ROBERT HOLDEN SOLUTIONS
ACTIVATING EMERGENT SOLUTIONS
COACHING & PROBLEM SOLVING
FOR INDIVIDUALS & GROUPS
Problem Solving: for individuals, teams, or businesses with a method called Dynamic Facilitation.
Coaching: developing men’s understanding of themselves by teaching emotional intelligence, leadership, communication and outdoor skills with a proven coaching process, or by rights of passage in the wilderness.
TESTIMONIALS
DYNAMIC FACILITATION
My facilitation method moves you away from decision-making and harnesses a different, creative form of thinking to swiftly resolve your problem.
This form of thinking is typically discovered in moments of crisis, and can be reliably elicited by facilitation.
Dynamic Facilitation is a simple, reliable, true and tested method for problem solving, developed over 40 years by Jim Rough of Center for Wise Democracy, a non-profit of which I am part.
I guarantee I can get you to a different place with a 3.5 to 4.5 hour session.
This process has been written into law in some states in the Germanic part of the world, and adopted by some cities, including Ashland NC here in the US.
With Dynamic Facilitation, I guide you through a process that uncovers a new, deeper solution to your issue, one that addresses root causes instead of just the symptoms.
In the process you will experience a moment of breakthrough - from which new solutions are birthed. The process feels like a dissolving, after which new ideas come into resolution.
The power of this method is that I facilitate - I do not teach. I enable you to solve your own problem.
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I use this process to facilitate individuals, groups, businesses and organizations. For groups the process is team-creating.
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Facilitation Shifts you from Left-Brained Decision-Making to Right-Brained Choice-Creating
Decision-Making
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Left-Brained:
Choice Between Options
Divisive
Linear
Tackles Symptoms
Side-Steps Problem
Leads to Unintended Consequences
Entrenchment
Rigid
Competitive
Creates Division
Choice-Creating
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Right-Brained:
Provides Clear Path Forward
Integrative
Non-Linear, Creative
Tackles Root Causes
Resolves Problem
Handles all Objections
Freeing
Allows for Change
Collaborative
Creates Teams
Dynamic Facilitation: What is a problem?
A problem is a place where you want to move forward, but are unable to. Here your forward momentum is blocked and you get bogged down. This is a natural result of the way we think.
In this place you can often see two or more paths forward and we all turn to a from of thinking called decision-making to help us. Sometimes we have a whole mess of ideas, feelings, thoughts, problems, solutions and information that leaves us feeling crippled.
Often the more experience we have, the larger the problem, the more insightful we are, the more sensitive we are, the more difficult making a decision is.
Usually the best we can do is let one side of the argument win, and pick a path - often feeling that we choose the best of a bad set of options.
What is a decision?
Decision means to cut away, making a decision means we cut away all other choices in order to select a path forward. If we think of the problem as a road block, the decision results in us choosing to take a detour, either to the left or the right or some other direction.
A decision side-steps the road block, and usually provides forward momentum by ignoring unintended consequences, or leaving objections unresolved. In decision-making one argument wins.
What is a solution?
If a problem is a road block, and a decision results in a detour, a solution is like sweeping aside the road block to allow forward movement down a clear forward path, one that makes the available detours irrelevant.
In terms of my process, a solution is a place we reach, a moment of breakthrough where suddenly you are able to create an idea that integrates aspects of all your choices, and solves a deeper issue than you were expecting, which has the problem and decision dissolve away, leaving you with one clear path forward, and a feeling of relief and resolve allowing you to take it.
This solution is not something you were able to see when you came in, but now seems self-evident. Often once reached a new wave of creativity sweeps in, allowing you to come up with new creative ideas about that path forward. I call this process choice creating - the emergence of one clear path which you choose to walk.
I don’t believe you…
The process is extremely reliable and robust. If this sounds crazy to you - that there are simply no other choices - you are actually deeply embedded in decision-making. The more entrenched you are, the easier it is to liberate you, and the greater the magnitude of the available breakthrough, and the more surprising the effect of choice-creating.
For individuals:
My method solves your problem by allowing you to integrate previously seen paths or solutions into one clear way forward. It resolves inner conflict, provides moments of deep insight and leaves you with previously-unseen, now self-evident ideas.
For Groups:
My method literally creates teams; resolves conflict between team members; leaves members feeling heard, understood and listened to.
For Everyone:
Provides an integrative solution, harnesses the power of creative problem solving, provides a breakthrough solution, provides new direction, allows you to get on board with the new idea.
DYNAMIC COACHINIG
I coach ambitious, mission-driven men to understand themselves in order to effect positive change.
I work with men seeking a different, more balanced, masculine paradigm - those for whom the one they were taught no longer works, or has created crisis for them - often in their well-being, mental health or emotional state - manifesting in their relationships and in their external world.
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I teach men emotional intelligence, leadership, communication and outdoor skills. My method helps clients deeply understand themselves, trust their intuition, act decisively, and become intimate with their emotional world.
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I guide men through, or encourage them to seek initiatory experiences, whether that is with me in the outdoors, with plant medicines, or with others in different settings they are drawn to.
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My 1 on 1 coaching begins with a focus on processing your past, freeing up mental space and energy - allowing you to move on from what holds you back and significantly improving your mental health.
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As well as 1 on 1 coaching I place many of my clients in a men's group, where they can learn from others in this process, and practice what they are learning in a group setting. This practice is a powerful addition to coaching, allowing clients to move further, faster.
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The process of becoming an excellent manager is much like that of becoming a powerful coach, so clients in my men's group will experience the coaching, reflections and insights of others who have been able to embody what I teach.
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Drawing on my training and experiences as an environmental and evolutionary ecologist and climate scientist, I teach men using a holistic lens of ecological and holistic understanding of the whole system. I use the Hero's Journey as a model for understanding life, how inner well-being is reflected in the outer world, and for helping client's understand their path through both. Understanding of the emotional world, masculine-feminine dynamics, cycles of grief and rebirth all integrate onto the Hero's journey into something I teach, called the 'Mythical Model'.
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I help men become intimate with themselves, and the grieving process, and a bi-product of this work is improved success in all my clients relationships - whether that is with colleagues, direct reports, their manager, or with romantic and intimate partnerships.
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As a scientist, I focus primarily on men who are managers in tech and STEM fields.
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My goal is to improve your understanding of yourself, teach you to manage, care for, improve your mental health and turn you into an excellent manager , communicator and leader - for yourself, your loved-ones, your work, and your community.
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I draw on my training as an Ecologist, my experience leading expeditions to remote parts of the world, my experience and training as a coach and also from my lived experience of moving through my own crisis of mental health and burnout.
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I want spirited men committed to their life's purpose, and feeling strong and balanced enough to live form a place of open-hearted truth. I do everything I can to guide clients along that path, with the desire that they will surpass me and move on.
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I help men create and maintain a useful, purposeful, intimate, meaningful and successful life.
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Our society focuses on symptoms rather than root causes and if we give our attention to only the surface level of things, we perpetuate dis/ease on all levels. Climate change is an outer reflection of the same societal/inner sickness. I work with men to recognize, understand and address the core of their blocks and suffering.
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Men tend to neglect their intimate and personal needs which sets them up for crisis later in life. I support clients off of that path and onto a more holistic one, creating more fulfilling work experiences and better personal relationships.
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We need to address things at the deeper levels. I help men understand their emotional world and their intimate needs to become more effective managers and communicators so that they can get the things they want out of life and bring their gifts into the world.
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I am passionate about working with men in tech, STEM fields, the environment, and those in crisis. Let’s have a conversation to discover if working together is a fit.
MY NAME IS ROBERT
I help people and businesses solve problems. I’m an ecologist and former climate scientist. I coach men in their teens, 20s, and 30s around their purpose, life path, passions, desires, and management skills. I’m passionate about working with startups, men in management, and STEM fields, or teens looking for greater depth and guidance in life.
I use the mythical model as a framework to help men navigate their own, distinctive life path. Through this process, my clients get to know themselves, trust themselves, and become intimate with their inner world. This is crucial to developing management and relational skills.
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I guide teams through a coaching and personal growth process created by Canadian academics - which is the only statistically proven coaching process - and the only one created using data.