Holding two frames at once without picking a winner
Name the two ways of making sense of one question that both feel partly true right now, and write what each one still gets right.
Why it works
Streib and Keller’s (2018) refinement of Fowler’s model, as Mallery and Mallery (2022) summarise it, moves away from strict stage succession and describes overlapping waves of styles in which a person can show more than one style at a time, with residual elements of earlier styles still present. Feeling partly in two frames is therefore consistent with the model, and writing out both frames gives each its due rather than ranking one as the current self.
How to do it
- Write the question you cannot settle in one sentence.
- Write the answer you were raised with, in its own words, and what it still gets right.
- Write the answer you are moving toward, and what it still gets wrong.
- Note which frame you use at work, at home, and alone.
- Write one situation where you would like to use both at once, and what that would require of you.
Evidence
The overlapping-styles claim is Streib and Keller’s (2018), as summarised by Mallery and Mallery (2022), who also report that longitudinal data has not established a fixed stage order. The practice is an inference from the overlap model and has not been tested. (mechanistic)
Streib and Keller (2018) was not read directly; the overlapping-waves wording is taken from Mallery and Mallery. Streib (2001) is cited from its abstract only, for the religious-styles modification. The authors write that further longitudinal data is needed to identify whether they develop sequentially.
Sources
- Streib, H. (2001). Faith Development Theory Revisited: The Religious Styles Perspective. International Journal for the Psychology of Religion, 11(3), 143–158.
- Mallery, S. T., & Mallery, P. (2022). Centers of value and the quest for meaning in faith development: A measurement approach. Frontiers in Psychology, 13, 975160.
Common mistake
Forcing a decision between the two frames so the in-between feeling ends sooner. The overlap model describes more than one style being active in one person as possible, so the exercise is for seeing what each frame still carries.
Practice this with IX Coach
More practices for James Fowler’s Stages of Faith, Made Practical
- Faith timeline: mapping what you trusted at each age
Draw your life as one line and mark, age by age, what you trusted to make sense of things and where that trust changed hands.
- Centers of value: answering the four questions in writing
Write down what you give your life to, who you are committed to in life and death, what you hope for, and who you share your most sacred hopes with.
- Master stories: naming the story you were handed about how life works
Write the story you live by, and name who or what you picture holding the final say when things go wrong.
- Retelling one disagreement from the other side
Write your position on one unsettled disagreement, then write theirs well enough that they would recognise it as their own.
- Mapping the circle of people you feel close to
List the people you feel most responsible to and close to, and mark which of them hold a belief or value that differs from yours.
- Talking with someone about a conviction you do not share
Ask someone who holds a conviction you do not share what it protects for them, repeat their answer back until they say it is right, then say what you still hold.
- Asking whether an old frame still fits this moment
When you notice yourself reaching for a belief you were raised with, ask whether it fits the situation in front of you, and write what the situation actually needs.
Related concepts
- Kegan’s Subject-Object Theory, Made Practical
Moving from being run by your assumptions to being able to examine them
- Ego Development Theory: What It Is and How It Is Measured
The frame you make meaning through, how researchers measure it, and how to work with it without ranking anyone
- Spiral Dynamics, Made Practical
Understanding how value systems develop and how to navigate across them
- The Self-Transforming Mind: Kegan’s Fifth Order, Made Practical
When your own way of seeing becomes something you can look at, question, and let be changed
- The Construct-Aware and Unitive Stages of Adult Development
Seeing the self and its stories as constructions — what it looks like, how rare it is, and what it does not promise
- Ken Wilber’s Integral Theory (AQAL), Made Practical
Five elements for catching what your view of a situation leaves out, held as a map rather than a truth
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