What is “Unfolding?”

At Aletheia, we are always talking about “unfolding.” This might leave you wondering, “What do you mean by unfolding?”

There are two fundamental kinds of change: improvement and unfoldment. Mostly, our culture focuses on improving. Improvements are wonderful. However, an exclusive focus on improving obscures the profundity and transformative power of unfolding.

Aletheia Coaching is a methodology that distinguishes self-improvement from self-unfoldment and offers support for unfolding more of your innate resourcefulness, creativity, and collective genius.

the self-Imrpovement paradigm

Like everyone, you probably desire self-improvement and improvements to your life circumstances. You may want to improve your home, your career or job, your income, your relationships, your body, and, most importantly, yourself.

The journey of improvement is from where you are to where you want to be. You may want our life to turn out in a very particular way. And as long as your life hasn’t turned out this way, you suffer.

The desire for improvement is usually born for a sense of deficiency. Your home is lacking, your love life is lacking, your friendship are lacking, your job is lacking, your income is lacking, etc. You get the picture! Of course, often you feel like it is you who is deficient. Self-improvement is born from the sense of self-deficiency.

Improvement efforts are a noble attempt to address this painful sense of deficiency. However, notice how rarely they actually do this. The failure of New Year’s resolutions, one of the most widespread self-improvement initiatives, is predictable and for some, even an expectation.

The difficulty and struggle that you face when trying to improve yourself usually winds up reinforcing the sense that you don't have what it takes. Ironically, self-improvement efforts often reinforce the belief in self-deficiency. And, of course, this propels you (and everyone else caught in the self-improvement trap) into more self-improvement efforts.

It is true that sometimes you or someone you know will succeed in their improvement project. This success story often reinforces the improvement approach. You might find yourself saying, “If others can do it, so can I!” You, like most others, might be so committed to the self-improvement paradigm that you are blind to other options. Self-unfoldment is another option.

The self-Unfoldment paradigm

Unfolding is how, as living organisms, you grow, flourish, and thrive. Everything is always more than its current expression. It is as if everything is the seed out of which something more grows. Unfolding is the discovery and expression of this “more.” You are always already more than who you are now. This is true of all living systems and living beings. Unfolding is always an unfolding of innate wholeness into a greater revelation and expression of wholeness. And, as you unfold, you express your depth and your profound sufficiency.

In the self-improvement paradigm, you ask “What is missing?” By contrast, in the self-unfoldment paradigm, you begin by provocatively asking, “What if nothing is missing?” Self-improvement projects are born of self-deficiency whereas self-unfoldment is a profound expression of your very nature as a whole and complete human being.

Consider an acorn. It is a marvel. Everything needed to grow into a beautiful oak tree is packed into this tiny space. All that is required to express itself as an oak tree are the right conditions of sunlight, water, nourishing soil, and air. The acorn starts whole and complete. The tree that unfolds is whole and complete in every moment. The same is true for you and each of your coaching clients.

Attention in the self-improvement paradigm is often cast into the past or the future. What is arising in the immediacy of the present moment often remains unfelt and even ignored. To create the conditions for self-unfoldment keep bringing your attention back to the present moment to sense and feel what is arising now. Inquire with curiosity, precision, and compassion. Through this practice you will unconcealed and express more and more of your innate wholeness and completeness, just as the acorn unfolds a beautiful oak tree.

Through the practice of unfolding, you will discover a profound treasury of inner resources and boundless creativity. You will tap into collective genius expressed by the deep interconnected context of life. When applied, these discoveries enable you to navigate the challenges you face on a day-to-day basis.

By participating in our courses, you will learn how to create the conditions that foster unfoldment for yourself, for your family and loved ones, and for your coaching clients.

In a world where many people feel like they don’t have what it takes, the question “What if nothing is missing?” is like a breath of fresh air. When you shift from the self-improvement to the self-unfoldment paradigm, your coaching becomes simultaneously more effective and less effortful.

We need both improvement and unfoldment

The approach of improvement tends to work with mechanisms that break and can be fixed or, by some measure, improved to function better. The approach of unfoldment works with living systems. Living systems aren’t mechanical, they are complex. New forms emerge from complex systems, often in ways that surprise us, delight us, and challenge us. We need both kinds of change in these times.

At Aletheia, we help you flourish and thrive through improving and unfolding your life, relationships, your career, and yourself.