Richard Bandler - Reframing. Neuro–Linguistic Programming™ and the Transformation of Meaning

You want both those questions answered. You want to know what that part's job is. «What do you do for me?» «I get you to be taken care of.» «How do you do it? What is it that you do?» You see, «being taken care of might mean that people hug you. Or it might mean that people feed you. Or perhaps it means that people are nice to you. You need to find out what that means in the land of experience. That is what counts in the end.

Dan: I want a part to fully access visual and auditory information that I take in. A part objects to reaccessing totally all visual and auditory information.

And I agree with it. What's its function, though? What does it do for you? What would happen if Dan actually had a part that could recall all visual and auditory information? People like that are called idiot savants, and they get put into mental hospitals. Idiot savants are completely dysfunctional; they can't operate at all as human beings. They are constantly aware of everything that ever happened to them. They can multiply great. They are whizzes at mathematics, but they can't function in the world of experience, because they have so much internal «downtime.»

When a part has a concern, take it into account and then redefine what the new part is going to do. Dan might redefine it as «I want to build a part that is going to make available some information about all the anchors that are occurring in a particular environment," or «I want to be able to visualize specific pages in a book I read once.» Whatever it is that you want to be able to do, specify it in experiential terms so that you know exactly what is going to happen, and so that the other parts of you know whether they are going to object or not. Then if they have objections, they'll be good ones.

Bill: I've got a function that I'm having a lot of trouble phrasing. The stuff that I'm getting says «Look, I want you to minimize the probability of being laughed at and treated with disdain. And I want to maximize the probability that you will at least be treated with respect, and hopefully even honored.»

OK. Well, that certainly is a rather extensive function. It doesn't Want you to make a fool of yourself.

Bill: OK. Is that a function?

Yeah, that's a function. However, the question is what would happen if you made a fool of yourself?

Bill: That's not my question. My question is «Are those words which convey function as opposed to words which convey behavior?'

Well, those words mainly convey behavior, but the functional implications are tied to the behavior pretty well.

Bill: What are some words that do convey functions?

OK. For example: «If I made a fool of myself, then I would lose income because my clients would go away.» The part's behavior is protecting you from making a fool of yourself because it's afraid that you will lose your friends and your business associates and your clients. The function is to keep your friends.

Bill: So it's the «then» part of an «if, … then» statement?

That's one way to think about it. There are many ways of getting the function. It's just not as simple as you want it to be. The function is what you get; behavior is how you get it.

Lucy: I'm on my list again. A part that rationalizes objected and then said «It doesn't matter.»

Ask it if its objection is really important… .

Lucy: Nah. I've got another part that doesn't want to give me what I want, because I've already got so much it isn't fair. That is its reason.

I didn't ask you to find out reasons. What is the function of your having a part like that? That's the important question. We don't want to know the part's reasons.

Lucy: OK. I'll have to look at it again.

What kind of part is it?

Lucy: A bad part; I don't want it.

No, No, NO! There are no bad parts. We have all good parts. The only question is, " What kind of good are they doing?»

Lucy: It's making sure that I deserve the things that I get.

And rightfully so. OK. So that's its function, and its concern is that if you get this too easily, you won't appreciate it. Then you build in having to do certain things that make you deserving of the outcome you want to have.

Nancy: I can take care of all the objections and concerns, but then I'm getting a message that I need another new part—an ally—to help do all that.

Fine. However, I think it probably would be better if you found an ally that's already in there. You don't need to build a whole new ally–Just go in and find some other part that can already do what you need.

It's too much work to build two new parts in the same day.

Nancy: One part's concern is to be sure that I would be able to notice other people's disapproval.

What is the function of the part that wants you to do this?

Nancy: Well, it would be the part that is concerned with my failing.

It's not concerned with whether you fail or not; it's concerned about whether people disapprove of you or not.

Nancy: Well, yeah. The two are connected.

Certainly. If you fail, people may disapprove of you. But what it's concerned with is people's opinion of you.

Nancy: Yeah, and it's also related to getting some things that I want.

OK. That part is concerned that if they disapprove of you, then they won't give you a job, or they won't give you something else. Are you telling me that you don't believe you have the sensory experience to tell when you are behaving in a way that people disapprove of? I want a literal answer to that question. Do you, or do you not, have that much sensory experience? …

Nancy: I guess I do.

OK. Just go and get the part that does that, and say «Hey, part, I need your help over here. We're building George, a part who's going to do X, but George needs to have sensory experience about this, and you know how to have sensory experience. I want you to connect with this new part if we decide to build it.» The new part doesn't have to have every quality. If you already have parts with certain qualities, you just get those parts to help out.

When you have all the functions and concerns of all the parts that object, then go on to redesign the fantasy so that all those concerns are satisfied. Check with every single part to make sure that each one is satisfied that this is a representation of an outcome that includes all the things they are concerned about and whatever it is that you want the new part to do. You make a new fantasy in which all the objections don't need to exist.

So in Teri's case the new fantasy must include the new part having responsibility for making sure she distinguishes between the way she is now and the way she was when she was «crazy» so that she can tell the difference. As long as she can tell the difference, the part that doesn't want her to go crazy won't object.

If there's a part that's afraid you are going to make a fool of yourself, then you have to build in the ability to have the sensory experience to notice when that happens. Without that you won't know, and those other parts are always going to be afraid that if you do certain things, you'll make a fool of yourself. You have to have feedback loops to satisfy those parts. If Bill writes, then he's got to be able to have ways of becoming somebody else and reading his writing in order to find out whether his response is «That's stupid!» or «Hey, that's pretty interesting.»

Whatever concerns your parts have, you build safeguards into the fantasy so that you have a representation of what the world of experience would be like if you had a new part that functioned to get the outcome that includes all the concerns the other parts have. We not only want to build a good part, we want to build a graceful part as well, a part that can do what it does and not step on any other part's toes.