Hello Sir,

One of the many ways I understand......

(1)_The meaning of your communication is the response you get.

(2)_The map is not the territory.

This man  who I had helped years ago with his son who was then considered learning disabled, called me about a month ago. He was wondering if I would help his sister with a particular problem she was having with her husband. The description he gave me went something like this.

My sister will just be sitting there reading, or watching television, and her husband will come in, and for no reason at all, he will just get angry at her. And that this was effecting her life in a not so enjoyable way.

I agreed that I would see his sister under the condition she would somehow bring her husband with her. She didn't have to tell him what it was about, but rather that she needed help with something, and that she wanted him to come along. But before I would agree fully, I needed to first talk to his sister. I did, and we set a date for the two of them to come in.

So here I am in my office, and the two of them are sitting, one to my right, and one to my left. Now, I am hunting for what ever pattern the two of them have been using inside of this loop that has brought them to me, when all of a sudden, she hollers, "there he goes again!"

Now, not being one to jump to any conclusions, I quickly change the subject. Then, in a few minutes, I make the exact same expression her husband had made when she had that response,  and she hollers at me "why are you so angry at me now?"

What had happened, was that when she was young, and whenever her father would get angry at her, he would make a particular expression. And, somehow, her husband began using an expression which was very similar to the one her father had used. And when she picked up on that expression unconsciously, her conscious understanding was that her husband was angry with her. And when I asked him what he was tying to communicate when he went into that state, he said, "sincere love and affection for my wife.

Clearly, in this example, the map, what she was perceiving reality to be, was indeed not the territory, or what was intended by this gesture.

On  another note, here, the meaning of this mans communication, to somehow communicate his affection for his wife, was not the response he was getting.

Now, if he were to use the presupposition in question here, that the meaning of his communication is the response you get, and this presupposition is only a tool, he then might have been able to say..

Look, listen, I am wanting to communicate that I love you. And every time I do, you seem to get really defensive. Is there something in what I am doing or saying to you that is causing you to feel this way? Or something else that would open up a dialogue that might lead somewhere more useful.

You see, and since this presup is a tool, a way of seeing the world, it is then something that can be used.

One day, I go into the convenience store to get a soft drink, when I notice how  the woman behind the counter looked. She looked very good. Every hair on her head was held perfectly in place. Her makeup was applied perfectly. And, in all honesty, I decided to compliment her. So I said to her "you look really good today". And, she stopped what she was doing, almost turning white, and looked back at me as if I had told her she was hideous. I then, thinking quickly, said, "on second thought, you do look terrible", and she responded with a beautiful smile.

Who knows what she was doing in her own head with my communication when I first offered her a compliment. Perhaps the last guy who said that to her was her husband, and right afterwards he left her for ever. Perhaps anything. Who knows?  Just because we have an intended meaning, doesn't ensure that the person we are communicating with will be able to take that communication in, and make the kinds of associations which will apply that intended meaning. So, the presupposition, the response you get is the meaning of your communication, is just a usefully respectful way of understanding that other people sometimes go through things which are different than what we have gone through. And will at times make associations, and have different understandings than what we are intending to be communicated.

Rather than blaming this woman for not understanding me, I realized that she was only doing the best she could in her ability to make sense out of what I was saying to her.... which goes to another NLP presupposition, people are always making the best choices available to them in a given context. This in no way states that no other choices may be available in the world at large. But if we don't first open up an effective line of communication, there is little chance of sharing what some of those other possible choices may be.

And I am not saying that any of these tools will work for me all of  the time, and when they don't I simply do something else.

Stay well

Carmine