Making Self-Actualization Actionable #1

After a lifetime of studying and modeling self-actualizing people, Abraham Maslow wrote a chapter about his experiences in a book, Challenges of Humanistic Psychology that James Bugental edited. He titled of the chapter, “Self-Actualizing and Beyond.” What I found wonderful about this chapter is how he described both his original motivations for the modeling project and how he then set about to create benchmarks for self-actualization. So given that one of our key discoveries in Neuro-Semantics is the “secret history” of NLP in the work of Maslow and Rogers and that benchmarking is one of our key contributions to the field of NLP, I thought I would quote extensively from the chapter and relate it to current work that we are doing in Neuro-Semantics.

Modeling: 1935

Forty years before Bandler and Grinder modeled the three Human Potential Movement leaders (Bateson, Perls, and Satir), Maslow modeled two people who showed extraordinary development of human excellence and began the Human Potential Movement. What he discovered was that in

“… trying to understand two of my teachers that he loved, adored, and admired and who were very, very wonderful people … [I] sought to understand why these two people were so different from the run-of-the-mill people in the world. These two people were Ruth Benedict and Max Wertheimer.” (The Farther Reaches of Human Nature, 1971, Chapter 3, p. 40)

Maslow’s modeling then began out of astonished amazement at two individuals who “were most remarkable human beings.” Unlike the NLP modeling of skills, this model wasn’t about what they did, but what they had become- being more than doing. Now in terms of doing, they were both famous-Max was the co-founder of Gestalt Psychology and Ruth the founder of Cultural Anthropology, the mentor of Margaret Mead, first wife of Gregory Bateson.

“I made descriptions and notes on Max Wertheimer, and I made notes on Ruth Benedict. When I tried to understand them, think about them, and write about them in my journal and notes, I realized in one wonderful moment that their two patterns could be generalized. I was talking about a kind of person, not about two non-comparable individuals. There was wonderful excitement in that. I tried to see whether this pattern could be found elsewhere, and I did find it elsewhere, in one person after another.” (41)

This modeling is driven by the scientific attitude of seeking knowledge about human excellence, something that Maslow spent his entire life searching this out. He selected “wonderful people” “… and then tried to figure them out and found he was able to describe a syndrome-the kind of pattern that seemed to fit all of them.”

Maslow selected people who were visibly successful and who were also inwardly success because he wanted to discover the farther reaches of human nature:

“When you select out for careful study very fine and healthy people, strong people, creative people, saintly people, sagacious people- then you get a
different view of mankind. You are asking how tall can people grow, what can a human being become?”

What did he find as he searched for human excellence? He found that these self-actualizing people were living for what he defined as the being-values-the values of being-the values that were valuable in and of themselves, inherently, innately, and were not valued only for their instrumental use. He commented that these B-values are “the meaning of life for most people.”

“Self-actualizing people are, without one single exception, involved in a cause outside their own skin, in something outside of themselves. They are
devoted at something … which is very precious to them … so that the work-joy dichotomy in them disappears.” (42)

Benchmarking Self-Actualization

In his 1967 chapter, Maslow was looking for the actual behaviors that led to and that indicated self-actualization- the benchmarks.

“What does one do when he self-actualizes? Does he grit his teeth and squeeze? What does self-actualization mean in terms of actual behavior, actual procedure?” (43)

That’s when he came up with “eight ways in which one self-actualizes.” I will be quoting him for each of these eight ways in the next weeks and adding comments about each.

1) Total Absorption

“First, self-actualization means experiencing fully, vividly selflessly, with full concentration and total absorption. It means experiencing without the self-consciousness of the adolescent. At this moment of experiencing, the person is wholly and fully human. This is a self-actualizing moment. This is a moment when the self is actualizing itself.” (44)

Maslow wrote that this “can be a very sweet moment” and that’s because in such moments of absorption, one can forget poses, defenses, shyness and “go at it whole-hog.” Such engagement! This is the very thing that Csikszentmihalyi has described in his description of a flow state. The flow state is where one becomes so completely engaged in an activity that one gets lost in it. One becomes so engaged with something, and the amazing thing is that it could be just about anything- an athletic event, a puzzle, rock climbing, reading a book, having a coaching conversation with someone, writing, cooking, making love, playing with a dog- the list is endless.

And it is this kind and quality of total engagement that e call “the genius state” in Neuro-Semantics. Building on the foundational work of DeLozier, Grinder, Dilts, and others, Accessing Personal Genius is all about this- how to turn on your “genius” or “flow” state so that it is yours- at your command. No longer do you have to wait for it, cross your fingers and hope for it, you can “turn it on” and step fully into the zone of your optimal state- at will.

Now given that this is one of the benchmarks of self-actualization, in fact, the first one, and that it is a total absorption and engagement with something outside of yourself- this again clarifies the old confusion between self-actualization and selfishness and why we say that Self-Actualization is not about you, it is through you.

Ready for living the self-actualizing life? Then get ready to move far, far beyond multi-tracking as you step into total absorption of a meaning and value that endows your life with a rich and robust meaningfulness.

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D.

Here’s something fantastic to imagine-imagine NLP Leaders getting together
and collaborating! As a visionary, while it is a far-off dream and wild
imagination, it could happen! What if … what if those who are leaders in
the field of NLP gathered together, and using our prime model (the NLP
Communication Model) to talk, we talked about creating a platform for
cooperating and even collaborating? Wouldn’t that be something?

Well, a couple years ago after an experience that I and Frank Pucelik had
with a young wild NLP trainer who was being seduced away by some cult, we
had a brainstorm. What if we called “the elders of the tribe of NLP”
together and began a series of conversations to see if we could facilitate
the leaders in this field to get together in a more collaborative way? That
was the idea. So we did that. We called for a NLP Leadership Summit. That
became a reality the following year at the NLP Conference (Nov. 2012). We
invited those who had been Leaders in this field for twenty-years to come
together and so we had a gathering of 28 for a day of conversation.
Actually we reduced the number to 15 years to accommodate some of the
obvious leaders in the U.K.

That first conversation was mostly to get to know each other and so we spent
half of our time sharing who we are and some of our experiences and then
half the time working on some basic questions about vision in the field of
NLP. As a result, we created a LinkedIn presence (The NLP Leadership
Summit) and since then more Trainers have joined. The only requirements
that we set were:

1) Having been in the field of NLP for 20 years.

2) Planning to attend the NLP Conference in London in coming year.

Why these requirements? Because we want to first call “the leaders of the
tribe” together and see if we can get some basic cooperation among us and
then expand it outward to the new up-and-coming leaders. And we want
“leaders” because they are the ones bringing people into this field whether
by training, writing, researching, etc.

What dawned on me two years ago when we dreamed this up was that those of us
who are bringing people into this field and influencing them about NLP, what
it is, what it involves, what you can do with it, etc., we are the leaders
and we are therefore the ones responsible for the state of affairs in this
field. As you probably know, I have been writing articles about the state
of affairs in this field since the early 1990s. One of the first articles
that Bob and I wrote we titled, “The Downside of NLP” pointing out some of
the real problems and challenges before us.

Well, as you also know, we in Neuro-Semantics know that merely complaining
about something is quite insufficient. If we want to change things, we have
to take responsibility and step up and take the risks to make things better.
So that’s the why behind The NLP Leadership Summit.

After The NLP Leadership Summit last year, I wrote a report about what
happened there. Here’s a bit of that. Among the best dreams for the field
of NLP that were described and discussed were the following. What is our
Vision for NLP?

NLP as a Community -a community of people who cooperate and collaborate.

NLP as known for what it gives, rather than received; NLP is contribution
and a force for good in the world.

NLP as an esteemed Profession, one with standards, one taught in
Universities around the world.

NLP as a resilient community built upon trust.

NLP as a community that deals with conflicts, has great models for helping
people work through conflicts.

NLP as people who search for patterns and structures in experiences.

With those visions, the conversation went to community, to relationship, to
trust and trusting. This led to asking for a show hands for those who
thought “There is a NLP community” and those who thought “There is not an
NLP Community.” Hands were about equally divided. Then Heidi Heron from
Sydney noted, “There are many NLP communities, there is just no singular
global community with a shared consensus.” That resonated with everyone.
We have communities, but not a single community that combines and unites the
smaller communities.

Early in the day there was an attempt to begin talking about Standards and
establishing professional criteria, and I think that all of us wanted to
talk about that, and yet most also realized that if we jumped into a topic
like that too soon, it would be counter-productive. Standards is a
conversation that we need to have, but to have it also requires lots of
rapport and relationship. So we put that one off at that time.

Where to from here? With many people in the room who had been at many
similar attempts like the 1997 Visionary Leadership Conference and having
seen the attempts come to nothing, we knew that this had to be just the
beginning, the first step of a long journey, and that there has to be
continual follow-up. I first mentioned that we could meet once a year,
every year at the NLP Conference, but several felt such was just not
sufficient. And true enough. Yet it is a beginning. So we did agree-
“Next Year in London!” And we will be working on a Linked-In presence
whereby we can invite more and more of the “elders of the tribe” into the
NLP Leadership Summits.

If we are a field made up of many small communities and if we are leaving a
legacy which most of us really do not like then how do we change that
legacy? This year (2013) we will meet for the day prior to the NLP
Conference – November 15 and if you are a NLP Trainer with 15 or more years
experience in this field and want to join us – please let myself, Frank
Pucelik, or Teresa from Crown House Publications know

<mailto:meta@acsol.net> meta@acsol.net

R. Frank Pucelik – <mailto:rfptk@hotmail.com>
rfptk@hotmail.com

<mailto:nlpconference@crownhouse.co.uk> nlpconference@crownhouse.co.uk

—

Feel free to send this out to NLP Trainers and Leaders

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D.

Modeling Excellence Series #16

Earlier this year I wrote 15 articles in the “Modeling Excellence” series and ended that with the one back on May 27. Recently in a training someone asked, “When is modeling ineffective? What would be an example of an ineffectively modeling of some excellence?” At the moment of the question I did not have a poignant example, but now I do.

A number of years ago after Southwest Airlines demonstrated their excellence in creating a low-budget airline that stayed profitable and kept growing during the same time that every other airline in the US was suffering declines and losses, if not going through bankruptcy. So both United Airlines and Delta attempted to model what Southwest was doing and enter into the market as competitors. So both launched subsidiaries to compete with the Southwest’s business model. United invented “TED” which I often flew between Grand Junction and Denver. Yet while they were certainly able to copy the system, they were not able to actually model the excellence that distinguished Southwest.

That is, they were able to copy the planes, the processes, quick turn-arounds at airports, etc. but they were not able to model and replicate Southwest’s values or spirit. Southwest is known for their entrepreneurship, fun, and love and the airline trades under the ticker symbol LUV. They were the airline which first introduced humor in something as serious as the safety instructions given just before a flight takes off. They added little comments like, “If you haven’t been in a car since 1970,
here’s how a seat belt works.” So while United and Delta airlines could model the externals-what Southwest does, they could not model the spirit by which Southwest employees do what they do. Given their cultures, they could not model the culture.

This explains, I think, much of NLP modeling which has failed to be effective. People have examined and modeled the structure of some experience and have fully identified all of the external steps, actions, and responses required to be able to do whatever some high performer or expert is able to do. But they missed something. They did not get the internal stuff- the spirit of the expert. They did not capture the expert’s attitudes, values, principles, understandings, beliefs, decisions, identity, permissions, and frames of mind.

So what’s the problem? The problem is that while Neuro-Linguistic Program is superb at detailing the behaviors of an experience and some of the first-level frames of mind- beliefs, it is not equipped to flush out the multiple layers of self-reflexive frames. And why? Simple. The classic NLP strategy model does not include a model for modeling the systemic self-reflexivity of human consciousness. NLP is excellent for detailing the linear strategy of the visual, auditory, and kinesthetic steps in “thinking and “feeling.”

This explains why NLP needs the Meta-States Self-Reflexivity Model. That’s because above and beyond the strategy model, and each piece of the strategy model, are additional layers of reflexive thoughts-and-feelings and for each one of those are additional hidden layers. And it is the Meta-States model that is designed to identify these layers that hide within, above, and behind these “thoughts” whether they are beliefs, decisions, identities, permissions, prohibitions, understandings, etc.

Now, systemically when these layers combine they gestalt to create additional phenomena that are more than and different from the sum of the parts. Within human consciousness, they gestalt into attitudes-higher level frames of mind that hold together a synergy of multiple beliefs. And because of this, using the Meta-States model we can model the structure of an attitude to identify the spirit of the expert.

Here then is the difference that makes the difference within so many experiences. That is, above and beyond what the top achiever does is his or her attitude or spirit that actually drives the experience. It is the person’s spirit that endows the experience with the certain quality that takes it to a new level and gives it the quality that we are actually seeking to model.

The point is that our modeling will be ultimately ineffective if we do not get both the what and the why. The what is the performance, even when it is the micro-performance of the actions that make up the activity. The why is made up of lots of things:

•  The intention behind it, which is made up of the values or significance and which answers the why question. “Why are you doing that? What’s your intention?”
• The principles and understandings governing one’s assumptive frames about how it works and how to carry it off.
• The aspirations of one’s vision about the meaningfulness of the activity.

The point is that to unpack the expert’s attitude or spirit requires the ability to enter into his or her matrix of multiple meanings or meta-states that galvinize the person’s robust state. This explains why we really cannot, or should not, use NLP as mere technology- as merely a set of techniques. To be a technician alone will only model out the external activities as United and Delta did with Southwest and entirely miss the inner “culture” of the company. To model the culture, the inner spirit and attitude of the people who add the quality to the activity, we have to use a model that can handle the non-linear, systemic self-reflexivity of the human
subjective experience- the Meta-States Model.

For books on Meta-States, see www.neurosemantics.com and click Products.

For the APG Trainings that Introduces Meta-States, click Trainings and then APG.

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D.

Emotional Mastery Series #8

If you really want to master your emotions -self-actualize. That is, make real (actualize) your best version of you so that you become as Carl Rogers said a “fully functioning person” and as Abraham Maslow said you access your “full humanness.” And if you do this, what will you feel? How will you handle your emotions? What will be different about your emotional life?

Well, first and foremost, you will have lots of energetic vitality. By gratifying your basic needs truly (and not falsely or through distortions) and adequately (sufficiently, not perfectly or one-hundred percent), those driving impulses (“needs” or requirements for living) will be gratified and “go away” thereby allowing the next level of drives to emerge. And after the levels of basic needs the self-actualization needs emerge. And when these are the inner driving impulses of your life-then you will be living passionately with a strong sense of purpose, inner value, and joy.

In self-actualizing you will be giving accurate meanings to your basic and higher needs which will enable you to truly and adequately gratify your inner impulses and drives. As you then learn effective and adequate coping skills, you will satisfy those needs which, in turn, will release your energy and vitality. That’s the design of your “needs” as well as the sign that you have gratified them truly and adequately.

The vitality that you will be feeling will be an energy to live fully, to be your best self, and to strive to contribute and make a difference. That’s what “self-actualization” means and if I belabor this, it is because of the myth that connects it to selfishness. The truth is that self-actualization is not about you, it is through you, but paradoxically not about you. This vitality involves experiencing those moments that Maslow called “peak experiences.” These are those little moments that happen to everyone (or nearly so) in which, for that moment, you sense that “life is good, it is precious, it is sacred.” And in that moment, you are again “in love with life” and are “surprised by joy” (C.S. Lewis) and are able to appreciate freshly as if for the first time, again.

All of this is one side of the self-actualizing emotional life. There is another. The other involves being able to experience your emotions- all of them, the negative ones as well as the positive ones- fully and accurately. And as you do so, you lose your fear of any of these emotions. After all, they are just emotions- just the somatic or bodily experience of the meanings being activated in your mind-body system. And now you can use the negative emotions for their best value- to stop, look, and listen and see where you need to make some life adjustments.

Now as a self-actualizer, you can much more effectively and efficiently use your fear, anger, sadness, stress, frustration, vulnerability, tenderness, etc. to be more fully alive and more fully human. Now you can allow yourself to fully experience the emotions without being overwhelmed by them or think that you are going to “lose control.”

By self-actualizing, what you will feel will be more appropriate to the contexts and situations of your life. Here’s what Abraham Maslow said about people actualizing (making real) their inner drives and integrating what could be dichotomies. This came after his study of the fully human self-actualizing subjects that he studied:

“It seemed to me that … it could be traced back to the relative absence of fear in my subjects. They were certainly less enculturated; that is, they seemed to be less afraid of what other people would say or demand or laugh at. They had less need of other people and therefore, depending on them less, could be less afraid of them and less hostile against them. Perhaps more important, however, was their lack of fear of their own insides, of their own impulses, emotions, thoughts. They were more accepting than the average. This approval and acceptance of their deeper selves than made it more possible to perceive bravely the real nature of the world and also made their behavior more spontaneous. … they were less afraid of being laughed at or of being disapproved of. They could let themselves by flooded by emotion.” (1968, Toward a Psychology of Being, p. 140-141).

About what happens to the experience of anger in a self-actualizing person, Maslow described the change in this way:

“In the healthier person, anger is reactive (to a present situation) rather than a characterological reservoir from the past. That is, it is a realistic effective response to something real and present, for instance to injustice or exploitation or attack, rather than a cathartic overflow of misdirected and ineffective revenge upon innocent bystanders … Anger does not disappear with psychological health; rather it takes the form of decisiveness, self-affirmation, self-protection, justified indignation, fighting against evil, and the like.” (1968, p. 162)

“The ability to be aggressive and angry is found in all self-actualizing people, who are able to let it flow forth freely when the external situation ‘calls for’ it.” … “a child should learn not only how to control his anger, but also how and when to express it.” (1968, p. 195)

Emotional Mastery Series

•  What is an Emotions (#1, 2 & 3)
•  Pseudo-Emotions (#4)
•  Emotional Continua (#5)
•  Emotional Tolerance (#6)
•  Don’t just feel, Do Something! (#7)

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D.

Emotional Mastery Series #7

•  What is an Emotions (#1, 2 & 3)
•  Pseudo-Emotions (#4)
•  Emotional Continua (#5)
•  Emotional Tolerance (#6)

If an emotion is the difference between map and territory, between how you have mentally mapped something in terms of your understandings, beliefs, representations, etc. and how you then experience some event, person, or interaction in the world- then as noted before in this series, your emotions are always right. That is, they are right to the map that you’re using and the skills that you exercise in the territory of the world. But this right does not mean that they are useful, effective, or healthy. They are just right to how you created them. They can often be very wrong to the context and so inappropriate, unuseful, and even interfering and sabotaging.

No wonder then that we have to be careful and intelligent about how we relate to our emotions. We have to understand them- what they are, what they are not, their proper use, their improper use, etc.

Overall, a good way to start is to think of your emotions as signals of the map/ territory difference. And if they are signals, then they signal you to Stop, Look, Listen when a negative emotion is activated. That’s because a negative emotion means that something is wrong in your world as you have constructed it. So to positively use your negative emotions, use the signal to slow down, check things out, and reflect on how you have created that emotion, what it means, and what you should or should not do about it.

Like the gauge on your dashboard, the negative signals are there for a positive use. They tell you when something needs to be attended too-you need gas, oil, engine check, something. In The Emotional Hostage (1985) Leslie Cameron-Bandler and Michael Lebeau made a similar point, “Unpleasant emotions are worth having if they are used well.” And if used well, then it
means understand what the negative emotion is saying:

“There is little point in regretting something you have done unless that feeling of regret helps you change your future behavior. There is little point in feeling guilty unless your feeling of guilt leads to a renewal of will and intention to fulfil your standards in the future. There is little point in feeling frustrated unless that feeling of frustration propels you toward creative efforts to attain your desired outcome. The functional attribute of an unpleasant emotion specifies what you need to do to respond appropriately to that emotion.” (p. 38)

It is the function of emotions to get you to respond appropriately. Anger gets you to stand up and fight for something; fear gets you to move back away from a danger or threat or approach with caution and resources. Sadness enables you to acknowledge value and move you to replace what you have lost. Every emotion exist to fulfil a function that enables us to be healthier and more effective. And that why, positive or negative, the emotion is valuable and designed to energize you to take effective action.

Yet if you feel emotions, but you do not respond to them and from them, then you are not putting the signal, the message, and the energy of your emotions to good use. To put this more bluntly: The purpose of your emotions is not for you to just feel that emotion! The purpose of the emotion and the feelings it generates is so that you do something about it! So, yes, feel it, embrace it, be with it- and use the energy it generated to act, to do something about it!

There is little point in feeling the emotion unless that feeling helps you change your behavior and alter your thinking. There is little value in merely feeling the feeling and not understanding how your system created it in the context of your life.

This realization raises several questions for all of us:

• What are you going to do now that you have that feeling?
• Given that feeling will you check out and adjust your mental map?

Maybe that feeling should get you to work on your skills so that what you know, you can do with competence and grace? Are perhaps what you need to do is to qualify the expression of the emotion.

As signals, emotions come to us as ongoing feedback about what’s going on with you as you move through the world using your skills to actualize your mental map. If you don’t realize that your emotions are your creations, then moving through life will seem like being a back seat passenger of forces that are happening to you without your understanding or agreement. You will then see and feel like a victim to your emotions. Once, however, you realize and take ownership of the fact that your emotions are your creations you move from the back seat to the driver’s seat. You shift from going along for an emotional ride to being the manager of your emotions.

As energy to act, your emotions give you a boost for action. The emotion itself is not the action, just feeling the emotion does not demand or require that you do something. Yet once you feel the emotion, now you are in a position to decide what you are going to do about it. Will you just observe, notice, and understand? Will you express the emotion by informing others about what you are feeling? Will you act it out in a certain way? If so, to what purpose? What’s your outcome in acting on the emotion? What
do you seek to achieve?

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D.

Emotional Mastery Series #7

• What is an Emotions (#1, 2 & 3)
• Pseudo-Emotions (#4)
• Emotional Continua (#5)
• Emotional Tolerance (#6)
• When Emotions are Distorted (#7)

This may be controversial, well, in fact, I’m sure it will be controversial. Yet given the exaggerated coverage of Murder Trial of George Zimerman by the US media, I thought I’d use it to write about emotions and emotional mastery.

The George Zimerman case has been in the news here in the USA for many months and in the past month has absolutely dominated the news. CNN covered it as if there was no another thing happening on the planet. They devoted hours and hours to it every day especially during the three week trial that finally occurred in Florida. Then last week, after all the evidence was presented, the jury of 6 women deliberated 16 hours and found him “not guilty.” Normally that would be the end of things. But in this case, it has not ended.

Now it has been fascinating to listen to the pros and cons of the actual evidence that Mr. Zimerman, a neighborhood watchman who reported a young man acting suspicious, and who followed him to see what he was doing, and then there was a four minute hiatus and then suddenly there was a confrontation, of which Zimerman got the worse. A witness reported him on the ground and the other person on top and beating him (which accorded to the injuries that he came away with); later he testified that he head was being slammed against the concrete sidewalk (which his injuries also indicated), and fearing that he would go unconscious and so fearing for his life, he shot the young man, Trayvon Martin, and the single shot just so happened to deliver a fatal blow so that he ended up dead.

Why then is the situation not over? My opinion is that it is mostly because of the media and in particular, how the media framed it. While Zimerman is Hispanic and Martin was Black, the media (esp. NBC) presented it as a racial white-on-black crime. The media also presented it as “racial profiling” which all the evidence has failed to substantiate. Then there are all the people emotionalizing the situation and that’s what I want to address.

Apart from what happened that rainy night in early 2012, and all of the emotions that naturally arise when there’s that kind of conflict and fight and death, there have been lots of “playing on emotions” and “amplifying emotions” to make a whole lot more of the situation than is warranted. About emotions-it is very sad that any young man of 17 years of age was killed. That’s a big loss to his parents, family, and friends. And when there is that kind of tragic loss, there will be sadness and grief.

Other emotions: When a community suffers a crime spree and those discovered were young men, it makes sense that someone commissioned as a neighborhood watchman would be on the alert and could easily over-react. It also makes sense that a young man who thinks he is being followed by someone in authority might feel under threat and, as it is with young men, one might be quick to get into an altercation that might degenerate into a fist fight and brawl and then something worse might happened. As it did in this case. These fight-flight emotions are human emotions and normal, and unless managed well, can be dangerous.

Is it really any surprise about the emotions evoked given such events on a dark rainy wintery night? Fear, anger, apprehension, surprise, etc. All of that is normal enough and strong enough to evoke strong reactions. What’s made it much worse is the way others have framed things that amplify the emotions, play off the emotions, and exaggerate the emotions. How have they done that? By giving too much meaning and distorted meaning to the events.

Some immediately made it about “race.” NBC news actually altered the 911 call from Zimerman and distorted it in such a way as to give the impression that he was “racially profiling” Martin. Later they acknowledged the distortion, and apologized, but by then it was too late. The damage had been done. Emotions of anger, rage, outrage, injustice, etc. were now in play and arousing people to watch “justice” and revenge.

Even the President got involved and made statements that “fan the fire” of the racial conflict and hatred saying such things as, “If I had a son he would look like Trayvon” and “35 years ago I would have been Trayvon.” That kind of personalizing, which maybe he wanted people to understand the Black experience, tended to make things worse- much worse. Instead of calming the situation and being a leader to the whole nation, he promoted one side of a local issue. For me, this showed his incompetence as a leader. He was not rising above it and providing a unifying perspective.

What has been and continues to amplify and distort the emotions of thousands of people about this situation is the either/or thinking, the exaggeration, the tunnel-vision perspectives, and the jumping to conclusions. These cognitive distortions inevitably distort the meaning that we give to things and will amplify emotions.

If you are reading any of the news about this, you will read that some people have taken a tunnel vision view about the “stand your ground” law in Florida. Interesting enough, though, that law was never brought into the trial and had nothing to do with the verdict. But now there are rallies in dozens of cities wanting to get rid of those laws.

Another tunnel vision point of view is that of “profiling.” To listen to some people, profiling is the worst evil on the planet. But if there a crime spree and those involved are consistently young men, then seeing a young man sauntering along on a rainy night “acting suspicious” is precisely what a watchman would and should look out for. It’s a matter of probability. Someone not walking fast when it’s rainy and who doesn’t stay on the sidewalk, and who looks like he’s looking into windows – that’s a curious thing that should be checked into, shouldn’t it? Why would someone ignore that sign? That has nothing to do with race, that’s about behavior. And behavior is precisely what we can profile.

Now about “race,” it has been noted scores and scores of time that 93% of all shootings and deaths of young black men in the USA is by young black men. It’s called black-on-black crime and apparently Chicago is the nation’s worst city for this. And according to one news report that I saw, during the trial of Zimerman, 8 young (16 to 19 year old black youth) were shot in Chicago and not one of them got any national attention. Why is that? Why does the media seem to think that the only “news worthy” news is when it is white on black or hispanic on black or something other mixture? What’s with that? And why do those who are supposedly the leaders in the Black community not raising their voices about that?

Here is a situation where emotions have raged and become exaggerated and have led to all kinds of additional hurtful actions. And why? The meaning given to the events. The events have been semantically over-loaded so as to agitate, anger, frustrate, and elicit more hate, especially racial hatred.

And what about emotional mastery? What’s needed to bring some emotional calmness, respect, thoughtfulness, etc. into the situation? Better meanings.

• First we need to stop jumping to conclusions based on inadequate information. We need to calmly and patiently keep asking for the facts of the case and not assume guilt or injustice or whatever until the facts are in.
• Second, we need to not interpret one instance between two individuals as representative of whole groups of people. That kind of over-generalizing leads to stereotyping and abstracting that semantically over-loads the situation.
• Third, we need to keep contextualizing the when, where, who, what, etc. facts of the case so that we don’t take it out of context and distort the meaning. Keeping our emotional cool is challenging enough. Keeping it when there’s been a tragic loss of life is even more challenging. But it can be done. We can express our sympathy and concern to those who have suffered loss and we can withhold judgment and blame from others until we get the facts. And when in the course of things, a selected jury has made a decision, we can accept it because we live in a land that’s based on the law, not enraged emotions.

What makes democracy wonderful is not that we have to agree everything that happens, we do not. But we do need to be respectful of each other and as calmly and respectfully as possible ask tough questions without being insulting. If we could do  that, if we could demonstrate that level of emotional mastery- we could solve the real problems and avoid creating unnecessary ones.

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D.

Emotional Mastery Series #6

 What is an Emotions (#1, 2 & 3)

 Pseudo-Emotions (#4)

 Emotional Continua (#5)

Question: What is the one big emotion that everyone wants to experience and feel? Of all emotions, which one is the emotion most desirable? If there’s any common response to these questions or the question about what do you really want, at least in American culture, it is “I just want to be happy.”
Happiness, it seems is what everybody wants. And it certainly seems that this is what is constantly sold on the internet, on television, in movies, and in all forms of social marketing these days. It is not only sold as the great prize, happiness is also presented as the great panacea for life’s problems. As a result it is common for people to think, “If only I was happy, everything would be okay.” And so lots of people live their lives searching for happiness.

Yet as wise ones over the ages have repeatedly noted, there’s a paradox in pursuing happiness: Pursue happiness directly and happiness will evade you. Conversely, when you stop chasing happiness and focus on doing something that it engages you fully, makes a contribution to others, and that you find meaningful, then happiness will be yours.

Beyond that “happiness paradox,” there are several other problems with focusing on happiness. It is mis-directed for several reasons. One problem that arises from over-loading “happiness” as the most important emotion and he only one worth pursuing is that it tempts us to discount all of the other emotions. Then we not only stop caring about the other emotions, we dislike them and may even try to avoid them.

Yet if we are to be emotionally intelligent and whole, we need all of the emotions. This also includes the negative ones as well as the positive ones. We need them all in order to be whole. Without the capacity to experience the full range of human emotions-we cannot be fully alive and able to effectively handle the challenges of life’s experiences.

The so-called “negative” emotions are important for us to know when to “stop, look, and listen” for what may be going wrong with either our map or our experience and make needed changes. When there’s a loss of something important in life, it is normal and natural to feel sad. Sadness helps you to recognize the value of the loss. It tenderizes your heart. It enables you to recognizes what’s precious in life. And it motivates you to do the “grief work” and then replace what you have lost.

Anger is important to recognize a violation of your values. The subsequent energy gives you the backbone to stand up for yourself and fight for your values. Without that ability you would not stand up for yourself. You would be a wimp. Others would learn to walk over you. Fear is important to recognize a danger or threat to you and your values. Of course, all of these emotions, as symptoms of your mental map-making and understanding, can be distorted and erroneous. They are the feel of your meanings and so the meanings need to be checked for accuracy and usefulness.

Over-loading “happiness” as the most important emotions tends to reduce our ability to tolerate the other emotions. And without emotional tolerance we tend to reject our emotions, avoid them, defend against them, deny them, and use all kinds of defense mechanisms and this, of course, in the long term creates a blindness to our emotions. Only wanting happiness will lead you to suppress other aspects of your experience.

Emotional tolerance enables us to work through the experiences of life without getting stuck by hating, resisting, and fighting a symptom- a particular emotion that we dislike. The fact of life is that when we’re engaged in any challenging project, there will be set-backs, disappointments, moments of anxiety and stress, and therefore the need for patience and persistence, etc. And if a person does not have the emotional tolerance and acceptance of such emotional states, then that person can become stopped or blocked at those very points.

Such “negative” emotions are often the very emotions we try to stop, block, avoid, or escape through various dysfunctional behaviors. That is, what seems like a dysfunctional behavior- over-eating, smoking, getting drunk, using drugs, procrastinating, ADD, etc. are actually serving a purpose. That purpose may be to dampen our feelings of loneliness, avoiding rejection, calming our nervousness, or calming ourselves down when feeling socially distressed. These “secondary gains” for many of the behaviors are what causes another level of trouble. They develop as pseudo-solutions for handling emotions.

The real solution is simple- accept an emotion as an emotion, tolerate it as just tension in the body, explore the meanings creating the emotion in the first place, and then find more effective ways to deal with the emotion. The key to changing any such self-destructive behavior is to be willing to allow or tolerate the feelings that the behaviors are blocking. So if you are feeling tension from thoughts of being inadequate, thoughts of being abandoned or rejected, distressed by thoughts of being mortal, being different, etc., then allow yourself to simply feel the tension and explore the meanings generating the tension begins the freeing. Your emotions gives
you energy for life and make up your engine for navigating life’s journey-so welcome them, embrace them, tolerate them, and use them as signals about your meanings.

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D.

Emotional Mastery Series #5

Having provided an operational definition and description of what an “emotion” is (#1-#3) and that no every emotion is a real emotion (#4), I now want to present another perspective for thinking about emotions- one that will assist in experiencing more emotional mastery.

The perspective is to view any given emotion on a continuum.  If you think about your emotions in terms of a continuum, you can get a fuller and richer view of your emotions.  If you position any given emotion (the basic emotions) on a continuum, you thereby make it possible to begin to identify the other emotions that cluster around that one.  This will enable you to see the relationship between similar emotions and that will lead you to see how one emotion can shade or evolve into another emotion.

As an example, think about anger and the emotions similar to anger, the emotions that cluster around anger.  I first discovered the value of thinking about emotions in terms of a continuum many years ago when I took a contract with the Department of Corrections in the State of Colorado.  My job was to work with men who were leaving one of the Federal Penitentiaries in the state and to enable them to develop some anger control.  A year or two later I took another contract on the same subject, but the second group was composed of a bunch of boys, ages from 14 to 18, who were in a lock-up-situation for being convicted of a violent crime.

Displeasure Scale

• Violence
• Out-raged
• Rage
• Wrath
• Fury
• Ire
• Anger
• Indignation
• Offended
• Stress
• Frustration
• Agitated
• Upset
• Vexed
• Irked
• Dislike
• Annoyed
• Bothered
• Peeved

What I stumbled onto in engaging the two groups for anger control was to ask the men and the boys about the emotions they experienced before and after they experienced “anger.”

• Before you get angry, what are you feeling?
• What would you call that feeling or emotion?
• When anger stops being anger, what is it?  What do you then call it?

That led to a whole list of anger words: rage, wrath, fury, ire, indignation, offended, stress, frustration, agitated, upset, vexed, irked, dislike, annoyed, bothered, peeved, etc.   Then, working with the men and boys about this list of words, I put them into a scale- an Anger Scale or as I later labeled it: A Displeasure Scale.  I did that because displeasure is the message of anger- displeasure with something that’s not going the way we want it to go.

There are many words for describing kinds and intensities of displeasure:

Anger: “Anger” is the general term for the emotional reaction of displeasure, typically strong displeasure.  Anger refers to a sense of threat to your person and values.  You can experience rational and irrational anger, in-controlled anger or out-of-controlled anger, useful verses unuseful anger; current and appropriate anger and old dated angers. Anger does not refer to any outward expressions, only to the feeling of threat and desire to aggress.

Prior to the emotion of anger, we experience the levels and intensities of displeasure as:

• Upset: a state a disorder, confusion, disturbed, decomposed, a disorder that may range from minor to major.
• Annoy: feeling disturbed or irritated, something wearing on the nerves.
• Vex: more provocation than just annoyed, feeling perplexity and anxiety.
• Irk: having difficultly in enduring & resulting weariness or impatience of spirit.
• Bothered: feeling bewildered, upset, interference with peace of mind.
• Peeved: irritation, mild mood shift to resentful, holding a grudge.
• Peevish: querulous in temperament, fretful, contrary, marked by ill temper

When anger grows in intensity, then we have:

• Ire: great intensity and exhibition in words and deeds.
• Fury: even more violence and connotes a degree of temporary madness.
• Indignation: righteous anger at a commonly agreed upon unfairness, injustice, or meanness.
• Wrath: either rage or indignation and suggests a strong desire to avenge or punish.
• Rage: anger, sometimes including violent actions.

The Displeasure Scale – of Anger

When it comes to the emotions of displeasure, there is a wide range of descriptive terms we can use to sort and separate levels, intensities, and kinds of displeasure.  By developing the ability to distinguish these kinds of negative anger emotions saves the emotional energy of true anger for those events and situations that truly violate our values and call for a strong emotional response.

There’s a verse in the Bible that says, “Be angry and sin not . . .” (Eph. 4:26).  Here is some ancient wisdom about properly owning, using, and registering anger in a way that does not use it to violate another person or even yourself.   The verse also says, “Neither let the sun go down on your anger . . .”  That describes the need for releasing anger so that it is not stored up and turned into “cold” anger (e.g., malice, ill-will, resentment, bitterness).

Construct an Emotional Constellation for Emotional Awareness

This works with lots of other emotions.  Because emotions occur along a range and have varying degrees of intensity, we can gauge an emotion’s intensity on a scale and distinguish emotions at different levels of significance.

• What is the range of the emotion and on what scale?
• When is the emotion more intense, less intense?
• What is it?  What do you call it?

These questions and distinctions allow us to create emotional scales and distinguish emotions at different degrees.  This means that there are typically a constellation of emotions around an area of emotionality.  And as we did this with the Dislike Scale, we can do it with other emotions.

How?

1. Choose an emotion.
2. Make a list of similar emotions, words that indicate a closely related emotion.
3. Invent a continuum to put the emotions on.
4. Put the various emotions along the range of emotions from least to most intense.

Here are some more examples:

Here are some more examples:

Fear

• Terror
• Panic
• Paranoia
• Fear
• Worry
• Apprehension
• Stress
• Upset
• Out of sorts
• Avoidance

Sadness

• Depression
• Bitter, victim
• Emptiness
• Grief-stricken
• Grief
• Sadness
• Loss, miserable
• Hurt

Joy

• Ecstasy
• Happiness
• Delight
• Mirthful
• Joy
• Playful
• Pleasant
• Content

Guilt / Wrongness

• Overly conscientious
• Guiltiness
• Self-betrayal
• Pained Conscience
• Guilt
• Shame
• Embarrassment
• Remorse
• Disappointed
• Feeling bad

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D.

Emotional Mastery Series #4

Masquerading around our lives are pseudo-emotions. Seducing us to call them “emotions,” to think of them as real emotions, and to respond to them as if they were actually “emotions,” these masquerading false-emotions plague our lives and those of our loved ones. And what makes them so tricky and so difficult to catch is that you and I can create them in a moment, in a nanosecond.

Now it is true that with most of these pseudo-emotions, there is an actual emotion lurking somewhere within. Yet that’s the problem, while there is a real emotion present, it is covered-up and ignored, and the pseudo-emotion is given prominence. Now we have two problems. First, we don’t know or are unaware of the real emotion and we are over-invested and confused by the presence of the pseudo-emotion, mistakenly thinking that it is the actual emotion.

Now to create one of these pseudo-emotions in a mere moment of time, all you have to do is to start a sentence with the words, “I feel . . .” Then to complete the deception, just add a judgment.

• “I feel put off by her.”
• “I feel offended by his foul mouth.”
• “I feel low self-esteem.”
• “I feel mediocre.”
• “I feel defeated by all this talk of what we cannot do.”
• “I feel stupid when he takes-over in the meeting when I am talking.”
• “I feel that you don’t listen to me.”

And the list goes on and on and on. I feel defeated, like a failure, ugly, beautiful, stupid, like a winner, triumphant, inadequate, dominated, cheated, silly, like a kid, etc. Yes these are pseudo-emotions and, as pseudo-emotions, they deceive you into thinking you are experiencing or working with an actual emotion when you are not. In this format, you have made a judgment or evaluation and framed it with the words “I feel . . .” but you have not identified an emotion or a feeling. You have only shared a judgment.

Now there probably is a real “emotion” down underneath the judgment. When you say something like: “I feel judged.” “I feel mediocre.” “I feel put down.” my guess is that you are feeling the emotion of frustration or anger. Or it could be fear or stress. There will be some negative emotion that reflects something about your world that isn’t working well. But instead of identifying the emotion and getting in touch with the feeling, you have judged the experience and then deceived yourself thinking that it is an emotion when it is not.

In a video-tape that we made of expert coaching, Graham Richardson, coaching in Sydney at the ACMC training in 2011, he commented “So now you’re getting real.” And then he asked, “How does that feel?” His client said, “Real.”

Graham immediately recognized that was a pseudo-emotion and so commented: “Yeah. But how does it feel?” His client then said, “Pretty good.” So Graham explored, “And how does that feel? I need a feeling.” The client then said, “I feel very centered.”

At those words, Graham confronted him directly, “That’s not a feeling.” Real- Pretty good- Centered – three attempts at identifying a real emotion and still the client had expressed no actual emotion! That elicited a long ten second pause … At which time, the client said, “It’s the feeling in my chest…. (holding hand on chest).” To that Graham said, “Yes! What is that feeling?”

Another pause, this time for three seconds, “… It’s the feeling of being unstoppable if I choose to.” Another pseudo-emotion. Graham commented; “Yeah, not a feeling.” … and then asked, “Are you connected to your feelings?” At which point the client acknowledge, “I push them down.”

Consider that coaching interchange: the client used four words in a row, quickly, at first and then more and more slowly as he tried to identify his emotions, but in the final analysis, he was not able to identify his actual emotions, just his judgments: real- pretty good- centered -unstoppable. For some people, maybe for the majority, identifying, detecting, and being aware of what we actually feel is a tremendous challenge.

So many, many years before “Emotional Intelligence” was popular, NLP dealt with this as we talked about emotional states. What state are you in? Basic NLP introduced the idea of intelligently handling our emotions by talking about eliciting states, detecting states, anchoring states, shifting states, working with our states, and transforming our states. And this became even more developed with the discovery of the Meta-States Model because to understand a meta-state, you have to understand states.

When is an emotion not a real emotion? When we present abstract ideas and evaluations about ourselves and our world and do so using the linguistic template, “I feel  …” Don’t be fooled, just because someone starts a sentence with, “I feel…” does not mean that they are talking about their emotions. Keep asking, check to see where they feel that in their body. If they cannot point to where they feel that in their body, it is probably not a real emotion.

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D.

Emotional Mastery Series #3

In the past two articles, I have identified five of the seven truths about emotions, and with this one the last two truths.  As a kinesthetic sensation enriched by meaning (cognitively) an emotion exercises influence on us to get us to move (motion) out (ex) from where we are.   As a difference between map-and-territory, these mind-body systemic experiences create energy, motivation, and vitality within us.  They are therefore important, but not as ultimate truth, but as relative truth indicating what meanings our bodies are attempting to actualize.  As somatic registering of our meanings- they indicate the meanings that we are feeling.

5) Emotions are always right – relatively and conditionally to the map-territory situation.

Here is the paradox, while fully fallible (definition- “liable to error”) emotions are always right.  How is that?  They are right to the maps out of which they come and they are right in the context and situation that they are reflecting.  That’s why we should pay attention to them without falling into the falsehood of “obeying” them.  They do provide information, although that information may be erroneous.  And what this means is fabulous for human beings.

What this means is that there are no “bad” emotions.  Write that down. There are no bad emotions. The judgment of “bad” doesn’t apply to this mind-body function, an emotion is just an emotion.  It arises as a symptom of how you are thinking in relation to your expectations and skills.  They are not indicators of external reality.  Instead they indicate the relationship between our map and our experience of the territory.  In this, they are completely fallible and not an infallible voice or authority.  Our emotions can be very wrong and erroneous to the outside world, a reflection of distorted thinking and fallacious reasoning.

6) Emotions can be responded to in a variety of ways.

When it comes to emotions, you and I can respond to them in a wide range of ways.   We can listen to them, suppress them, ignore their message, obey them, release them, take them into consideration, etc.  Once we feel an emotion we can be chose how we will respond, listen to them, ignore them, or deal with them later.  So, how do you want to respond when you feel any given emotion?

The range of your choices and your flexibility of response describes your repertoire of skills in responding to your emotions.  So as you develop more and more ways of responding to your emotions, you’ll have a sense of more choice and more control in your life.  And as you do this, be sure to quality control your emotions.

What does it mean to quality control? It means to check to see that the emotion itself, how you are experiencing it, how you are creating it, what it is registering, and so on is useful for you, helpful, empowering, and enhancing.  After all, if emotions are fallible, functions of thinking, meaning-making, and experiencing the territory, then emotions need to be quality controlled for ecology and realism.

So, just because we feel something doesn’t demand that you act on it. Emotions can be distorted and even perverted.  What you feel may not be real.  You may be feeling an “old” emotion, a dated emotion, an imaginary emotion, and so on.  So check it out before you just react!  By quality controlling your emotions, you will discover that you have many more ways of responding to an emotion and that ultimately, you have that choice.

7) Emotions always habituate and become unconscious moods and attitudes.

When an emotion habituates, we live in it and lose awareness of it as an emotion.  Then the emotion becomes something else, it becomes a mood.  It becomes an attitude.  It becomes a generalized mind-set or disposition and when this happens it doesn’t so much feel like an emotion.  As it is repeated and habitualized, it feels so familiar and so comfortable, that you will experience it as “the way things are,” “what’s real,” and “life as you know it.”

Summary

Here then in summary are the 7 truths we speak about emotions in Neuro-Semantics.  These are not the only “truths” but central to being able to create and experience a healthy emotional intelligence and emotional mastery.

1. Emotions measure the map / territory difference; they are felt meanings.
2. Emotions are important as information signals.
3. Emotions are functions of the body as well as the mind.
4. Emotions are just emotions, not commands from heaven or our destiny.
5. Emotions are always right – relatively and conditionally to the map-territory situation.
6. Emotions can be responded to in a variety of ways.
7. Emotions always habituate and become unconscious moods and attitudes.

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D.