Introduction to the Four Quadrant Process

We create our lives, drawing to us both people and events, By our words, thoughts and actions. -Ione Jenson

In 1951, Maslow reported that the healthiest adults in his study were independent, detached, and self-governing. They governed their lives by looking deep inside themselves for what was right, and this was not always or necessarily in alignment with what was culturally popular or socially acceptable. Maslow defined them as autonomous (empowered/ self-actualizing) and found that they had discovered the seeming opposites such as work/play, duty/pleasure, self-interest/altruism, individualism/selflessness to all be the same. Maslow felt that truly healthy people made choices that were good for everyone, not just solely beneficial to themselves. They were able to find win/win solutions to the problems and challenges in life and were able to apply the principles of synergy effectively. They had attained maturity.

Webster's Dictionary defines maturity in the following way. Mature: 1) based on slow, careful considerations; 2) having completed natural growth and development; 3) ripe

We need to ask ourselves: "Am I a mature person? Am I willing to take responsibility for my life, for the choices I make, and am I willing to be responsible for the outcome of those decisions? Am I willing to stop blaming others or life itself for all the things that I don't like or that don't work in my life? Am I willing to look at the people in my life and see how they mirror for me both my own strengths and weaknesses? When I see a weakness reflected, am I willing to honestly stop projecting my self-hatred out onto others and begin learning how to embrace the unlovable within myself? Am I willing to look at not only my self-interest in any given situation, but also look at what is good for the whole, the family, the office staff, my community, my country or humanity at large? Am I willing to give people the benefit of the doubt and listen carefully in order to try to understand their reasons before pressing my arguments on them? Am I willing to remain non-judgmental when another's lifestyle or opinion differs from mine? Am I willing to honor diversity both in other people and in myself? Am I willing to be as honest as possible with myself and in my dealings with other people? Am I willing never to "use" another as a means to personal gain, in any manner, however large or small? Am I willing to confront my fears and insecurities in order to surrender the need for power and control over the lives of others? Am I willing to embrace my truth and base my actions on what I deeply hold to be honest and true regardless of popular opinion?"

Over the past few decades I've discovered the people I've observed, interviewed, or counseled and who live the healthiest, happiest and most productive lives, tend to have four basic things in common. They all know what they value and have strong personal boundaries around those values. They are willing to look at what does and doesn't work in their lives and face the reality of what they need to modify in order to live in integrity and in accordance with their personal value system. They respect their inner processes and understand that many outside factors and cultural influences have molded and shaped them, and they are willing to work toward integration when aspects of themselves are in conflict. They all have a firm belief in something greater than the limits of their own conscious finite minds. They call it by many names: God, Divine Mind, Cosmic Intelligence, Super Conscious, Organic Process, Energy, Wisdom, Synchronicity, or a myriad of other labels, but they all subscribe to the concept that a higher power source turns the universe in some mysterious way and with some semblance of order.

As I have worked through my own processes and have aided countless others in working through theirs, it has become apparent that to use these four processes in tandem is to find a healthy and workable way of life. The order in which these steps are applied will vary from situation to situation, but sooner or later, moving through each step creates a more productive and complete course of action. Two of the processes are essentially left brained and two are right brained although some overlapping may be involved. Finding that delicate but powerful balance between the logic/ reasoning and intuitive/feeling components of our brains, the yin and the yang energies, is to find the centered peaceful existence we all crave, and yet, at the same time it allows us to live involved, powerful and effective lives. This is not to say challenges, personal growth, and learning opportunities will not occur, but it is to say that with a predetermined way of confronting issues, we can use them to enhance our personal awareness and for the advancement of our soul growth. In doing so, each experience can lead us deeper into self-knowledge and direct us to ways of enhancing the state of our health and increasing our productivity.

I have made a diagram of the four-quadrant process in this manner:

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

In the upper left quadrant of the circle we need to sort out our basic VALUES and goals. It is essential to be clear with ourselves as to what values we embrace as our own and which ones, perhaps, have been handed to us by our childhood religion, our culture and/or our families. Some of these early values or goals may or may not serve our best interests at this point in our lives, and if we can be clear about what is really important to us, we can live a more integrated life and one of utmost integrity. Unless we know what we value and practice making choices that support those values, it's difficult to respond to life and to crisis in a healthy way.

In the bottom left corner of the circle, we see the process of ACTION. Many of our challenges need confronted with realistic evaluation. They often call us to modify our behavior or to take assertive steps in order to create solutions to the dilemmas they pose. While doing nothing about a situation is occasionally the action that needs to be taken, more often, we can release the numerous mind games that roll over and over in our heads if we will just take some constructive steps toward finding a reasonable solution. Often these steps may be very small, but even a small step can make a world of difference in regaining our personal power in adverse circumstances.

The bottom right hand corner is the quadrant of SYNTHESIS and INNER HEALING. This quadrant offers many different techniques and possibilities for synthesizing the earlier events in our lives that still color and influence our adult years. There are many ways to gain skill in implementing these techniques for integration. Of course, good therapists are always available, but beyond that, there are workshops, classes and wonderful books dealing with and providing instruction in every one of these techniques. Having entered into this quadrant during the early 1960's when little was available and certainly nothing was being taught on college campus' along these lines, I found a few books and works on Assagioli and psycho-synthesis, did some Gestalt therapy as taught by Fritz Perls, found some books on dream work, universal symbolism and directed daydreams. I also took a few of the early sensitivity sessions. From these I gleaned ideas and often extrapolated those ideas and began my journey into self-understanding and integration. However, if you have any doubts at all about your ability to do this safely, or if you have major emotional or mental challenges, by all means seek the help of someone qualified to lead you through this quadrant.

The fourth and final quadrant located in the upper right hand corner is termed THE COSMIC OVERVIEW and EVOLUTIONARY PERSPECTIVE. It is the process which gives me the confidence to begin work on the other three. It is the same process which helps me, when I have come to the end of a challenge, understand the larger meaning behind the lessons I've learned. And it also gives me a perspective beyond the obvious, although sometimes this comes years later. From this quadrant comes my daily spiritual practices and my strength. It does not dictate a universal belief system because my understanding changes and grows as I do. Neither my system of belief nor my daily spiritual practices are exactly like anyone else's, nor should they be. Each of us has our own path and must find a system or journey that speaks deeply to our inner depths. However, this quadrant implies faith in something larger than our finite minds and calls on that power to help guide and expand both our lives and our options.

These four processes can be used every day of our lives. By making them routine, we have an automatic way of responding to the unexpected challenges, both large and small. However, again I would like to make it clear that there is a need for support groups and good therapists of all kinds. One should not hesitate to seek out professional help and expertise when one is going through major crisis or mental disorders. There are times in everyone's life when they would probably profit by talking with a professional therapist, or at least unburdening to a wise and trusted friend or Spiritual Director. There are always times in our lives when we may need guidance getting started on a new path or to do an occasional "sanity check" when we may become so deeply entrenched in what is happening in our world that we can't see clearly. However, for the vast majority of those people confronting the daily challenges or vicissitudes of life, a clear understanding and plan of action is sufficient for guiding them through some, if not most, of the murky waters that continually appear from time to time during our lives. But ultimately, life is a process without end, and we cannot always have a therapist at hand to guide us through all the changes, challenges and transitions it brings. Nor would it be emotionally healthy to do so. We need to learn how to be, in most situations, our own healer and therapist; that is the way to self-actualization and is the ultimate road to individuation. All good therapists know that if they are successful with a client, they have worked themselves out of a job. While we might have to go to four different therapists to attain these four types of healing, because often therapies are linear and one basic therapeutic approach is preferred or used more often, we can walk ourselves through these four steps quite simply during many of the challenges to be faced. The more we use these steps in resolving everyday issues, the more effective we will be in handling the larger issues of life. Developing a habit of self-observation and a plan of action makes steering the course of our soul's growth easier, richer and more rewarding and ends in positive results, such as freedom and peace. Those are the qualities that have only been dreamed of during the times when we were evolving unconsciously and we were unaware that we could be co-creative partners with the Divine Mind.

While the four qualities in the healthy productive people that I talked about at the beginning of the chapter seemed to have, for most of them, evolved naturally or as the result of good role models when they were children, they quickly admitted that they apply these four basic principles/processes to almost every major issue in their lives. Often they are applied automatically, yet all four elements are always present to some degree in their final resolution. Others of us have learned to consciously apply these same processes, bit by bit, as we've read, meditated and learned from one teacher after another through the years. And while I suspect such learning will always be somewhat cumulative, we may be able to hasten our progress by seeing these four steps as parts of a whole larger process. It's a model that could benefit all people, and particularly the clients of most helping professions.

People who grew up in difficult times, during the Great Depression, the World Wars, etc., watched neighbors and parents employ some of these same processes on a daily basis. There were few entitlement programs and few social services, and everyone was having a difficult time surviving. This made it nearly impossible to rely on family or community generosity except where cooperation and mutual support were employed for the benefit of all. During that time period, these skills weren't normally labeled in psychological or spiritual terms; they were just plain basic survival skills and were often based on some type of faith. However, learning to survive made room for creativity and self-reliance, and ultimately, self-esteem came from knowing that even when life was tough, they could manage to find a path around the obstacles. How empowering. We need to model this confidence for our own children; what better legacy could we leave them?

Using processes which include both inner healing (right brain) and taking action (left brain) seems essential to healing. I have observed people who have spent years in therapy working solely on their inner processes, and who have employed all sorts of spiritual insights or platitudes and, yet, many of these individuals are still not able to live healthy lives. After several years they are still screaming, weeping and blaming. They remain immobilized as they view their victimhood.

While these inner processes are good, when they are used singulary without taking responsible action, they are often much less effective. When both inner synthesis and outer action are utilized together, they are potent agents of healing. Emoting is helpful, synthesizing and forgiving the actor while retaining a clear sense that the act was not acceptable, is essential, but also refusing to remain a victim of the past by taking responsible action to alter what needs to be changed now, becomes a must if one wishes to move forward and live a centered and happy life.

On the other hand, there are therapies and programs that stress only the outer processes and people are still, figuratively, left to "bleed and die" internally, or they continue to behave in unproductive ways. My friend Dorothy, once told me before she died, that after five years of psychotherapy she knew almost everything there was to know about herself but found nothing to "fill the inner void." Eventually, in the late 1960's, she found her spiritual path which employed inner healing meditations and it was at that point, in combination with her outer changes, she begin to find healing and a new wholeness.

Another clear case I read about told of a woman who went to her local women's shelter so battered that she had to remain hospitalized for several days. Her abuser was sent to prison. When the woman was released from the hospital, she began to get her life back in order. She went back to school and received her General Equivalency Diploma, (GED) found a good job and looked like she had made great progress. However, the day the abuser was released from prison the woman married him, they subsequently robbed a bank, and she ended up being incarcerated. We can only guess, but if she had received some intensive inner healing through psycho-synthesis, visualization, gestalt, dreams, journaling, etc. in addition to the outer life changes, perhaps there might have been a different outcome.

It is a strange paradox. We do need to express feelings, we do need to grieve, and we do need to grieve to the end of our grief when it finally "lets us go." However, we also need to live our lives as well. We deserve times of pleasure, happiness and well-being even around and outside our grief. Whatever our loss, there comes a point where we need to take charge of our lives, and while our grief and emotional processes are a part of life, it is much healthier when we come to realize that it is not all of our life, and we are no longer willing to allow it to consume us and leave us bitter and sad forever. Many people are finding that using a combination of both the inner and outer processes has assured them of a more successful outcome, and at times, that outcome is quite dramatic. Buddha felt that "enlightenment" is the middle way, the path between opposite extremes.

Ken Wilbur, in his book: One Taste, maintains that since we range from matter to body to mind to soul to spirit, we need to exercise all those levels by incorporating a practice from each level into our daily practices. Each level of practice enhances the other levels of our being, and there are many, many practices at each level from which one may make a choice. We hear a great deal about confluent education: the process of getting mind and emotions flowing together. Getting the body, mind, soul and spirit flowing and growing together is an integral approach that pays big dividends.

Summary

It seems that people who live relatively healthy and balanced lives, are those individuals who are able, consciously or unconsciously, to process the events in their lives through these four major channels and strike a balance between the inner and outer journeys. Even as a river has an inlet and an outlet to remain fresh, so humans must employ both introspection and action to stay vibrantly alive and healthy. In earlier decades we dealt so much with rational left brain psychological techniques that we often did not honor feelings. Then we moved to the opposite extreme and began dealing with feelings to such a degree that we often negated the value of taking action. Neither empirical data nor information from the affective domain is complete within itself. It is only half a picture when looked at in isolation from the other; wisdom dictates that we must be informed and use processes from both arenas to obtain optimal results. The four quadrant process is cumulative and, like most practices, increases in value and effectiveness with practice.