For distortion, ask:
‘How do you know?’
‘What’s the evidence?’
For generalisation, ask:
‘Is that always the case? Every time? Never?’
‘What if. . . ?’
For deletion, ask:
‘Tell me more. . .’
‘What, when, where, who, how?’
Remembering a few caveats
You can ask questions in two basic ways: one is considerate and valuable and the other sounds more like an interrogation by the Spanish Inquisition.
So here are some important points to bear in mind (you don’t want to fall out with your best friend!):
✓ Bear in mind that rapport always comes first. Without rapport, nobody listens to you. For information on building rapport, head to Chapter 7.
✓ Remember that people need to trust you before they’re ready to open up on difficult issues. So pace their timing. You can find more informa- tion on pacing and leading people in Chapter 7.
✓ Make sure that you’re clear about what you’re trying to achieve – your outcome – while you ask questions, otherwise you can get overloaded with irrelevant information and cease to be helpful.
✓ Soften your voice and be sensitive in your questioning. Feed the ques- tions gently into conversations and meetings rather than firing them like a market researcher in the street.
✓ Try the Meta Model out on yourself before you rush off to sort out your family and friends uninvited. Go steady. Like Tom in the following example, they may wonder what’s happening and not thank you for your new-found interest.
On Friday nights Andrew winds down after a busy week working in the City with a beer at his favourite pub in the picturesque village where he lives. After taking an NLP training course, he was enthusiastic to try out the Meta Model.
His drinking partner, Tom, an architect, talked about the week he’d had, and especially about a major argument with a colleague over an important project.
As Tom began his tale with ‘I’ll never work with him again,’ Andrew ques- tioned the generalisation with: ‘What never? Are you sure? What would happen if you did?’
Tom looked puzzled and responded with: ‘Our partnership isn’t going to work; communication has just broken down.’
Delighted to spot not one but two nominalisations in one sentence (check out the earlier sidebar ‘Abstract nouns and the wheelbarrow test’ for a descrip- tion of nominalisations), Andrew jumped in with: ‘How would you like to be a partner with this guy? And how may you be able to communicate?’
To which Tom was aghast and said: ‘Look, you’re normally on my side.
What’s going on?’
In his keenness to try out NLP, Andrew forgot to match and pace his friend and ease in gently with some subtle use of the Meta Model. All Tom really wanted that night was to have a good moan to a friend who would listen and sympathise.
The value of the Meta Model lies in gaining clarity. Watch out for the danger of getting more information than you can handle. Instead, pause to consider the outcome you’re seeking before asking the next question.
Hypnotising Your Audience
In This Chapter
▶ Discovering your everyday trances
▶ Adopting artfully vague language to good effect
▶ Enlisting the help of your unconscious mind
Imagine scenario one. You’re driving along the road on an ordinary kind of day. This stretch of road is familiar, one that you’ve travelled dozens of times. You know where you’re going. You reach your destination, stop the car, and notice that you have no clear recollection of travelling the last few kilometres.
Now imagine scenario two. You’re sitting with a group of people: perhaps you’re attending a meeting or lesson of some kind. You wake with a start when someone turns to you and asks you a question: ‘What are your
thoughts on this?’ Oh dear. Your attention has wandered. You haven’t a clue what the discussion is all about.
So what’s happening in these two scenarios? Nothing extraordinary. You’re simply experiencing an everyday trance, as if your brain is operating like a computer in sleep mode. You’re daydreaming, which is an excellent example of your ability to delete the details of what’s happening around you and sink into the relaxation pattern of the trance. Scenes like these ones happen the world over, every moment of the day.
In this chapter, we dip our toes into the world of trance and talk about how to turn it to your (and other people’s) benefit. Specifically, we look at the language patterns you can choose to adopt in order to communicate more effectively with other people, by getting through to the unconscious part of their minds.
Discovering the Language of Trance – the Milton Model
Humans have an amazing capacity to make sense of what people say – even when it’s utter gobbledygook. Sometimes, being artfully vague is valuable – when you’re non-specific in the content of what you say you enable other people to fill the gaps for themselves. When your language construction is deliberately vague, people can take what they need from your words in a way that’s most appropriate for them.
The Milton Model is a set of language patterns that you can use to take somebody into a trance state, an altered state of consciousness, in which they can access unconscious resources, make changes, and solve their own problems. The Milton Model is named after Milton H Erickson, one of the most influential of all hypnotherapists (read more about him in the earlier sidebar
‘Milton H Erickson – the master at work’).
The Milton Model uses all the same patterns as the Meta Model, except in reverse (head to Chapter 15 for details on the Meta Model). Whereas the Meta Model aims to gather more information, the Milton Model aims to
Milton H Erickson – the master at work
As a compelling teacher and therapist, Milton H Erickson (1901–1980) inspired and fascinated those who came to learn from him or be healed.
His mastery of therapeutic skills brought positive results for many people and led him to become the most influential hypnotherapist of the 20th century.
He had a profound effect on John Grinder and Richard Bandler, the founders of NLP. They modelled Erickson in 1974 and then published several books that demonstrated the language patterns they noted. These patterns form the basis of the Milton Model in NLP, which deliberately adopts language in which the meaning is vague. The Milton Model is in contrast to the Meta Model, explained in Chapter 15, which aims to elicit more specific information.
Erickson excelled at inducing trances in his patients and effecting real change that healed people. He paced the existing reality of his clients, patiently describing what they must be experiencing before introducing suggestions and leading them to new thinking. His therapeutic style was much more permissive than earlier hypnotherapists. By permissive, we mean that he adopted a flexible approach that worked with the existing map of his clients – always respecting their reality and using it as the starting point for his work. He gently took clients into a trance by making general comments that they couldn’t help but agree with, rather than saying
‘You will go into a trance now.’ He believed that clients already had the necessary resources and saw his role as the therapist as enabling the client to access them.
reduce the detail, deliberately adopting vague language that can be acceptable to different people. Table 16-1 outlines the main differences between these two models.
Table 16-1 Milton Model versus Meta Model
Milton Model Meta Model
Makes language more general Makes language more specific Moves from surface structure to deep
structure
Moves from deep structure to surface structure
Looks for general understanding Looks for precise examples
Aims to access unconscious resources Aims to bring experience to conscious awareness
Keeps client internally focused Keeps client externally focused
Comparing language patterns and the Milton Model
In Table 16-2, we highlight some of the key language patterns of the Milton Model. Just as in the Meta Model – Bandler and Grinder’s earlier explanation of language – the Milton Model identifies three key types of pattern. You see the same deletions, generalisations, and distortions that happen in normal speech (which we explain in full in Chapter 15) – the ways in which people make sense of their everyday experiences and transform them into language.
Table 16-2 NLP Milton Model Patterns
Patterns Examples of the Vague Language
You Can Use to Challenge Deletions, Generalisations, and Distortions and Take a Person into a Receptive State Deletion
Simple deletion (misses out part of the message)
You’re ready to listen Unspecified verbs (doesn’t say how the
action is carried out)
As you make sense of this in your own time. . .
(continued)
Table 16-2 (continued)
Patterns Examples of the Vague Language
You Can Use to Challenge Deletions, Generalisations, and Distortions and Take a Person into a Receptive State Unspecified referential index (doesn’t
say who is being referred to)
Some people will have been important to you
Comparisons (misses out what is being compared)
You’re feeling more and more curious Nominalisations (an abstract noun that
is turned into a verb; see Chapter 15)
You’re gaining new insights, building new friendships
Generalisation
Modal operators of possibility (shows what you can and are able to do)
You can become more successful . . . you’re able to discover new ways Modal operators of necessity (states
what you must, you have to do)
You must take this forward to where it has to go
Universal quantifiers (all, everything) Every time you feel like this. . .
All the skills you need are easy for you to learn
Distortion
Complex equivalence (one situation means the same as another)
This means that you’re getting all the help you need
Mind reading (interpreting another’s thoughts)
I know that you’re becoming more interested
Cause and effect On each breath, you can relax even more
As the comparison of the two models in Table 16-1 shows, the Milton Model makes statements that are deliberately very general; the effect of this approach is to relax the person you’re speaking to. In contrast, the Meta Model essentially invites the other person to retrieve specific details that are missing.
Meeting other aspects of the Milton Model
As well as the language patterns described in the preceding section, Erickson also used a number of other linguistic devices to assist in communication with his clients. We discuss three such devices in the following three sections.
Tag questions
A tag question is added to the end of a statement to invite agreement.
Tag questions are a deliberate and very effective device that distracts the conscious mind of recipients with something they can agree with. The effect is that the statement in front of the tag question goes directly to the unconscious mind and is acted upon:
✓ This is easy, isn’t it?
✓ Your health is important, you know?
✓ You can, can’t you?
✓ It’s time to relax, don’t you know?
Even if you never read or discover anything more about hypnosis, remember two of the most powerful words in the English language that are also examples of tag questions: that’s right. Don’t take our word for it; just try them out; you’ll find that it’s virtually impossible for someone to disagree with you.
Embedded commands
Embedded commands or questions are sentences that are constructed so as to contain within them the outcome that Erickson wanted from the client, as with the italicised parts of the following sentences:
✓ ‘I’m curious about whether you will learn to relax and let yourself be comfortable in a few moments.’
✓ ‘What is interesting is when did you last learn so easily?’
The purpose of the embedded command is to send directions straight to the unconscious mind, without the conscious mind blocking them. Erickson used his tone of voice to mark the commands out from the rest of the sentence: for example, by deepening his voice for the command element.
As you adopt lessons from communicators such as Erickson, remember that although what you say is important, the way you behave (body language, tone of voice, and so on) has the most effect.
Double binds
Double binds give people a choice, but limit it. You cover the options and assume that the result you want is going to happen:
✓ ‘When will you clean up your clutter, before you’ve had lunch or after?’
(A typical one to use with messy teenagers or housemates!)
✓ ‘Would you like to order it in blue or in green?’ (How about this one in a sales situation?)
Finding your own preferred model
To help you understand the differences between the Milton Model and the Meta Model, try this little role-playing exercise with a willing friend. One of you acts as the salesperson and the other as the customer:
✓ The salesperson: Imagine that you’re a salesperson and your task is to sell an object or service to your partner. Your job is to persuade the customer to buy without giving the person any details of what you’re really selling – see how interested you can get your partner while you remain artfully vague in the style of the Milton Model.
✓ The customer: Imagine that you’re a customer and your job is to get more specific information out of the salesperson who’s trying to sell to you. Challenge the vague language using tips from Chapter 15 on the Meta Model patterns to elicit detail from the generalised speech.
Afterwards, ask yourself which role felt most natural to you? Do you prefer to see and discuss the sweeping big picture or do you feel more comfortable when you talk about detail?
Understanding the art of vagueness and why it’s important
As you gain familiarity with the Milton Model, you can do what others before you have done: start to notice some of the language you hear as you listen to
The tale is in the telling
Part of Erickson’s therapy was to create stories – teaching tales – which helped people to make sense of their situations in new ways.
Erickson was confined to a wheelchair, and yet he carried out an extensive therapeutic practice, travelling widely and teaching and giving seminars right to the end of his life.
Vast libraries of transcripts of Erickson’s tales and seminars are available to purchase (see www.tranceworks.com), which make fascinating reading. Yet, those fortunate
enough to have met Erickson in person point out that the written word conveys just part of the man’s intuitive approach to clients. If you think about the communication equation we talk about in Chapter 7 on creating rapport, you may remember that words play only a small part in any communication – something like 7 per cent of the effect. Erickson’s smiles, gestures, the tone of his voice, and his instinctive respect for and curiosity about his clients are the missing ingredients in the written stories.
everyone you meet. You can notice that most people have mastered the ability to communicate at a general level. In other words, most people have mastered the art of vagueness, which allows you to go inside so easily, does it not?
Vagueness is everywhere! Just consider these statements:
✓ ‘We can work it out.’
✓ ‘Things can only get better.’
✓ ‘It doesn’t have to be like this.’
✓ ‘Someday, we’ll all be free.’
✓ ‘We all have our problems.’
Phrases like these are equally at home on the lips of politicians and pop stars, clairvoyants, and copywriters. You hear them on the radio every morning and they pop out from the newspaper in your daily horoscope as well as the advertisements on your computer screen for the latest must-have products. They send you into a relaxed state. You can’t help but agree with such highly generalised statements.
The power of using vague language lies in the fact that you get people into a different state. Such language distracts people from the outside world, so connecting with everybody in a group or getting rapport with someone you don’t know well becomes easier. When you’re vague, the following happen:
✓ Your listeners find their own answers, which are more powerful and long lasting for them.
✓ You don’t instil your own ideas or put inappropriate suggestions in the way.
✓ Your clients feel more in control, because they’re free to explore different possibilities that you may never have thought of.
In addition, being vague also opens up your own map. Remember that the language you adopt affects you too – not just other people. So often people impose their own limits by the way in which they talk about themselves – those naughty thought viruses like ‘I’m not good enough’ or ‘I’ll never be able to do that’ jump out and block their route to success. The Milton Model can combat such thoughts and help you do the following:
✓ Arouse your natural curiosity
✓ Discover more empowering ways of acting
✓ Find times when you were at your best and return you to that resourceful state
✓ Think more clearly
NLP has adopted the idea of chunking from the world of IT; the term simply means breaking things into bits. Illustrated in Figure 16-1, this NLP concept says that information needs to be in chunks of the right size for you to process it: tiny details or the bigger picture, whatever is appropriate for the person to whom you’re speaking. Chapter 15 on the Meta Model, this chapter, and Chapter 17 on telling stories all explore the different ways in which giving people information at the right level of detail or chunk size aids communication.
Figure 16-1:
Chunking up, down, and across with
language. Meta Model Chunk down
to specific Stories and
Metaphors Chunk across
Milton Model
Chunk up to general
The Milton Model is a style of communication that moves upwards and focuses ideas at a highly general level; the Meta Model has a downward direction, concentrating on very specific details. When you use stories and metaphors, you’re simply moving sideways – chunking laterally – to match the same level of detail but using stories to help people make new connections.
Going Deeper into Hypnosis
Hypnosis has existed since the eighteenth century – its original founder is usually accepted to be Franz Anton Mesmer (whose name is the origin of the word mesmerise). Hypnosis – or trance – is a natural state of focused attention, one in which you become en-tranced, where your main focus is on your internal thoughts and feelings rather than the external world around you.
Thanks to the more recent influence of Milton Erickson (check out the earlier sidebar ‘Milton H Erickson – the master at work’), NLP views hypnosis and everyday trance as a safe and valuable route to your unconscious (which in this context means other than conscious). Your unconscious signifies the thoughts, feelings, and experiences of which you’re currently unaware.
Erickson said that his patients were having problems because they were out of rapport with their unconscious minds, suggesting that good mental health involves a rapport between the conscious and unconscious minds. His style of hypnosis enlists the help of the unconscious mind to facilitate changes in patterns of thinking and behaviour, and works by a therapist talking to somebody in such a way that the person becomes self-reflective. In this