Partners in Place

“I had just retired and was drawn to using the wheel to look back on my life and bring all those parts of me forward into the present so I could see more clearly who I am and what shaped me – and what I might do next. I started with a retrospective approach and ended up with six wheels: Childhood, College Years, Peace Corps, Parenting, Career, and Aging & Rebirth. To get started, I picked a photo for the center of each wheel. Then, I divided the outer ring into four headings: My Heart World, My Mind World, My Spiritual World, and My Natural World. Thus, I had six wheels, each with a photo in the center and the outer ring divided into four sections. As I gazed at each photo, I asked, “what do I want to ask this self?” and “what did I take with me from this stage into the next one?” I was flooded with memories and feelings, which I wrote down in brief phrases. The wheels and the divisions were of course, all arbitrary. That’s the beauty of working with the wheel. It can be anything you need or want it to be. I made several passes at each wheel, and each time was able to go deeper and deeper, like opening boxes hidden within boxes, hidden within yet other boxes. Working with the wheel in this way helped me chart my future path, and was deeply satisfying.”