[Neurons] 2016 "Neurons" #35 Erickson's Contributions to NLP

Mon Jul 25 08:35:13 EDT 2016

From: L. Michael Hall

2016 "Neurons" Meta Reflections - #35

July 25, 2016

Reflections about NLP #3

ERICKSON'S CONTRIBUTIONS TO NLP

Here's something most people don't know about NLP.  Namely, when NLP began
it was not called "NLP," it was called Meta.  Those involved were the Meta
people.  It was in late 1976 that the term "Neuro-Linguistic Programming"
was created and used for what had been invented.  That's why there is no
mention of "NLP" in the first books- The Structure of Magic, Patterns of
Milton H. Erickson, Changing with Families.  At first, the pre-NLP Meta
groups focused on Gestalt (the first group was the Gestalt Class at the
College) and then the second group focused on the first models:
Representational Systems (from Perls and Satir), the Meta-Model (some
linguistic distinctions from Perls and Satir) and then Grinder's
Transformational Grammar (TG) taken from his 1973 book where he sought to
demystify TG. 

Then suddenly everything seemed to change.  What happened?  Gregory Bateson
introduced Richard and John to Milton Erickson and they discovered a whole
new set of linguistic distinctions-hypnotic language patterns.  As they
found and studied hypnotic language patterns and began modeling what
Erickson, they created a list of linguistic distinctions that detailed how
"hypnosis" worked.  They fondly called this new set of distinctions, the
Milton Model.  The structure of what's called "hypnosis" works via
communication- a specific way of being precisely vague (!).

As I read the history and have talked with those at the beginning, I get the
sense that things changed radically once the hypnotic language patterns were
added to NLP.  Prior to this all of the NLP Communication distinctions
focused on precision and clarity.  Afterwards NLP began to become
"manipulative" as those involved began exploring what states and behaviors
they could induce in people with the new communication distinctions.  They
even bought books on hypnotic phenomena and sought to see how many of those
phenomena they could produce using the Milton Model.

Reading The Wild Days of NLP by Terry McClendon suggests to me that this
changed everything in the early NLP movement. Suddenly, NLP (or Meta) no
longer stressed precision, specificity, and modeling expertise in actual
behaviors.  Now the group shifted to being focused on inducing people into
hypnotic states-doing things to people.  And yes, while sometimes this would
improve life and enable new resourcefulness, often it was about
self-indulgence.  

What Erickson contributed to NLP was mostly and primarily the hypnotic
language patterns, the Milton Model.  What the group discovered was that
whereas with the Meta-Model you could take a person back down to real life
experience and ground it in see-hear-feel referents, the Milton Model could
take a person in the other direction.  It can take a person up-up-and-away
into a person's imaginations and into a person's wildest dreams and hopes.
It takes a person up into the non-specified realm of nominalizations and
unspecified nouns and verbs: "And you can enjoy a loving and deep
relationship with your loved one, feeling a rich connection and support as
you have never felt before." 

Another thing that Erickson contributed was a deeper appreciation of
matching and pacing.  Form him we learned the pattern, "pace, pace, pace,
lead."  The young Meta group learned from Erickson just how important it was
to match, match, and match a person's experience; by so pacing Milton could
create a deep unconscious connection which allowed the person to be more
open to change.  Erickson also furthered the idea that each person has his
or her own map of the world and the need to create a new theory of
personality for each person.  That's what he did. These practices
underscored his attitude -one of absolute respect for his clients and
curiosity about them.  Milton Erickson himself was highly ethical and didn't
tolerate manipulation.

Of course, as a medical doctor and a psychiatrist, Erickson's work focused
first and foremost on health, wellness, disease, pain management, etc.  He
had introduced Medical Hypnosis to the psychiatric community in the 1950s
and his series of books on his seminars- Healing in Hypnosis (1983), Life
Reframing in Hypnosis (1985), Mind-Body Communication in Hypnosis (1986), as
well as his many other books focused mostly on medical conditions.  Yet NLP
did not take this from Erickson.  If NLP had, there would be a whole set of
patterns similar to Robert Dilts' "Allergy Cure" pattern in NLP.  And this,
by the way, is still an open and mostly unexplored area for NLP.

My take on NLP's journey into hypnosis and hypnotic language patterns is
that it unfortunately led to some people (not all of course) taking up NLP
and using it for manipulative purposes.  After all, the Meta-Model
essentially de-hypnotizes people.  It brings them out of their
nominalizations and unspecified models of the world and grounds them back in
the real world.  But with these new language patterns some of those who came
into NLP who lacked a strong sense of ethics or professionalism began using
it to sell, negotiate, seduce, etc.  

The Milton Model conversely induces people into states but does so under the
framework of the client not knowing what you are doing.  Further, both
Bandler and Grinder to this day still think this way, In various ways they
say: "The conscious mind cannot be trusted to know what's best for it, only
the unconscious mind can be trusted."  This then leads to the next step:

"I as your therapist or programmer know what's best for you; so right now
I'm going to speak to your unconscious mind.  So go away and I'll give you
what you want; you don't need to know what I'm doing or how I'm doing it."

No wonder people have gotten the idea from some NLP practitioners that "NLP
is manipulative."  In the hands of some people, it is!  Taking the Milton
Model, they use it to covertly do things to people with or without their
understanding or approval.  In Neuro-Semantics from the beginning, we have
considered this unethical and have taught our trainers and people to not use
the hypnotic language patterns in that way.  We have even revoked the
license of a few who did such.  We emphasize to work with people explicitly
and overtly.  In the code of ethics that governs our use of NLP and
Neuro-Semantics, we emphasize respect, understanding, transparency,
permission.

They used the technology without the attitude pf respect and honor for
people that Erickson had.

Erickson contributed to NLP the how of state induction, the positive nature
of our "larger" mind- the mind that is typically outside of consciousness,
and how to tap into it as a positive resource.  He contributed the idea of
isomorphic metaphor-to speak to someone using an analogy, an analogy
completed corresponding to the structure of the person.  David Gordon wrote
an amazing book on this subject (Therapeutic Metaphors) integrating into
isomorphic metaphor representational systems, sub-modalities, and strategy.

To this day using hypnotic language presents an unique challenge.  Part of
the challenge involves the misunderstandings and myths about
hypnosis-thinking that it is about mind-control and making people do things
that they don't want to do.  Part of the challenge is the responsibility for
guiding a person into their inner world and doing so in a way that respects
the person- his or her values.

Erickson contributed a lot; he and Bateson had been life-long friends long
before NLP arose.  And as Wyatt Woodsmall has noted, like Virginia and
Fritz, NLP did not model their attitude, spirit, beliefs, etc.  But their
products- what they did with their language and behavioral patterns.  NLP
would have been significantly better if the early pioneers had modeled the
attitude of Virginia and Milton.

NSTT: Neuro-Semantic Trainers Training 

.        Sept. 28-Oct. 12  Hong Kong

.        Contact Sherran at apti.com.hk 

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D.

               Neuro-Semantics Executive Director 

               Neuro-Semantics International

P.O. Box 8

Clifton, CO. 81520 USA                             

               1 970-523-7877 

                    Dr. Hall's email:
<mailto:meta at acsol.net\hich\af31506\dbch\af31505\loch\f31506> meta at acsol.net

    ISNS new logo

What is Neuro-Semantic NLP?

Neurons:  Get your free subscription to the weekly International \Post on
Neuro-Semantics by Dr. L. Michael Hall. Subscribe at:
wwww.neurosemantics.com

    Coaching: For world-class Coach Training - The Meta-Coaching System,
www.neurosemantics.com/metacoaching   Meta-Coach Reflections sent every
Wednesday to the group of Licensed Meta-Coaches.
www.metacoachfoundation.org  

Self-Actualization: Neuro-Semantics launched the New Human Potential
Movement in 2007, for information about this, see
<http://www.self-actualizing.org/> www.self-actualizing.org  

NSP --- Neuro-Semantic Publications: Order books from Neuro-Semantic
website,  <http://www.neurosemantics.com/> www.neurosemantics.com  click on
Products and Services and then the Catalogue of books.  Order via paypal.  

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://pairlist8.pair.net/pipermail/neurons/attachments/20160725/855b6da4/attachment-0001.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: image001.jpg
Type: image/jpeg
Size: 10627 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <https://pairlist8.pair.net/pipermail/neurons/attachments/20160725/855b6da4/attachment-0001.jpg>