What We Do And How We Do It ..
[The Abbreviated Text]
We approach our work in a very particular way … from what we call the “Excitatory Bias” or a positive point of view based on “What’s Working” and oriented towards possibility.
The essence of this approach might best be summed up in the phrase used by my original mentor as I was developing the essential models we use today …
Going to where the problem is NOT.
This essential idea became the basis for what became known as the MythoSelf ® Model which is the basis for the primary approach and method we use in our work today.
It’s All About Mastery …
The MythoSelf ® Model follows a particular pattern of working with clients … a series of steps that form an extremely flexible framework that we apply in a variety of settings that are described in our Essential Services.
We begin by focusing on helping our clients develop profound awareness … self-awareness, situational awareness and social awareness … in some traditions this is referred to as becoming awake, or awakening.
Once we can remain aware and awake in an ongoing and highly focused way we can begin layering in additional skills that contribute to our mastery. Some of these skills that we put our attention on are sensory acuity, state management, strategic thinking, behavioral flexibility and communication performance.
We developed a “Road Map” outlining what we think of as the “Steps to Excellence” based on the fundamental approach we use, the MythoSelf® Process:
[NOTE: What’s on the rest of this page was written and posted for those of you who want to go really deep, or are among the few who share my “geeky” passion for how transformatonal change and breakthrough performance really works from the inside out … if this is you … ENJOY!]
A Metacognitive Approach:
Metacognition is “cognition about cognition”, “thinking about thinking”, or “knowing about knowing”. It comes from the root word “meta”, meaning beyond. It can take many forms; it includes knowledge about when and how to use particular strategies for learning or for problem solving. There are generally two components of metacognition: knowledge about cognition, and regulation of cognition.
[From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metacognition]
The work we do is essentially metacognitively oriented and rooted in the neuroscience of cognition. We base much of what we do in how we develop and mature neurocognitively, and how we can enhance our developmental level. The outcome of this work is to achieve personal mastery, leading to masterful performance and the creation of exquisite outcomes.
Rather than approaching the work we do based on trying to alter, update or change the contents of our thinking the process we use shifts the fundamental way we think and how we think about the contents of our thinking … as well as the relationships between what we’re thinking about and the context to which we are applying our thinking. This is the essence of metacognition … “thinking about thinking.”
Metacognition is important if your outcome is mastery, because it allows you to update how you experience the world and your response to what happens in it. By putting your attention on how you are experiencing what you experience you can begin to modify what’s possible for you. Using a developmental model we have designed ways to move our clients to higher levels of mastery in how they think and respond, raising the overall level of their performance.
As we see it the ability to awaken and achieve personal mastery is dependent upon our level of metacognitive development.
Here’s an infographic of the brain we designed illustrating multiple levels of metacognitive development:
Our use of embodied cognition, or body-based cognition, most distinguishes our unique approach from many of the other approaches to transformational change and, developmental coaching and consulting. We presume that all perception, decision-making and behavior is essentially body-based. Our methodology provides direct access to body-based cognition and ways to alter how we process our experiences to create new options and resources leading to new outcomes.
We built the work we do on a strong foundation of neuro-cognitive science with deep roots in applied linguistics coming out of the neurolinguistic tradition. This is about how symbolic language, i.e.: words and abstractions as semantic representations, modifies our perceptions and stores our memories. Our memories are then subject to modification and change upon recall once again, despite our tendency to accept them as “real” representations of what happened as objective truth.
This approach is sometimes known as constructivist, meaning that it assumes we construct our experiences subjectively rather experiencing them purely objectively. Our work also assumes a relativistic orientation, where the situational context and relationship modifies the perceptions of our experiences and the meaning we apply to them. The more effectively we manage the processes of perception, sense-making, decision-making and action taking the more effectively we are able to create the outcomes we intend.
The relationship between aligning our intentions and the outcomes we produces is one we we measure how masterfully we are performing. Ultimately our approach and methodology is about creating mastery in our performances, or a near-perfect alignment between our intentions and the outcomes we produce.
The Satisfaction Cycle®
A way to ease into the underlying structure of what we do and why it is so effective is to look at one of the primary applications of the MythoSelf® Process that we designed, the Satisfaction Cycle® model.
The Satisfaction Cycle® model was originally designed for a specific client who wanted us to create a highly effective approach to high-ticket, intangible sales for them. Using a generative exemplar-modeling approach we designed the Satisfaction Cycle® model using cutting-edge neuroscience and linguistics research on persuasion and influence, based on our research with sales professionals who were at the very top of the field in high-ticket sales.
Once we had the basic structure of the Satisfaction Cycle® in place we realized we had designed a generalized model for effective communication and influence in any kind of professional situation. This model has now become the basis of how we do much of our coaching and consulting work with clients internationally. We then realized that we could extend the basis of MythoSelf® Process model to a wide range of client applications, and this led us to the creation of of five basic essential services offerings.
Here is a simple graphical illustration of the model and steps that comprise it:
The MythoSelf Process®
From The Book: “Do What You Do Best“
Maybe the simplest way of all to describe the MythoSelf Process is as a model of behavioral communication along the lines indicated above. I sometimes refer to this model as “hypno-behavioral communication” to fully reflect the underlying hypnotic communication protocol it uses. What you’ll probably be most interested in and want to keep your focus on is the functionally of the MythoSelf Process model.
Essentially I designed the MythoSelf Process model to address the relationship between communication and behavior in terms of performance, and more precisely to provide the means for dramatically enhancing and even transforming your performance. When you’ve mastered using this information yourself you can begin to match the performances of elite performers in the many fields of application we’ve studied and worked with over the years.
To reset your thinking about the MythoSelf Process as a model of behavioral communication there are two or three specific aspects of communication that you need to be aware of to make sense of it as intended:
- First, there is communication as input or becoming aware of what’s happening outside of yourself and attending to the information or data in the system that is available to you
- Second, there is communication as output from you that you send into the environment that influences what happens externally and creates a response
- Third, there is communication as the internal instructions that organize and direct the system that you are, i.e.: your body-mind system, and creates the experience you have of your life
These three aspects of behavioral communication as outlined above inform the entire construct of the MythoSelf Process model. The fundamental intention of the model is aimed at gaining mastery of these three aspects of behavioral communication, i.e.: input, output and internal organization/direction. When you have mastered these three aspects of communication you gain the remarkable facility to “Have the Experience of Your Life” as I like to say. While that alone would be enough to validate wanting to invest in developing this mastery, beyond that you’ll also be accessing an extraordinary level of personal and interpersonal performance.
Soma-Semantics®
The methodology that we use in applying the MythoSelf® Process model is called Soma-Semantic Modeling™, or more simply Soma-Semantics®.
Here’s a description of Soma-Semantics® from a MythoSelf® Process training manual: