Though we often focus on the many challenges women face in the workplace, it is no secret that women also hold themselves back from reaching their full potential. Faced with gender bias and stereotypes, unfair policies and pay practices, and a culture that favors men’s advancement, it is not uncommon for women to shy away from direct confrontation and give up their personal power. Limiting beliefs are often cited as a reason for women’s lack of confidence and ability to be perceived as potential leaders.
I know, from my experience coaching professional women since 2007, it is easier to teach someone the skills necessary to navigate a competitive work environment than it is to help them let go of the limiting beliefs they may have about themselves and their future success. Out of necessity, therefore, coaching must address the external as well as internal factors inhibiting women’s progress.
It has always been of great interest to me to discover ways to lift these barriers, and I use a variety of methods with my clients. But when a colleague and mutual friend introduced me to Jaqueline Sussman. I was extremely impressed with her approach to help women break down their barriers and step into their authentic leadership and power. Her work in Eidetic Imagery is masterful.
Marcus: What is Eidetic Imagery?
Sussman: Eidetic images are bright, lively pictures seen in the mind, much like a movie image or photograph, which are neurologically recorded in the brain and systematically stored for future reference. When recalled, the eidetic image can create a vivid experience of events and conflicts with drama, clarity, and detail. Through this process, obstacles and challenging problems can be clearly viewed and their underlying causes identified. Problematic situations are viewed, as greater insight and innovative solutions are downloaded from within.
Beliefs and behaviors are ruled from the subconscious. In order to deeply change one’s attitudes and behaviors one needs to access their subconscious mind, to clearly see the stored images driving their limiting behaviors and to replace these with the images of their most distinctive powers and capabilities also, stored in the unconscious and hidden from awareness. Eidetic Imagery is a methodology that accesses the unconscious directly and brings to all this to light.
Marcus: How does this help women release limiting beliefs they may have about themselves?
Sussman: The gift of Eidetic Imagery is that a person can concretize their actual limiting belief by seeing it in an image. This allows them to:
- See their limiting belief clearly.
- See how others they work with feel and or respond to them as they operate with their limiting belief.
- Go within and discover an aspect of themselves that embodies their wholeness, strength, and hidden potential that is opposite to their limiting belief. They also are able to download visions of solutions to their dilemmas.
- Illuminates how to act in order to bring positive influence and leadership.
For example, they may bring up an image of themselves not being able to speak in a meeting. They experience the painful emotions associated with that situation, view how others react to it, but then are coached to replace that image with one that represents a powerful and confident persona. They then use this new image whenever they are in a similar situation. The result of using this new image is life-changing.
Marcus: Women often suffer from lack of confidence which prevents them from realizing their full potential. How does eidetic imagery help with this?
Sussman: Women's beliefs about themselves have been indoctrinated through years of cultural, historical, and psychological conditioning. Each woman brings her own unique history of being raised as a woman to her work environment based on her culture, religion and developmental history. These socialized impacts are wired in the neural pathways in the brain and act like knee jerk reactions to life and work situations. Some of these automatic reactions unconsciously impede a woman’s capacity to succeed without her ever being aware of it.
However, women also bring to the table the distinctive gifts, abilities and talents rooted in her authentic nature, which differ from that of men, in part due the distinct socialization process that men and women undergo in our culture. All too often, in my work, I have seen women not feel confident in her unique expression of power or style of leadership, as her more “feminine” attributes have not been named, valued nor, modeled in the work place. Thus, women are left no choice but, to unconsciously emulate male styles of leadership and interaction in order to be taken seriously, leaving them operating in a split state of consciousness unable to truly be themselves
Limiting beliefs and obstructive knee jerk reactions arise spontaneously in both men and women alike, however, women experience a particular type of stress as she works in a male dominated culture, whether subtle or, overt. Women have shared with me that they feel insecure and uncertain at work with men suffering with inner conflicting thoughts such as, “If I strongly express my opinions in the meeting with the men, will I be perceived as a bitch? “If am more demure, or soft spoken will I be taken seriously?” “If I promote myself and express all of my accomplishments when asking for a raise, will I be viewed as arrogant?” “I subtly feel one down with my male colleague, like he has more authority by being male.” This psychic stress, cuts women off from her ability to source her unique abilities change or impact problematic situations at work and to offer the best she was from within her.
The Eidetic Imagery process, allows each woman, to clearly see, feel and understand how she is diminishing her power in specific situations at work.
Once, clearly seen, it brings clarity, awareness and perspective in seeing how she is operating in ways that limits the expression of her most gifted and authentic abilities. Then, the process offers imagery tools, which bring new visions that enable her to see how to overcome difficult situations from a wellspring of her authentic strength and ability. All the answers come from within her.
Marcus: What is the subsequent effect on their ability to assume leadership roles?
Sussman: Leadership calls for authenticity. Being authentic takes courage in trusting one’s own style of being and the dictates of their inner knowing and confidently leading others in their visions. Being confident means being true to oneself, thus, in their decisions, their thoughts, impulses and sensibilities. This is the mark of a leader. Eidetic Imagery offers a direct route to self-confidence and the ability to stand on one’s own because it taps into the part of the mind that is usually hidden from view. Eidetic Image psychology taps into one’s native intelligence and brings one’s most gifted abilities forward for utilization in assuming positions of influence and leadership.
Marcus: What is the impact of this work for the future?
Sussman: At this time in history, women are bringing unique and distinctive gifts to the table, which have not traditionally been viewed as powerful. Whether this is due to nature or socialization is unknown. However, Eidetic Imagery research has shown what women are bringing different abilities to the work place than men.
As women increasingly find themselves in leadership roles, the result is a natural paradigm shift in the way power and influence have traditionally been viewed. This represents a movement away from the masculine lens of control, domination and one-upmanship towards one that is more inclusive and compassionate, emphasizing the greatest good for all. The infusion of the feminine psyche in the work place has set the stage for greater balance of power and for a more cohesive and interconnected vision for the world. But, in order to do so, women have to have confident trust in their own selves.
The impact of this work allows women to discover the unique feminine strengths lying within her own psyche and manifest these into the world around her in order to facilitate true and effective change. The change must first come from within her and then out into her world.
