Alfred Korzybski Series #6
If you and I are a semantic class of life (series #5), then how do we learn to effectively handle our semantic nature so that we become less reactive semantically and avoid creating semantic disturbances in our neurology? Korzybski addresses these questions directly and NLP similarly addresses them, although more indirectly.
Korzybski addressed both semantic reactions and semantic disturbances directly. For him, when you and I semantically react we are “using our nervous systems in an animalistic way.” That is, we are confusing map-and-territory and identifying something “out there” with our labels and evaluations of it. What then is the solution? Simple.
Stop identifying, distinguish your map from the territory, take a moment to be silent and notice that on the “unspeakable level” of your neurological abstracting that whatever you are experiencing that’s being triggered by the outside world is your abstraction of it, not it.
NLP speaks about this same process by saying: come into sensory awareness, move from evaluating to describing, adopt a know-nothing state, recognize that your map is not the territory.
One there is a semantic disturbance, the solution is to recognize that our mental-emotional, physical-and-relational disturbance is semantically based. The problem is not the world. The problem is not the other person. The problem is not “out there.” The problem is our frame. It is the map that we are using, the mental model we are operating from, and the way we have come to understand, represent, and evaluate the triggering event. We have falsely meta-stated it with mapping that disturbs us. The good news is that we are the source of the disturbance— you are disturbing you. And that’s good news because if you are doing the disturbing, you can stop that process and begin a better process!
Now all of this establishes the foundation for how the NLP Meta-Model of language works as well as how reframing shifts meanings and so our responses. So whenever a person has strong feelings in response to something that is not immediately present, they are in a semantic state—a state conditioned by their meanings. This then leads to them experiencing a semantic reaction in their body. It’s their words that convey their meanings that begin effecting their nervous system. It’s not the actual external stimuli that actually fires off the nervous responses, but the meanings the person creates about those stimuli. The nervous disturbance comes from the meanings being experienced and lived in.
Korzybski’s point: Your semantics effect your nervous systems. Because you think in words and language forms, your sensory systems for processing information and creating internal representations make-up your nervous system. Then this effects the rest of your nervous system— your body and physiology as your mind-body state. It is this new factor of our semantics in our nervous system, which isn’t true for animals, that makes us distinctively human.
So as a semantic class of life we are semantically conditioned beings. Since we don’t merely use words as signals (the way animals do), but as full-fledged symbols, our symbols enable us to process information at meta-levels. That’s why we can always generate words to say about whatever we experience, and then we can say more words about those words.
What results from this? Ah, the unique human experiencing of being able to live in meta-land! We can and do live at meta-levels of abstraction. And unless we are careful, we can confuse levels of abstraction and live in delusional worlds. Our symbols powerfully effect us since they create one of the most significant aspects of our “environment.” They can also induce us into various psycho-physiological states that relate to, and accord to, our internal representations rather than to external representations.
Now as long as our semantic reactions are just that—reactions, they are automatic, immediate, and unconscious. This endows them with the quality of operating as our human “programming” driving us and leaving us without choices. The solution? To become conscious of abstracting so that we can develop semantic responses that we choose. That is, we can consciously alter our meanings and generate the responses that we want to make.
No wonder Korzybski invented the phrases neuro-linguistic and neuro-semantic to describe these processes. Operating as our linguistic and semantic environments, they operate without us being aware of our linguistic habits (our internal dialogue, representations, evaluations) and structurally the exert an influence upon us and create all kinds of semantic maladjustments.
This explains why language uniquely represents one of our highest neurological functions. Korzybski specifically asserted that language is a fundamental psycho-physiological function (p. 18). And because all language has structure, all language automatically involves interconnected semantic reactions (p. 33). Do you know that? How well do you understand that? And do you know what to do with that understanding?
Now regarding human achievements, they all rest upon our use of symbols and our ability to communicate clearly and accurately.
“Animals have no ‘doctrines’ in our meaning of the term; thus, doctrines are no part of their environment… We have them, however, and, since they are the most vital environmental semantic conditions relating to our lives, if they are fallacious, they make our lives unadjusted and so, ultimately, lead
to non-survival” (pp. 239-40)
to non-survival” (pp. 239-40)
Wrapping Up
As a semantic class of life you map out your world by your words and phrases. Recognizing that whatever you say about anything is not that thing, but that you are at the verbal level liberates you from semantically reacting. Now the “world” you map for yourself to live in can enhance your functioning and experiencing rather than create self-imposed limitations.
Trainings in Colorado
After the International Conference of Neuro-Semantics (July 1-3) — we are planning to host Coaching Mastery which is Module III of Meta-Coaching. If you are interested, there are details on both http://www.neurosemantics.com/ and http://www.meta-coaching.org/. You can also register or get more detailed information about it from Michael … write meta@acsol.net
NEUROSEMANTICS homepage
Michael Hall, Ph. D.