The 21st Century questions that each of us must answer in our personal lives, businesses, various leadership roles, and in every aspect of our lives is “Is it it enough for us to get bye, or do we demand more from ourselves and our life?” If the answer to the first question is “No”, and then the second is “Yes”, then the next question is “How?” How can I create that sustainable, higher level quality of life? And then there is the important issue of “Transitions”.
The first thing a person needs to understand is that today’s life is different from yesterday’s. Life is changing and we must change too. And we inevitably will. We can make that realization of personal and social change an asset, or by default, a huge liability. Whether we acknowledge it or not, the choice patterns of life create our futures. Those choice patterns create hope or despair, opportunity or dead ends, for ourselves and everything and everybody we engage.
My Master’s Thesis was on Milieu Therapy. Now I realize it should have been Milieu Therapies, with the emphasis on plural. The underlying principle of Milieus is that everything you do, moment to moment, day in day out, creates balanced healing, or growth. Or destruction. The key principles are moment to moment, day to day, and balanced. Sustainable change is both in the present moment, and balanced. Otherwise the change is illusory.
Everything you do can, and should, be held to that standard. That’s why I teach individuals, groups, and organizations how to identify imbalances, and the potential for creating change through re-balancing, in all life’s applications.
Milieu Training Applications for different aspects of life balancing:
- Individual: Presenting problems, issues, goals, ambitions
- Spiral Cycles of Growth, or Destruction
- Applied Philosophy
- Master’s Applied Philosophy
- Couples: Presenting problems, issues, goals. Assessing relationship assets and liabilities.
- Personal and Interactive Spiral Cycles of Growth, or Destruction
- Individual and Interactive Applied Philosophy Apps
- Relationship Apps for Master’s level Applied Philosophy
- Families: Milieu balancing the speed of change of children, adolescents, and parents to create a strong foundation for the family’s future and parental growth post family. Parental leadership at different stages of adult children’s lives. Retirement life stage planning.
- Businesses: While each business, market, economy, and competitive environment is different, there are underlying similarities. One commonality is the constant requirement for change and adaptation for each business to be sustainable, and ultimately, to flourish. Even in markets where there seems to be little competition, the requirement for growth and change exists, sometimes coming from within the company from ownership, management, or stockholder competing interests. Each company, business, and market is different, and requires constant change to keep up with, and ahead of, varied business forces in the market place.
Examples of Apps for Individuals:
- Body Training components: Exercise programs-aerobics
- Strength and Flexibility co-ordination-reflex training ,sports
- Mental Training components: Applied Philosophy, meditation training, wellness orientation training
- Energy Training components: Master’s Level Applied Philosophy, advanced Meditation, Martial Arts (systemic commitment to stage development)
There are a very wide range of Apps for individuals, couples, families, and businesses. The key skill is to know where to look and who to talk to. Take your time, you don’t get out of life alive. Typically, good systems have common themes-they all touch on elements of all three of the above cornerstones of Life Balance, and at least offer some amount of integration of them.
One more important note-all of our lives are filled with transitions, you might even make a case that failure to handle transitions well can convert a good life to a problem life. One key ingredient in successful transitions is to continue to think ahead, to know in advance that your life will have many stages, and therefore a need to exercise skills in those transitions in order to avoid unnecessary stress and confusion, you can see the future if you look for it.
For more information about Milieu Therapies, and how to apply them, contact Mike Kennelly at (310)202-8707 or (307) 200-9064
What a powerful article!. In the second paragraph you said
“Whether we acknowledge it or not, the choice patterns of life create our futures.”
I’m just starting to get a hold of this in my life. I always thought if i did my affirmations, worked hard, and stayed positive life would work out in my favor. Although it may work that way for some, I still found that it wasn’t that way for me.
Thank you for this article. As I get more clear, and acknowledge my choices and the pattern they create, I see how my life can be shaped in the direction of my choice.
Am looking forward to your next post!
Cheers,
Kim