Elizabeth Hartley

Psychotherapist • Coaching Psychologist • mBIT Master Coach • mBIT OPC Trainer

I work with people, coaches and organisations to create meaningful change from within.

My work brings together psychological insight, psychotherapy, coaching and mBIT — Multiple Brain Integration Techniques to help people understand themselves more fully, make better decisions and work more effectively with others.

Because when people change how they think, feel, decide and relate, the impact can extend far beyond the individual.

From Inner Change to Organisational Impact

Three ways I work

My work has evolved across psychotherapy, coaching, training and organisational practice.

Although the settings are different, the principle remains the same:

THE CLINIC

Psychotherapy

A space to step back, think differently and understand what is happening beneath the surface.

I work with people who may be questioning their relationships, their direction or what they want from the next chapter of their lives.

My approach combines psychological understanding with a warm, thoughtful and practical way of working — helping you develop greater clarity about yourself, your relationships and the choices available to you.

Meaningful change begins within

Explore The Clinic →

THE STUDIO

Coaching for people who know something needs to change but aren't always clear what that change needs to be.

My coaching brings psychological insight into the process of moving forward — helping you step back from the noise, understand what is really important and make decisions that feel aligned with who you are.

I am particularly interested in the relationship between how we think, how we feel and what we know intuitively.

This is where mBIT can add another dimension to the coaching process.

Change Within - Impact Beyond

Explore The Studio →

THE ACADEMY

Training & Organisational Practice

I train therapists and coaches to develop their practice through mBIT and support organisations to think differently about people, decision-making and change.

Through the Academy, I offer mBIT Coach Certification and mBIT Organisation Practitioner Certification (OPC)training.

The focus is not simply on adding another qualification.

It is about developing practical approaches that can make a meaningful difference — to individuals, relationships, teams and organisations.

Develop people. Strengthen collaboration. Create organisational impact.

Change Within - Impact Beyond

Explore The Academy →

The thinking behind my work - why there is a circle at the heart of my brand

You may have noticed the circle that runs through my branding.

It is inspired by the ensō — the Japanese Zen circle, traditionally created in a single brushstroke, the ensō can represent wholeness, presence, freedom and interconnectedness. What particularly resonates with me is that the circle does not have to be perfect.

It can be open, uneven, still becoming, and that feels very human, because none of us are finished products. We learn, we change,
we question, we begin again. That has been central to my own professional journey, and it is reflected in the way I work, wholeness within.

Understanding the different parts of ourselves, recognising how we influence and are influenced by the people around us.

Understanding that meaningful change within one person can influence relationships, collaboration, teams and organisations.

This is also why mBIT — Multiple Brain Integration Techniques — has become such an important part of my work.

The head, heart and gut offer different ways of knowing.

When we learn to listen to and integrate them, we can approach decisions and change with greater awareness and coherence.

And that has relevance far beyond the individual - Because organisations are made up of people.

What happens within us influences what happens between us.

And what happens between us can shape the organisations we create together.

Read the story behind the Enzo →

From people to organisations

Organisations don't change independently of the people within them, when we talk about organisational change, we often focus on structures, strategies, processes and policies, these all matter. But sustainable change also requires us to consider the people who bring those systems to life. How do people make decisions? How do they communicate? How do they collaborate? How do they respond when things become difficult? And do people feel able to contribute, challenge, listen and work together wisely?

My organisational work brings psychological understanding into these questions.

I am interested in creating workplaces where people can think clearly, make better decisions, collaborate effectively and contribute to healthier organisations.

Because meaningful organisational change doesn't simply happen to people. It happens through people.

About Elizabeth

A career built around people and change

My professional journey has taken me across psychotherapy, psychology, coaching, supervision and professional training.

I bring together my experience as a Psychotherapist, Coaching Psychologist, mBIT Master Coach and Trainer, alongside my work developing practitioners and supporting people through change.

I have always been interested in what sits beneath the presenting issue.

What is really happening?

What has brought someone to this point?

What might they understand differently?

And what becomes possible when they have greater clarity about themselves and the choices they are making?

Today, that curiosity extends into organisations too.

I believe the same principles that help an individual create meaningful change can inform how we think about people, relationships and decision-making within organisations.

Different settings. One underlying philosophy.

Change begins within.

Read more about Elizabeth →

Ready to explore what could change?

Whether you are looking for psychotherapy, coaching, professional training or support with organisational change, the starting point is the same.

Understanding where you are now — and what needs to change from within.

THE CLINIC

Psychotherapy

THE STUDIO

Coaching

THE ACADEMY

Training & Organisational Practice

Explore how I can work with you →

Elizabeth Hartley

Psychotherapist | Coaching Psychologist | mBIT Master Coach | mBIT OPC Trainer

Change Within - Impact Beyond.

The Thinking Behind My Work

Change begins from within.

My work brings together psychotherapy, coaching psychology and mBIT, with a particular interest in how our thinking, emotions, body and experiences influence the way we make decisions and create change.

I believe good coaching and therapy should be both human and grounded in evidence.I also believe we should be honest about what research tells us, what it suggests, and where our understanding is still developing.

We are more than our thinking

We often approach decisions through our rational mind:

What should I do?
What makes sense?
What are the facts?

These questions matter.

But they are not the whole story.

Our emotions, physical sensations, experiences and intuition can also provide important information.

Research into interoception, embodied cognition, emotion, intuition and brain–body communication continues to explore how these different systems interact.

This is one of the reasons I am interested in helping people become more aware of the different ways they experience and process information.

Head. Heart. Gut.

mBIT — Multiple Brain Integration Techniques — provides a practical framework for exploring three interconnected intelligences.

HEAD

What makes sense?

Our cognitive and analytical thinking helps us gather information, evaluate possibilities and consider consequences.

HEART

What matters?

Our emotional and relational intelligence connects us with values, meaning, relationships and what is important to us.

GUT

What do I know intuitively?

Our bodily and intuitive responses can provide information that may not immediately be available through conscious reasoning.

The aim isn't to choose one over another.

It is about learning to listen, integrate and make more coherent decisions.

What do I want to make possible?

When we are faced with a decision, it is easy to become caught up in what we have to do.

I prefer to begin by stepping back and asking:

What do I want to make possible?

This shifts our attention from simply responding to what is happening towards considering the outcome we want to move towards.

From there, we can explore:

Why does it matter?
What does my head say?
What does my heart say?
What does my gut say?

And then:

What decision will move me towards that outcome?

For me, this is where coaching becomes more than problem-solving.

It becomes a process of developing greater awareness, making more conscious choices and taking purposeful action.

What does the research say about mBIT?

There is a growing body of research into the relationship between the brain, body, emotion and decision-making.

There is also direct peer-reviewed research into the mBIT Head–Heart–Gut model.

A 2019 study by Soosalu, Henwood and Deo, published in SAGE Open, developed and tested the Multiple Brain Preference Questionnaire (MBPQ).

The study explored whether people's preferences for head, heart and gut processing could be distinguished and measured. The researchers identified a three-factor structure corresponding to the three areas and reported good reliability for the resulting questionnaire.

This is useful research, but the wider evidence base for mBIT as a complete coaching methodology is still developing.

I think that distinction is important.

I do not present mBIT as a scientifically proven treatment, nor do I suggest that we literally have three separate brains making independent decisions.

Instead, I use mBIT as a practical coaching framework informed by neuroscience and research into cognition, emotion, intuition, interoception and brain–body communication.

Why this matters

For me, the value of this work is practical.

Sometimes we know what makes logical sense but cannot bring ourselves to act.

Sometimes our emotions are telling us something our thinking has overlooked.

Sometimes we have a strong instinct but cannot yet explain it.

And sometimes our head, heart and gut seem to be pulling us in completely different directions.

Coaching creates space to explore these different perspectives.

Think clearly.

Feel what matters.

Listen within.

Then make a decision that feels more coherent, considered and aligned.

From Inner Change to Organisational Impact

My work begins with the individual.

Greater awareness can create greater choice.

Greater choice can lead to better decisions.

And better decisions influence how we communicate, collaborate and lead.

What happens within us can therefore influence what happens around us — including within the organisations in which we work.

Change begins from within.

From Inner Change to Organisational Impact.

Research & Resources

I believe in making the thinking and research behind my work accessible.

Direct mBIT research

Soosalu, G., Henwood, S. & Deo, A. (2019)
Head, Heart, and Gut in Decision Making: Development of a Multiple Brain Preference Questionnaire.
SAGE Open, 9(1).

This peer-reviewed study explored whether head, heart and gut preferences could be distinguished in decision-making and developed the Multiple Brain Preference Questionnaire (MBPQ).

Read the full research paper →

Wider areas of research

I am particularly interested in research relating to:

Interoception
How we sense and interpret signals from within the body.

Embodied cognition
The relationship between our physical experience and the way we think.

Emotion and decision-making
How emotional and physiological information contributes to judgement and choice.

Intuition
How we can make rapid judgements using information that may not always be available to conscious reasoning.

Gut–brain communication
The complex two-way communication between the gastrointestinal system and the central nervous system.

A note about the evidence

I believe being evidence-informed also means being honest about the limits of the evidence.

There is substantial scientific research into brain–body communication, interoception, embodied cognition, emotion and decision-making.

There is also direct peer-reviewed research examining aspects of the mBIT Head–Heart–Gut model.

However, the research base for mBIT as a complete coaching methodology is still developing.

I therefore do not claim that science has proved we literally have three separate brains, or that mBIT is a scientifically proven treatment.

I use mBIT as a practical framework for coaching and personal development, informed by relevant research and designed to help people explore different sources of information within their decision-making.

My approach

I don't believe we need to choose between science and human experience.

We can be curious about both.

My approach combines psychological knowledge, coaching practice and mBIT, while remaining open to emerging research and new ways of understanding how people think, feel, decide and change.

Change begins from within.

Elizabeth Hartley Coaching Consultancy

From Inner Change to Organisational Impact.