Wheel of Life

When to use:

The Wheel of Life is a technique that works when there is a need to look at the level of satisfaction in the most important areas of Mentee's life. By using the visual form of this exercise, Mentee can easily see what is important at a given moment.

Props:

• A4 sheet
• Colored markers / highlighters
• Virtual board, in the case of remote work (e.g.: Miro, Mural)

Instructions:

Stage 1

Prepare an A4 sheet of paper with a previously drawn circle, divided into 8 parts.

You can download the template here.

Stage 2

Ask the Mentee to think about what the most important elements of his or her life are.

These could be:

• health and physical fitness
• family and love
• personal development
• professional satisfaction
• physical environment, i.e. the surroundings in which they live
• finances
• career
• relaxation and entertainment
• friends and community
• philosophy of life and spirituality

Importantly, the above areas are just inspiration and if a given area is not important to the Mentee, do not deal with it. And if an area important to the Mentee is not on the list, feel free to add it. This is the Mentee's life circle, so the Mentee has full decision-making power over which elements will be included in it.

After selecting 8 elements, write them down on the life circle.

Stage 3

Assuming that the center of the circle is 0% and its outer border is 100%, ask the Mentee to mark the percentage level of his or her satisfaction with each of the eight listed.

The resulting image is a reflection of the situation here and now, how it is and not how the Mentee would like it to be.

Stage 4

In the next step, ask the Mentee to think about how the Mentee would like each of these areas to look.

Here, the following questions that you can ask may come in handy:

• What do you see?
• What is most important to you?
• Do any parts of the circle influence each other?
• In which areas would you like to increase your level of satisfaction?
• What can you do to achieve the expected level of satisfaction?
• In which area are you already at the level you expect?
• Is there any area that exceeds your expected state of satisfaction?
• Which area do you want to deal with first so that the image of the entire circle improves in your opinion?

Note that you can't have 100% in each element. It will be impossible and unrealistic to do.

Stage 5

Encourage the Mentee to decide what they will work on and which area you want to focus on first.

Ask the Mentee to write down:

• 3 actions they will perform first to improve the state of the selected area.
• 3 actions that will lead the Mentee to improve the selected area.

Stage 6

Summarize this exercise together and end with the most important reflections for you.

Own work based on: “The Art of Asking Questions in Coaching” Tony Stoltzfus, own practice.