As you read about Life Code Matrix on this website, you may be wondering, so what's behind all this? Let's hear the story straight from the one who created this program, Cilla Sturt.
What is your professional background?
My career has been an interesting mix of Counseling, Community Church Leadership, Social Work, Sales, PR and Marketing, Company Management, Business Coaching, & Identity Coaching.
What have been your identity challenges?
I grew up in the jungle (Sepik Province) in Papua New Guinea. I have lived between NZ and Australia since then. At home now with nearby Te Aroha mountain, the Ohinemuri river, the waterfalls, and the intense green Punga fern forests of the stunning Karangahake Gorge in New Zealand; so much reminds me of the isolated Missionary station, Anguganak, where I lived growing up.
Understanding identity and the senses, and how they connect with us has been endlessly interesting to me because it was an enormous challenge trying to adjust as a teenager. Big city life and a new culture at the age of 18 was a culture shock. I have white skin, but on the inside I am Melanesian.
This has given me an interesting lens to see life from. A double lens. I can see through the lens of a sophisticated city dweller, with big ambitions and goals to achieve. I can also see life through the eyes of a bush woman who lives in a simple grass hut and is happy to sit and be; content to listen to the rain falling.
How did you come to develop this new sense-based Identity Coaching?
I realized early on in my coaching work, that to have the resilience and motivation to achieve anything of value, we need to have a strong foundation in order to achieve our goals. But I wanted to find out what that foundation is. When we know what it is, how do we meaningfully connect to it? I discovered that the core of our identity is held in our senses and we all have our own unique, one off, connection to the senses. Our senses each contain a code, and that is our foundation. Our foundation is not in our mind. Not in our emotions. Conscious ownership of this sense code makes our identity strong. Our relationship within the matrix of the world around us improves in multifaceted ways when we have this connection. This concept has now been backed up by independent research, and the research has been published.
How does Life Code Matrix connect with nature?
Nature strives continuously for balance. Last night we had storm here, but all the plants quickly recovered today. Nature is made to recover its balance in all senses. After any disaster, you notice how everything in nature will organically find a way to grow itʼs way back to balance; from a tiny weed to a towering mountain. Humans also have an inbuilt intrinsic strength, because we are made in the image of God. We lean towards balance, and even our destructive behavior can be our way of survival, of trying to find a way back to how goodness started in the Garden of Eden. There is a hard wiring in us to be perfectly, uniquely, who we are. Life Code Matrix names this part of us. Unlike plants and animals we have something extra special because we are created to be human. That means we are capable of consciously connecting to who we are. ʻWho we areʼ is made in Godʼs image.
Could you please explain one of your sense codes?
We connect every moment of every day from our senses until we die. But for each person each moment is a uniquely different experience in their senses. That's what makes us who we are.
One example is my code for smell. The name of my code happens to be ʻLOVEʼ. When I smell a beautiful fragrance that I am drawn to I remember: ʻThats me! I am loveʼ. I become aware that I am in tune with love in my own life, and of course at times, I am not. Maybe I have fallen out of love with life, a situation, a person... and am not connected to love right then. Knowing my code word empowers me to step back into love, and be who God made me to be. I canʼt do that if I donʼt know my own code. I would be flying blind. In this way, love, through my sense of smell, can involve all of who I am: prayer, emotions, thoughts, and behavior. Some examples of other peopleʼs code for smell are: Peace, Knowing, Happiness, Authentic. They donʼt connect for me with the sense of smell.
How do you connect with this in your life?
I choose to do this exercise as a daily prayer experience with all of my 6 senses. I want to be authentically me, and not be manipulated by people and experiences externally. This exercise is easy to do as I am walking in nature. Itʼs a way to help me take full responsibility for being who I am; to step back and take ownership of who God has created me to be. My relationship with God is a daily living reality, and this sense connection is a way to experience the nitty gritty of who I am in that relationship. This code connection for me is a trinitarian dance step in every day life! This is owning up to the fullness of what God has given me and who He has created me to be.
How do we get this sense code identity?
We already have it. We are all ʻmade in the image of Godʼ. We are born with a unique sense identity and soul, but we can take them for granted. Often people place more emphasis on external identity and have less respect for soul and senses. Indigenous cultures have an intrinsic connection to sense and soul understanding because they need it for survival. We, in our consumer driven, external success driven, materialistic culture have disconnected from the senses and so we miss out on acknowledging this amazing foundational piece, whether we have a faith in God, or not. Life Code Matrix helps to name it, own it, take responsibility for it.
But we love the senses in our culture, donʼt we?
We have chosen a more emotional, cynical, hypocritical, synthetic, intellectual approach to senses. Our senses have also become an area of confusion. For example we are starving for touch and yet have rules banning touch with children in schools and rules banning staff from touching the elderly in retirement homes. We touch each other at work with a quick firm handshake as a greeting. Otherwise, no touch allowed. On the other side of the coin, touch in our culture is reduced as a concept to be sexual in all the senses. Touch has been allowed to expand in certain social circumstances as overt sexual behavior and pornography has become a backdrop of our social landscape, whether we have faith in God, or not, itʼs there, everywhere. The book and movie: ʻ50 Shades of Greyʼ is an example of that. Human touch is meant for safety, comfort, healing and nurture but how many of us have a true experience of that? Not many.
We are over indulging our taste in many things but most obviously in food. We are dying from over eating, whether we have faith in God, or not. Taste is connected to health through food as nutrition but we use food to satisfy our cravings, our addictions.
We are losing our sense of smell by filling the world with pollution and covering the problem with synthetic sprays in our homes, cars and bodies. Never before have we had so much access visually to information and knowledge, and yet we are more confused and directionless and lost than ever as a society.
Doesn't our faith in God make a difference?
Disconnection from our senses affects us in every way including in our spirituality and our faith. We can feel incomplete in who we are, whether we have a faith in God or not. We can find ourselves seeking a sense of completeness from external influences, whether we have a faith in God or not. We can try and build strength from external forces, rather than our own resources, whether we have faith in God or not. This is confused and dualistic living which creates overall a feeling of inauthenticity. Not being in tune with who you are leads to feeling out of alignment, disillusioned and depressed, and this happens to people whether they have a faith in God, or not.
How do you see the future for Life Code Matrix?
It is trendy these days to be ʻauthenticʼ, and corporate leaders have made it totally cool to have ʻintegrityʼ as a company value. Awareness of our connection to nature, and valuing the planet is a growing trend; as we all realize how precious our resources are and try to protect them. This awareness is increasing for individuals, and for corporations. Even if it is paying lip service, it is there. Awareness of the importance of the senses is a growing trend across all the social sciences, because senses are woven into everything to do with authenticity, integrity, health, science and nature. I am excited about the future! I think Life Code Matrix is just right for the time we are living in. It allows us to slow down for a couple for hours and connect to who we are, and get ourselves back into alignment. It gives connection to strength, motivation, clarity, authenticity, direction at a time when many people have lost hope. With millions of people living in crowded cities, disconnected from nature, this offers a practical way to know how to live authentically from our God-given senses so we are not flying blind. That's all good!
Read more about the senses and how they relate to our identity:
ʻSENSES Our Forgotten Identityʼ - By Cilla Sturt. Available now from Amazon
Contact Cilla Sturt: cilla@lifecodematrix.com