[Neurons] 2024 Neurons #42 NLP: DEEPER THAN COMMUNICATION

[Michael Hall]

From: L. Michael Hall

2024 Neurons #42

September 23, 2024

 

NLP:

DEEPER THAN COMMUNICATION

 

After several years of research into the field of critical thinking, and
then into thinking itself, and after publishing more than ten books on
thinking and its many kinds, I wrote about NLP as a Thinking Model [that was
Neurons, 2023 #43 and #44].  That came about after I surveyed all of the
early NLP books to see if I could determine why the founders and developers
choose to focus NLP as a Communication Model rather than a Thinking Model.
I wanted to know, "What was their reasoning to do that?"

"NLP is the martial art of communication: graceful, enjoyable, and very
effective." (Seymour and O'Connor, 1990, 41). 

 

Sometime after that I re-read one of the very best NLP book, Introducing NLP
by John Seymour and Joseph O'Connor I came across this which is right in the
beginning of that book: "NLP-a way of thinking about ideas and people."
(1979, p. 21).  Now for a moment I thought that perhaps I had jumped the gun
by making my statement that "no one had recognized NLP as a Thinking Model."
But then, when they wrote the following, I realized something else.

"What is thinking?  ...everyone knows intimately what thinking is for
themselves. ... Thinking is such an obvious commonplace activity, we never
give it a second thought.  We tend to think about what we think about, not
how we think about it." (Ibid., p. 43)

 

By framing the phenomena of thinking as "such an obvious commonplace
activity" that everybody does it and everybody knows what it is-they thereby
dismissed it completely!  "We never give it a second thought."  Amazing!
Somehow they forgot Bateson's comment in his Preface to The Structure of
Magic (1975) that what he and his colleagues had struggled to do for years
and years trying to find a basis for human psychology, linguistics,
consciousness, and thinking.  He said that the NLP founders identified it in
something so simple, and so obvious, namely, the sensory systems.  Thinking
has its beginning in the sensory representations which we use to reference,
in our minds, what we're thinking about.  That was an incredible discovery!

 

Yet, for the most part, NLP as a field essentially dismissed the thinking
question, "What is thinking?" and focused on another question, "What is
communication and how does it work?"  "What makes Perls' and Satir's
communications so transformative?" Ultimately, as they built the NLP
Communication Model, they ignored the deeper phenomena of thinking.  Yet
ironically they built it out of the thinking patterns of the Meta-Model, the
representation systems, and the cinematic features (falsely labeled
"sub-modalities").  In that way, NLP shifted from its essence as a thinking
model as it was sold as a Communication Model.

 

Now NLP as a Communication Model has performed wonderfully.  The sensory
systems (VAK) has provided a deeper look into the key variables that operate
in the theater of our minds.  That, in turn, establishes many of the
different intelligences that we have which we can use for learning,
information gathering, knowledge building, modeling, and much more.  Of
course, anything powerful can be powerfully misused and NLP has suffered
that fate as unethical persons have used it for personal gain by taking
advantage of others.

 

Yet in focusing on Communication rather than on thinking, NLP has missed so
many opportunities for changing the world.  Because more fundamental than
communication is the quality of our thinking.  If your thinking is distorted
or biased or fallacious-then so will be your communications.   Therefore the
place to correct things is at the level of thinking.  And that's what we
call critical thinking-to think about our thinking so that we can check it
against reality, so that we can make sure it is accurate and precise.  And
if we can do that-we can much more easily change ourselves, invite change in
others, and ultimately, change the world.  To that end, we now have three
Brain Camps wherein we train people for critical and creative thinking.  We
call the critical thinking skills -essential skills, and the creative
skills-eureka thinking skills, and the meta skills- executive thinking
skills.

 

Of course, at this point an old problem arises.   Thinking is hard work.
Well, real thinking is.  Superficial thinking is easy because it is pretty
much mindless.  Real thinking starts when you realize that we don't truly
think until or unless we have a problem.  Ah, that's the problem with
thinking!   Problems elicit thinking.  "We do not think unless we hit a
snag."  That's what John Dewey wrote in his classic book, How We Think.
"The origin of thinking is some perplexity, confusion, or doubt."   How
about that?  If you are moving through your daily interactions without
problems, puzzles, inquires, questions, etc., you are probably not thinking.
But here's the magic, you can!  If you want to, you can choose to actually
and truly think.  But be warned: when you do-you and your world will change.
Welcome to Neuro-Semantics.

 

 




 

 

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D.

Executive Director, ISNS

738 Beaver Lodge

Grand Jct., CO. 81505 USA

meta at acsol.net

 

 



 

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