This thesis outlines a notion of selves as relational, multiple, embodied and imaginal, in contrast to the more dominant Cartesian framework in which selves have been conceived of and constructed as separate, singular, disembodied and literal. It shows how my practice as a management educator on a two year part-time postgraduate programme in People and Organisational Development and as an organisational change consultant in different contexts attempts, over time, to realise such a relational view of the way unique, contextualised, embodied selves emerge as I engage in and write about my practice with others.

The thesis represents a sustained inquiry into the dialectic of how I and others shape my practice and how my practice shapes me and influences others. It situates this inquiry within the traditions of action research. In addition, it will interrelate and engage critically with ideas from the fields of complexity theory, the psychology and sociology of the self, and postmodern thought.

I will both argue for and demonstrate that practice can be conceived of and carried out as an emergent, self-organising, relational activity. I will also indicate and show how I attempt to realise the holistic nature of practice, in which self, practice and context are intertwined, and where the traditional, separate boundaries between what is perceived as personal, professional and political are challenged and made more permeable and interconnected. I will do this by accounting for and presenting my thinking, learning, and description of and critical reflection on my practice using a number of different genres. These genres will include examples of autobiographical, narrative, scholarly, poetic, dialogical and journalistic writing and will illustrate and embody in writing different facets of my self. In giving ‘voice’ to these different aspects of my self, I will further demonstrate the multiple, imaginal and relational nature of the self.

Tracking my unique form of relational emergent practice, as it has evolved over the six years of this thesis, using the method of writing accounts of my work and sharing these with people I have been working with in cycles of action and reflection (what I call in short ‘showing my work to others’), will demonstrate the originality of this work as well as its contribution to both ‘living life as inquiry’ and to a ‘living educational theory’.