Uncategorized – Page 6 – How did You become You?

Can you put it in a wheelbarrow?

The above figure shows how we use language, viz. we have an experience and create an internal representation of sensory information which is stored eventually in deep memory. As we recall the memory and bring it to conscious mind in order to speak about it, some interesting things happen.
We nominalise, delete, distort and generalise . See below:-

Nominalisation a common form of distortion
• The communication in this company is atrocious
o How could we communicate more effectively?
• They need my decision by Monday
o When will you decide?
Note: nominalization is when we make a verb into a noun and remove the doing or action. There is a simple test for nominalization, if you cannot put it in a wheelbarrow, then it is a nominalisation, in the above examples you cannot put communication or decision in a wheelbarrow even although you could put a piece of paper with what had been communicated or what the decision was, written on it.

Deletion
• I am afraid
o What specifically are you afraid of?
• She is a better driver
o Better than whom?
• I like her
o What do like about her?
Distortion (mind-reading)
• Susan has no regard for my opinion
o How do you know?
• He’ll be compelled to act
o What gives you that impression?
• You’ve lost all respect for me
o What leads you to that view ?
Generalisation
• I am never mistaken
o You have never ever made a mistake?
• Everybody thinks like that
o Everybody? Everybody in the whole world?
• Nobody takes me seriously
o Not one single person in the whole world ?

Reasons to know about this are:-
• Sometimes how we use language, clouds understanding of a specific situation.
• It provides an easy way to get someone, especially you, to think a little more about a situation
• It will provoke new ways of thinking

What is this about?
This is to do with how the brain uses language to build its ‘maps’ and how people create faulty mental maps of reality, failing to test their linguistic / cognitive models against the experience of their senses.

How can we use this insight?
First thing is to notice. Use the observer to catch yourself using these linguistic devices and then ask yourself an appropriate question e.g. you say or think ‘nobody takes me seriously’ . then ask ‘ what nobody? Nobody at all anywhere ever? In the whole wide world, there is nobody that takes me seriously?’ I’m sure you can come up with one or two that do. What this does, is give a truer perspective and probably something better to build beliefs on. Use the insight also, to gently catch others when they use the devices, to help them maintain a ‘truer’ possibly better balanced view.

When you observe, which of the four do you use most:-

Nominalise?
Delete?
Distort?
Generalise?

What happens when you ‘correct’ and gain a truer, more balanced perspective?

Reframing; think about it in a different way.

Reframing:- I believe this is one of the most powerful ‘tools’ I have learned on my path.🦉

A very old Chinese Taoist story describes a farmer in a poor country village. He was considered very well to do, because he owned a horse that he used for ploughing and transportation. One day his horse ran away. All his neighbours exclaimed how terrible this was , but the farmer just said “maybe.”
A few days later the horse returned and brought two wild horses with it. The neighbours all rejoiced at his good fortune, but the farmer just said “maybe.”
The next day the farmer’s son tried to ride one of the wild horses; the horse threw him and he broke his leg. The neighbours all offered their sympathy for his misfortune, but the farmer again, just said “maybe.”
The next week conscription officers came to the village to take young men to the army, they rejected the farmer’s son because of his broken leg. When the neighbours told him how lucky he was, the farmer replied “maybe.”

The meaning that any event has depends upon the ‘frame’ in which we perceive it. When we change the frame, we change the meaning. Having two wild horses is a good thing until it is seen in the context of the son’s broken leg. The broken leg seems to be bad in the context of peaceful village life; but in the context of conscription and war, it suddenly becomes good.
This is called reframing; changing the frame in which a person perceives events in order to change the meaning. When the meaning changes, the person’s responses and behaviours also change. (Grinder, 1982) There are many NLP books that will take you into reframing and how to do it in many contexts, too numerous to mention here

The reasons you’d want to know about this are:-
• Another frame will generate other ways of thinking about an issue
• Even thinking about reframing an issue or problem will help in generating a solution

What is this about?
It is a useful strategy in generating flexibility of thinking, in order to resolve issues and problems, both within yourself and with others.

How can we use this insight?

Calling someone too ‘unfocused’ for example. A reframe to enable you to work with the person in a better way, is to maybe think of them, being useful as a ‘wide angle’ lens, bringing more into the ‘picture’, broadening and deepening understanding of the whole context, through doing that perhaps.
Or let’s say you perceive someone in your team as obstructive, then a possible reframe may be, actually when you need a dam to stop a flood happening , obstructive is good. Or if you need a ‘solid wall to push against, then obstructive is good. Or more literally you can use them with permission, as a solid sounding board for new ideas.

This insight really can help you change your beliefs 😀

What / who is ‘bothering’ you at the moment?
How might you reframe that?

Changing beliefs; do you believe you can?

Figure 1 IM POSSIBLE

Belief change can be triggered by a set of techniques, from the world of Neuro Linguistic Programimg (NLP), which can then alter how we are, in certain situations. A presupposition of course is, that you really do want to change.
The reasons you’d want to know about this are:-
• Our internal maps of ‘Reality’ are determined by the beliefs we hold.
• Some of those maps that we have learned, may not be useful to us now, as they are currently held.
• The maps are laid down as patterns in our subconscious mind.
• We can ‘change’ and build new maps using different beliefs that will alter our perception of situations , problems etc.

What is this about?
A useful way to help us move forward in a situation when we determine a belief is holding us back.

How can we use this?
Let’s take an example of, responding in the moment. Using the observer notice what beliefs come up when there is an opportunity to respond in the moment and we do not respond, for example :-
Belief :- I need to be sure of my facts, before I can ask any questions.
A question to perhaps now ask yourself is, what do I need to believe in order make a response in the moment?
I need to believe that it is not important to always have the all the details and facts, for example.

Figure 2 Change beliefs change your life

Maybe a more useful belief to hold is :- It is OK to respond in the moment, without knowing all the facts and details. Write this new belief down and read it back to yourself over several days. You may need to modify it slightly to have it fit into your ‘changing’ mindset e.g. it becomes, “I am learning it is ok to respond in the moment, without knowing all the facts and details.”
In the next situation that arises, let’s say, you do respond and find to your astonishment, nobody dies! And you got more of what you needed 🙂

More details of these techniques can be found in NLP books and teachings, just be aware that you can change your beliefs, you are not ‘stuck’ with them forever.

Figure 3 Belief chain break

Start to notice situations, when beliefs are not serving you.

Explore that situation, what triggers the belief?

How might you change it?

What would be a more useful belief to hold?

Write that more useful belief down, play with the words till they sound good, for example add the words, “I am Learning to…”

How does the Brain represent Reality, Part 2

How does the Brain represent Reality part 1?

Figure 1 vakog

What are representational systems? See also part 2

Put another way, how does the brain re-present reality? (This entry is from the teachings of NLP).
The reasons you’d want to know about this are:-
• Your preferred system affects how you understand the ‘world’ out there
• We don’t all have the same preference and therefore do not all have the same ways of describing or talking about reality.
• Once you know your preference, you can exploit its strengths and begin to become more flexible by exploring other representational systems
What is this about?
A useful way to think about representational systems is; we experience the world through our five (or maybe there are six 🙂 ) senses, i.e. we see (visual), hear (auditory), feel (kinesthetic) smell (olfactory), taste (gustatory) and maybe we could include having a sixth sense (intuit). I will refer to the five using the acronym (vakog). Let me take gustatory as an example. When you have a meal you obviously taste the food and this strongly involves your sense of smell, (olfactory). The other senses are also involved of course, we see the food (visual), we feel the textures (kinesthetic) and we hear (auditory) and this is maybe more subtle, the sounds of cutlery, conversation, maybe background noise in a restaurant. Etc. Thus there is a whole experience laid down as a set of patterns in our brains, driven by each of the five senses. This is an important notion here, that as we experience life ‘out there’, we lay down patterns internally, to represent the experience, using our five senses to drive that, see Figure 1 vakog

I trained in NLP back in 1996, with John Seymour, here he is explaining about Visual Auditory and Kinesthetic

If we now, let’s say, sometime after the meal, want to remember the experience then it is as if we relive the experience internally, triggering each of the senses. As an example let me ask you to think about cutting a lemon in half, removing the pips, then biting into the flesh, you can feel your mouth salivating now, at the expected sourness to come.

What am I saying here?
• We experience the world through our senses
• That experience is laid down as patterns in our brains
. We represent what is out there, internally in our minds
• We can ‘relive’ the experience by recalling the pattern / representation
It may or may not surprise you to know that when we lay down and recall memories we have a preferred system for doing that. The visual, auditory and kinesthetic are the primary systems used in most western cultures. Olfactory and gustatory are minor and usually lumped with kinesthetic. Another fact that may help you, is to know that our learning styles are closely aligned with visual, auditory and kinesthetic.

Think about the way you learn best.

By seeing pictures?
By listening?
By direct experience?