March Practice Group - The Wheel of Life with VAKOG

The Wheel of Life exercise is a commonly used coaching tool for assessing a clients present position or balance of life.  The wheel is used to look at each individual area of life and forms the basis for an explorative information gathering exercise whereby the client scores his level of satisfaction on a scale for each life area.

Using the wheel on a regular basis helps us to identify which life areas are working well; giving them energy, and which areas are not working well, which may be draining energy and creating stress.  The idea being that we can get a clearer picture of the client’s life and the areas which he may wish to focus on as a priority. It is also an opportunity for he client to fully appreciate and draw strength from the areas which are working well.

We will be using this technique today in pairs to help one another establish three life goals that will significantly improve our life. We will then use the VAGOK to elicit our partners preferred system, ie, Visual, Auditory, Kinaesthetic, Olfactory and Gustatory, and get our partner to create a visualization of what it will be like to have achieved their goal and to evoke full enthusiasm and motivation to ensure our partner takes immediate action.

1.    Draw a circle on a plain piece of paper

2.    Be mindful from the moment you start conversing with your client to listen out for clues as to which submodality they use the most.

3.    Ask your client to list every important aspect of their life, such as family, relationship, career, hobbies, etc. As your client lists them, divide your circle into triangles to represent each life area.

4.    By use very subtle mirroring of your clients body language, vocal tones, language etc, start to get into rapport with your client.  When you are both relaxed, ask your client to give you a brief summary of each individual life area, working around the wheel.  Ask your client to give each area a percentage score for their current level of satisfaction with each area. 

5.    Once you have worked around the wheel ask the client which life area, if improved, would have the greatest positive impact on their life as a whole.

6.    Ask the client to come up with life changing goals that would take the clients satisfaction score right up to 100% if achieved.

7.    Ask your clients to imagine what it would be like to achieve each goal. Ask them to explain in full detail how they would know when the goal has been achieved. 

"Imagine a miracle is about to happen and tomorrow morning your goal will has been fully achieved.  What will be different about your day?  How will you look? What will you see? What will you be doing? How will you feel?"  Explore this in full detail and set an anchor for your client if you know how.

8.    Paraphrase back to your client using his/her preferred system for emphasis, how amazing it will be to achieve his set goals.

9.    Ask the client what the first step towards his goal is (his first action step) and when he intends to take it. Record his answer.  If you have fully calibrated with the client, then he should be almost leaping out of his chair to take the first step.  If not, explore how he is feeling and move back to the wheel for a further review of the chosen goal.