Life Positions and the The OK Corral

Life positions are basic beliefs about self and others, which are used to justify decisions and behaviour. There are a number of ways of diagramming the life positions. Franklyn Ernst (1971) the originator of the OK Corral drew the four positions in a grid, as can be seen from the diagram below. We have put these into red and green to show the effective and ineffective quadrants for communication and healthy relationships.

By shading in the quadrants according to the amount of time we think we spend in each we can get an idea of the themes to our experience.

Berne talked about the life positions as existential positions - one of which we are more likely to go to under stress. This is significantly different to the concept Ernst uses. He is referring to the way we move around all the positions during a typical day. However, there is likely to be one major position we go into under stress, with perhaps another position underneath this one. These positions can change as we develop and grow.

Three Dimensional OKness >