PRESENCING – THE AWKWARD VERB THAT WE SHOULD ALL BE PRACTICING

Last year, I joined thousands of others across the globe on a MOOC learning journey – if you aren’t familiar with the term, it stands for Massive Open Online Course, and one of the biggest of these platforms is EdX.  The particular MOOC on EdX that I joined, entitled Ulab: Leading from the Emerging Future, was led by Professor Otto Scharmer of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. I was drawn to the concept of Emergent Learning after reading the first chapter of Scharmer’s book entitled Theory U.  The book suggests that when we are faced with change, people can: 1) either get stuck and freeze, 2) they can retract and try to go back to the way things were, or 3) they can learn from this emerging future, which involves letting go, and letting come, and being present.

He goes on to re-frame this as the action of presencing. If you are familiar with William Bridges Transitions model, this is the neutral zone – a liminal space of letting go and letting come, of feeling and sensing and being present. Scharmer uses a biblical metaphor to discuss moving through this space; if you're familiar with the bible passage that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of the needle than for rich man to go through the gates of heaven, you may understand this passage through its metaphorical lens.  However, Scharmer notes that the needle was actually a small opening in a gate and that camels had to unpack all of the things they were carrying to go through.  In relating this to Theory U, he notes that once you've let go of everything and become fully present, you can go through this eye of the needle and something new will emerge. This is the turn of the U where you'll be able to learn and co-create an emerging future.

​I did see a lot of connection to mindfulness, in that through a mindfulness practice, we are better able to let go of all the noise in our head and really try to be present. I enjoyed his guided mindfulness practice which is recorded at Walden Pond. If you're familiar with Walden from Henry David Thoreau’s writing, you may be familiar with this passage, “I went into the woods because I wished to live deliberately to front only the essential facts of life and see if I could not learn what it had to teach and not when I came to die I discovered that I had not lived.” I think Thoreau’s experiment is the ultimate kind of letting go and presencing, going to live simply in the woods and leaving all you knew before behind.  As a coach, practicing mindfulness and being present is hugely crucial in our field. You cannot successfully coach if you're not fully present with your client. Moreover, being present for ourselves is crucial to our ability to be present for others.