ABTI | Joseph Riggio International

Ontological Integrity

The restoration of ontological integrity. 

“The conflict about who I was, what I know to be true innately and intimately, and what I was taught to believe is the truth about the world, fractured my sense of self … i.e.: my ontological integrity. Instead of remaining secure both in who I was and how to aim myself into my future, I had conflict.”

 

Today I would argue that the ontological crack is really a separation between accepting direct sensory experience, and how someone has been taught (by choice or coercion). In the process of being taught they learned to think about what they experience other than as they themselves experience it directly.

We are taught to turn sensation into ideation … lived experience into abstractions and the representations we substitute for it.

We learn to “process” our experiences to project meaning onto them, not to have our experiences directly and perceive meaning based on what we experience as it emerges and unfolds before us.

In not knowing how to have the experience of our life in favor of “processing” our experience, we do not just lose touch with the direct sensation of what is happening as we experience it … we lose ourselves as well.

Mistaking ontological longing for existential longing, i.e.: mixing up your desire to know yourself as you are, with the desire to find meaning and purpose in your life, especially in your work, is common when your ontological integrity has been compromised.

Doing what you are doing and accepting it for what it is, and no more than that … i.e.: farming makes you a farmer because you are farming, not because G-d destined you to have a farmer’s soul … provides existential peace.

Today we are taught in every way that we must find our purpose to experience existential relief, substituting what we do for who we are, as the basis of our being. Depending on how you look at it this is either insanity … or what must be a leading cause of it.

A way of talking about being at and operating from your center is, “Bringing the system to rest.” Being “at rest” refers to the entirety of your experience in the world … internally, your body-mind experience, and in relation to the system that you are a part of that simultaneously contains you externally. When you are “at rest,” you are settled and at ease, without conflict, internally and externally … simply resting in a “Ready State.”

In the Ready State you can easily take action … or not … there is no hesitation or urgency to act, both are equal and remain fully available based on circumstance and choice.

The beginning point is somatic integration, becoming aware of what you are experiencing as you are experiencing it, i.e.: awareness that is sensory-based and embodied. This sounds remarkably obvious and simple, and it is once you have learned how to do it. Yet without access to the Ready State being aware of what you are experiencing, as it happens, is somewhere between unlikely and impossible.

At first I bought the theory that experiencing extreme stress as you make “progress” in your life is normal, and I thought I was sane, or at least as sane as anyone else I knew. Then I began waking up and realized I was truly living an insane life within an insane social model. When I sought relief, I found that all the ordinary physical and/or psychological medical references controlled by the insane society I was living in had to offer me were ways to modulate and cope with the “symptoms” of stress I was experiencing.

Like this, I was lost and had no easy or clear way back to sanity on my own. I was caught in the web, but I knew enough to recognize that struggling against it would only ensnare me further. While I did not have a path to freedom yet, I decided that I had to begin to make my moves within the structure of the system without attracting to much undue attention from it. From where I stood it appeared to me that “the only way out was through” … so I dove in, going deeper, becoming fully present to the insanity I was living.

 

(Excerpts taken from: “Experiencing The Hero’s Journey”   by Joseph Riggio, edited 13 April 2019)

Seeing Wholeness

The Key To Transformational Embodiment 

About 30 years ago I began searching for the universal ”skeleton key” to transformational change.

By the mid-1990s I had come to the conclusion that the ”key” to transformational change was part of what I began calling the somatic ground of being … embodiment … the foundation of ontological experience and awareness. This led to an approach using somatic interventions to instigate ontological transformation.

I remember sitting in the “Hypnotorium” with Roye at the front doing something with someone, a piece of profound transformational hypnosis.

This is very different from what many think of as hypnosis, i.e.: “You are getting sleepy … your eyes are getting heavy, tired, and they want to close … just let them close, NOW … going deeper into a deep, deep sense of relaxation … let yourself float down, even deeper, still …” and then some suggestions about stopping smoking or losing weight, or some other habit interruption and reframing.

It’s also obviously very different from stage hypnosis, (same script followed by), ”Now you will follow my suggestions … when I snap my fingers you will open your eyes, and when I mention the word “hypnosis” you will cluck like a chicken …” No, not anything like that at all.

Transformational hypnosis was … is … the art of shifting the ontological awareness you operate from about reality, what is real and how it is organized, and most importantly your place in relation to it.

Within the art of transformational hypnosis there is an intention not to change symptoms or behavior at the surface, but the structure of your perception at a deep and essential level, all the way down to the core of your sense of identity.

Now the way I was learning about how Roye worked was presented in what he referred to as “wholeform” … never truly broken down into steps to follow, but instead presented as a complete piece of work.

Someone would come in and present a life issue they were facing and within … a significant choice in a relationship maybe, or the need and desire to make a major change in their profession or lifestyle, it might be they were dealing with a major loss and were struggling with processing it fully, and as often it would have been someone who was simply stuck and yearning for a breakthrough to an imagined future that infuriatingly continued to elude them.

Roye would refer to whatever it was that the person presented as the ”presenting problem” and point out that it was simply the lens to a solution. The trick of course was to be able to elicit and discern the solution that had been obfuscated by the presenting problem and remained unavailable to the one presenting it.

So I would come, a couple or a few times a month, or even weekly, to sit in the Hypnotorium with Roye to learn the secrets of the deep art of transformational hypnosis. I have to admit that for months the entirety of it eluded me and all I could gather from what he was doing at the front of the room was bits and pieces of technique.

Maybe I would pick up a way of leading someone into an altered state with some bit of language. Or, I’d notice that Roye would alter his posture to be more like the person he was working with, and yet with all these bits and pieces I was gathering my skill remained mostly limited to working at best at the surface of things.

Then it happened …

I think maybe I was tired, or frustrated, but I’d given up trying to “get it” and I just sat there as Roye was doing a piece of work with someone and I saw the whole thing!

This wasn’t the process he was using, or what he was doing, it was what he was noticing about the person in front of him. They are the whole thing!

This is where the magic happens. I got that absolutely in that instant, as fleeting as it was and as difficult to recapture. By trying to “get it” … looking and listening for what it was, I remained unable to get the “whole thing” … the entirety of what happens moment to moment as you are with someone.

The “whole thing” is the entirety of how someone is organized in any given moment AND how they change moment to moment in an endlessly choreographed dance of dynamic movement.

This way of seeing became the essence of the work I do and teach in MythoSelf Process and Soma-Semantics models.

I proposed we have a fundamental, ontological state of being that is innate to us, because of the deep integration between the somatic and semantic structure of wholeform experience that treats the body-mind as an integrated singularity. This state of being always emerges in wholeform as a singularity all at once.

The wholeform ontological structure contains the entirety of the way we are within our bodies, how we use them, move within them and move through them, and the language forms that arise to inform us and others via the descriptions of the subjective experience we are having as we do.

One of the primary teaching distinctions of the MythoSelf Process and Soma-Semantics is the art of Seeing Wholeness.

Yet Seeing Wholeness remains elusive, as it did for me for months of my early training with Roye, only becoming apparent in that first instance as a wholeform experience of undifferentiated wholeness that was the true essence of the person I saw for the first time that day.

 

Seeing The Wholeform Of Wholeness:

To see wholeness you cannot be looking for the pieces or the parts, as wholeness only exists in the wholeform.

This is what makes it so hard for folks to learn … the letting go of trying to see what they cannot yet discern for themselves.

For most people to learn to see wholeness you must allow yourself to see it through the eyes of someone who can already see it, and see what they are seeing, not what you are looking for yourself.

This of course is a kind of trick you must learn for yourself, i.e.: to see through the eyes of another.

What you’re noticing for is the entirety of whatever you are present to, not the parts of the entirety. Of course the entirety includes you, since you are present as well.

Wholeness always includes whatever happens between you and what you are noticing, and it is there that the magic of the wholeform experience becomes most present … in the space between.

To put this another way, I always feel the wholeform experience before I can see it, but once I can feel it I can’t help but to see it as well.

What we call adumbration in the MythoSelf Process and Soma-Semantics training forms the basis for seeing wholeness … the ability to foresee what is emerging as it emerges, or even a microsecond or so before it is apparent in any ordinary sense of being able to see it.

As crazy making as this seems to see wholeness you must allow yourself to feel it coming before it’s there within yourself. Then you must allow yourself to stop looking for anything and just notice for everything, because when you are tracking for wholeness everything changes all at once.

When you are noticing for wholeness you do not only notice that someone has moved an arm or a leg, or that they smiled or frowned, or that their voice changed in someway such as increasing or decreasing in volume or pitch. You notice for the way they are now entirely different AND they moved an arm or a leg, or that they smiled or frowned, or that their voice changed in someway such as increasing or decreasing in volume or pitch.

By getting caught by the arm or a leg moving, or that they smiled or frowned, or that their voice changed in someway such as increasing or decreasing in volume or pitch, you lose the sense of the wholeform, and you lose any ability to see wholeness.

Wholeness flows.

Wholeness doesn’t exist in any moment and it does in every moment. It is the ability to see the grand pattern of change and transformation, and to notice for how that pattern organizes itself in alignment with some future, teleological wholeform possibility.

Using the information that is present by tracking the Soma-Semantic (whole)form you can then assist whomever you are working with to align themselves with that wholeform possibility as the possibility of choice. This then becomes the trajectory along which they propel themselves into their chosen future.

NOTE FOR MYTHOSELF PROCESS FACILITATORS AND TRAINERS:

When you can do this you are doing the MythoSelf Process, and only when you are doing this, doing anything else is something, but not the MythoSelf Process.

Merry Christmas 2018!

Joseph Riggio, Ph.D., Parsippany, NJ
Architect & Designer of the MythoSelf Process,a SomaSemantics and Generative Flow

SENSING TIME

Time lines in an abstract spiral

Just like seeing or hearing TIME is a sense.

I was in a brief exchange with James Tsakalos, an NLP Trainer, colleague and FB friend of mine, about setting time frames in training events.

Fundamentally it was about when we begin and end training days with groups. I mentioned that I almost always begin the first day at 10:00 or 11:00, while I think James likes to start early. typically around 8:00.

My reasoning for this is that for most folks who work they typically begin their day earlier rather than later, say 8:00 – 9:00 versus 10:00 to 11:00, and starting at a different time signals very clearly “THIS is NOT THAT.”

The same can be said for other aspects of timing during the day, e.g.: ending times, or breaks … I usually break for 90 minutes for lunch, not 30 or 60 minutes. Again in part for the distinction that it makes versus many people’s standard routine, as well as because it gives them longer to integrate and incorporate the material we covered in the morning.

Also my lunch is ordinarily set at 1:00 PM/13:00, and it’s interesting how much that can shake people up who are habituated to an earlier time for lunch.

 

 

A Sense of Time

Most folks don’t think of TIME as a sense, but when you begin to you also get that time is a sense just like seeing or hearing, touch, taste or smell.

I also count vestibulation (balance) and proprioception (spatial & movement awareness) as senses. So in my world as a neuro-cognitive scientist there are eight senses I address that we use to discern data about the world we live in, move through, manipulate and experience. FWIW I don’t limit my list to just eight, I only keep these eight in the forefront of my awareness and in the loop when I’m discussing senses and sensation.

First a little background to where I’m going …

Way back when … I started my movement into consulting, coaching and training as a hypnotist and then I studied and became an NLP trainer. NLPers (those folks who are NLP practitioners) break down the five senses into what the call representational modalities, i.e.: visual (seeing), auditory (hearing), kinesthetic (feeling), olfactory (smelling), gustatory (tasting), shortened into the acronym VAK-O/G. Then they are trained to calibrate what representational modality that someone is accessing according to the VAK-O/G.

NLPers track the VAK-O/G representations that someone is using in a number of ways, but the most common are eye accessing (noticing where locationaly relative to the individual moving their eyes they rotate their gaze to, e.g.: upper left, lower right), language predicates, e.g.: “I see” … “It’s crystal clear to me.” … “You sound funny.” … “I’m feeling excited.” …, and in a more subtle and sophiticated approach by where in their body they are breathing from and the rate of their breathing, e.g.: upper chest, rapid breathing is associated with visual accessing verus lower belly, slow breathing with kinesthetic accessing.

Ideally NLPers want to cross calibrate and confirm their assessment of which representational modality a person is accessing by having two or more of these kinds of signals simultaneously happening, e.g.: they look up to their left (a visual access), while they say, “I observed you were moving a lot when I looked across the room.” and they say it quickly for them indicating a more rapid rate of breathing and expression associated with visual accessing.

Now, a bit later on in the development of NLP, let’s call it ten years to make it simple, one of the co-developers, Richard Bandler, began putting a lot of attention on what he called “submodalities” – or, more refined distinctions of the representational modalities. For instance if we use the visual representational modality (sight/seeing), we could speak to the distinctions of location … where is the image, what is the posititonal angle of the image (relative to the individual accessing it), how far away or close is the image … then there would be other things we could notice for as well, e.g.: size, color, brightness …

Okay, so as a NLPer I learned to calibrate and track for representational modality accessing and the finer aspects of sumbmodality distinctions. BUT, as a NLPer I was only introduced to these within the traditional five senses covered by the VAK-O/G list.

 

 

More Than The Traditional Five Senses

As I continued working with people, learning and studying I realized that I had to include both vestibulation (the vestibular process of the sensation of balance) and proprioception too (the awareness of spatial perception, our bodies in space relative to other objects, movement of our own body and other objects relative to one another, and the location and movement of our body relative to ourselves, e.g.: posture, limb articulation, etc. This radically changed how I worked with clients and over time how I perceived and experienced myself, and the world around me.

Then at some point I became aware of TIME as a sense like the traditional five senses, and vestibulation or proprioception. This was a powerful moment of awareness for me. To give some credit where it’s due I had some introduction to time as sense of sorts from other sources as well. NLPers also have an awareness of time, and they have a process they use called the “timeline” that indicated how people experience and position themselves relative to time. The NLP book that addresses the “timeline proccess,” “Timeline Therapry and the Basis of Personality” by Tad James and Wyatt Woodsmall. So I’d already had some influences vis-a-vis my discoveries about time with clients.

Time was a topic that the great American anthropologist E.T. Hall explored in his book, “The Dance of Time” and I’m a great fan and virtual student of his work. His work covered many “silent languages” as he referred to the non-verbal and cultural aspects of communication, perception and awareness in his many books. The more I learned about “silent languages” the more I became intrigued with how we perceive, think, process and act outside of the normally referred to ways that are what I’ll call fully conscious for now. In other words, some of what we do is available to use as a consciously aware experience we’re having or have had, and some of what we do is utterly outside of our conscious awareness and happens silently or invisibly as E.T. Hall might refer to it.

Time for most folks is outside of their conscious awarenss, except as they track it by the clock in modern life. Yet, internally we have incredibly sophisticated ways to track time that are organized primarily around the rising and falling processes of our internal physiology and its chemistry.

 

 

The Finer Distinctions Of Time … And Other Things Too

So as I continued my exploration of time I began to realize that time also has submodality distinctions, i.e.: finer ways of thinking about time than “it passes” or that it is a particular time based on the agreed to conventions of time … “clock time.” One of the things that both NLPers and E.T. Hall point out is that time “moves” differently for differnt people in different contexts and depending on what they are experiencing.

We’ve probably all experienced a time when we were with people we enjoyed being with and the sensation was that time just flew by and our experience with them was over in what seemed an instant. If you’ve ever been in a bureaucratic or institutional loop where you need to get something done, e.g.: renew your driver’s license or get a copy of your birth certificate, you might have experienced time moving much more slowly than the clock indicates, looking up after an hour and realizing it was actually only five minutes. Now if you love someone and you’re waiting to see them again multiple that by 10, and if you’re a five year old waiting for your birthday to arrive or Christmas maybe, multiple that by 100 (then of course when your birthday comes the party only lasts 1.5 seconds)!

But time does more than this … it also organizes our lives syntactically according to the rules of computation, e.g.: this happens before that and after this. Time therefore becomes the tableau upon which we write our lives in part, since we experience our lives syntactically, or happening in a sequence or events that occur according to the movemnt of time. The brilliant theoretical physicist and cosmologist, Stephen Hawking, wrote about time and space in his popular non-fiction book for lay folks (i.e.: those of us who aren’t theoretical physicists or cosmologists), “A Brief History of Time” where he lays out the relationship of time and space syntactically for the entire universe and everything in it as well.

This realization that time and space are singular leads to a secondary realization that the perception of time and space are also singular, meaning that for humans time and proprioception are singular as well. I’d argue that we also experiene balance as a function of time and space, making the actual human perceptual singularity the interwoven realtionality of time, proprioception and vestibulation. This is more than a little relavant with regard to action and outcomes too.

 

 

The Teleological Factor

Now to make things just a little more complex, I need to address the fact that I’m a “teleologist” by inclination. By that I mean that I think in terms of the future pulling us toward it versus the past pushing us forward.

So rather than being an artifact of our history we are artifacts of our futures … i.e.: we experience ourselves in relation to what has happened, just not yet. This is the teleological equation, and is built on the beliefs and expectations we hold about what will happen when we act or not. So we don’t act based on what we’ve experienced, but rather what we expect we will act upon and experience.

So this brings me around to my next point …

TIME IS A CONTEXT.

When I’m training I consider the context as important as the content I’m delivering. And I mean that literally. I organize the context as carefully, and often more carefully, than the content I deliver.

My shifting the relationship people in my training have, by doing something as simple as changing the start time to what might be “normally” expected, say 9:00 AM to 10:00 AM, it shifts the sense of where the participants are from “this” is like any other day, to “THIS” is NOT like any other day, “THIS DAY” is special in someway.

Now they reorganize their expectations to allow for something special to happen, making it that much more likely that something special will happen. There are many reasons that this can happen, but the simplest expectation is that because they are now experiencing themselves in relation to what’s happening as extraordinary compared to their normal day. When someone expects something out of the ordinary they begin to notice for it, even when it was something that was there all along. Even when what they are noticing for might have been missed or taken for granted before.

Also, one shift leads to another, when I shift the time frame that’s typical or normally expected, the relationship to time that someone hold shifts … like when they are on vacation and move through their day differently than when they are at work. So now we can use the presumption that when someone’s relationship with time has shifted and their hold on “normal” time is looser, and I can help them move through time differently.

For example, if there is something they want to attain or achieve that they perceive as far off in the future, when their sense of time is loosened we can shift it to bring it closer (remember my teleological premise of the future pulling us forward towards it … when that future is closer the pull tends to be stronger).

We gain another shift as well. When the pull of the future is stronger, because we’ve slid it closer in time, we also tend to become more adept at noticing for what will allow us to realize what we intend more effectively and efficiently. In some ways we shift the signal to noise ratio of what’s important to notice versus random data in the system that’s unimportant to us in regard to getting out outcome. This also allows us to adust and adapt more rapidly, and therefore we expend less energy and time getting to where we’re going.

So this simple thing of doing something outside of the expected, like starting an hour or so later than people are used to starting their day, becomes a vital contextual advantage to helping them make the shifts they need to so they can both succeed in getting their outcomes and geting them with less effort and time invested.

 

 

TRANSFORMATIONAL THINKING

There’s a big difference between shifting what someone thinks about and how someone thinks. To make big shifts in life it’s important to shift the way you think, NOT just what you think about, or how you think about it (whatever the “it” may be … money, relationships, health, fitness, security …).

The most significant thing that helps shift the way you think is shifting the way you experience the context you how whatever you’re thinking about within. Part of the premise I work from is that all thinking is both embodied and situated, i.e.: it occurs in and is shaped by the context it occurs within.

Now if we shift the context we will shift what is experienced within that context, since everything is experienced within the context it occurs within and is shaped by that context. Taking that a step further we can also presume, whether it’s true or not, that it’s possible that everything we expect to experience within a context is shaped by that context as well. Since we act upon and experience what we expect, how the context affects what we expect it also affects what we act upon and experience.

When you accept these presumptions of how context shapes experience you begin to recognize the the significance of shaping the context … hence the importance of shaping time as contextual frame and using it to help shape the way we think, and not just what we think about …

 

I’ve been describing it…
TIME IS A TOOL FOR TRANSFORMATION.

 

 

Joseph Riggio, Ph.D.
Architect & Designer of the MythoSelf Process and SomaSemantics

P.S. – I’d love to hear what you think too … leave me a comment below …

NOTE: Join the extended conversation in my FB group: GNAU Nation at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/GNAUNATION/

My comments on Social Ontology

[NOTE: Copied from http://blognostra.blogspot.in/2005/08/re-sv-mythoself-tm-my-comments-on.html … reposted here in full. Response on mythoself-tm@yahoogroups.com in response to the Social Ontology blog at www.blognostra.blogspot.com – simultaneously posted in both forums. – JSR]

Robert,

Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more;

I must admit I don’t “get it” … a lot of words and little point. You the “master” of “simplicity” taking so many words to say so little. I appreciate that Najma loved it so it of course may just be me, but with absolute honesty I don’t get it … at least in relation to Social Ontology … or even the ordinary construction of logical connections.

First, as always with you, I accept that this is ultimately a trance-lation from Swedish into Swenglish … (pronounced either ‘swing-lish’ or ‘sweng-lish’ if you prefer, for those who want to know). I also accept that Najma may speak Swenglish better than I, and that may make a difference. Yet, the connection to Social Ontology, even with these exceptions escapes me.

I want to “get it” … I really do … I read and re-read what I perceive to be your rambling statements … some of which I really liked … individually … and still I must make great leaps of faith to make them connect … faith I have in droves … faith in this connections that are at best so tenuous … I don’t lack … I simply refuse to expend.

 

It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
 – William Shakespeare


But, maybe, just maybe there is one ‘saving grace’ … the “bridge is just a bridge” part … maybe there you could have pulled it out of the fire of ill-formedness and illogic … you didn’t but …

Let me get to my more immediate point … (and then one more beyond that if you’ll allow me … of course I’ll be writing it, but only you can choose or not to read it) … (BTW is it helpful for me to segregate my comments aside by placing them aside in brackets … in this case indicated by parenthesis) … (I expect if you choose to reply you may go line by line, or paragraph by paragraph and delineate your response in that way … so I want to set it up so that you might use my structure of presentation to make an adequate analysis and rebuttal … let me know if this works for you.) …

My immediate point is that what you write about in your “Comments on Social Ontology” have little to do with Social Ontology. I do recognize that you are disturbed when I elucidate a point with what you consider to be extravagant language, when you believe I could use simple words that would suffice just as well. In part (have spent considerable time in Denmark) this may be an issue of speaking a language based in Old Norse and using lots of “imports” … like German, English and French words … where words are not presently available in the native tongue. Svenska (Swedish for those of us speaking English) is a language that originated in Northern Germany and was imported into Sweden becoming what is sometimes called Old Norse before continuing its evolution into modern Swedish. Discounting “new” compound words that are actually words created to express an idea by combining two or more simple words – similar to the German tradition of compounding words – the language is “vocabulary poor” compared to a language like English, English being one of the worlds richest languages in terms of vocabulary.

Now being “poor” in terms of vocabulary (or “rich” as the case may be) has it pros and cons (as do most things with alternates, or options attached to them – i.e.: a “this/that” framework or framing structure … the essential basis of choice and the decision-making process that follows from it). [Do you notice the cognitive linking and logical chaining? … Do you perceive it’s enhanced by the choice to use bracketing to segment out distinct tangential but separate ideas? … Do you notice that even though I’ve wandered greatly in my response to you, somehow the ideas seem to flow and remain connected? … Have you been able to track how exactly, with precision and specificity  I manage this “trick” of presentation? … just curious …]

Nothing can come of nothing.
 – William Shakespeare

So back to Swenglish … the pro proposition of a “vocabulary poor”  language is that you must use the limited vocabulary to express even the most complex ideas … and sometimes the words themselves don’t actually exist to do this … SO THE CONCEPT MUST BE MADE BY INFERENCE … i.e.: the listener/reader must generate the meaning from the words expressed for themselves. This is an interesting form that generates a specific cognitive approach. The sender and the receiver in the communication “assume” active participation, that the “message” won’t be contained completely in the content of the “expression” of the message, but in the “interpretation” of the message. This particular cognitive structuring regarding communication creates a kind of “short-hand” in communication and leads to a preference for directness, simplicity and brevity. For an insight into the expression of this cognitive structure look at the design ethos of Scandinavia (hear I reference the swath of land ranging from Norway in the west and Finland in the east, all at a latitude north of Germany for all intents and purposes). The Scandinavian design ethos is also one of simplicity, purity that emphasizes clean lines, little decorative extravagance and very direct (some would not hesitate to say “elegant” – myself included) solutions. What you may find “missing” is the “playfulness” and “joy” found in more “extravagant” design – which lead us to …

The con proposition in a “vocabulary poor” language (Swedish compared to English in this particular case) is that somethings are in fact inferred and not expressed. The speaker/writer “intends” a message BUT it is up to the listener/reader to extract it. It is ultimately imprecise in terms of expressing more abstract considerations. Compare the art of Scandinavia pre-WWII with the art now being generated when a large majority of Scandinavians are learning to speak a second language (most typically German or English) and expanding the range of their vocabulary richness. If you want what I’d consider to be the most obvious representation of the Scandinavian ethos that arises from the cognitive structure I’m pointing to follow the “humor.” In most of Scandinavia humor is based in sarcasm. This is itself based in cynicism and irony which of course would work well within the structures I’ve indicated are most present in the cognitive structure driven by a “vocabulary poor” language. By example I give you the comparison between Existentialist philosophers Kierkegaard and Sartre (French being a much more “vocabulary rich” language in comparison to Swedish). It leads to a particular kind of purity in thought, but with little extravagance … what someone raised in a “vocabulary rich” language and the associated cognitive structure might perceive as morose.

Those of you familiar with  Edmund Sapir and Benjamin Lee Whorf and their propositions regarding the influence of language (specifically the specifically the “native” and “crib” languages of an individual) will understand the significance that the native language of a speaker may have on their cognitive structure and the preferences associated with it (the theory that Sapir and Whorf developed is known as the “Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis” by linguists and cognitive scientists). I am a “believer” in the premise of their propositions regarding the influence of language on the development AND APPLICATION of the cognitive structure of an individual. For those of you who want and/or prefer it more simply … the language you use (as a native speaker) will directly influence the way in which you think. In fact this idea would more accurately along begin to represent what I’m driving at then all of what you’ve written Robert. To say it succinctly and directly I’ll actually put it to Edmund Sapir in his own words:

“Human beings do not live in the objective world alone, nor alone in the world of social activity as ordinarily understood, but are very much at the mercy of the particular language which has become the medium of expression for their society. It is quite an illusion to imagine that one adjusts to reality essentially without the use of language and that language is merely an incidental means of solving specific problems of communication or reflection. The fact of the matter is that the ‘real world’ is to a large extent unconsciously built upon the language habits of the group. No two languages are ever sufficiently similar to be considered as representing the same social reality. The worlds in which different societies live are distinct worlds, not merely the same world with different labels attached… We see and hear and otherwise experience very largely as we do because the language habits of our community predispose certain choices of interpretation.” (Sapir, 1958 [1929], p. 69)

This is the whole point of what I’m driving at … it’s called Social Ontology … and the creation of a social reality, while what you write about is almost virtually all about a subjective reality (vs. the the inter-subjective position I write about). You are an individualist while I myself more and more find myself becoming a collectivist with a strong individualist consideration. Your entire post is about how an “individual” perceives the world apart from others and then acts upon this perception for all intent and purpose ignoring the impact and influence they have both upon and most importantly from others. That in fact a bridge is only a bridge because we say so … other wise it’s just a structure spanning some gap made of something. When does a fallen tree become a “bridge” or is the answer never? This is my point is unpacking the structure of the structure of how we get to thinking what we think. The fact that the Universe may be infinite is only significant in relation to something else … attached to the cognitive consideration of how space and our relationship with impacts and interacts with our decision-making process for arguments sake. Yet you present this a a poetic “Truth” … when what I am striving for and emphasizing in my work around Social Reality is the presentation of the distinctions between “Truth” (upper-case “T” to indicate some ultimate, inviolate, metaphysical Truth) vs. “truth” (lower-case “t” to indicate something believed to be so by an individual or group based on some empirical evidence they agree to share). The same applies to the distinctions I’m making regarding “Reality” and “reality.”

So while I don’t object to your writing I object to you referring to it as “Comments on Social Reality” and by inference associating that back to what I’ve written about … and the inclusive inferences in what you’ve written about that writing.

The ultimate expression of what I’d like to see is that you express what you are expressing in a way that is intelligible to those who are reading it with regard to the subject you suggest it is in reference to, in this case Social Ontology. And to use your own criteria of “simplicity” as the measure of worth and validity to do so with the extensive suggestion of inference. Do so directly. Say what you mean and want others to “get” from what you are offering. Do this if only within the overall structure of what you say otherwise. BUT … DAMN IT … DO IT!!!

I understand as well as any “staking out a position” … and I understand as well as any staking out that position by standing on the shoulders of giants who’ve come before. I’ve stated well and full that my work, the entire body of my work rests on the enormous foundation of the work I learned with Roye Fraser and most especially his work called the Generative Imprint™ and the Function Mode™ models. Stating anything less would be at the least crude/rude and at the most plagiarism (the most deadly of sins amongst academics and scholars …). However, it is also essential to note that my work resides on a foundation supported and enhanced by the work of Grinder and Bandler called Neurolinguistic Programming or NLP – and my position in regard to these developers is one of ultimate respect, even when I am in disagreement with them. Their work “allows” for my work to exist in the way that it does. Could I have reproduced this work independently … possibly … would I have, unlikely. So to dismantle this work without regard for how it finds its way so deeply into my own is not just disrespectful but duplicitous and deceitful in the extreme … as would be the disregard, dis-acknowledgement or dismantling of the work of so, so many others … including but in no way limited to Joseph Campbell, Sigmund Freud, Edward Hall, Clare Graves, Konrad Lorenz, John Searle … and on and on and on …

Nothing is so common-place as to wish to be remarkable.
 – William Shakespeare

So let’s move on, shall we … towards an end to this particular rebuttal and reframe. The comments you make have little to nothing to do with Social Ontology and in fact are more poetry than exposition (when the perfect word is available it would be sacrilegious not to glory in its use …don’t you think). The comments you make if they are explanatory or pragmatic in any way are more about the nature of individual perception and expression, or as Bandler and Grinder exposed us to about thirty years ago – subjective experience. This is so much more the domain of phenomenology (as I have clearly expressed on my blog at: http://blognostra.blogspot.com in the earlier postings positioning my take on Social Ontology) then on anything resembling the inquiry I am making into inter-subjective experience (under the rubric, Social Ontology). Further I am taking a particular tack as I move on towards the inclusion and impact of language and specifically communication in the structure and form of Social Ontology as it relates to the construction of social reality.

What I am intending to unpack and make explicit (I personally much prefer the languaging of David Bohm here, “unfolding”) is the nature of the impact and influence of the social constructs of reality on the individual – who often perceive themselves as having their “own” experience when I propose they are most clearly not.

What I am proposing is that the individual, regardless of whom they may be, is having a social experience – even when they are alone. That all of the experience of the “individual” is in fact a social experience and it is perceived individually. So to unfold that point further … the individual has a social experience through an individual perception, or an inter-subjective experience that is perceived subjectively. This is a defining point in my argument (argument as in philosophical argument or proposition put forth in discourse).

The significance I am further bringing to this argument is one of application, that the inter-subjective experience of the individual is the basis of the reality they experience act upon (as well as from). That the inter-subjective experience is the basis of all action and behavior and that this action and behavior is premised in the inter-subjective frame that they reside within. Then further that this frame is constructed in part, albeit in large part, by the structuring of the shared communication of those who participate in it; and in some unique and specific cases most especially by their shared agreements.

[Now a quick aside – how are your comments in any way related to that discussion and argument? … Back to our main program …]

These agreements are largely, if not wholly (Don’cha ya’ just love that ambiguity?) contained in language. This gives rise to the latest direction I’ve taken which is to point towards the impact and influence others who “get” this level of Social Ontology and the structuring of social reality can have on those who don’t “get” that this is the basis of their reality and decision-making process. This is called alternately propaganda, persuasion and influence to name the most prevalent forms of the application. When it’s applied in a mass communication medium it can and does shift the basis of culture and the collective decision-making process engaged in by the individuals who populate that culture (and/or society). This is the realm of Politics (upper-case “P” vs. lower-case “p” which would alternatively apply to the interactions among individuals at a level below that of the “society-at-large” or in the modern sense “Government”).

So my intention is to “set my people free” … what’s yours???

Not wine … men intoxicate themselves; Not vice … men entice themselves.
 – William Shakespeare

Best regards … until we meat again,

Joseph Riggio

Architect and Designer of the MythoSelf™ Process
http://www.mythoself.com

“Kick ass, take names” – Matt Furey (http://www.mattfurey.com)

On 12/8/05 05:43, “Robert” <robert@svensknlp.nu> wrote:

 

Reality, ongoing and working with and without constructing or not within any boundary.
It’s just made up, right in your mind anyway, right?

I was reminded about Milton Erickson in his ways he pursued I guess so many altered states and tested along his journey ways to shift between.
What he found or what he did with that skill and knowledge isn’t for me to say since I never met him.

There are some nice passages in the books about him some about reality and what it is and how to expand on that.

I was reminded earlier this week, that people are often very judgemental about new things, either it be a particular methodology or a particular view or whatever they judge it’s never about exploring new avenues.

The beach is filled with sand, each sand particle is in itself made up by even smaller stuff and in that smaller stuff there is even smaller stuff and then “again” you know and you guessed even smaller stuff!
If I didn’t know better, I bet it would end up empty?

And you guessed right, it does!

It becomes so empty in fact it’s so large it is called space. In relation to that space the sand particle seems large even as a universe some say. Which btw is infinite, that’s how large and small the universe is, it is contained in one single word, infinite, and that if you ask me is pretty neat.
Instead of using complex math describing the universe, we simply accept it is, infinite.

Then some people tries to describe the universe, and many get mad doing so since the universe is so big, remember I did say “infinite” and those scientist cant contain the whole universe in their heads at all. It gets to big, since the brain isn’t infinite but the imagination absolutely is.

Reality is such subtle thing, I worked with realties my whole life, my own and others, its many ways to slice an apple, the description started with NLP gave humanity a way to cut down the apples and oranges to a more down to earth examples where the descriptions could be better describing the reality ongoing and in NLP they named it “a model”.
They found out, its turtles all the way down, and then again another turtle all the way down, an infinite way to say, how big is the universe really?

Infinite of course!

If there is one thing that is clear, sound and felt as it is the one thing, maybe it isn’t and then again maybe it is not that, maybe I should look elsewhere?
Epistemology, the study of how we map cognitively the minds processes and adjusted with the NLP applications by mapping that with the NLP models have brought us truly Jedi Mind powers where we can sway and opinion with just a gesture and a smile and a word…as easy anchored and fired away.

Then a few Jedi’s said, this isn’t the way, we want power, and more of it.
They are known as powerful wizards and never explain what they do and wink and say, come here and become one of power since it is all unconscious ruled and controlled.
They even use waste powers as hypnosis in ways people never before have seen.

Then there was this voice in the crowd, what about just explaining what is going on, take away all the mystery and just plainly explain what it is?
The first night an attempt on his life was made. That power he wielded shined so brightly and was feared by the power wielders as the mightiest power of all and they all missed it.

Truth is what it is, reality for some and a misconception for others, but again, into the unknown we cast our self, and I just never really got it, how can it be unknown if we know it is unknown?
It is as so many argue it is in relation to what is known, the boundary, a string of ideas where your mind just knows this is this, and nothing else it can be, unless you learn NLP or such systems to create a diversion so your mind can hide contemplating that a bridge is a bridge and then it isn’t a bridge but stones and then even other materials in that and then…even more.

Then a few wise men said, just accept it, it is a bridge, then move on to the other side.

The other side?

Yea, while your thinking about the bridge and its reality, this side is crashing down into the sea…so..move it..

Fear is a great ruler of men.
Take away fear and the bridge even if it collapses only offers us the chance of swimming or learning to swim.
Which some would argue and rightly so that seems a tad late to do so.

I saw Dr Phil doing his “get real” workshops where he scare people and even before they end up in the workshop since they are confronting the fears about things like the bridges that collapses even before they do?

That’s the beauty of our minds we can in advance know what things are to be before we even are doing the activity at all!
Doing that into the level of a model where your model is as accurate as the reality it’s applied to is a rare ability, some might argue it is about then creating the reality in your head and I think they are right.
Is the model the reality it is applied to or is the model just a description of what is currently believed to be reality?
It seems it will be a tiny difference, subtle but that level of interaction between our senses and the thing out there as described very well using the epistemology and any further attempt to explain such difference will be just further models about what is infinite.

Then when we can just plainly sit down, eat an apple and look at the waves bathing us into the serenity of life.
Take a sand particle, identify with it in such a way it’s a whole reality of the universe being infinite, and that is just a model about the universe and how you as an observer affects it.

Consciousness allow us great things, what are you going to do today?

Let’s move along, the bridge is closing down.

Where do you want to go?

If there is no fear, life then unfolds, rightly so some would argue.

Infinite

Your best

/Robert
www.riggiomodel.biz <http://www.riggiomodel.biz/>
Kicking asses anywhere and bruising egos all over the world and still sitting there enjoying life.
(Also known as a green small guy by some)
Hey, somehow Lucas got his ideas, why not small green guys from outer space?
Space, a 5 year mission to explore.

 

Revisiting Bliss …

Follow your bliss …

and the universe will open doors

where there were only walls.

Joseph Campbell

 

Coffee & Croisant Sq 200px

 

Wow!


I was a little stunned myself at how much more clarity and focus about what counts in life can be achieved in about the time it takes to have a cappuccino and a croissant.

 

If you’re … lost … tired … unmotivated … or, yearning for something elusive that you hope will give you the sense of destiny and  fulfillment you desperately desire … but have been unable to find … what I discovered accidentally one morning over breakfast with a friend may just be the answer you’ve been looking for …

But first indulge me in sharing a little bit of background.
Joseph Campbell is remembered by many for his injunction to …

Follow your bliss …

It always amazes me how little people expect of life that really counts for something, and how hard they are willing to work to get it.

 

I think that’s mostly because they don’t get what Joseph Campbell meant when he referred to “bliss” …

Most people think “BLISS” refers to being happy or comfortable, or more than that a kind of ecstasy of spirit. 

Yet, I’m confident it has nothing to do with any of those things …

As I understand it, and work with my clients around it, “BLISS” refers to being fully and completely aligned with one’s self … identifying and moving in sync with your true nature.

Think about it … Joseph Campbell says when you follow your bliss “the universe will open doors where there were only walls” … he says nothing about feeling “happy” or “being comfortable” …

In Joseph Campbell’s magnum opus, “The Hero With A Thousand Faces” … he lays out the structure of the “Hero’s Journey” and shows us that the hero/heroine must enter the “belly of the beast” first … facing their fears and overcoming many trials before achieving their bliss.

But, while the “Journey” can be wrought with difficulty it doesn’t have to be that way …

Joseph Campbell also points us to other aspects of the “Hero’s Journey” … in this case specifically the “Guide” and the “Magic Helper” … Luke Skywalker’s “Obi Wan Kenobe” and “Hans Solo” in StarWars, or Daniel’s “Mr. Miyagi” and “Ali” from The Karate Kid are examples … but, my favorite guide and magic helper are Carlos Castaneda’s “Don Juan” (Juan Mateus) and “Don Genaro” (Genaro Flores).

The guide and the magic helper are crucial when you are ready to transcend what limits you.

In the past there were many who fulfilled these traditional roles of guiding the seeker over the threshold … the shaman … the medicine man/woman … the witch doctor … the priest/priestess … and on and on.

Today some hope for this kind of facilitation with their psychologist, counselor or therapist … yet the medical models these folks work from is often completely lacking in achieving such transcendence.

However, all is not lost … there are still some models which seek to fulfill these sacred roles … I got this many years ago when I was apprenticing with Roye, my own mentor.

A little over two months ago I began something extraordinary … a *NEW* program for one to one private work I designed, i.e.: the Breakfast Discovery Process … an extremely focused, a single 45 minute coaching session.

Both my client and I agree at the outset that the intention of our time together will be to arrive at an extraordinary clarity about the current situation and the realization of a direction leading forward … a path through the next steps to take.

According to great Swiss psychologist, Carl Jung, there are two tasks of life:

  • In the first half of life arriving at ego differentiation … to find yourself at home in the external world.

  • In the second half of life the task becomes about … discovering who you are as an individual.

I had a conversation about a month ago with a twenty-something client who was striving to achieve the realization of the first task … to find himself at home in the external world, i.e.: to know what to do with his life.

The conversation began naturally enough, around how he was not sure about what to be doing with his life … the direction he should be taking to build a career and find success in his life. The real issue was one I’ve heard again and again, “I get started on something new with a sense of excitement and hope that this thing will be it … then I quickly get bored and disinterested.”

Twenty-somethings … Thirty-somethings … even some Forty-somethings find themselves lost in this loop … looking for bliss in their lives, but only finding boredom instead. 

This comes with incredible possibility … with options and choices, i.e.: boredom common to folks who are ambitious and desire more from life than a guarantee of a place to go from 9-5 everyday and a paycheck at the end of the week.

Transcending the re-occurring boredom that comes with opportunity requires a special kind of vision and perspective to see beyond the obvious. Yet, when that special perspective is achieved what had been hidden with it becomes obvious as well.

This is the foundation for BLISS.

We discussed a lot of things, beginning with an exploration of where he’d been in his life and where he found himself in the moment … all very casual, all very conversational.

At some point he began revealing his deeper thoughts and desires … what really held him back and where he really wanted to be … what it was exactly that he was revealing, all spoken outside of his conscious awareness (… and that’s what made is so unavailable to him).

Although it was now obvious to me the path forward remained inaccessible to him …

The key to his movement was actually remarkably simple … a single powerful insight followed by an equally powerful single action were all it took to transform his blindness to clarity.

A critical point is that insight without action is most often meaningless … yet, insight followed by action can be the most powerful transformative process available to you.

Now like most things … any old action won’t cut it.

The action must be precisely aligned with the insight, and the insight must cut through to the core of your hidden identity to create the alignment that leads to BLISS.

My client wanted to know the next steps …

  • First of all he was (and is) a truly talented programmer … code comes to him like babbling comes to a baby.
  • He was a dream employee for every up and coming start up he ever worked for … for the first month or two … and then he’d simply get bored and lose interest in the project and ultimately the company.
  • Then he’d move along to the next bright and shiny thing that came along (usually at an increased salary and bonus package) … doing well, until that too got boring … and so it went.
  • What he kept missing … that was actually supremely obvious despite how elusive it was for him … was that he was the world’s best starter and problem solver when it came to coding … and the world’s worst finisher … he didn’t get bored with coding, he got bored with finishing.
  • What he was really missing was a way to structure his talent in relation to a team that could and would support what he was best at … that would allow him to step away and move on as soon as he began to get bored BEFORE he lost interest.
  • Next step … get hired in a leadership role with a team under him to support his remarkable talent as a coder and a way to keep him motivated about moving the project forward without him having to be responsible for doing it himself.
  • So we designed a way for him to find and move into role where he could get just that, including all the steps he needed to take immediately to make that happen … and he was on his way.

Okay, so you get the idea … a carefully crafted conversation that leads to the insight and action creating the transformation from existential angst to BLISS is what my accidental discovery led me to … and I built an entire process to deliver this kind of clarity to anyone who wants it in about 45 minutes.

I call this process the Breakfast Discovery Process (or BDP in my personal shorthand).

I have a limited number of openings available at the current investment level … and when they are gone the price will more than double.

I’m also including bonuses worth more than three times what the current investment for BDP | Breakfast Discovery Process is today that you’ll get when you register before 1 January 2016.

Here’s your link:

Get all the details and register here:
The Breakfast Discovery Process

 

All the best,

Joseph Riggio, Ph.D.
New Hope, PA

PS – If you are ready to get started here’s the place to register before the program investment more than doubles (from $447 to $975) … and you’ll get my year-end special bonus package when you sign-up before the 1st of January 2016 … including permanent access to TCP | The Complete Package … my premier Personal Development DFY (done for you) program, and Story Control … the complete videos from the three-day program I ran with Jamie Smart … the bonuses alone are worth about three times what I’m charging for the BDP | Breakfast Discovery Process before I raise the price in less than two weeks from now.

The Breakfast Discovery Process

 

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