Metaquestioning made easy (kind of!)

The Happy Hypnotist,

Metaquestioning made easy!

Last time we looked at the origins of the meta model and introduced how we all delete, distort and generalise the information we process. Let’s now take it a bit further and get a bit more structured.

The meta model is designed to teach the listener how to hear and respond to the form of the speaker’s communication. This model allows you to respond in a way to obtain the fullest meaning from the communication. Using the meta model you can discover the richness and limits of the information as well as the modelling processes the speaker is using.

Deep Structure and Surface Structure

At a deep level of thought, a speaker has complete knowledge of what he wishes to communicate to someone else. This is called the deep structure and operates at an unconscious level. In order to be efficient in his verbal or written communication, we unconsciously delete, generalise or distort our inner thoughts based on beliefs and values, memories, decisions (limiting), strategies, what we want you to hear, etc. What is finally said or written (surface structure) is only a small subset of the original thought and may be ambiguous or confusing and lead to miscommunication and very often does.

Why is this all useful to know you ask? For me, it is absolutely fascinating to know I do this! Of course, like you, I did not think I really did this to a great degree, though it was easy to notice it in others. Are we really this bad at communicating? Actually we are really good at communicating what we think we would like to communicate, though not necessarily what the truth of our experience is. This is why reading someone else’s diary is so fascinating, naughty and forbidden, because to know, to really know what is at the deep structure level of another human being is all consuming.

To illustrate deep structure and surface structure and why it is important to be aware of the distinction, let’s assume you are my therapist. Before saying or writing a word and often in a blink of an eye, my inner thoughts (deep structure) are unconsciously filtered through my model of the world (beliefs and values, etc.) without my conscious appreciation, of course.

I might say to you something like, “My family doesn’t appreciate what I do.” Which is the offering of the surface structure of my communication. You, as my friend and therapist take in my words and at a deep level of thought (your deep structure), filter what I have said through your beliefs and values, memories, decisions and then you may say (surface structure) something such as “I know exactly what you are saying and here is what you should do.”

Really, however, you do not. I have not said what I really mean and you are doing your best to help me, though that advice is purely based on your own map of the world. With the best of intentions, you have no idea how to help me, because I have not given you enough information. I have not told you the truth.

This is not to say that anybody is purposely lying. It is just that we throw away words so flippantly and others are so wanting to be helpful, it all gets very confusing, very quickly and nobody feels understood.

Worse still, this may result in an argument because I feel you do not understand me and are always telling me what to do and I may become more entrenched in continuing with my limiting beliefs and behaviours as you adamantly stick to your own views too. What a shame. I am (kind of) asking for help and you are doing what you think is your utmost to help and we are at loggerheads.

What do you do? Well, a good approach is to realise I am not communicating very well and have a little empathy, knowing that emotional states blur communication and it is really how I feel that I need support with. You could be well advised just to get very curious about what I have said and to ask questions for both of us to gain a better appreciation of my deep structure.

Of course only do this by invitation, as you feel your way asking one or two questions and if you get the ‘back off’ face as I call it, when you intuitively know you have overstepped the mark, outstayed your welcome or the like, stop.

If I really want help (and, by the way, many times we do not, we just want a sympathetic ear or someone to validate that we are in the right and the rest of the world is of course entirely wrong because you are my friend after all) then I will accept and perhaps encourage your further delving into my private world.

Once we have this clarity, you are in a better position to provide advice. What often happens is that when I, as the client, get clarity on the issue and what needs to be done, I do not need your advice, but simply your continued support and curiosity. You, in essence, merely help me discover the path from my surface structure to my deep structure of language through questioning, sounds easy doesn’t it?

This is why I tell my students that this really is an easy job. The tricky bit is to lay off! The tricky bit is to hold back when you want to gush out all your advice. The clever bit is to worm your way around to the client, or friend, discovering the solution that you think you knew from the start. When I have my penny dropping moment and offer the solution you have crafted a path for me to discover by your clever questioning, we are cooking with gas.

The Meta Model provides us (as coaches, bosses, therapists, family members, friends, …) with a set of questions to assist the person we are helping (client) to move from the surface structure of his communication to an understanding of his deep structure -- unconscious beliefs, values, decisions. This is not about finding the right answers but having a better understanding of your client’s model of the world.

Avoid asking ‘Why’

The questions in the Meta Model do not have any ‘why’ questions. When you ask someone a ‘why’ question, often they feel they have to defend what they have said or done, make excuses or rationalize their behaviour. On the other hand, if you expressed the question as a ‘how’ question, then you get a better understanding of the process used by your client and thus more information and understanding.

Deleting

Recognise when deletions have occurred and assisting in recovering the information restores a fuller representation of the experience.

Ask questions such as:-

About whom

About what

How specifically

I am afraid

What or whom are you afraid of?

I don’t like him

What don’t you like about him?

I don’t understand

What don’t you understand?

I don’t get any recognition

How would you like to be recognised?

How will you know when you have been recognised?

What would let you know?

How would you feel if you were recognised?

Limits of the speakers model

They identify limits by challenging limits you can allow the speaker to expand his/her model of the world

1. Universal quantifiers
2. Model operators (primarily operators of necessity)

Universal quantifiers

Challenge and exaggerate the quantifier or insert additional quantifiers

All

Every

Always

Never

Nobody

I never do anything right

Never?

Can you think of a time when you did do something right?

Model operators

Lack of choice

Have to

Must

Cant

Its necessary

What prevents you?

What would happen if you do?

Semantic Ill-formedness

Distortion

Which may impoverish the experience

1. Cause and effect
2. Mind reading
3. Lost performative

Cause and effect – x causes y

Challenge whether the causal connection is true allows them to review the situation to see if there are further choices.

Challenge how x causes y

I’m sad because you were late

You frustrate me

You make me angry

Mind Reading

How specifically do you know x allows you to challenge old assumptions

Everyone thinks you are crazy

How specifically do you know that?

How specifically do you know?

I’m sure you can see how I feel

How specifically can you be sure I see how you are feeling?

Lost Performative

Usually judgements, rules that are appropriate to your model of the world and puts them into others

Challenge for whom

That’s the right way to do it

Right for whom?

Its wrong to live on the social

That’s a sick thing to do

What, how, who?

If you find yourself going inside to fill the gaps, as for further information

That really hurt me

How?

The client makes his communication clearer, so you do not fill in from your experience.

I am afraid of the crowds

What is it specifically about the crowds?

How do you know you are?

What prevents you from feeling calm in crowds?

Never lead your client – if you find you are finishing the sentence in your own head you are leading!

Be persistent with metaquestioning.

Good metaquestioning words:

Because?

Specifically?

And?

How?

What?

Where? Always? Never?

Introduction to the NLP Meta Model & A Practice Sheet

INTRODUCTION TO THE META MODEL Whenever someone talks about an experience, their verbal description will delete a great deal of that experience.  That’s what words are useful for  taking a very complex and detailed experience and briefly summarizing it.  What you get is at best a brief outline of the total experience.  Whenever you gather information, you draw on your own personal history in making an internal representation of what the other person says in order to: a) understand it, and b) know what you need to gather more information about to complete your internal representation. As you do that, there is a very strong tendency to delete or distort infor¬mation, and add in details that were not mentioned by that other person, and are not even in that person’s internal representation.The meta model is a set of questions that allow you to gather information that specifies someone’s experience, in order to get a fuller representation of that experience.  It is one of the essential tools that separates a good NLP Practitioner from a sloppy one.  You can use all of the NLP techniques elegantly, but if you haven’t pinpointed exactly where and when to use them, you can come up with a wonderful solution for the wrong thing. If you don’t know how to gather information, you’re like a surgeon who has a very sharp scalpel, but doesn’t know where to cut. When clients, business partners, employees, students, etc. communicate with you, or offer you a difficulty to solve, knowing what questions to ask makes all the difference.  Many people don’t know what questions to ask, and they end up solving the wrong “problems.”  They think they understand, and begin to solve some¬thing they don’t know about.  Often they do more harm than good. Ex:  Management:  “We need to produce more.”  So the supervisor speeds up the assembly line, causing more defects.  Manager meant more quality.  (Or the manager might have meant more different kinds of products.) Ex:  Listening to dinner conversation between two people in a restaurant.  It was clear to us that neither could possibly know what the other was talking about, but they thought they did.  You can have very “meaningful” conversations and arguments without ever knowing what the other person is talking about.  The M M is a way not to do that. When  you  do information gathering,  you’ll be asking questions.  There are six questions in English:  What?, Which?, Who?, When?, Where?, and Why?  “Why?” is the only one that doesn’t ask for specific detail.  The answer to “Why?” is usually “Because…” and a historical or theoretical explanation.  You may get specific detail in response to “Why?” but that will only be a lucky accident.  This is why the question “Why?” does not appear in the meta model.  These information gathering questions are often called “challenges”; if you don’t like that  word, use some other word that you like better. The M M was the beginning of NLP  a great deal of NLP has been developed by using it.  (For instance, Strategies was created by exploring the question “How?”)
Distinction	Meta-Model Inquiry
Unspecified Things
1. After seven years I’ve just lost contact.	With whom?
2. It seemed like an impossible task.	Seemed to whom? Impossible to whom?
3. Now I don’t even talk to her.	About what?
4. The other one is better.	Better than what?
5. I have understood so much from you.	What specifically?
6. You are nice.	Compared with whom or what?
7. You find out the world looks different.	Different from what?
8. Things get me down.	What things?
9. Something should be done about it.	What specifically should be done about it?
10. People get me down.	Who specifically…?
11. This one is the last.	Which one specifically is the last.
Unspecified Verbs
1. I can deal with it.	How specifically?
2. He just won’t leave me alone.	How specifically will he not…?
3. He won’t love me.	Love you, in what way?
4. This is what I believe.	How do you believe, specifically?
5. When he starts another conversation I’m compelled	Starts how? Compelled how?
6. I am blocked.	How are you blocked?
Nominalizations
1. There is no respect here.	Who is not respecting whom?
2. She needs more strength.	Being strong in what way?
3. Knowledge is most important.	How will (who) knowing what be…?
4. Can you have thought without experience?	Can you have (who) thinking (how) without experience?
5. There is a lot of confusion.	Who is confusing whom, in what way?
Universal Quantifiers
1. I’ll never play again.	Never?
2. There is nothing I need to add.	Nothing?
3. Since we changed the times, all the children have been upset.	All the children?
4. The editorials never mention the problems that we have found.	Never mention the problems…?
5. To make sure, I always do a check.	Always? Have you ever failed to do a check?
Modal Operators of Necessity and Impossibility
1. I can’t do anything right.	What stops you?
2. I’d really like to leave him but I can’t.	What would happen if you did?
3. People cannot know.	What would happen if they did?
4. I have to believe it.	What would happen if you didn’t?
5. I couldn’t say something like that.	What would stop you?
	What would happen if you did?
6. I must never say those things.	What will happen if you do?
7. I must not show my feelings.	What prevents you?
Cause — Effect
1. My family makes me mad.	How do they make you mad?
2. My brother has been depressed since he spoke to Dad	How has speaking to Dad made him depressed?
3. When she smiles through her fringe, I get all confused.	How does her smiling make you confused?
4. Her refusal to listen really makes me sad.	How does her refusal make you sad?
5. The whining tone in his voice gets under my skin.	How does his whining tone get under your skin?
6. I feel bad for making her cry.	What did you do that you believe made her cry?
Mind Reading
1. I know what makes him happy.	How do you know…?
2. You should have known I would not be pleased.	How should I have known?
3. He doesn’t like me.	How do you know…?
4. He should know better.	How should he know not to do that?
5. I know what is good for him.	How do you know what is good for him?
6. I’m sorry to keep annoying you.	How do you know that you are annoying me?
Lost Performative
1. It’s right that people should know.	For whom is it true that people…?
2. Failure is a necessary part of the system.	Necessary for whom? Who says it is?
3. That is a stupid thing to say.	That is stupid according to whom?
4. Oh, it is not important anyway.	It is not important to whom?
5. It is not good to be strict.	Not good for whom?