Quantum Physics
"Not only is the Universe stranger than we think, it is stranger than we can think."
Werner Heisenberg, Across the Frontiers
"Quantum physics teaches us that we can simultaneously exist in many places, under certain conditions."
Amit Ray, Quantum Computing Algorithms for Artificial Intelligence
I have a major obsession with quantum physics. It may sound very nerdy but that’s probably because you haven’t been hooked yet. Just read the above quotations and you might get an idea of what I mean.
Nearly thirty years ago I encountered the concept of quantum physics and on a closer look I could see that there were many physicists, doctors, spiritual leaders, writers (including the Williams’ Blake and Shakespeare) who were talking excitedly about the connection between ideas surfacing in this field and the human condition.
Since the way the world is put together has to conform to the ultimate laws of physics and we are a part of the way the world is put together, whatever are those laws of physics, in our being we will also confirm to these laws.
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Up until the beginning of the twentieth century and the scientific legacy of Isaac Newton, these laws were set down as per the reach of physics at that time. This had been understandably limited to those areas that the equipment, laboratories and human scientific reasoning had reached. Which is normal. You don’t point an accusing finger at a baby who’s just learning to crawl and say “Hey, can’t you walk yet?”
We can only be at where we’ve got to.
But with the appearance of Erwin Schrödinger, Werner Heisenberg, Max Born, Max Planck, David Bohm and others on the scene since the early 1900’s, physicists began to ask new questions and develop the ability to look for the answers. And quantum physics was born.
I could write a book about these fascinating parallels between quantum physics and the human condition and therefore why quantum physics is so relevant in the field of coaching.
Actually I did. It’s called Quantum Skills for Coaches. (And there’s a dvd to accompany it.)
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So, I won’t try to summarise these myriad revelations here, but suffice to say that when I qualified as a leadership coach in 2000, I immediately began to integrate some of these mind-blowing concepts into my coaching practice. And the results made my jaw drop. I found myself working with an invisible energy within the client’s body and inviting their body to speak its mind about the troublesome issues in their life. ( I know…. it sounds wild!) And to my amazement I was seeing clients’ long term phobias, traumas, relationships, aversions, blockages, fears, damaging mind-sets, low self-worth etc being resolved and transformed.
"Those who are not shocked when they first come across quantum theory cannot possibly have understood it."
Niels Bohr, Essays 1932-1957 on Atomic Physics and Human Knowledge
"When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change."
Max Planck
Some years later, after much pushing and prodding by colleagues and clients, I wrote Quantum Skills for Coaches as a handbook to teach other coaches how to work in this way, with energy.
If you’re wondering whether this means that my coaching sessions are rather weird and whacky fear not. The tools I have developed to incorporate quantum concepts into my practice are intuitive, fun and powerful; even the most logical, cognitive-minded individuals I work with can easily embrace them. And of course, they are only one element of my extensive coaching toolkit and I use them as and when they would be helpful for a particular client.
If you’re interested in learning more about the book or the training courses then do visit quantumskillsforcoaches.com or contact me
"Know the world from end to end is a mirror;
in each atom a hundred suns are concealed.
If you pierce the heart of a single drop of water,
from it will flow a hundred clear oceans;
if you look intently at each speck of dust,
in it you will see a thousand beings.
A gnat in its limbs is like an elephant;
in name a drop of water resembles the Nile.
In the heart of a barleycorn is stored a hundred harvests.
Within a millet-seed a world exists.
In an insect's wing is an ocean of life.
A heaven is concealed in the pupil of an eye.
The core at the center of the heart is small,
yet the Lord of both worlds will enter there."
Mahmud Shabistari