Christian Assel, Sept. 2013


Walking-in-your-shoes makes it possible to understand people, animals and elements of our world in a special way. This understanding is always needed when conflicts, difficulties or hurdles have arisen that require action on an inner level. Once you have To understand a particular person in a particularly profound way, as well as the motivations for their actions, their intentions and intentions, their innermost, their soul, then it is easy for them to respect and acknowledge them. You can take it exactly as it is. This promotes a good relationship between you and the person, with more power and more opportunities for both.

The same applies to other roles that can be taken for their cause. WIYS makes it clear what they have z. For example, they may want to say their symptom, their illness, their dissatisfaction with certain elements of their lives, their potential, their future career or their "blind spot".

By "walking" is literally meant "walking". The person seeking advice designates someone from the group, who plays a certain role as a substitute for him. This representative, we call him the "Walker," literally moves in space, in keeping with his inner movement. Through the process of physical movement, the walking person enters the real role, from which they feel more and more through the dynamic movement. The deputy literally "enters" the role and the walk becomes a little "adventure trip". The Walker becomes, as it were, a role in itself and can report from the "depth" in a detailed way. This information about the Walker is more accurate and detailed than, for example, in the case of a family location. Unknown and previously invisible realities become visible and recognizable in this way.

The question of how it can be that the deputies can even feel anything from their role has already been much speculated. Many authors only deal with this topic in their books alone. Unfortunately, nobody has yet been able to provide me with a real explanation, and I believe that there are none. Explanations are also not so important to me because it is enough for me to know that we can find insights on a deeper level. Finding an explanation for something inexplicable is not very interesting to me. It has a special power for me to stop at this limit and to say: I can not explain it, so I do not want to try it either.

This method was developed by John Cogswell and Joseph Culp. John was looking for a way to better serve his clients by letting them walk or even walk. This allowed him to advise her more comprehensively. Joseph was looking for a way to delve deeply into the role of the film or the theater, because the actor and the role reach amazing closeness. Immediately after experimenting with this method, Joseph saw that roles from the "real" life, such as the For example, real people can be "walked" and this has broken the previous boundaries of acting. From this developed "Walking-In-Your-Shoes", as we know it today.

At the phenomenological level of walking-in-your-shoes, which may perhaps also be called the "soul" level, the counselor's concern is shown in a particularly genuine and real way. He can see how the request "ticks" or sees itself in the world and feels what it has and what it needs, its lightness, its difficulty, its impulses and blockages. If the counselor understands the issue better with this help, it is much easier for him to develop compassion and to engage more deeply with it. This makes it easier for him to deal with understanding, love and act accordingly in relation to the human being, the animal or the element at issue. This serves life and promotes togetherness. The pleader can grow because he can discover for himself how others relate to him and how he is to them. The more walking roles he goes, the more answers he gets to his questions. The requestor approaches more and more to what he encounters from the outside, and thus comes to himself.

Which roles are suitable?

In principle, you can let everyone "walk": your mother, your father, a sibling, a child, a deceased, any other relatives, a problematic figure, a colleague, an employee, the boss, a theater or film role , yourself, your inner child, your future, your "blind spot", your calling, etc.

When it comes to relationships between two roles, it is also possible to "double walk", a double walk, with two roles going at the same time, paying particular attention to the relationship and possible interaction of the two.

As long as there is a request from a person seeking advice, there is really nothing that could not be determined for a role. But that also has limits. In my opinion, this is achieved when the requestor chooses a role that is outside his own horizon of experience and is no longer of direct relevance to him, for example in the case of curiosity. Then we come into the domain of arbitrariness, and we have to ask ourselves if this method is still used meaningfully and responsibly, and whether the available time can not be better for another walk. It is also out of the question for me, the leader, to deal with a cause that pursues goals or intentions other than the successful life and well-being of the personally present concern. It would be an exception for me only if there is an explicit order from a non-present person. Once this was the case when someone wanted a walk that was in jail and therefore could not be present.

Nevertheless, there are seemingly unlimited possibilities and directions that a walk can go into. For the right choice, the advice-seeker can ask the following questions: "What role could answers give me to my most important question, which role could be of most help to me in my present situation, in my current phase of life? Which understanding will carry me further?"

Even a life partner can be gone because he plays an important role because he is fateful. It can also be a person from the living environment is selected, which is problematic: a colleague perhaps, or a neighbor, etc. This can help to re-understand the person, because a person can only be problematic if it is not understood. An insight into this person can be a key to a new behavior - to oneself and to other people as well.

It can also be an animal gone. This is a particularly fertile area that still has a lot of undiscovered potential. Animals have an intensive part in a person's life. They have a sense for fine currents and disturbances and can perceive emotional and mental conditions, as well as changes well. If the animal's life or relationship with the animal is to be better understood, walking often has a twofold effect on both animal and human. The animal can often only be helped if people are helped. Since animals very often take on human problems and burdens, but people often notice this late, it often takes the insight into something essential from the human domain to relieve the animal. Seeing what the animal is looking at is an important clue to what man has missed. When man solves the problem, it also frees the animal.

A certain proportion of a person may also be gone, e.g. the inner child, or the "blind spot" (there is definitely one ...), the illness, the symptom, the greatest talent or an underdeveloped area. It can be the calling, the addiction, the future, the self-esteem ... etc. In any case, the sentence applies to me: There can never be enough understanding!

The process of walking-in-your-shoes

It begins with determining the role of the "going". The choice is not always clear and unambiguous, so sometimes we discuss the situation and the issue a bit, and I give guidance on which role is best suited. Then someone from the circle of participants is chosen to "walk" this role for the participant. That The participant usually does not go himself, but selects another deputy for the group. The "walking", also called "Walker", then gets ready by forgetting everything around him. He lets himself be put into the service for the process that follows, and lets himself be tuned into whatever comes now, without evaluation and without interpretation. The goer repeats and renames his own role loud enough for everyone to hear. "I am now [name of the role]".

Then the walk begins with the first step, that is, it begins to move in space, according to the inner feeling. Everything else shows and then results from what the outgoing person externally and internally perceives from the role. There are no guidelines, and anything can happen (more in the examples). The procedure is so interesting because what appears in the Walk has a lot to do with the real person, the real animal, or the real element. We do not know why that is, but it is always amazing how accurate the information that emerges often corresponds to reality, and how some participants are amazed at how exactly a person, an animal, or an element appears in the substitution. Although the person who "walks" in the walk has no (known) information about his or her role, he comes in the role of that person, the animal or the element amazingly close.

 The walk begins, as I said, with the first step. If the walker first has to orientate himself and find his way in the role, it makes sense to start simply in circular paths, until the contact with the respective role has become stronger and it becomes clear where it is "long". But any other movement may be possible, and it is good to be inactive as a leader. Some roles have been rewarded by not even taking the first step. If the walk is determined by stagnation or heaviness, then this is an important clue, and it would be pointless to force a go. Another walk, on the other hand, can be defined by lightness and power, and the movement and information just "bubble" out. Anyway, after the first steps, I can see in what way the walking person moves, or what is striking or characteristic. If he walks big or small, he goes fast or slow, if there is a rhythm or a pattern, he goes energetic or weak, where he looks, where he does not look. How do I take and how does the walker perceive the walk? What happens before my eyes? I try to understand what exactly happens. The question is: what really happens?

Walking causes the body to move, perhaps to a beat or rhythm, and it releases energy. The energy of movement also releases images, emotions and impressions that have a lot to do with what's behind the role. And that is exactly what we want to find; that is exactly what we want to work out. As the walker moves in the role and deepens the perception, I ask him what he is aware of exactly, whether he has pictures or sensations and what is special about this process. I try to get an idea of ​​what is happening. By observing and asking questions, I immediately start to work out the important details in order to make them understandable for the participant and the group of participants. It is very important to note, not to interpret in the perception of the role, but to stay close to the action. I do not go into my imagination, but stay close to the perceptible with my thoughts and images. It is important that I look at the essentials of the walk. I can ask the walker during the walk, which he perceives as essential, for example. Only in the discovery of the essential and the signifier lies the meaning of this process, and the choice of the questions to the walking one is only after that.

I am always asked how it is possible that someone else can perceive the role of another person, animal or element so precisely. As I said: I do not know, and I also do not like to explain it. But there is a clear picture for me: Every participant with a walking concern brings "his" information in ways that are inaccessible to our minds. We have no sense for this process and are virtually blind to it. At the same time, the process of walking is an outrageously outrageous insult to the mind, for the knowledge gained here often eludes it. However, if our minds can be mildly tuned, the work is worthwhile, because with the help of this method we can make the information visible and fruitful and bring the hidden to light.

A walk is a snapshot, and what appears to be valid in the concrete moment. This validity can last for a very long time, but it can also change rapidly as changing situations in the life and world of the counselor change. For all time, we will certainly not find true findings. It would also contradict the constant changes of all things and the constant growth of all things. We also do not divination and do not use "truths". If something is true at all, then it is the fact that the walk can change something for the life or well-being of the participant.

At the end of the process, when something essential has been shown, it is advisable to release the "walking" person from the role. This works well if the participant thanks his Walker and calls him back to his real first name. "Thanks for your service, you're back ... [name]".