The Wheel of Life

The wheel of life is a way of portraying your life as segments of a circle, allowing an easy visual display on where your life is out of balance. You take a circle, and divide it into 8 segments.

	You then label each segment, taking 8 from the following list:
Fitness/health Career Wealth/Money Personal & spiritual growth Fun/recreation	Love/significant other Friends/Family Physical environment/home Creative/self expression Life style/possessions

Each segment starts at 0 at the centre, and goes to 10 at the outer edge. You next rate your level of satisfaction in each life area where 10 means you are fulfilled and satisfied, 5 means there is significant room for improvement and a 1 is an area where you are totally unhappy.

Next, draw a line through each segment to create a new outer edge.

Now look at the wheel. Is it in balance? Or are there areas that are significantly in need of attention? Is your wheel smooth but small, or big in parts and small in others? You can see from this example that there are some areas that are well out of balance. These are the areas to focus on. There are no right or wrong answers, but if your wheel looks out of balance it could be that you are not paying enough attention to certain areas of your life.

Now it is time to think about where you can make some changes and improvements. Don't try to do too much at once, but make a change, e.g. to walk for 30 minutes each day if fitness is your greatest challenge, or to cut up your credit card if debt is a big issue.

When I use this with my personal clients I get them to take each area and to describe what it would be like if they scored a 10. I ask questions to get them to feel, to visualise to think about what it would be like if they were totally satisfied. This creates a real difference with where they are now.