PATH, MAPS, and CIRCLES were developed to assist individuals, families and their support networks to plan positive and positive futures. Circles came first (with Judith Snow), to discover who was in her life, to work to build an exciting and robust future. MAPS had its origins in schools, to replace the medicalized files with stories that children and adults could use to discover the potential and direction for inclusion and friendship for all. PATH followed by reversing the planning process, beginning with a North Star imagination of dreams and highest purpose, and then a Vision of possibility, working backwards in steps into an action plan to implement a better life.
These conversational planning processes have become part of the family of Person Centered-Planning approaches that have been adopted and adapted by individuals, families, organizations, school systems and governments around the globe. More detailed information on each process follows.
PATH draws on people’s capacities to imagine different futures, & to think backwards from a future possibility & tell fruitful stories about how that possibility might come to be.
MAPS is a planning process for people and organizations that begins with a story – the history. Although MAPS originated in the ‘disability’ sector, its applications cover the full spectrum of life situations.
