exploring neurodiverity
through the Eight Tensions™
Exploring neurodiversity through the Eight Tensions™
Thursday 16th October 6pm-8pm (online) and Saturday 8th November 2025 9.30am-3.30pm (online or in-person at King’s Cross, London).
This Autumn, join Carolyn Green and Dr Natalie Lancer for a two-part hybrid course Exploring neurodiversity through the Eight Tensions™. This course will teach you how to support your clients to explore themselves within their neurodiversity.
It is aimed at people who have a basic understanding of neurodivergence and are currently or will be working with neurodivergent clients. This course gives you an introduction to the Eight Tensions™ Framework, and how you can use the Eight Tensions™ to help your clients explore shame, guilt, procrastination, masking, perfectionism, rejection sensitivity, executive function and overwhelm. We will highlight potential techniques and approaches including CBT, ACT, CFT, mindfulness and narrative therapy to support and enhance your clients’ lives.
We will cover:
- What do the tensions raise for different people with neurodiversity?
- How can we incorporate that in one-to-one coaching and group work?
- How can we help our clients explore who they are within their neurodiversity?
Contact Natalie for more information: natalie@natalielancer.com
My co-trainer Carolyn Green, Coaching Psychologist, CBT Psychotherapist and Neurodiversity Specialist explains the significance of exploring neurodiversity through the Eight Tensions™:
“Dr Lancer’s Eight Tensions refer to the inner conflicts, dilemmas, or struggles that we often face as individuals when navigating life and the world around us. These tensions are neither negative nor positive, instead, they sit on a continuum. Developing an understanding of where we sit on a particular continuum can prompt self-reflection, personal growth, and the pursuit a more authentic and meaningful life. However, they can also lead to existential crises when individuals struggle to reconcile these opposing aspects.
On first learning about Dr Lancer’s Eight Tensions™ Framework, I was struck by the way each tension resonated with the strengths and challenges of neurodiversity and I have developed coaching programmes that use the framework to explore underlying issues of neurodiversity. The feedback from my programme in which I applied the Eight Tensions™ to a self-development group for neurodiverse people speaks for itself:
“This course was literally life changing for me. I walked in feeling completely overwhelmed and not sure what to do about how I was feeling in life. I thought I needed fixing but it turns out I just needed understanding. This programme is helping me find words for things I’ve carried for years”.
Come and join us on Thursday 16th October 6pm-8pm (online) and Saturday 8th November 2025 9.30am-3.30pm (online or in-person at King’s Cross, London) for this eye-opening, impactful and immensely practical training, so you can learn how to implement the Eight Tensions™ in your coaching for neurodiversity.
Information about your trainers
Carolyn Green
Coaching Psychologist, CBT Psychotherapist, Neurodiversity Specialist
I’m a Coaching Psychologist, BABCP-accredited Cognitive Behavioural Psychotherapist, and Neurodiversity Specialist with a background in psychology, education, and healthcare. I support neurodivergent adults, particularly those navigating adult diagnosis and identity development, through evidence-based, neurodiversity-affirmative coaching. My practice is modified to the individual, integrating Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Compassion Focused Therapy (CFT), cognitive-behavioural coaching, and mindful self-compassion to support neurodivergent individuals in building identity, flexibility, and wellbeing.
I am passionate about translating psychological insight into real-world change, through supportive, inclusive, ethical, and evidence-informed practice. I deliver strengths-based, neurodiversity-affirmative coaching, training and supervision. I offer group programmes, for example, “The Neurodiversity Signature” – exploring self-identity and ‘The Executive Function Factor” – a practical exploration of executive functioning.
I offer multidisciplinary assessment for autism and ADHD and am a Clinical Supervisor for the University of Hertfordshire, I also train and support professionals across the UK, Europe, and US. My work is grounded in the belief that coaching is not about fixing but liberating and helping people reconnect with who they are.
I am also a certified Eight Tensions™ Coach . On first learning about Dr Natalie Lancer’s 8 Tensions Framework™, I was struck by how deeply each tension resonated with the strengths and challenges of neurodiversity.
I use the tensions flexibly, sometimes focusing on one tension that resonates with an individual client, other times exploring all eight over a longer Eight Tensions™ specific, one-to-one, coaching journey. Clients may also work with the Eight Tensions™ cards to guide their own reflections. Sometimes this alone is enough, or it can form the basis for a more focused piece of coaching work. I have adapted the framework into an eight-week programme to address underlying aspects of neurodiversity and self-identity, such as shame, guilt, procrastination, masking, perfectionism, overwhelm, and rejection sensitivity.
In both individual and group settings, I connect the tensions to neurodiversity and integrate them with approaches such as Cognitive Behaviour Therapy, Narrative Therapy, Compassion Focused Therapy (CFT), and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT).
What I value most about being an Eight Tensions™ coach is how the tensions invite individuals to ‘step inside’ and experience themselves in new ways, to explore identity, uncover insights, and create their own roadmap for coaching. Unlike externally driven coaching models, The Eight Tensions™ foster intrinsic understanding and enable deeper, more transformative work.
Dr Natalie Lancer
Chartered Coaching Psychologist
I am a Chartered Coaching Psychologist and Former Chair of the Division of Coaching Psychology at the British Psychological Society. I specialise in existential psychology – encouraging my clients and coaching supervisees to consider their work through themes such as responsibility and choice. I supervise on the Master’s in Existential Coaching course at the New School of Psychotherapy and Counselling. I have various other elected roles in the British Psychological Society including Trustee and Chair of Senate.
The Eight Tensions® was formulated as part of my Psychology Doctorate at Birkbeck, University of London. I train coaches how to use the Eight Tensions® in an annual five month programme and provide ongoing CPD for Eight Tensions® practitioners which has led to the growth of the Eight Tensions® community. I also provide coaching supervision using the Eight Tensions® as a framework. I have given several keynotes and presentations about the Eight Tensions® at the British Psychological Society’s Division of Coaching Psychology Annual Conference, webinars for the Association for Coaching and many other organisations. I, and latterly others, have published peer reviewed articles on the Eight Tensions®. Its application has grown over the last five years both in my own practice and research, and in the practice and research of other coaches and business consultants. I confirm that I am writing from first-hand experience in research and teaching.
I apply the Eight Tensions® to help a variety of clients achieve their goals in a realistic, practical and human way in my coaching programmes. Clients include doctoral students at the University of Cambridge and Durham University and business leaders looking to make practical changes to their lives.
In 2016, I co-authored Techniques for Coaching and Mentoring with David Clutterbuck and David Megginson (Routledge). I was the three season host of the BPS podcast, The Coaching Psychology Pod (which to date has 50 000 downloads).
The Coaching Psychology Pod
This podcast is brought to you by the Division of Coaching Psychology, part of the British Psychological Society. We unpack Coaching Psychology and will help you take a thoughtful and considered approach to your coaching practice.
Over the last three years, host, Dr Natalie Lancer, Chartered Coaching Psychologist and Former Chair of the Division of Coaching Psychology, facilitated conversations with a panel of selected experts where we talk about specialised coaching topics that will directly impact your work as a coach.
As you are listening, to find out more, head to the Division of Coaching Psychology’s webpage on the British Psychological Society’s website.
We would love to hear your thoughts and reflections on the podcast. Please email us at natalie@natalielancer.com
free resource
- How does engaging in CPD and supervision give you an advantage as a coach?
- Is there a way to find and strengthen our unique voice as a practitioner?
- Can CPD and supervision support your business development and coaching practice?
Download the eye-opening, reflective exercises in the FREE CPD-Supervision Advantage Workbook to advance your business and keep your work fresh, ethical, and deeply fulfilling.
Say Hello!
You can always directly email me on natalie@natalielancer.com