"Book
Review"
(Published here with permission from Steve Andreas)
Whispering in the Wind,
by Carmen Bostic St.Clair and John Grinder.
Reviewed by Steve Andreas.
This book states, “Our
intention is to provoke a professional high quality public dialogue among
the practitioners of NLP, as an integral part of these developments,” (p.
348) and it is in this spirit that I write. I hope this can begin a fruitful
and ongoing exchange that others in the field will contribute their thoughts
and insights to. While I found much of the book interesting and
thought-provoking, raising many issues that are important to the field, I
also found a lot of it difficult to understand, and often contradictory in
both form and content. I want to begin by mentioning the sections that I
found particularly useful.
Pattern
Verification
The discussion using the
example of modeling spelling (pp. 80-92) is a very clear and much needed
presentation of an important aspect of modeling, and the scientific method
in general--how to use counterexamples to a generalization to enrich and
differentiate the generalization, rather than to falsify it.
Scope
and Category
I also appreciated the
distinction made in this book between:
-
Hierarchies of wholeness or inclusion (what I have been describing as
change in scope) in which the change is one of increased, and/or
different information in sensory-based experience (what this book calls
“First Access” FA) and
-
Hierarchies of logical levels which are created as a result of
categories of experience--and categories of categories, etc. (which
this book refers to as f2 verbal descriptions).
Bateson, Keeny, and many other
illuminati of systems theory have completely missed this difference, which
is quite significant and useful in tracking how a person responds in a given
situation, and also as a guide to changing that response.
Changing scope is the
basis for context reframing, which changes the kind and amount of “sensory”
information in someone’s representation. Expanding scope is sometimes called
“seeing the big picture.” Change of scope is the underlying basis for a
number of the content reframing or “sleight of mouth” patterns
(justification, consequences, etc.)
In contrast, a category
is a group or set of experiences. When someone thinks of a category, they
focus on the criteria used for creating the category, and tend to ignore
most of the sensory-based information in the individual experiences in the
group. This is the difference between FA (perception of a specific dog) and
the f2 category “dog.” The category typically elicits a representation of an
“average” or generic dog, rather than a specific dog. Categories provide the
underlying basis for a different set of content reframing patterns, such as
“redescription,” “model of the world,” “apply to self,” etc.
Charles Faulkner and I have
been exploring the many ramifications of this important distinction between
scope and category for the last couple of years. We continue
to find uses for it, and have been teaching what we have learned so far in a
seminar titled “Changing Levels of Meaning and Experience.”
Deletion, Distortion and Generalization
I appreciated the
reexamination of this fundamental topic. (pp. 274-275) Deletion creates
distortion, and this is the process of generalization. In the example
of “dog” above, all the qualities of different individual dogs are deleted,
leaving only the common characteristics of the generic dog that represents
the category.
I came to similar conclusions
some time ago. However, I would also add another word, amplification.
While simple deletion results in distorting what is left, study of the
neural nets active in perception clearly show that all of them also
amplify certain signals at the same time that they delete others.
In my new book,
Transforming Your Self: Becoming who you want to be, I model this
process of generalization in considerable detail. (The contents,
introduction, two chapters and the Appendix are on my web site,
www.SteveAndreas.com)
Robert
Dilts’ Neurological Levels
Dilts’ “neurological levels,”
is another thing that Charles and I have been reexamining. As the book
points out, Dilts’ “levels” do not consistently utilize criteria for
either scope or category inclusion, and sometimes the hierarchical
relationship is reversed. For instance, Dilts places “identity” at a
higher (larger) level than “beliefs.” I think that he probably placed
identity higher because it recursively describes itself, and this makes it
much more powerful in influencing behavior. Curiously, this recursion
actually bridges between logical levels (violating Russell’s “Theory
of Logical Types”--more on this later).
However, since identity is
composed of the beliefs that we have about ourselves, it is a smaller
subset of the much more general term “beliefs,” so it should be at a lower
(smaller) level in a hierarchy than beliefs.
The book also critiques
Michael Hall’s “Meta-States” work, in which levels of experience also figure
prominently. Like most others in the field, Hall misses the difference
between scope and category that has been hidden for years in
the experiences described by the words “meta,” “chunk,” “frame,” and
“outcome” in the earlier NLP model. Since Hall places great value on the use
of large categories, his approach is essentially a conscious mind, top-down,
large-chunk, approach, often omitting FA, the unconscious, and the ecology
of the larger system.
History
and Epistemology
I and others also found the
historical anecdotes of the early development of the field interesting and
enjoyable--information that only Grinder and Bandler and a few others can
provide.
The book includes a fairly
large section on epistemology--how we perceive and know what we know.
Although in many ways this is a pretty standard review of psychophysics and
perception, I have talked with several people who found it very useful.
Modeling
Distinctions
The entire book is about
modeling, and it repeatedly bemoans the lack of modeling in the field. “In
particular we refer to the lack of modeling, the very activity that defines
the core of this discipline NLP.” (p. vii) “The vast majority of the actual
activity at present in what is loosely referred to as the field of NLP is
application and training.”(p. 55.) “It is regrettable that creating
variations on such themes seem to be the principle focus of much activity in
NLP as opposed to modeling of new patterns itself.” (p. 225) There is a
great deal of discussion about the difference between NLP modeling,
application, design, variations, and training (pp. 50-56), and in
particular the difference between a new model and an application of an old
model.
However, after reading the
entire book very carefully several times, I’m still unclear what the
distinctions are, and which patterns the book would place in each category.
The meta model is described as
both the first model in NLP (pp. 142-163) and also as an application
of the model already existing in transformational grammar.
“The meta model can,
for example, be usefully understood to be an application of the modeling of
linguistic patterning inspired by Transformational Grammar” (p. 51).
The Milton Model is described
as the third model in NLP (pp. 173-183) and elsewhere as the inverse of the
meta model--in other words, the distinctions are (mostly) the same, only the
uses are different, which seems to make it also an application of an
existing model, rather than a new model. In short,
no criteria are provided that would
clearly distinguish between these different categories of modeling.
The book states that “The new
code is an excellent example of pure design, a pure manipulation of these
variables.” (p. 51)
OK, let’s take a look.
“New
Code” NLP
The “new code” is a general
model for change work, presented as an advance over the “classic code.”
“. . . in the new code, the
so-called resource states are created directly through the participation of
the client in an activity--often a game--that itself creates a high
performance state but one, curiously enough, that has neither history nor
content to it. It is simply a game but a game that activates neurological
circuits that serve as the base for changes in the content selected
previously by the client. The structure of the game itself is designed to
ensure that certain characteristics that are typical of high performance
states are present. But once again this occurs without any particular
content and without reference to any historically experienced states.” (p.
233)
A “high performance state” is
characterized by the Chain of Excellence: Respiration--> Physiology-->
State-->Performance. (p. 233)
“The
Change Format for the New Code
-
Select
from 3rd position some context in which you experience some behavior you
wish to change/influence.
-
Localize
physically this hallucinated context and the image and sounds of yourself
in that context performing the behavior you wish to change/influence and
step into the position of the image of yourself (1st position) without
attempting to change anything--self-calibrate. This is also the
opportunity for the coach to calibrate your present state response to the
context in question.
Separator state
-
Play the
game (1st position) or equivalently, enter into the content free, high
performance state (e. g. The Alphabet Game, the NASA game...)
Spend
15 minutes playing to allow full activation of the circuits underlying
the performance in the game.
-
At the
end of the play (15 minutes or until the circuits are fully activated),
the player (1st position) without hesitation and most importantly
without attempting consciously to influence in any way his experience
steps back (into 1st position) into the physical space where in step 2
occurred--that is, the physical space (on the floor) where he had located
the hallucinated context in which he wanted to change something.” (p. 240)
Comparison of New Code and Old Code.
In the classic format for
integrating a resource state with a problem state or context, a specific
resource is chosen by the client’s or the therapist’s conscious mind, and
then accessed by a verbal request to recall a past state “Think of a time
when. . .” or an “as if” state “What would it be like if. . .” followed by
associating into this past or potential representation, and then integrating
it with the problem state or context.
In contrast, the new code
format accesses a nonverbal high performance state as a resource, to
eliminate or minimize verbalization and irrelevant historical content. Then
while in this high performance state, the client steps back into the context
chosen for change, unconsciously integrating the high performance state into
the chosen context. In a variation discussed elsewhere in the book, the
client asks their unconscious mind to choose a context to change/improve, so
that the entire process is unconscious, including the results of the
integration. This prevents any possibility of content intervention or
interference by the conscious mind of the client or coach.
Content-free States
In my understanding, all
states have content, so there is really no such thing as a “content-free
high performance state” (p. 239) any more than there is a such a thing as
“pure awareness.” Awareness is always awareness of something,
so it always has some content, and so does a state. A “content-free high
performance state” is simply a resource state in which the content is so
different from the problem state as to seem irrelevant, as in the “alphabet
game.” (pp. 242-245).
This process presupposes that
a high performance state will be effective for any kind of problem, skill,
response, behavior, or context, and I think that this “one-size-fits-all”
assumption is patently false. A high performance state for watchmaking is
quite different than one for football. The resource for resolving a phobia,
dissociation, is exactly the opposite of the resource for
resolving grief, association.
In most fields, development of
methodology results in further differentiation of more specific methods for
specific applications. At one point in the development of medicine,
blood-letting was considered a cure for all sorts of ailments; now it is
used only in very restricted cases in which someone has too many red blood
cells.
In the modeling that Connirae
and I have done, we have determined the characteristics of specific
difficulties and/or skills, and then characterized the resource states that
are appropriate for them (just as Bandler and Grinder did for spelling).
Primarily these have been content-free submodality interventions, but some
include specific content shifts. For instance, in grief people often recall
the unpleasant ending of the relationship through death or
other loss, rather than the valuable relationship that was
lost. When this is the case, it is vitally important to ask the client to
change the content of their representation; resolution of grief is
impossible without this content shift.
Prior to NLP, most change work
was focused on content. One of NLP’s earliest and greatest contributions was
to refocus attention on process (while presupposing content).
However, content interventions are also useful; what is important is to
distinguish between content and process, and determine which is appropriate
to change in a given situation.
Submodality Patterns
On pp. 244 and 265 the book
mentions spontaneous submodality shifts as evidence of the effectiveness of
the new code format. However, there is absolutely no mention of the many
very effective patterns involving direct and rapid change of submodalities
that were developed by Richard Bandler, such as
the Swish, the Compulsion Blowout, the Last Straw Threshold Pattern, the
Decision Destroyer--not to mention the classic submodality phobia cure
utilizing double dissociation.
There is also
no mention whatsoever of the submodality patterns that Connirae and I
developed for anger/forgiveness, shame, guilt, adjusting criteria,
responding to criticism, internal/external reference, and aligning
perceptual positions.
Since the book
proposes a single change format for all change work as an improvement over
other NLP methods, I would have appreciated at least some examples or
discussion comparing the results of the new code approach with more specific
patterns, with specific follow-up reports of the resulting changes. Is the
new code format actually more effective with phobias than the classic V-K
dissociation? Does it work better to teach someone how to spell? Is it
really more effective for a compulsion, or grief, or shame than the specific
submodality methods?
Personally, I doubt it, but I’m quite willing to be shown.
Perceptual Positions (Triple Description)
Perceptual positions are first
on the “partial list of new code patterning” (p. 239), essential ingredients
of the new code.
I want to ask the reader to
pause briefly to respond to a hypothetical proposal from someone that the
five representational systems be relabeled 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 (instead of
“visual” “auditory” etc.) I doubt that you would consider that an
improvement, because numbers are a much more abstract and general verbal
coding than words like “visual” that already have a simple meaning that is
reasonably close to sensory-based experience.
The perceptual positions were
probably numbered by following the terms “first person,” “second person,”
“third person” familiar to linguists, but I think this is a carryover from
the early modeling that ought to be revised to make learning easier. For
over 15 years we have been using “self,” “observer” and “other.”
This makes learning much easier, and also avoids other errors that are more
likely with the 1st, 2nd, 3rd coding.
In order to take other
position, you have to spatially leave self position and then
“step into” (p. 251)
the other person’s position. As you do this you have to pass through
observer position as you make the transition between self and other.
Since one has to go from 1st
position into 3rd position in order to get into 2nd position, the number
sequence is misleading. The 1, 2, 3 coding imposes a sequence which is not
only functionally inaccurate in terms of the process that one has to
go through in order to change positions, it is also different than the
sequence in which the positions are usually taught and learned.
Kinesthetics in Observer Position?
The book is very emphatic
about this:
“It is important to make
explicit that 3rd position is not a dissociated position in the sense that
there are no kinesthetics involved in 3rd position. A well-formed 3rd
position always involves strong kinesthetics.” (p. 255)
“We have been astonished to
discover with alarming frequency an interpretation of 3rd position in which
participants in training programs are being instructed that 3rd has no
kinesthetics. Little wonder those participants find it difficult to operate
effectively from their so-called 3rd position.” (p. 266)
In my view, “observer
position” does just that, it observes--a dispassionate observer and nothing
more. In Heinlein’s classic science fiction book, Stranger in a Strange
Land there is the concept of the “fair witness” who reports only what
s/he observes, without conclusions or evaluations. A fair witness would
describe a brown horse as “A horse which appears to be brown on this side.”
In the crime novels and movies of the 30s and 40s the detective would often
say, “Just give me the facts, ma’m, just the facts” (no interpretations). In
a carefully aligned observer position, the person feels the perceptual
kinesthetics of being in that position, but no evaluative emotional
feelings about the events being witnessed, except perhaps a soft feeling of
compassion for the people being observed if they are involved in a difficult
interchange. One possible explanation for our difference of opinion may lie
in the book’s description of other position.
Other
(2nd) Position
The book describes 2nd
position as:
“2. adopting the
characteristics and perceptions of some identifiable group. As an example
to give the reader a taste of this, imagine what a well-aged hunk of cheese
represents from the point of view of:
a. a mouse
b. a cow
c. a starving student
d. a lactose intolerant patient
e. a marketing executive
f. a lawyer
g. an accountant
3. systematically shifting
perceptual position from one to another of the three privileged perceptual
positions specified by Triple Description. We would like to note here that
number 2 above could be classified as a generalized 2nd.” (p. 248)
I completely agree that taking
the role of an executive, a lawyer, or an accountant is a “generalized 2nd”
(other position). However, that means that taking the role of a
“consultant” or “director” illustrated in the Angela/Geraldo exchange (pp.
250-256) is also a “generalized 2nd,” and not 3rd position, as
stated.
I understand the great
usefulness of taking on an other position (generalized or not), particularly
if that person has great skill or expertise. However, any such other
position will introduce its content biases, presuppositions, and emphases.
These may be very useful, just as content reframing or other content
interventions can be. However, it inevitably introduces content, as can be
clearly seen in the Angela/Geraldo example, in which the consultant does
much more than simply observe--offering future possibilities, scornful humor,
intention, and asking specific and very directive questions. Every
description and example of “3rd position” in this book is actually 2nd,
because they all specify a person, role, or position other than that of a
dispassionate observer, so of course they will have evaluative feelings.
This is totally inconsistent
with the otherwise clear distinction made in this book between process and
content, and the book’s emphasis on interventions that are based on process
rather than content.
Clean
Perceptual Positions
The book mentions the
importance of a “very clean” 3rd position (pp. 234, 255) and “clearly”
“clean” and “cleanly” are used repeatedly (pp. 250, 253, 256, 257) but
nowhere does it define operationally how to achieve a clean position.
Many years ago Connirae
modeled a systematic way to teach clean access to all three
positions with her “Aligning Perceptual Positions” process (published in
Anchor Point in February 1991). This process uses only the (content-free)
submodality of location, and it makes a huge difference in how
useful, informative, and resourceful all three positions are, yet the book
makes no mention whatsoever of this pattern, which provides an operational
definition of clean positions.
The book’s lack of an
operational definition for “clean” positions might be excused, but for the
fact that it criticizes Eric Robbie for using terms that he does not define:
“c. Robbie introduces and uses
terminology without definition thereby removing all possibility of a serious
attempt to appreciate whatever insights he is attempting to express--such
minimal operational definitions are a prerequisite for opening a
professional and interesting dialogue publicly within the field of NLP.” (p.
106)
Besides “clean” positions,
this book uses many other terms that are not defined, including, “stalking,”
“shunts,” “characterological adjectives.” “automatic movement to privileged
states,” (p. 239), “NASA,” “trampoline,” (p. 263) and “mental spaces” (p
296). (“Characterological adjectives” and “mental spaces” may have accepted
definitions in linguistics, but most of the book’s readers will not be
linguists.)
The
Presuppositions of NLP
This book takes an extreme and
extraordinary position with regard to the NLP presuppositions:
“. . .we find the so-called
presuppositions of NLP are, at best, a pedagogical device to assist people
new to the adventure called NLP in making the required transitions in their
thinking to the new forms of perception and thought implicit in the
technology. Unfortunately presuppositions, like beliefs, are ultimately
filters that reduce the ongoing experiences of their possessors. We
personally do not find any value in the enumeration of such rationalizations
(the so-called presuppositions of NLP).” (p. 202)
Yet the book also states:
“Many students of NLP,
especially in their initial enthusiasm for the effective use of the
patterning, seize upon an epistemologically peculiar (and impossible) goal.
The task they set about to accomplish is to free themselves from all
perceptual filters, often stating that thereby they will appreciate the
world without distortion. Such a naive project is surely incoherent.” (p.
247)
Like it or not, we all do have
presuppositions. Knowing what they are, and that they are arbitrary choices,
allows us to choose to change them contextually, in order to create multiple
perspectives and understandings. Attempting to dismiss them would not
eliminate them, but only blind us to the perceptual and behavioral biases
that result from them!
The book also says:
“Allow us to offer an extended
example of one of these differentiators: specifically, the fourth;
4. neither the agent of change
nor the client is required to believe any set of assumptions to utilize NLP
patterning effectively.
In particular, for example,
there is no need to subscribe to the so-called presuppositions of NLP in
order to benefit from an effective application of the pattern to some
problem or challenge. Normally, these presuppositions include statements
such as,
Having choice is better than
not having choice.
All the resources necessary to
make the change the client desires are already available within the client
at the unconscious level.”(pp. 201-202)
Yet elsewhere the book states:
“Further, these patterns [The
“chain of excellence”] had in common a deep trust that unconscious processes
when properly organized and constrained would produce deep, long term
ecological changes in spite of, for example, a client’s declared conscious
beliefs that such changes were impossible. . . . the ability of the
unconscious to assess the longer-term consequences and then, based on this
assessment, to make such selections (desired state, resource or replacement
behavior) greatly exceeds that of the conscious mind.”(p. 236)
This statement (and the new
code format itself) certainly appears to assume that “All the resources
necessary to make the change the client desires are already available within
the client at the unconscious level.” There are many other places where the
book presupposes that having choice is better than not having choice.” (pp.
231, 247-248)
Moreover, the presupposition
of unconscious positive intent, which is included in every list of
the NLP presuppositions I have ever seen, is a fundamental basis for six
step reframing, which the book describes as the bridge to the “new code.”
“. . . the Six Step Reframing
format that we are proposing creates the bridge from the classic code to the
new code. In the new code, we find that: . . .
3. There are precise
constraints placed upon the selection of new behavior(s); more specifically,
the new behavior(s) must satisfy the original positive intention(s) of the
behavior(s) to be changed;” (p. 236)
So while the “presuppositions
of NLP” are dismissed summarily, several of them are used as essential parts
of the “new code!” These contradictions cast a long shadow of doubt over the
rest of the book--does the right brain know what the left brain is doing?
Presentation of Patterning
On pp. 53 and 351 the book (redundundantly)
offers specific and useful suggestions for presenting new models to the
field of NLP, including 1. description of the pattern, 2. consequences of
using the pattern, 3. selection criteria for the use of the pattern, and
making a video available. (p. 352) However, in the description of new
code patterning and format (pp. 239-240) many terms are not defined (as
mentioned earlier) the consequences are not specified, no criteria for
selection are offered, and no video is made available! This is only one of
many, many discrepancies in this book between what is talked and what is
walked.
The suggestion of having a
library of videotaped examples of patterns available to the field for study
is a particularly good one, to provide sensory-based examples of the actual
use of patterns. People’s descriptions of their work are often very
different from what they actually do (e.g. Virginia Satir). This is one of
the reasons that Connirae and I have been producing videotapes for the last
21 years--so that people could see and hear samples of exactly what we were
doing and writing about. Years ago we produced some videotapes of Grinder’s
training, but the last Grinder video that I am aware of was produced about
18 years ago.
Russell’s “Theory of Logical Types”
This book is very clear that
logical levels are created by inclusion of logical categories within larger,
more encompassing categories. However, I found the discussion of logical
types confusing. It defines two sets as being of the same logical type if
there is isomorphic mapping between them. (pp. 295-301) But since no use
whatsoever is given for the term “logical type,” I have no idea how this
proposed distinction is of any use.
Bertrand Russell used the term
“logical types” interchangeably with logical levels, in declaring that a
class (at one logical level) cannot also be a member of itself (at a smaller
level).
G. Spencer Brown in the
preface to Laws of Form (1974) has shown that Russell’s theory of
logical types is not only unnecessary, but if accepted, would deprive us of
the branch of mathematics dealing with imaginary numbers, which is very
useful in electronics and in calculations involving sine waves and other
trigonometric functions! The theory of logical types would make impossible
the many useful self-referential (and sometimes paradoxical) messages which
people do, in fact, make and respond to. It would also outlaw important and
interesting phenomena such as the self-concept, which describes itself
recursively, including itself in its description.
The theory of logical types
(and any conclusions derived from it by Bateson, Dilts, Hall and others) was
declared “brain-dead” by Bertrand Russell himself in 1967, as reported by G.
Spencer Brown (also in the preface to Laws of Form): “The theory was,
he said, the most arbitrary thing he and Whitehead had ever had to do, not
really a theory but a stopgap, and he was glad to have lived long enough to
see the matter resolved.” Please let us hear no more about the “Theory of
Logical Types.”
Language
and Organization of the Book
Whispering would be a
great challenge to an editor in language, punctuation, and organization of
topics. For example, the fifteen pages of notes (pp. 105-119) for
Chapter 3, Part I, could all have been integrated into the chapter instead
of being dumped at the end. The chapter is not quite 3 times as long as the
notes! Many topics are broken up and scattered throughout the book, and as
already noted, often contradictory statements are made about the same topic.
The language used in the book
is usually very academic and overly complex, for instance, the following
sample. (I challenge the reader to read it once, and then summarize its
meaning!):
“1. the meta model is a set of
epistemological operations designed to verbally challenge (e.g. through
specification) the mapping (f2) between FA and our mental maps as well as
the internal logic of the language system itself (e.g. cause-effect
relations) as it forms a base for the generation of linguistically mediated
mental maps that guide behavior. A systematic application of this set of
verbal patterns leads precisely and efficiently to the identification of the
FA events (the reference experiences) that are the source of the
representations to be changed to achieve the client’s goals.” (p. 198)
I would probably translate
this paragraph into ordinary English something like the following:
“People respond to events
based on their internal pictures, sounds and feelings. They also collect
these experiences into groups or categories that are labeled with words. The
meta-model is a method for helping someone go from the information-poor word
maps back to the specific sensory-based experiences they are based on. It is
here in the information-rich specific experiences that useful changes can be
made that will result in changes in behavior.”
Epistemology
Since epistemology is how we
know and test knowledge, it seems to me to be an error to think of the
meta-model as “a set of epistemological operations” as mentioned above. The
meta model simply translates from f2 into FA (just as one can translate a
sentence from French into English) without making any epistemological
statement about the truth of either one. The meta-model can be (and often
is) taught as a set of practical techniques, without even a methodology to
guide its use, much less an epistemology.
Incongruence
The book has very harsh
words for teachers who are incongruent:
“1. There were a number of
extremely well-trained practitioners of NLP who were themselves clearly
capable of miracles (relative to the capabilities of other systems of change
work) with clients; however it apparently had never occurred to them (or
perhaps they simply had chosen not) to apply the patterning to
themselves--that is, self-application of the patterning. Thus, my perception
was that many of them were incongruent in significant contexts in their
lives--there were portions of their personal and professional lives that
showed absolutely no presence of the choices they busily assisted others in
creating in their lives. I was not happy with this situation.” (p. 231)
And later we find: “CAVEAT:
Messengers incongruent with the message they purport to bear are not
listened to, nor should they be!” (p. 366) Given the incongruencies that
appear in this book, this statement becomes self-referential (violating the
theory of logical types), paradoxically telling us not to listen to what it
says!
I agree that self-application
of the methods we teach is vitally important for all of us, and one result
of this is congruence, a worthy goal. However over the last 67 years I have
learned a great deal from people who were incongruent, and a degree of
incongruence may be inevitable for us mere mortals. We are all still
learning, and all of us have a long way to go.
Learning a new skill or
understanding always results in incongruence, at least initially. So if
someone were always congruent, that would mean that they could never learn
anything new! I do agree that incongruence is an important signal that
indicates an opportunity for further learning, change, development and
discovery, and this book provides more such opportunities than most of us
have time to pursue.
Format
of the book
As a publisher, I notice that
the book is priced about 2 1/2 times higher than other comparable books. At
that price it should at least have a color cover and an index! The small
discounts offered make it extremely unlikely that a bookstore will stock it,
since a bookstore needs at least a 40% discount to break even (They may
“special order” it as a courtesy to a customer). The paragraphing and
indentation could be greatly improved, and the bold-faced type used
throughout the book is the equivalent of shouting (not whispering).
Summary
The foregoing is only a small
sample of the topics in this book, but it is already more than this article
has space for. The topics raised are important, and deserving of further
discussion and clarification. I wish that they were presented in a form that
is more user-friendly, so that more people would be willing to read them,
and therefore be able to think about them carefully and respond to them.
Given the many kinds of
difficulties I had in reading and understanding this book, I find it
difficult to imagine that the authors took other position with the reader. I
think that few people will buy Whispering. Of those who do, few will
manage to read it. And of those who read it, very few will be able to
understand it.
I hope that this review can be
a contribution to the kind of friendly and respectful professional dialogue
that the book calls for, and that can strengthen and further develop the
field. There is some nourishing meat here, but also a lot of gristle that
needs to be cooked and chewed very thoroughly before swallowing, and quite a
lot of much less nourishing skin, feathers, teeth, claws, and bone that is
best set aside.
Steve Andreas has been learning,
training, researching and developing NLP patterns for the last 25 years. He
is the author of the recent book, Transforming Your Self: Becoming who
you want to be, Virginia Satir: The Patterns of Her Magic, and an
anthology, Is There Life Before Death. Steve is also is co-author
(with his wife, Connirae) of Heart of the Mind and Change Your
Mind--and Keep the Change. He lives with his wife and three teenage sons
in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains near Boulder, Colorado. 1221 Left
Hand Canyon Dr. Boulder CO 80302 andreas@qwest.net
www.SteveAndreas.com
Affordable NLP Training
