From Environment to Context: Umgebung, Umwelt and the Experience Matrix
The concepts of Umgebung and Umwelt mark a fundamental distinction in how we relate to the world, one that runs close to what the Experience Matrix means by context.
Umgebung: the objective environment
Umgebung refers to the objective physical environment around us: geographic territory, material structures, climatic conditions. It is measurable space, mappable space, the space physical geography describes. In this conception we are observers facing a relatively static setting, defined by its objective and quantifiable characteristics.
Umwelt: the lived subjective world
Umwelt, a concept developed by the biologist Jakob von Uexküll, moves past that passive view. It refers to the perceptual world in which an organism exists and acts. Not the environment as it objectively is, but as it is lived, perceived and given meaning by each living being. Every species, every individual inhabits its own Umwelt, shaped by its sensory capacities, its vital needs, its history and its projects.
Context as lived world
This distinction takes us to the heart of how the Experience Matrix reconceives context. Context is no longer passive scenery (Umgebung) but a living system of relationships and interactions (Umwelt). It reveals itself as a dynamic field where visible physical elements interweave with the invisible forces of social dynamics, the emergent patterns of collective behavior, and cultural and economic flows.
Context in the Experience Matrix
Seen this way, context in the Experience Matrix works as an active interface between our interiority and the world. It is no longer a neutral container but a partner in co-creation. Our emotions, behaviors, skills and beliefs are not simply in the context. They take active part in building it, continuously.
Emotions then act as a sensitive barometer of that ongoing interaction between our personal Umwelt and the many Umwelten around us. They register the quality of our adjustment to the lived context, revealing the harmonies and tensions between our inner projects and the possibilities our relational and cultural environment affords.
The individual as co-creator of a world
This approach changes how we understand adaptation and change. We no longer simply adapt to a given environment. We take active part in creating the world we move in. Every action, every choice, every relationship helps shape our Umwelt and, by extension, the collective Umwelt.
Working on oneself within the Experience Matrix therefore involves a double transformation: of our inner patterns and of the context we co-create. It means recognizing that personal development always sits inside a relational and cultural ecology of which we are both product and maker.
Practical implications for coaches and helping professionals
The distinction between Umgebung and Umwelt, and the reconception of context that follows from it, changes how we practice.
Rethinking the initial assessment
Instead of simply mapping the client’s “environment” (family, professional and social situation), the practitioner explores the Umwelt, the lived world specific to this person.
Rather than asking “Describe your work environment,” the practitioner asks: “How do you perceive your workspace? What draws your attention? What in that space inspires you, or holds you back?” This approach surfaces the client’s particular perceptual filters and their personal points of leverage.
Working with active co-creation
The practitioner no longer tries to help the client “adapt” to their environment, but to consciously co-create their lived context. That perspective opens new places to intervene.
With a manager struggling in their relationships, instead of working only on communication skills, the practitioner explores how that manager can actively transform the relational quality of their context, through their attitudes, their team rituals, the attention they give others, and so create a different organizational climate.
Working with the feedback loops
The Experience Matrix lets the practitioner identify the feedback loops between a client’s personal development and the transformation of their lived context.
A client changing careers works simultaneously on new skills (the Know-How space), while gradually modifying her professional network (context), her daily habits (behaviors) and her view of herself (identifications). The practitioner supports that ecosystemic transformation rather than a sequential one.
Using emotions as a contextual compass
Emotions become a real-time barometer of how well the person and their lived context fit together, offering precise entry points for intervention.
An entrepreneur feels recurring anxiety in certain professional settings. The practitioner uses that emotion to explore how the client might change the way they inhabit those settings, for instance by turning a meeting they experience as something imposed into a space of shared construction, and so changing their emotional relationship to the situation.
A systemic approach to change
This perspective invites the practitioner to consider every development goal in its ecosystemic dimension, recognizing that personal transformation and contextual change cannot be separated.
An executive wants to develop their leadership. The work integrates the development of their personal capacities and the gradual transformation of their organizational context, through new management practices, altered interactions with their teams, a different presence in meetings, creating a virtuous circle of co-evolution.
This article is also available in French on atelierpnl.eu: De l’environnement au contexte : Umgebung, Umwelt et la Matrice de l’Expérience.