[Neurons] 2021 Neurons #28 MECHANISMS & MYTHS OF META

[Michael Hall]

From: L. Michael Hall

2021 Neurons #28

May 24, 2021

 

MECHANISMS & MYTHS OF META

 

I spoke about "going meta" the other day.  It was a presentation on Modeling
Using the Meta-States Model.  It was a description of the very nature of
self-reflexive consciousness.  As the central executive function in the
highest development of the brain (in the prefrontal cortex),
self-reflexivity is what distinguishes us from all other species.  Yet not
only does this special kind of consciousness distinguish us from the
animals, its multiple aspects and functions play a critical role when it
comes to the highest areas of understanding, intelligence, and performance.
That's why we have to include it in our modeling if we want to get a full
picture of any expertise.

 

This is where the original NLP models for modeling are completely
inadequate.  As good as Neuro-Linguistic Programming: The Study of the
Structure of Subjectivity (1980) is, it only scantily mentions the meta-move
in how a strategy is structured.  Yes, there is the little (m) notation
after some responses, but that tiny little (m) is only briefly mentioned and
never really developed. 

 

For a fuller development of the meta-move within any linear strategy, you
have to study and learn the Meta-States Model.  It is true that other NLP
models began "going meta" and including some of the meta-level structures.
Several people enriched NLP modeling with meta-levels:

Robert Dilts with The Neuro Logical Levels.  In that model, Robert included
four meta-levels (i.e., beliefs, values, identity, purpose) over and above
the primary state (i.e., behaviors, environment, and capability).

David Gordon and Graham Dawes with The Experiential Array Model included the
meta-levels of beliefs (i.e., motivating, contributing, and enabling
beliefs), values, and criteria.

James Lawley and Penny Tompkins with Symbolic Modeling with Clean Language
included the meta-level of metaphor.

Leslie Cameron-Bandler, David Gordon, and Michael Lebeau in their The
Emprint Method included beliefs, values, and criteria.

 

Most of these developers also acknowledged a debt to Gregory Bateson for his
Levels of Learning, his extensive description of the meta-response, and the
epistemology of meta.  Yet it was only in the Meta-States Model do you can
find a full development of meta and its mechanisms.  Seven of those
mechanisms are self-reflexivity, self-organization, multi-ordinality,
holographic structuring, systems thinking of the loops, mindfulness, and
simultaneality.

 

These mechanisms of meta reveal the systemic nature of human consciousness
and therefore the need for systemic modeling.  Because your thinking,
feeling, and learning reflect back onto itself, your first thinking-learning
becomes the content of your next level thinking-learning, and that becomes
the content of the next higher context that you set.  And when you set it,
it becomes a meta-level frame of reference for all that went before.
Complex?  Yes.  Human?  Even more so!

 

The idea of meta has always played a big role in NLP.  In fact, before the
name NLP arose (Sept. 1976), the people and community that were working
things out was called Meta.  Frank Pucelik even registered "Meta Institute"
when he moved to San Diego (1977-8).  If you read some of the original
books, you will find meta-moves, meta-patterns, meta-tactics, etc. all over
the place.  So no wonder whenever you sign up for NLP training anywhere in
the world, you will get hands-on practice of patterns with three people and
you will take turns being experiencer, coach, and meta-person.  The role of
taking a meta-perspective occurs in nearly every single NLP pattern.

 

Strangely enough, however, Grinder has come to downplay the meta-role as he
aimed criticisms at the Meta-States Model and myself.   In spite of his book
Turtles All the Way Down (1987) where he abundantly talked about the
meta-moves, he has come to now constantly questioned meta and meta-states.
"Why do you refer to it so often?"  "What is the need for going meta from
one state to another state?"  In the Bandler camp, there are trainers who
have foolishly announce that they do not go meta "because it takes away from
being in the moment."  Of course, that is a major misunderstanding of the
concept of "going meta." 

 

"Going meta" does not mean becoming dissociated.  It does not mean being
less involved or less present.  The truth is the exact opposite.  When you
step out of one experience, you step into another state- perhaps observing,
witnessing, learning, being curious, etc.  Taking another perspective may
make you more emotional, "joyful about learning," "angry at being afraid,"
"love sadness," etc.  When you "go meta" you may become more emotional,
rather than less.  

 

The idea stepping out of one experience always and only means disconnection
is a big myth in NLP that some are still repeating today.  Regarding
consciousness, you and I can be present to a moment and simultaneously aware
(at a higher level) of numerous patterns.   Our self-reflexive consciousness
is able to set a frame for a moment and be present in the moment.  The human
kind of mind is that rich and robust.  It is not an either-or choice,
"either be aware of your awareness or lose that awareness and be in the
moment."  That is a far too simplistic dichotomy. 

 

 

 

 

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D., Executive Director 

Neuro-Semantics 

P.O. Box 8

Clifton, CO. 81520 USA                             

               1 970-523-7877 

 

Books can be purchased at www.neurosemantics.com 

Many other PDF books can be purchased at "The Shop" on
www.neurosemantics.com

 

131688 NeuroSemantics ThinkingMetaphoricalyCover FRONT

 

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