the situation? What step could you take to shift the situation and move forward in your development? For instance, if you are operating at Level 2 and are hurt because you are not affirmed, you yearn for affirmation. So then, what step could you take to affirm yourself or to seek affirmation from others? Use the worksheet provided to keep track.
