Changing with Families - A Book About Further Education For Being Human

by Richard Bandler

  What we have learned in our experience is that the desired state identified by members of the family with the therapist's help, no matter how different are the families themselves, is always a state in which all family members come to behave more congruently than they do in their present situation. Again, for us, congruency is a process — the ongoing process of learning and integration.

  Which of the patterns of coping which the family arid its members present to the therapist can best serve as resources to create an environment for growth and change — whether or not the family members regard these process patterns as resources in the beginning? To create an effective model experience, the therapist needs to understand both the direction of change and the currently available resources of the people with whom he is working.

  The third characteristic of creative, effective family therapy occurs during this phase when the therapist is working with the family members to prepare them to actively participate in creating the model experience. The act of participating in originating this experience will require that the family members act in ways which are different from the ones they have been using in the past. In other words, they will be taking risks. There are several specific ways in which the therapist can systematically assist the family members in making these revisions. First, the therapist works to build up the family members' trust in him as an agent of change. The therapist acts as a model of congruency by communicating congruently himself — all of the messages which he presents must match. The way in which he moves must match the sound of his voice, which matches the words which he uses, which match .... In addition, the therapist must be alert to identify each family member's most used representational system. When he has determined this, he can increase the confidence of each family member in him by shifting his own process words (predicates) to the representational system of the person to whom he is speaking. Even more effective than simply shifting his process words (predicates) to those of the family member with whom he is communicating, is for the highly skilled family therapist to vary the emphasis which he places on the types of communication systems which he selects to use with a particular family member. For example, with a family member whose most used representational system is visual, the deft therapist will communicate by using his body, hand and arm movements — any set of signals which the family member can see. With a family member whose primary system is kinesthetic, the therapist will make frequent physical contact, touching to communicate or emphasize certain points he wants to be sure the family member understands. The therapist uses his skills in communication both to set an example and to make explicit the process of effective communication. So, for example, when a family member presents the therapist with a verbal communication with a deletion which renders it unintelligible, the therapist requests the missing information rather than hallucinating what it might be. Or, if a family member is Mind Reading or communicating incongruently, the therapist may gracefully comment on it — demonstrating both the importance of the freedom to comment and the equal importance of clear communication to other family members. As he communicates, the therapist leaves space for the family members to respond, using polite commands (conversational postulates) and embedded questions. He shows that he values the family members' abilities to understand and participate in the ongoing process by inviting them to comment on exchanges between himself and another family member. By these techniques, he makes individual contact with each family member to develop their confidence in the therapist's skill as a communicator and as an agent of change.

  The second major way in which the therapist acts to help the family members prepare for change is to share with the family member the information which he has gathered, smoothly using his communication skills to do this. Typically, the family members begin with a statement of what they want for themselves and their family; this statement invariably includes a nominalization. As the therapist gathers information, he is de-nominalizing; that is, he is turning the representation of an event into a process. One of the things which happen as he does this, and shares the information with the family members, is that the way the family got to the place where they are now is seen as a series of steps of a process. By coming to appreciate their own family history as an understandable, step-by-step process, the family members can have hopes about there being a next step in the process which will allow them to make the changes which they desire. The therapist

  does not, of course, attempt to insure that each family member has the understanding which is his — his task is not to train family therapists. Neither does he keep relevant information from the family. Rather, using his skills as a communicator, the therapist presents to the family members the information each needs to understand that change is possible. As he shares his information about the process of communication in the family, the therapist describes what he experiences — he does not evaluate or make judgments about it. This distinction between the description of the process and the evaluation of other people's behavior is, in itself, an important learning tool for the family members.

  One of the outcomes of the therapist's skillful use of representational systems, congruency and sharing of information with all family members, is that the family members come to understand and trust one another. We find it very rewarding when we are able, through our communication skills, to help one family member come to fully understand that another family member is not being malicious, or evil, or crazy when he does not understand the first member's communication, but, rather, that their communications are simply not making a connection with one another, as each is paying attention to a different part of their shared experience.

  Contrary to what many people expect, difference itself can become an opportunity for growth; it contains the seeds of excitement and interest, and the challenge of new learning when guided in that direction. Difference can also, of course, be used negatively; then, sameness can be made a cementing factor. Both sameness and difference are essential, for they manifest the uniqueness of each human being. Much of the therapist's task is to balance these two qualities and, specifically, to use his skills to help the family members to convert the differences which previously caused them pain into an occasion for learning and growth.

  When the therapist works with the family to help them to understand the process steps by which they got into their present situation, and teaches them the difference between descriptive and judgmental language, the family often discovers a crippling episode from the past, usually based on miscommunication. This encounter can be used to help them learn that any human experience from the past can be uncovered, understood and utilized.

  The result of the processes of developing each family member's trust in the therapist as an agent of change and the therapist's sharing of the information with the family is that the family members become willing to take risks, to venture into unknown territory, and to attempt to build new bridges within the family. By carefully preparing the family members during Phase I, the therapist is able to engage the hopes, energy and creative participation of the family members in developing an experience which will serve as a model for them in their future growth.

  Determining the Desired State

  The presence of a family in a therapy session is a statement by that family that their present state — their present ways of coping, communicating and interacting — is unsatisfactory to them. It is a statement that the family recognizes, at some level, that there is a discrepancy between what their present experience as a family is and what they want for themselves. The typical case in our experience is the one characterized by the family arriving for the initial therapy session, each member having some idea of what it is that he wants to change. The initial focus of the therapist is to find out what those changes are. The simplest, and a very effective, way of doing this is for the therapist to introduce himself to each of the family members and to ask them what it is, specifically, that they want for themselves as individuals and for their family. This process is a model p
resented to the family to assist them in learning to make meaning congruently. The therapist understands that, while the content — the specific hopes of this particular family — is important, the way he secures this information, the powerful process of communication, is taking place at the unconscious level, with himself as the model.

  What do you want for yourself and your family?

  In what way, specifically, would you like you and your family to change?

  What are you hoping for, for yourself and for your family, in therapy?

  If you could make yourself and your family different in some way, what would that be?

  If I were to give you a magic wand, how would you use it?

  Any of these questions will start the process of determining the desired state for the family. As the family members begin to respond to the therapist's questions, they will, typically, present their ideas about what they want for themselves and their family in the form of a nominalization. For example, many families with whom we have worked state that they want more love, support, comfort, respect, etc. Each of these words is an event representation of a process, with most of the pieces of the process missing. The family members, sometimes, will begin by stating what they don't want. Using the linguistic patterns presented in Part I, the therapist works with the individual family members to secure positive statements of what they want — statements completely acknowledged by them of what each wants for himself.

  As we pointed out in the first part of this book, nominalizations involve the language processes of deletion, lack of referential indices, and unspecified verbs. For a family member simply to say that he or she wants more love leaves out much necessary information — whom does this person want to love or to be loved by, and how, specifically, does this person want the other person (or people) to love him (or her)? By systematically identifying and challenging the deletions, lack of referential indices, unspecified verbs and nominalizations, the therapist gathers the information he needs to understand what the family members want.

  During this phase of family therapy, the therapist is making use of his skills as a communicator to connect the words the family members use with what they want. The therapist has connected the family members' words with their experience (has adequately de-nomin-alized their speech) when his understanding is specific enough that he knows what observable behavior would indicate for that person what he really wants — when he would be able to act out some sequence of behavior with the family member which would be recognized as an example of what that individual desires.

  Two general ways of proceeding to adequately connect language and experience (de-nominalization) are:

  a) Employ the linguistic distinctions of deletion, lack of referential indices, unspecified verbs, nominalizations, and modal operators;

  or

  b) Have the family members act out a sequence of behavior which is an example of what they want.

  These two general ways of starting the process of de-nominalization are, in our experience, more closely connected than the two categories would suggest. More specifically, when a family member is describing verbally what he wants or what stops him from getting what he wants, almost invariably both that person and the other family members will be acting out before your very eyes the thing being described. In other words, family members match their verbal communication with their nonverbal behavior. Knowing this, the therapist can accelerate the process of understanding what the family member wants by being sensitive to the non-verbal signals which are being sent at these points in the therapy session and then shifting to focus on that process. For us, these two ways of proceeding to connect language with experience are fully integrated. As a guide for ourselves in this area, we invent, both for us and for the family members, experiences which include as many of the sensory channels and representational systems as possible. This action, for us, is a basic assumption about what are the most effective conditions for learning and changing. By choosing to act out an experience, rather than simply to talk about it with the family, the therapist engages all of the family members' channels for experiences (visual, kinesthetic and auditory).

  The process is complete when the therapist understands what kind of observable behavior is an adequate example of what the family member wants — in other words, the de-nominalization is complete when the therapist has established which experience (Complex Equivalence) counts for the family members as an example of what they want.

  One of the major tasks for the therapist in Phase I is complete when he has successfully connected language with experience for each member of the family (de-nominalizations). However, there is one very important step remaining for the therapist in this area, as he is attempting to gather information regarding the desired state for the family as a unit. The de-nominalization for each of the family members may result in a set of experiences (Complex Equivalences) which are relatively unrelated. To establish, for the family as a unit, a desired state which will be helpful for the therapist to use to guide his behavior in creating a unified experience with the family, he works to find some way to coordinate the experiences which the family members want for themselves. In other words, he must choose a route to de-nominalization by which the individual experiences (Complex Equivalences) which they want will overlap, or, at least, will connect. Since the therapist is going to use these Complex Equivalences as the basis for creating an experience with the family in Phase II, these experiences to which the family members agree will have to fit together. In the process of delicately and gracefully integrating the different experiences wanted by the separate family members, whatever is common among those experiences will emerge naturally. In our experiences in family therapy, often the most diverse-sounding word descriptions, once connected with experience, will automatically merge for the family members involved.

  The therapist can be sure that he has adequately connected the family members' words with experience (de-nominalized the family as a unit) when the result is a set of experiences (Complex Equivalences) which, themselves, connect. As the process continues, if the therapist notices that there is little connection among them, he might ask one of the family members to present (either as a verbal description or in any representational system, e.g., pictures, body movement, etc.) an example of an occasion when he failed to obtain the very thing he desired. As one of the family members does this, the therapist might then ask the others how the description or action being presented is connected with what they want (their de-nominalizations). In our experience, this has never failed to produce an overlap in the experiences (Complex Equivalences) which the different family members want.

  The outcome of the process of making clear what each family member wants is that the therapist and the family both come to understand what the essential ingredients are of an experience which they will co-operatively build as a part of Phase II of the family therapy session. The set of overlapping experiences (Complex Equivalences) which result from connecting words with experience (de-nominalization) suggest the structure to be used for Phase II. Before the therapist and the family can begin effectively to construct this experience, one other class of information is necessary. Having a map of San Francisco is a valuable asset if you intend to visit and explore that city; however, the map is of little use unless you also know where you presently are in relation to San Francisco. Your map will be useful to you only if you can get to San Francisco from where you are now. The therapist's major task is to assist the family in moving from where they presently are to where they want to be. The other category of information necessary for the therapist is the present resources and current patterns of coping which now exist within the family.

  Determining the Present State

  (What is Currently Going On)

  As the therapist employs the various ways of connecting language with experience and, at the same time, gathers the information necessary to understand the desired state of the family, he is engaged in the ongoing process of communicating with,
observing and listening to the interaction of the various family members. Thus, while the focus of the content of Phase I is the desired state for the family, the process is the patterns of communication which are available within the family in its present state. Every verbal and nonverbal message of each family member and the verbal and non-verbal responses which those communications bring from the other family members constitute the process of coming to understand the family's present state.

  The amount of communication which occurs in a family therapy session is enormous — it is, actually, much more than is needed for the therapist to determine the present state of the family system. With this in mind, we have isolated what we consider some of the more informative and distinctive features of family interaction; by isolating them, we are identifying one way for therapists to organize their experience in family therapy so that:

  a) They will not be overwhelmed by the complexity of the situation;

  And

  b) They will detect the processes which will allow them to sufficiently understand the present state of the family system so that they may effectively create, with the family members, the experience in Phase II.

  This is simply a way of saying that, in this phase, we are offering a model for family therapy which has been effective and useful in our experience; as with all models, it is neither exhaustive nor unique.

  The first of these larger patterns is the calibrated communication cycles which already exist within the family. Typically, the calibrated loops which we encounter are already so established in the family process that the family members regard them as an unalterable part of their experience. Often, the very learning that these cycles can be changed is, perhaps, the most powerful information which we, as therapists, can provide for the family members. Our feeling is that, by understanding the underlying process by which these cycles of pain and miscommunication are created, we, as family therapists, can have more choices about the way in which we assist families both to overcome those loops already present in their system and to avoid forming new ones in the future. The general pattern of the process by which calibrated communication loops are formed in family systems can be represented as: