What is emergence? Some questions answered, some answers questioned.

[Steve Saunders]

David realised the cause and effects of dissociation. All his work was centred upon recovering the not-here-and-now aspects of self. All his stages of work reflect different, and progressively more effective ways of achieving this. He knew that the individual person's system was unique and would find its own content way. He said he never asked a question unless he knew what the answer would be!

Grovian Metaphor was designed to enable the inner/outer child aspect to morph into a form were they could touch the present body and thus migrate "home". Symbolic Modelling is a simplified application of this work.

Clean Space was created to more directly access the Child Without, using spatial navigation to enable the undoing of the dissociation.

Emergence brought together in a hugely more powerful and efficient form all of the purposes of his earlier work. The purpose of emergent question patterns was to navigate between aspects of self, thus reconnecting/migrating them even less traumatically and even more cleanly in terms of reducing practitioner input".

David also accepted everyone as they are. He only taught or passed on what others could understand of his work, and he was indifferent to the opinion of others.

I worry seriously that his work will be trivialised if books and presentations on his latest work go out from uninformed and non-understanding minds. I know he would just laugh and be unconcerned and separate himself from it, but I am not unconcerned.

So accept him and his work as it it, and do not preseume to publish or present until enough of us have understood and agreed. I offer my time freely to those who would like to understand emergence - because I do not believe anyone out there does, and you better had if you're going to claim to be an expert on it, or I will be on your case.

So here are some questions that need to be answered correctly by a person claiming expertise:

What is the purpose of mind?
What is the purpose of [body, emotion, dissociation, trauma]?
Why do people dissociate?
How do they dissociate?
Where do they go when they do dissociate?
How does one recover dissociated aspects of self?
How do each of Grovian Metaphor, Clean Space, Q4 and Emergence work to realise the recovery of the inner and outer child?
Why is emergence recursive not repetitive?
What kind of relationship is the relationship between the days of the week and dissociation?
Why does the whirly-gig work, and when should it be used?

I have clear, concise and logical answers to these questions - I hope you have, too!

love Steven Saunders

[phil]

Ooer, Steve, that's a bit aggressive isn't it? '... I'll be on your case!' Are you the Police representative of the Emergence-y Services? :-)

I have to ask: could you share freely with us the clear, concise, logical and correct answers to your own questions? That may seem a bit of a tongue in cheek response -- and it is -- and seriously you certainly are one of those who spent a lot of time working with David in the last few years -- you must have a lot of insight into the particular synthesis that emerged as a result of your work together during that period.

Similarly it would be fantastic if others would do the same thing for what emerged and how that developed when David was with them. We can build up such a fascinating picture of the progression of David's thought.

[webmaven]

I hope Steve and others who have been working closely with David over the past few years will share their understanding and experience of David's newest processes. I would absolutely love to know what he was working on currently and how that relates to his earlier work.

Please, do tell! ;-)

I look forward to reading the answers to your very provocative questions, Steve.

webmaven

[Steve Saunders]

Hi Phil,

Yup, probably a bit too serious, but fully intended - I'd heard about upcoming books and seminars by people who really do not understand emergence and my blood boiled! (Nice metaphor ?!) The last thing I want to see is someone asking questions 6 times, not even from their whole body, and saying "there you go, that's emergence, just repeating questions" - it discredits David's work and my own.

1. nothing exists without a purpose [the basic assumption]

What is the purpose of mind? To understand - right understanding.
Mind comes into existence after a "measurement" has been made. A measurement happens due to either a lack of understanding or an interruption to the smooth flow of awareness. Mind then goes to work seeking the right understanding of the event or the recovery of the interrupted life force flow. After right understanding is achieved and reconnection to separated aspects of self, the mind stops and the experience of "no mind" returns. [However, if too many successive measurements happen then the typical occidental mind remains active until the right environment enables mind to complete its job.]

What is the purpose of [body, emotion, dissociation, trauma]?
Body: to hold projections from not-self - memories, form, self-image, enabling interaction in the physical dream-world. Body provides the real-world aspect of the real-and-imaginary self, manifesting the required projections of others (parental DNA and thereafter).

Emotion informs right expression; it is the interaction of the self with the projection of the other. Following the emotional cue, however strange, informs right action.

Trauma serves to inform learning and therefore future right action.

Why do people dissociate?
Dissociation serves to: preserve that which cannot tolerate an experience, measure the experience for later understanding. It's an aspect of projected awareness, which is an ongoing continuous activity, but separated by measurement/interrupt.

How do they dissociate?
If the awareness is interrupted then the smooth flow of out-to-object-back-to-me is broken and that which was at object and the space in between is left as a structure. The person gets cold (shock) and eventually warms up. When the dissociation is undone they heat up with the extra returned energy - evidenced with hundreds of people.

Where do they go when they do dissociate?
The go into the object(s) of focus of awareness - perpetrator's eyes, wallpaper pattern, a sponge, literally whatever.

How does one recover dissociated aspects of self?
By navigating space/time or movement to the recorded real-world event, noticing the points of focus and interrogating them, then by navigating back to the here and now. (Hey, this is like timeline - yes, but somewhat cleaner!)

How do each of Grovian Metaphor, Clean Space, Q4 and Emergence work to realise the recovery of the inner and outer child?

The metaphor approach turns the objectified outer/inner child information into metaphor that can then move e.g. curtains that can then flap like a bird and fly to the client's body. The key point is touching the body.

Clean Space navigates the body to touch the locations of the objectified children, thus connecting through moving in a fixed spatial structure. Hence fix the space first then move.

Q4 pulls back pronouns and adjectives to their sources, and then forward to the present. - the pristine before self. Clean Worlds is an example of this type of process.

Why is emergence recursive not repetitive?
The next question applies to the last answer. Like the satir "how do you feel about that feeling" applied recursively. The layers of emotion, space, time, movement are navigated through the emergence. Why 6 not other numbers - nature is efficient.

What kind of relationship is the relationship between the days of the week and dissociation?
The 7 days of the week are one of the oldest cultural hypnoses; they pervade our experience subtly and at every level. The archetype of each day through the week reflects perfectly any negotiation, mediation, meeting, session, life, week, day, experience - it is fractal in our lives. In dissociation the separated parts are 6 steps apart - literally Sunday to Friday, with the Saturday pause point.

Why does the whirly-gig work, and when should it be used?
a) complex numbers for a complex world - spinning in a psychoactive space is like going round a spiral staircase - technically its called a Riemann Surface.
b)Once the information has been fully uploaded and networking is starting to happen, and in cases where the directions of focus are the important factors, and when unconsciousness is involved - body movement due to coma, operations, anaesthetic effects.

These are short answers and more could be said, maybe too much has been said. ;-)

Beyond this, David was right at the end of his journey with the cards to separate the asker of questions out - to eliminate "F" in ABCDeF. Completely removing F is part of completely removing projections from other people - so that the client's mind can actually get to work on all the stuff it has to understand. Therefore, in my own developments, I created the question/instruction:

"Represent the story of your [life/issue/family/people/race/culture/land/religion/job...].

The person goes and does this 6 times over and by the end they seem to be in right understanding and free of mind - takes a few days! No facilitator needed, but having a clean space free of projections is really important - no interruptions, mobiles, etc etc because they all interrupt and stop the processing. This is why I'm moving to a farm to have small groups, each person cocooned in their own process. Even observers get in the way of emergence.

So for people to heal themselves give them instructions to prepare their autobiography - 6 times! No more coaches, no more therapists or trainers, just time to let mind do its work. His job was done, and he knew it! And nothing exists without a purpose.

I hope these short answers help, though I expect longer ones maybe required?

love Steven

[forumadmin]

For those new to the concept of emergence, you might like to try a visit to Wikipedia on the subject here It's one example of David's brilliance in drawing from all sorts of fields of thought and applying them to his own developing thinking.

Some of us may know where we would go next with it, we can't guess where he would have gone next.

[Corrie van Wijk]

I haven't read all of this above, just like to cheer Steve: "I worry seriously that his work will be trivialised if books and presentations on his latest work go out from uninformed and non-understanding minds. I know he would just laugh and be unconcerned and separate himself from it, but I am not unconcerned."

I share this worry with you Steve, I saw you and David work together. I've been around David for four years now, and I know nobody fully understood all the things he was doing. Hence my reaction to Nancy: just share your experience of him and realize that is only part of the elephant.

But if anyone understood what Emergence was about, it must be you Steve, although I'm not sure what you've been up to lately.

I'll be on anyone's case also, if they try to simplify or trivialise David's work.

Corrie

[phil]

Thanks to all for the interesting posts about EK and to Steve for trying to summarise your take on your work and David's - I know it was extensive and it's pretty complex to understand, even done briefly, for which another thank you. I do have several questions below but first a point about trivialised and simplified.

I don't know anyone who wants to trivialise David's work; as far as I know he didn't really make enemies, did he? Plenty of us challenged aspects of it and he always seemed to welcome that and ask our opinions.

As far as simplifying goes, my question is this: is his latest work only then to remain the property of those who understand it in all its complexity? If so, it will be a very exclusive club.

Questions about EK

If David's emergence iterative procedures works best with the facilitator non-present, utterly clean in other words*, what need of an expert in the whys and wherefores of the philosophy to facilitate the work? I can understand the RESEARCH and DEVELOPMENT of the process needing that exploratory, innovative, creative intelligence. Could it be that someone who DOES simply run through the 6 iterations and 'pauses on the 7th day' as it were could achieve whatever the purpose of doing it is? What could be cleaner?

Can a person facilitate him/herself using the 6 iterations, without any interlocution or physical or remote (e.g. by phone) presence from a facilitator (apart from perhaps initial procedural instructions)?

If 'nothing exist without a purpose', what's the purpose of David's work around emergence? Is it a therapy, a philosophy, a modus vivendi or something other?

I'd love to hear others' experiences working with David in his emergence period. I think that would at least include Carol, Deborah, Steve B and Caitlin.

Phil

* which I would think it would, if it were possible for the facilitator to not have any effect, big F or little f.

Phil

[Corrie van Wijk]

David was still developing emergence and didn't want me to write about it yet. I know he changed the questions from when he first worked on it with Steve.

I asked him what the similarity was between a chaotic system and a human brain, and he had some ideas about it.

I don't believe anyone can do the process on his or her own, if you can solve your problems yourself, you don't need to turn to a therapist.

Corrie

[phil]

I don't believe anyone can do the process on his or her own, if you can solve your problems yourself, you don't need to turn to a therapist.

I take your point about problems and turning to a therapist. Perhaps a facilitator is needed to maintain and protect the sanctuary of space and time wherein I can self-model. Steve's farmhouse sounds like something or this kind.

Still I wonder if anyone has tried using the iterative process reflexively for non-problem modelling.

And... Steve you say:

So for people to heal themselves give them instructions to prepare their autobiography - 6 times! No more coaches, no more therapists or trainers, just time to let mind do its work.

That 'just time'... how easily do most of us find 'just time' and use it in this way? Sounds simple. Again, personally, I find that without someone else around, I tend to distract myself, not stick with the process, start thinking about something else. That may be unique to me, I suppose - I'll be surprised if it is.

I can imagine a kind of self-modelling education: where clients are given the instructions and coached to follow them a few times then left to make their explorations in a sanctuary space, similar to Steve's farmhouse 'retreat'.

Perhaps a relevant model from the UK is an Arvon creative writing course. Around 12 people on the course I think; mornings are some group activity (character creation, readings, exercises, input from the 2 'tutors') then the entire rest of the day is for writing. There are desks in every room and small writing cabins all around the grounds where people can work undisturbed. The tutors are available for feedback by appointment. A visiting author spends one evening midweek reading from and answering questions about their work.

Phil

[Corrie van Wijk]

I'd like to think of the space of C as context, the Latin verb 'contextere' meaning literaly 'weaving together'.

Even if you don't do anything as a facilitator, you still create a context. Just your presence, especially if you are a strong personality, has influence on your client.

I agree that doing this work sometimes needs a space away from the world, but it can be any space that works for your client, like the M5 to Bristol.

Get out of your offices, walk in the park, create a safe context and hold the space.

Corrie

[MatthewH]

Steve,

Your posts here are great reading and very interesting, I am sure your insights and current developments into EK are invaluable.

As to the trivialised / simplified nature of EK, my thoughts reflect that of Phil's. For one to run these processes they are to be as simple as possible, as you have already presented in:

"Represent the story of your [life/issue/family/people/race/culture/land/religion/job...].

The person goes and does this 6 times over and by the end they seem to be in right understanding and free of mind - takes a few days!

I consider that the underlying structure of what is going on within the clients head, (and can we really be sure we would know anyway?) is of utmost importance to developers and trainers of this material, although not to clients - and maybe partly to facilitators...

I feel that there is some significant research to be done to confirm the processing and results of EK, this work and other relevant studies would form an excellent grounding to the 'understanding' and moving of EK forward.

I am really looking forward to the development of this discussion.

Best regards,

Matthew

[super_yacht@hotmail.com]

Hi All,
Why is emergence recursive not repetitive?


Recursive questions sound like the same old (repeated) question again and again. But each repetition guides the recipient to new levels of understanding (from what emerges). The questions are not content-orientated, seeking to maintain the context of the emergent knowledge. Like repetitive spinning (again in 6’s) you never return to quite the same place, spinning through time/space as on a helix or like travelling along a spiral. Thus retuning to the same direction but a different space from where a new perspective emerges.
Recursivness is some thing David talked about as long ago as 13 November 1998 at the Clean Language Research Day in London.
What emergence has brought is the timing and awareness of the delivery of the questions. When the clients system is ready for the next question which may be seconds or minutes (I’ve had cases where it can be hours). This timing is one of the challenge for EK practitioners.

My answer to Steve’s question
John

PS it was the M5 Corrie

PPS Steve explains the 6 questions 'Represent the story of your' in a short sentence, there is obviously a lot more going on, both said and unsaid which he hasn't mentioned.

[Corrie van Wijk]

"I consider that the underlying structure of what is going on within the clients head, (and can we really be sure we would know anyway?) is of utmost importance to developers and trainers of this material, although not to clients - and maybe partly to facilitators..."

David always tried to teach things as simply as possible and taylor-made. He worked with Carol on a format for coaches and John wrote down a syllabus for Keiko to work with. Indeed, that is a different story than to develop this material, which is work for genii like Steve and David.

I'll give a summary of it shortly.

Corrie

[Steve Saunders]

No point being an exclusive club. And also no point pontificating about something I know nothing about ...

Re: David wanting to eliminate the facilitator; that is to reduce the projected "you" from the facilitator to the client; he was still present "holding the space" - probably not the best metaphor, but even his card carries a projection. The work works best when the facilitator knows why they are doing what they are doing! In other words a logical scientific predictable basis for the process. Why? Because ALL HEALING IS PLACEBO. And so a good line in plausible reasons and scientific jargon works best in todays world.

Re what could be cleaner than a person unknowingly repeating 6/7b q's? Loads
First the questions work best when asked from whole body and transmitted to whole body to be receivable where the "aspect of self" is. so a person who comes from their head is not clean, and neither is a heart-centred person. The "wholer" the facilitator in terms of pronouns being 1:1 scale with the body, the cleaner the interaction.

I've used the 6's and emergence a lot on myself and also a lot with clients where they do so on themselves. So yes it works in the right space to self-reflexively do it. And its easy to self-distract and that is where a F helps. As the pronouns are more 1:1 self-distraction reduces until its mostly gone - that after all is the evidence of No Mind; completion.

The purpose of David's work around emergence; like all his work; migrating the not-here-and-now pronouns to here and now.

As john says, there is a lot more going on, than just the questions. Delivery, pacing very different from SyM, how to ask questions, WHEN, when to wait, direction inside or outside, how to use metaphor in space or emergence.

Matthew: we have now run this work with about 100 clients over 7 day retreats, extensively testing the work. Consistently the results speak for themselves.

Re: Story of your ... make sure whatever ... is chosen, also the "not ..." is also addressed with the same process either afterwards or in parallel. For a purpose - Guess!

love Steven

[phil]

Steve Saunders: The work works best when the facilitator knows why they are doing what they are doing! In other words a logical scientific predictable basis for the process. Why? Because ALL HEALING IS PLACEBO. And so a good line in plausible reasons and scientific jargon works best in todays world.

It's a fascinating area, the setting up of a piece of work. I suppose most facilitators and therapists use some kind of preamble to set up their process to achieve a desired outcome. The placebo effect is well established description. Still, with phrases like 'a good line', 'plausible reasons' and 'scientific jargon', is this the facilitator as wizard?

Are you saying that your process, indeed, all healing, requires a benign subterfuge by the facilitator up front so that the client can have confidence in the facilitator and the process, before committing to the 6 recursive iterations and so on and thus genuinely healing themselves?

If the plausible reasons and scientific jargon are smoke and mirrors, what's really going on? How do David's processes really work? Well, I suppose in that all this work happens in the realm of perception, 'really' is a vague term. Still, I'd be grateful if you'd clarify for me what you mean around tha 'good line'.

I agree with Matthew that more clinical research is needed (true of all of David's processes and spin-offs).

Could you say more about the pronouns for those who have not heard how they relate to David's work?

Steve Saunders: Re what could be cleaner than a person unknowingly repeating 6/7b q's? Loads
First the questions work best when asked from whole body and transmitted to whole body to be receivable where the "aspect of self" is. so a person who comes from their head is not clean, and neither is a heart-centred person. The "wholer" the facilitator in terms of pronouns being 1:1 scale with the body, the cleaner the interaction.

Could you give us your take on what 'clean' is? From the above, for you, 'clean' in the communication between facilitator and client requires

• the facilitator to be 'whole' and
• the communication from that wholeness to reach the client wherever they are in relation to their body at that moment?

Does 'clean' for you also take into account what is being communicated? For example, if a facilitator communicates as above and is transmitting their own opinions and interpretations, where is that on a continuum between clean and not-clean?

Anyone else got any thoughts about what difference it does or doen't make having a facilitator present?

[Steve Saunders]

Ok Phil, here I go!

Regarding "a good line": Clean as a concept cannot be measured because it is a great illusion.
Every single question is a hypnotic induction, it comes from a source within the facilitator, travels to the client and ends up where it ends up depending upon the interaction of question form and client system. Any therapy or business model or science requires a good rationale - people did not initially believe Newton or Einstein - the maths helps!

David was a master of hypnotism, trained in Ericksonian methods. His workshops were designed as "Theatre", he spoke of the need for importance and reverence - referring to the "sacred" and the "profane". In group facilitation he would run parallel inductions using the same process for a number of people (Inner Child workshop, Glastobury, December 05).

The setting-up of work creates a sacred world where healing can occur. It requires relationship, belief, connection, ideally group mass belief. If the set-up (induction) works then the healing can work, if not then people leave - and I've seen them leave his workshops, too.

Most humans live in the dreamworld of projection - in trance. Hence the NLP world view of everyone being a magician! (Structure of Magic Volume 1 Chapter 1).

YES, I AM SAYING THAT A BENIGN SUBTERFUGE HAPPENS. And not just in this work, in all human interactions - except those between Llamas!

And it is the facilitators job to be the wizard (your metaphor). You can be in denial of this, but David was not, quote: "David, the 6 questions don't always work." "They do when I ask them." Enough said?

Regarding "Clean"; it is a philosophy to minimise the intrusion from the practitioner into the client. Degrees of clean exist - opinions can be expressed without impacting them on another person, and clean questions can be loaded with emotional projection. Ideally the F is unattached to the content of the answer and treats ALL information equally. Ideally the question asked is the one required by the client system.

A facilitator must have a model though - whether its the SyM PSO or emergent navigation ot well formed outcomes, there is a projected F model. The belief and confidence in this model affects the outcome - placebo!

So, I love the philosophy of "clean". David spoke of "cleaner than clean" regarding emergence from six perspectives - 1) algorithm - a pattern of questions that reduces F choices further thus less projections, 2) complete unconcern for answers to questions or instructions, 3) less complications in navigation decisions on the part of F, 4) questions coming from whole body - it took me months to get this bit, 5) delivery roundedness (verbalisations and word patterns), 6) question form internally adjacent.

For deeper issues I do need an F or I get distracted, also. Read "The Amber Chronicles" relating to "walking the pattern" for insight here.

Hope these answers help ...

love Steven

[Steve Saunders]

1. Every single verb has an associated pronoun - i/me/you/myself/it/oneoneself/yourself/<name>

and every single one of these is held in a location or a movement. As the French have some 12000 verbs we have a lot of pronouns (ref. Bescherel)!

The pronoun is either "here and now" or not. The pronouns are distributed in different parts of the body - or outside! By locating, size/shaping and then navigating around (*), the pronouns can migrate and rescale to become the same size as the body.

(*) The navigations go from here and now via strangely scaled worlds/spaces to other pronouns etc etc until the here and now is regained. It appears that we have measured 6 spaces between pronouns now and so the world of clients reflects this.

2. The "you" pronoun is particularly pernicious - it is in the questions, it is not embodied as a rule. And that's the trouble with the questions - if F asks the "you" and its the "I" or the "me" that needs to answer then there is a problem. So therefore in questions:

"and what could that "me" know?"

more later

love Steven

[phil]

Thanks, Steve, for explaining that.

I'm relatively unfamiliar with David's approach to pronouns - I've only done a couple of exercises and had himself (sic!) work pronouns with me along with others in a group session of a workshop. So I'd love to know more about the theoretical background of yer maun's approach by asking these questions (of anyone who has experience of working with pronouns in the David Grove way) :

What is David's definition of a pronoun?

The linguistic roots of 'pronoun' comes from 'pro' + 'nomen' i.e. 'for the noun' or 'in place of the noun': is there any reason to suppose that personal pronouns are different to any other labels or symbols for the experience of identity?

In other words, did David deem pronouns to be part of a client's constructed landscape or to be something other?

I ask this because my (little) experience so far is that whenever a facilitator has interrogated a Phil-entity pronoun e.g. 'and where is that I?', the question seems to go to the same Phil-entity no matter which pronoun was used.

If I think now of me when I was 9 years old * it's as if time-space perception/projection shifts but the entity is no different: I-9 is the same as I-now (some would say there lies the problem!**).

In the paragraph above, the I, the me, the I-9 and the some all go to the Phil-entity, which is unchanging. What changes is the time and location of the projected experience. me and I-9 are in the bedroom related to 9 years old, I-now is here and now (well, it was when I wrote it!) and some is there and now, 'there' being outside my body slightly forward and to the right.

So after all that I am wondering, are pronouns in EK another description for the experience also described elsewhere as perceptual positions?



*- okay, I just wrote that phrase without consciously constructing it to be a good example of different times and pronouns in the same sentence, noticed it then went back and coloured it to use as a conscious example for this piece

** similarly an unconscious statement - 'some' is a Phil-entity pronoun, since AFAIK no-one has ever said 'there lies the problem!' to me in this context

[phil]

YES, I AM SAYING THAT A BENIGN SUBTERFUGE HAPPENS. And not just in this work, in all human interactions - except those between Llamas!

And it is the facilitators job to be the wizard (your metaphor). You can be in denial of this, but David was not, quote: "David, the 6 questions don't always work." "They do when I ask them." Enough said?

"To know enough's enough, is enough to know" Lao Tzu

I don't think your quote proves David believed it was the facilitator's job to be a wizard (my metaphor). Earlier you said

David wanting to eliminate the facilitator; that is to reduce the projected "you" from the facilitator to the client

which to me seems at odds. And to have a different opinion is not necessarily to be in denial. I was checking I had understood what you are saying and it seems I did.

Nit-picking apart...

It could be that the facilitator has to be a wizard/expert. I don't know, I fervently hope not. A world peopled with heroes implies villains and victims and with them all the entailments of the formulaic melodramas that loop on our TV screens 24/7.

There are so many approaches out there that claim to have the magic way or the magic person. I suppose I am looking for a way of working with someone as a client and as a facilitator that doesn't set the facilitator above the client as 'the one who knows', the expert, the wizard and doesn't require the client to modify their landscape to match the belief system of the process.

I don't know if that exists or can exist. A good step in the right direction is someone who doesn't want to be the expert. In my own experience of him as my facilitator, I think David did sometimes manage to keep himself out of my trance sufficiently to let me find my own way. He could put his ego aside and let me be. Those were the times when I had the most meaningful experiences.

[Corrie van Wijk]

Steve: "Clean as a concept cannot be measured because it is a great illusion."

No-one ever claimed that a 'clean' approach means that there is no interaction at all between the facilitator and the client, just that by means of asking clean questions we try to minimize the facilitator's influence and to maximize the flow of the independent thought process of the client. There is nothing magical about that, and David would be the very last person to have any ambition in that direction. David claimed to be a brain mechanic, and indeed he was: if you find the exact time and location of a problem you can solve it right there and right then: it is a physical thing that needs to be fixed, there is no placebo-efffect involved.

Corrie

[Steve Saunders]

Hi Phil and Corrie,

Phil: my (projected) experience of you is as a "very grounded, centred and solid" human being, and it would be of no surprise to me that you answer the same for all pronouns - this is, after all, a definition of healthiness!

And also, 1) the timing of the age question is crucial - ask after navigating spaces not at the beginning, and 2) some people have a "cosmological" boundary that stops access to the aspects of unconsciousness that know the age etc. So, some questions do not work with everyone's present structure. In your case I'm more inclined to believe your answer is as it is: the here and now can access freely memories etc.

I agree 100% that the facilitator must withdraw their ego 100% (as far as possible!) by being impartial, equanimous(?) and indifferent/accepting to content of answers. And that is why "Clean" is such a great philosophy to underpin personal development.

Nonetheless, is there no F responsibility? A client would start and finish in the here and now, just like a good timeline! The F has to recognise this state in the client? The F has to understand space and time and metaphor and navigation ... and use knowledge for the benefit of the client. No?

Corrie, I'll just disagree on the placebo if that's ok with you. Let us enjoy the different points of view. I agree about the mechanic fixing metaphor! :-)

love Steven

[webmaven]

Sorry folks, I just couldn't resist jumping in here. I have a great photo of David from his days at Eldon with a t-shirt he wore frequently that states, "Manure Movers of America."

Yes, he was also a mechanic (and possibly a bit of a wizard) with an incredible instinct for precision work, but I think he understood his real purpose was to help things move, to facilitate the client's self-organization, to assist the client in exploring and defining his/her psychescape. He certainly loved the challenge and the artistry involved in that process. And don't forget that impish sense of humor. ;-)

As this discussion evolves, it seems to me more and more that emergence is cutting-edge-of-cutting-edge. I hope that there can be more research and development on his newest ideas, and I would love to learn more about the more practical results of the emergence work.

Steve, you say that you have done seminars with 100 people ("Consistently the results speak for themselves," as you said). What are the differences you’ve seen from the beginning to the end of the 7 days?

The whole idea of "pronouns being 1:1 with the body" is kind of a wild concept for me to understand. What does that mean? How do you rescale the pronouns? What does that entail?

Also, is the question Steve posed in one of his first threads on this list the only question asked in emergent work ("Represent the story of your [life/issue/family/people/race/culture/land/religion/job...”])? I'm just curious. Still trying to get a feel for the process. I remember David told me once that it doesn't really matter what the answers are, if you can just ask the right questions.

webmaven

[Corrie van Wijk]

Steve: "Corrie, I'll just disagree on the placebo if that's ok with you. Let us enjoy the different points of view. I agree about the mechanic fixing metaphor!"

No Steve, you cannot just state something and then disagree with me without putting in an argument. Perhaps the placebo is not a good metaphor for what is happening, since a placebo is a replacement for a medicine that has been proven to work.

If you agree about the mechanic fixing metaphor, you must admit that something is done that is effective.

Now, you're a scientist, let's hear it.

[super_yacht@hotmail.com]

Hi Webmaven,
Having co-delivered most of the courses with Steve I’ll give you my perception.
The results from the 7-day course have changed since we started delivering them. David lived in Glastonbury with Steve and Josie and the evolution of Emergent Knowledge coincided with the evolvement of the courses. Having started with Deborah Henley David worked closely with Steve and others over 18 months. He attended one 7-day course and then only for an afternoon, but his influence was behind Steve’s evolution of these early courses.

Everyone is unique coming with their own life experience so the results are just as varied. Some who have had a reasonably stable life (less fragmented) show small results, such as improving their position in life, moving house, changing jobs (as in my wife’s case). Some have really changed their positions in life, several attendees have found the jobs that they have long sort for, relationships with children and partners have been a large movement. One attendee almost on the point of separation is now enjoying their relationship better than ever, while another made the step they had been putting off.
I could go on because of the uniqueness of each of us the results are anecdotally.

Because part of the work, in David’s words is ‘the system self organises’ and this doesn’t all happen in the moment, changes can occur over weeks and system realignment may take a year or two. Changes are across the board, however as the client is living it they don’t see the change and its only when they discuss it 6 months later that on reflection they realise the changes.

One of the interesting results is that in bring ‘back to wholeness or oneness’ they bring back into themselves the life force held in the fragments. A normal result is wrinkles and aging slips away, they appear years younger, one attendees daughter even commenting ‘I didn’t realise you were going on a beauticians courses’.

Probably the greatest feedback I had was from a woman who attended for one day as a client for our trainees. –“my doctor told me last week (after 5 years of psychotherapy) he didn’t know what more he could do and I should go out and find a miracle, …and I found you?”

I’m no longer working with Holigral (delivering my own courses) but believe Steve like David will never stand still and his work in emergence and courses move on as I’m sure do the results.

Regards
John Farrell

[Steve Saunders]

Ok plenty to answer.

Corrie, I choose not to debate te placebo effect on the forum. I restate my belief that all healing is placebo; drug, homeopathic, coaching and psychotherapy. Why etc are outside of "clean" discussion in my opinion.

It's actually 75 different clients on 7-day retreats, a few repeats and about 15 clients of people learning the techniques on 5-day event. so, nearly 100 people or thereabouts.

The results: typically as John said, they look younger, changes are permanent except for the few who choose to accept things as they already are/were. Other people say the delegates faces have changed; they get spontaneous hugs at work, and people around them are generally happier; life is "lighter". However, there is a downside; some people have not completed and then family projections etc can cause major re-traumatisation. And because I need to be able to hold space for completion I'm moving from the 7-day form to a permanent retreat where people may well still come for a week but which can be open-ended, allowed a more balanced exit. Results are also in terms of migrated pronouns (i, me, you, myself, one, <names>, <nicknames>" etc - they are same size as the body. The finishing conditions for emergent scaling are a psychoactive at-one-ment between the inner/outer child and the present person's body. There then follows a growing-up of the frozen aspect over a few hours or days.

No, certainly the "story" instruction/question is not the only one by any means, just my latest experiment. And it needs balancing with "the story of the world around you" or some people might excite a psychosis. It's powerful stuff and requires care - and I take ever more care every time.

Now, the D space stuff needs clarifying - maybe on the other thread - e comes from anywhere but A, including adjacent to A (A'). D I took to represent the holding dimensions of time and C space, but there I differed from David, something he was ok with but differed. D in his sense was beyond the "3" questions - entering the unknown words outside of the scope of reach of the ABC lived-in world. So C would hold questions 123 but D 456. The space between D and F was something David and I discussed. To explore it, try this:

"and what kind pf space could the space be between me (f) and my client?" and then ask of the 5 further spaces between the answer and the client. you will get a surprise!

[Corrie van Wijk]

Steve: "Corrie, I choose not to debate the placebo effect on the forum. I restate my belief that all healing is placebo; drug, homeopathic, coaching and psychotherapy. Why etc are outside of "clean" discussion in my opinion."

"Every single question is a hypnotic induction, it comes from a source within the facilitator, travels to the client and ends up where it ends up depending upon the interaction of question form and client system.[...] David was a master of hypnotism, trained in Ericksonian methods."

"David also accepted everyone as they are. He only taught or passed on what others could understand of his work, and he was indifferent to the opinion of others."

"I worry seriously that his work will be trivialised if books and presentations on his latest work go out from uninformed and non-understanding minds. I know he would just laugh and be unconcerned and separate himself from it, but I am not unconcerned."

When we drove back from the jazz-concert last autumn, David talked about his hypnotic voice and said he had not used that for a long time, because he didn't want people to go in trance.

To me, if you talk about a placebo-effect, you are either trivialising David's work or you are stating that the mind is more powerful than any drug or treatment.

If it would be the first, I'll be on your case.

If it would be the second, that's exactly what clean is about: getting the person to map his or her own mind and heal it. That is an effective treatment, not a placebo.

I cheered you on this forum Steve, but I have another perspective on this.

Love,

Corrie

[Steve Saunders]

Corrie, it is the second - the mind/soul is more powerful than any drug. Hence I call it by its name "placebo" - because this is precisely showing that it is the mind instructing the body in all cases - chemicals are merely "NLP anchors" in my view. I am certainly not trivialising the work. And I see this VERY clearly, no need for a therapist. The mind/soul/spirit is all-powerful in my world view; one I'm very happy with, and one that supports the extraordinary healing through this work; like remission of arthritis, disappearance of breast lumps, regaining of menstruation and the having of a child, creation of melatonin in a person previously extraordinarily white - they now tan.

[Steve Saunders]

Inner implies within the body (contracted), outer outside (dissociated).

99.99% of communication is from the child not the "here and now", because the true "here and now" has nothing to say except when so required in response to others. It is called "no mind" or "the void".

A major key to the magic of David's work was his innate reading and understanding of the real meaning of communications - he could infer the child world from the present communication. It's a skill I've been gradually developing through deduction and trial predictions of child landscapes from early signal in an session or retreat. So likewise on this forum, most communication is between our individual collectives of children, and little is from the wise adult (me included ;-) ).

Because he answered "where do people go when they dissociate?" he also knew that mind then emerges to try to solve the cause of the dissociation, and that it stays active until it has resolved the cause. So inner peace comes from resolving life's traumas or from accepting them as they are. Now, the signals from the dissociations are the thoughts words gestures nonverbals, "feelings in response to environment" and movements. When a person is present who actually recognises these signals for what they are, the "system" knows and expects to be resolved because it is being "heard".

A way of escaping the torrent of communication from the client's collective is to divert to paper/pens etc - brilliant! Otherwise the poor old F gets overwhelmed and burnt out. Hence "clean" - or at least one of the reasons for it.

The second reason is about projection - as it is the cause of the introjected inner child/inner dult from without, and because its absence is required to enable the mind to really get to work on resolving the past, the F has to find a way to not project or to minimise projection.

The third aspect is a collection: repeatability, ease of Facilitation, and transfer of simple process to enable others to get similar results; to reduce the F input to "handle turning" - thus sequences of questions were called "algorithms", and his work went from service to information, to service to space, to service to algorithm, ...

So these discussions serve our needs for expressing or gaining right understanding of the work (well at least in my case they do.)

love Steven

[Corrie van Wijk]

Wouldn't it be time for a second Emergent Knowledge Conference. How about Calais at lunch, over a fruits-de-mer?

[Steve Saunders]

Hi Corrie,

Which event was the 1st EK Conference? And why separate this from CL conference?

I have a prior commitment to go to a wedding in Menorca during the weekend of the June CL conference, which is such a disappointment for me. I'm trying to get someone to represent my proposed topic "Clean Motion".

I would attend an emergent get-together of those who shared in the emergent times, to discuss and present our different perspectives. Calais has better food than Dover, I guess?
Well, its a long journey for all, so if one were to happen then it needs purpose, organising, and 6 or 7 people of course!

Is there somewhere you know in Calais, else if we travel that far we might as well ask Jennifer if she can host the group? Personally I'll pass on the "fruits de mer" though - the placebo effect of shellfish on my body is not great!

I think conference is too grand a title for discussing Emergence - a "working group" might be a better title. I have made extensive manuals now and I am happy to share the contents. Currently I'm upgrading and rationalising them, but that is part of a wider philosophy that's my own path, and very much a path benefiting from the time with David, but going onwards. I'm not really interested in remodeling what I have understood clearly already. Though I am very willing to aid in helping others understand - but only if they ask.

My present research is in the missing language of English - "pre-verbs" and decoding movement using gerand-form questions. It still fits under the Emergent and Clean headings in terms of philosophy, just aware that English is an object-oriented language ill-suited to describing movement. We even represent dance with foot positions and music with dots. This is our cultural (occidental) blind spot - we need an equivalent of Native American to describe process or momentum. Currently my best approximations are of the form:

"while you are moving, what are you [experiencing/knowing/sensing], while you are moving?"
"keep moving, and what are you experiencing as you keep moving"

this is part of "clean motion" - only half our world is coded in locations (space or time), the other half is in movements and the old questions interrogated those spatially using static forms like "and what does that finger know?" - because it came from "space thinking".

so, I'm developing "momentum thinking" and it needs dance and music and gerand questions, so right now "Bollywood" is the business as far as I'm concerned!!

love Steven

[Corrie van Wijk]

The first conference was in Auckland a few years ago. Carol knows.

Calais is convenient, because I wouldn't have to go on a boat to England, which saves me costs, and anyone coming from England wouldn't need to take a car.

It doesn't need organizing, except Noémie might advise us on a restaurant. The two of us would be a start, anyone wanting to join in would be welcome. As for the menu fruits-de-mer is not compulsory.

[Steve Saunders]

ok I remember now - I was tempted at the time!

Well I guess there's enough of us to meet in a room for a couple of days!

Can you make a fruits de mer last that long?

What do you want there, though? What's the purpose? If we are going to do two days travel and invest in time/money, then we need a good enough reason. Surely the forum and skype phone calls can serve in the meantime?

I guess a topic could be "tunnel vision"?

We are likely to move to SW France ASAP (Josie/me), so then you don't need a boat to meet us unless the sea levels rise and Holland floods! London would be a bit Venice-like then, too.

love Steven

[phil]

Steve S: ...that English is an object-oriented language ill-suited to describing movement. We even represent dance with foot positions and music with dots. This is our cultural (occidental) blind spot - we need an equivalent of Native American to describe process or momentum. Currently my best approximations are of the form:

"while you are moving, what are you [experiencing/knowing/sensing], while you are moving?"
"keep moving, and what are you experiencing as you keep moving"

this is part of "clean motion" - only half our world is coded in locations (space or time), the other half is in movements and the old questions interrogated those spatially using static forms like "and what does that finger know?" - because it came from "space thinking".

so, I'm developing "momentum thinking" and it needs dance and music and gerand questions, so right now "Bollywood" is the business as far as I'm concerned!!

Phil: Interested in your movement research. In 2006 or 2005 I helped Jennifer run a Clean Space training in Normandy and we experimented with movement in the workshop on the loose presupposition that 'movement is the language of space'. As you may know, Jennifer has connections to the Feldenkrais discipline.

I made up an exercise for that workshop that people might like to try today.

Exercise

Everyone stands. In groups, I suggest only the facilitator speaks and participants don't respond verbally until feedback afterwards. Facilitator allows time between questions for people to process (for me space processing is slower and more profound than language work).


Obviously 'associated with' is extra language that's not needed and I presume the EK cognoscenti may would have a different suggestion to replace 'What do you know here?', 'What does this space know?' etc.

An alternative to try might be (italics denote optional):



Movement language

There is an internationally accepted (written) notation for dance and movement called Benesh Notation. It's how versions of ballets by long dead choreographers are recreated and is also used by clinicians and physiotherapists apparently. You can see examples and read more here. This is from the description of the system from that link.

Benesh Movement Notation is a universal language that provides:

• a true and accurate, 3 dimensional representation of movement including precise indication of the whereabouts of people and their relationship to one another within the working space, the directions in which they face and their paths of travel, and the movement and positions of the limbs, head, hands, feet and body

(snip)

I wonder if a spoken movement language is needed? What would it be for?

[phil]

I was at what was billed as the first EK conference in Auckland. I think it had been advertised quite late and in the end became more like a workshop with less than 10 people, as I recall.

The EK process that he presented at that time, December 2006 I think, was as follows:

1. Write down some words on a piece of paper
2. find a space for you
3. find a space for piece of paper
4. is this the right space for A?
5. Is this the right space for B?
6. Is the distance right (C)?
7. What do you know from here now? (A)
8. What do (the words) know? (B)
9. What kind of space is C? Get a metaphor (C)
10. what does (M) know? (C)
11. what do you know now? (A - listen to response and wait for the end bit)
12. is there another space?

Other notes I made in no particular order:

• You need to be finicky about the detail of the space -- they won't because it is socially abnormal
• often the best quality info comes right at the beginning
• emergent info has a short half life
• radar metaphor: Fourier analysis -- take the noise into account, don't filter it -- noise is the stuff you can't make sense of -- so you need to manage complexity
• narrative is not news
• David differentiating between Data, Information and News --
  • Data data makes no difference
  • Info is data that does make a difference
  • News is data that may go on to make a difference
• there's an owner for the information
• if it's difficult where you are, moved to someone else
• metaphorical barriers as you interrogate them gradually re-scale themselves to life-size
• ask a question that gives an answer you can draw
• at least six spaces to begin network
• asked about the knowing of the space
• questions are about knowing
• go to the boundary
• don't necessarily need to pay much attention to what someone says in a particular space because other spaces will have different info
• things that are there in one field may not be there in another field
• Bear in mind the psychoactivity of the spaces
• use a light touch -- be prepared to let it go
• when you are in A, to get out of ACB system, either move backwards or turn around and move forwards
• adjacent questions: ask questions alongside A
• in emergent systems don't ask "next" questions -- devalues A -- ask adjacent questions
• heating up the system, the numerology
• the system solution will not answer the original question(note: next to this I wrote down the first line from Tau Te Ching ' the way you can go isn't the real way')
• David talked about the difference between the rhythm of a march and of a dance -- I don't remember the point he was making
• energy field has a boundary and an observer (note: I made a note from myself that 'a field is an observation')
• use the mapping to associate the words to the spaces -- when you use those words the question would go to those spaces
• Q: is there another space that would like you to go to it?
• In terms of quantity of information, there is little information at A, more information at B and lots of information in C
• you can't guide the bits of information from outside the system
• emergence is the intelligent source which provides a solution
• when you get the response "I don't know", don't rush on -- spending time with I don't know can lead to knowing -- except that "I don't know" IS the answer to your question
• questions 'emerge' the nonsensical bits of information
• ancestral information may be encoded in a present day symptom
• Phil: holding off the learning that leads to amplification is like David's old metaphor of the archer pulling back the bowstring
• making the system responsible for change
• we cannot favour one data point over another
• a problem cannot be solved by a solution of the same order
• by asking "what do those words know?" we are creating a schism between the addresses of knowledge
• systemic weak links need to be preserved because they may provide the shortcut to where we want to go
• noise travels along links
• client doesn't want to be at A, wants to be at B
• find can't get directly to B from A, ask adjacent questions and questions of C to move by different path through context D to a new emerged 'outcome' (my word)
• be a good midwife for an emergent knowledge
• not goal driven
• don't need all the facts, incomplete information is okay
• iterative process
• not about applying philosophy or principles in a top-down way, but applying heuristics and algorithms to the system to create a bottom-up emergence

[Steve Saunders]

I had heard of choreographic representation, will look into Benesh.

Regarding spoken - well there already are spoken languages that represent movement, and our gerands plus adverbs try to do it also, so there must be a purpose!

Maybe there is as little need for it as for English when people are in tune. When not however why not have language that covers both halves of measured reality - location and movement?

Thanks for the workshop notes. They are as I would have expected, which is movement asked about from a spatial perspective. It's a nice start to experimenting with interrogating movements and accelerations (pulls). I have found that I have to be moving to ask questions about moving ... sitting down while asking a moving client is for me so far much harder than also moving myself. And with hindsight I move a lot in workshops - has the advantage of reducing projection onto me from the client - staying in one space allows the client to "fix" the F - not good!

I employ a Feldenkrais practitioner on every retreat - for 1 day they do a session with each person - its a fantastic complement to the work. So great for Jennifer; an awesome combination! I've found Tuesday works best (start Fri eve finish Fr pm) for bringing in the Feldenkrais, and I employ a shamanic masseur on the Thursday to help with grounding and embodying. I've also had the group do a dance improvisation with an awesome dance teacher - wonderful the things we can combine with our work!

Thanks for the EK notes - make sense in terms of the root thoughts that have fused, and why David was so interested in my radar knowledge!

Clean Motion research has lots of things tried; so far the best results are:

Momentum Questions come from the form:

“As you are ...ing, what could that ...ing know?”
“Keeping moving, what are you knowing as you are moving?”
“As you are moving, what knowing is emerging as you are moving?”

The “as” brings in a “with a movement” form of preposition.

The “are ... ing” construct maintains a present tense gerand relating to the experience now

“while, during”; these are ongoing temporal prepositions (pre-verbs). During implies a past event so as and while are the most useful momentum prepositions.

“how, which” can also be used in question forms

If you wish I will arrange a day or so of play in terms of clean movement - or call me and we'll do it with some "volunteers"!

love Steven

[Steve Saunders]

The toughest part for me so far in working with movement is avoiding a return to spatial thinking. In even this previous sentence the locations/objects are dominating. Another way of expressing my experiencing of working with moving is experiencing falling into location thinking, resulting in losing moving.

So, seeing the differencing between the languaging of the sentencing maybe you're beginning to enjoy experiencing the moving facilitating and the now'ing that is emerging from that doing.

;-)

love Steven!

[phil]

This being is seeing
That the timing of rhyming
Will be shaking the making
And quoting of poetry...
...ing.

ing

By the way, as I dust off my 3rd-form English memories, the local linguistic landscape of -ing words includes Present Participle, Gerund and Gerundive:

"The man is walking" = Present Continuous = verb to be + Present Participle.

"The walking is great in Scotland" or "Walking is a good way to take exercise"= Gerund = verb employed as a noun (uses Present Participle) (compare: 'There are some great walks in Scotland").

"The walking man waved cheerily" = Gerundive = verb employed as an adjective (also uses the Present Participle).

I hope I'm accurate there, though it is simplified.

I talk about the grammar not because experimental processes like your Clean Motion (or should that be Cleaning Moving?) should follow the rules. The rules emerged from an enormous system via the long-term and continuing emergent process of humans trying to describe their experience. So grammar bears looking at

[super_yacht@hotmail.com]

As you know I’m practising with horses. One of the challenges here is the large space we do it in. So I’ve been working on moving (facilitator) asking the questions, while attempting to remain ‘f’ often I become part of the client’s space ‘F’.
In moving the sound of your voice creates a movement for the client and it creates a different effect. I will try out some more of the movement questions.

Physical Space changes the process, outside without physical boundaries, perception changes. In France David did a space exercise with boxes (B) outside, I’ve found this much more effective then in a room. You also are less likely to interact with others in the class. I remember David telling the story of a client who was outside in her process while David stayed inside and talked on his mobile phone

Put my name on the list for an emergent get together. Although I think Steve Calais is closer to Glastonbury than where you are off too.

Cheers
John

[Steve Saunders]

Thanks Phil and John

Phil: absolutely Grammar bears careful consideration - its the other topic I've been looking at, that sponsored my search for "pre-verbs". The differences in prepositions between languages and things like the merging of pronoun with verb in Spanish really interest me!

And of course the "ing'ing" is breaking rules of grammar because they need breaking for expressing moving in-time experience - maybe?

In terms of F and A and who is moving, or when both are moving, its a complex interaction. One key aspect is that the moving and "gerundising" quickly moves into the "now" and an emergent property of "now" is nonprojection; thus the F becomes more disentangled than in say space or even emergence. (Admittedly on small glimpses of evidence, but the kind of intuition normally I find accurate.)

Cheerio

Steven

[Corrie van Wijk]

What I would like to have happen is:
1. an inventarisation of all the material on EK so far, since I know it is scattered around England, France and the US. I know James would be very much interested in putting it into an archive.

2. Phil's notes of the First Conference are a good starting point. EK is rooted in CS. I once asked David if you could exchange space for system. He smiled, knowing I understood more of it than he wanted me to, but said: "absolutely!"

3. I think we should distinguish a sane mind that is trying to resolve a personal problem from an unhealthy mind that needs to heal. There is a huge market for the first, and it doesn't matter if you as a facilitator bring your own worldview into it. It's up to the client if he or she thinks she or he will benefit from it, and to judge the results.

4. As for the unhealthy mind that needs to heal, this may be either the result of genetical or medical causes, or a healthy reaction of the mind to protect itself from an unhealthy situation. In the first case it's a medical problem, in the second case clean is the only answer, since you need to map the client's mind.

I would like to have clean a legitimate place in psychotherapy, it is not cognitive psychotherapy, it is not NLP. If a clean approach works, the client knows that instantly, because it gives a huge physical reaction. It deserves research by neuroscientists.

[Steve Saunders]

First define mind - wikipedia says:

Mind collectively refers to the aspects of intellect and consciousness manifested as combinations of thought, perception, memory, emotion, will and imagination; mind is the stream of consciousness. It includes all of the brain's conscious processes. This denotation sometimes includes, in certain contexts, the working of the human sub-conscious or the conscious thoughts of animals. "Mind" is often used to refer especially to the thought processes of reason.

From my knowing, what I call mind is always a symptom - a symptom of fragmentation. There is no mind when right understanding exists. So I do not differentiate unhealthy and healthy minds as such. If I were to, then a functional mind does its job and dissolves; a dysfunctional mind exhibits patterns that fit traditional criteria published by the Psychotherapy and Psychiatry communities. And somewhere in between is a mind that is neither fully functional nor diagnosable to the standard criteria.

The problem for me is that to even discuss this work minds need to be functional or preferably not existing. The horrible truth of projection in its full glory awaits this condition.

The material is not that scattered actually, and some people have it all in their heads. I will use the analogy of NLP; its not about learning processes, its about knowing how to create the perfect tailored process for the scenario. David could come up with new processes at the drop of a hat and so do I. The ability to do this comes from knowing the deeper structure/the why/the how/ of what is really going on. And this requires an awareness beyond mind.

love Steven

[Corrie van Wijk]

Steve: "The ability to do this comes from knowing the deeper structure/the why/the how/ of what is really going on. And this requires an awareness beyond mind."

This needs to be verifiable, so we can distinguish between your mind and anybody elses. So you'd have to come up with some kind of understandable description, and we need to agree on our definitions or metaphors.

To me, brain is a physical structure, mind is the conscious awareness of the person at A. Only the mind has a choice; unconscious processes are inherited or programmed by experience.

An 'awareness beyond mind': how would you describe or represent that?

Corrie

[Steve Saunders]

That's the whole point; you would not need to verify if you knew what lies beyond mind.

A number of people have now attained no-mind sustainedly from my programme, and several million Tibetans, its not that rare! They can vouch for it. That will have to do whether or not anyone else likes it or not. And ...

No mind is a void like emptiness, even Lao Tzu said the TAO was indescribable in 500 BCE.

Into the void comes projections of others; that's how we know how to respond - emotions are back to front; they come from outside in the past present or future as that which cannot be inside the body of the other person who projected it. Denial is the biggest form of defence mechanism relating to projection. I've given up bothering to get other people to get this now - they will at the right time:

What you see in me is ONLY you; 100%. You cannot see me as I truly am. Do not judge me, you only judge yourself. Accept me as I am, 100% unreservedly. I do the same for you. This is the way. So, I only ask a question when a client asks me to ask one.

What I speak for you is the knowledge that the "you" in my body has placed here to be spoken to you. What I tell you about you is for me about me and what I reveal about myself is about you. And vice versa. The true universe is back to front or upside down or inside-out from how a mind sees it.

Eyes project OUT to then receive back in the reflections. The trauma of dissociation happens when the smooth flow of out-in is interrupted by a shock or when something is not understood. It is the same being looking out through every pair of eyes. Me is You.

So, you asked how to represent beyond mind; well awareness of things like the above is crystal clear, for sure, and probably normal people think you're mad! So what do they know? Not a lot!

love Steven

[webmaven]

What I would like to have happen is:
1. an inventarisation of all the material on EK so far, since I know it is scattered around England, France and the US. I know James would be very much interested in putting it into an archive.

2. Phil's notes of the First Conference are a good starting point. EK is rooted in CS. I once asked David if you could exchange space for system. He smiled, knowing I understood more of it than he wanted me to, but said: "absolutely!"

3. I think we should distinguish a sane mind that is trying to resolve a personal problem from an unhealthy mind that needs to heal. There is a huge market for the first, and it doesn't matter if you as a facilitator bring your own worldview into it. It's up to the client if he or she thinks she or he will benefit from it, and to judge the results.

4. As for the unhealthy mind that needs to heal, this may be either the result of genetical or medical causes, or a healthy reaction of the mind to protect itself from an unhealthy situation. In the first case it's a medical problem, in the second case clean is the only answer, since you need to map the client's mind.

I would like to have clean a legitimate place in psychotherapy, it is not cognitive psychotherapy, it is not NLP. If a clean approach works, the client knows that instantly, because it gives a huge physical reaction. It deserves research by neuroscientists.

I wholeheartedly agree, Corrie. If we do want clean to have a legitimate place in psychotherapy, we must be able to discuss it rationally, "with mind." So, clarity of definitions (and making our research and hopefully the results replicatable) is absolutely necessary.


Regarding #1 above, did you mean an inventory of all the material on EK so far? That would be a really good place to start, especially since there is material in at least three countries! Some gathering would be useful.

Steve,

It sounds from all of your responses that what we're dealing with here in emergent knowledge is an extremely powerful tool for healing, but one that could be absolutely lethal if misused.

The “no mind” state that you described in your last posting sounds a whole lot like psychosis and the therapist getting enmeshed in the client to me.

What I’m trying to say here is that if what we’re dealing with in the process of emergent knowledge is so powerful, it needs the utmost caution and the most stunning clarity of understanding. David never hid behind metaphysics or rhetoric and was willing to explain his theories to anyone. Simplicity and elegance were hallmarks of his clean language and clean space approach, so why all the tricks with mirrors in his latest work?

I would like to see if we can come up with a more complete comprehension of how and why emergent knowledge works (and what it is), and if we don’t know the answers, I would much rather hear “I am not sure why that works” or “I don’t know” than something else.

webmaven

[Steve Saunders]

Thanks Webmaven,

Certainly, the emergence is SO powerful it needs VERY careful F and training. Ultra-clean in fact. So ultra-clean in fact that David asked me not to teach a number of aspects and he stopped teaching them himself. Now, I will teach those aspects but only to a person who has attained "No Mind".

Agree David wanted physical explanations and evidence - using polygraph tools to measure changes in clients etc.

No Mind is not a psychosis although the deranged minds of some scientists might think so. The psychosis is mind. It's healthy for mind to emerge for understanding. Prolonged mind is unhealthy IMHO.

Strange is it not that the person who best understands this work is accused of psychosis and the unknowing mind is somehow saner? Having worked 20 years in engineering before joining this field I have a sufficient statistic to assert that people do their jobs to learn about the field of work. When I fully understood engineering I had no further interest in doing any more. Similarly now I'm withdrawing from this world once sufficient knowledge has passed onto others. The field of psychotherapists and coaches is full of people seeking to understand themselves, projected out to helping clients. I never met as manipulative people in normal business and engineering as I did interacting with UKCP etc - and I know why I had to meet those people and learn about that. I suggest the psychosis is in the mind of the perceiver - you can only see yourself, not me.

love Steven

[Steve Saunders]

YES.

My experience is that any falling off the path of ultra-clean has potential lethality. Perhaps pure emergence is too potent. Which is why I've been looking at homeopathy and the minimum dose concept.

The work is homeopathic in the sense of working with the symptoms - and indeed the two homeopaths who have learnt this work call it "homeopathy without the remedy".

Steven

[phil]

'X - and anyone who believes not-X is either deranged or psychotic'. Is that mind or no-mind? Is that accepting others 100%?

The psychosis is mind. It's healthy for mind to emerge for understanding. Prolonged mind is unhealthy IMHO.

Does that pronouncement come from mind or no-mind? What IS understanding?
understand O.E. understandan "comprehend, grasp the idea of," probably lit. "stand in the midst of," from under + standan "to stand" (see stand). If this is the meaning, the under is not the usual word meaning "beneath," but from O.E. under, from PIE *nter- "between, among" (cf. Skt. antar "among, between," L. inter "between, among," Gk. entera "intestines;" see inter-). But the exact notion is unclear. Perhaps the ult. sense is "be close to," cf. Gk. epistamai "I know how, I know," lit. "I stand upon." Similar formations are found in O.Fris. (understonda), M.Dan. (understande), while other Gmc. languages use compounds meaning "stand before" (cf. Ger. verstehen, represented in O.E. by forstanden ). For this concept, most I.E. languages use fig. extensions of compounds that lit. mean "put together," or "separate," or "take, grasp."

Can I ask you quite seriously - do you value anyone else's 'understandings'?

Whatever it is, the way (I feel) you're talking down to some of us is getting in the way of my learning.

I reckon you can afford to drop the 'H' in IMHO.

PS I've slightly reconsidered this post and moderated its tone as I was being a bit unfair IMNESHO (In My Not Even Slightly Humble Opinion)

[Steve Saunders]

Hi Phil,

Thank you.

The answer is that it depends on context and content; sometimes I do and sometimes I do not.

Mostly I do.

That's my honest answer. I'll remove the H.

love Steven

[Steve Saunders]

Well, I'd better stop telling; and instead show or ask questions ...


Has there been a time when you completely understood something?

Notice the experience by doing that something now.

If this was something truly understood then the experience will have been ...


If the experience was not truly understood then the experience will have been ...

Or "do something you have yet to understand fully." And notice the difference.


The above process should give rise to an experiential knowing of the difference between understanding something and not.

I hope this exercise helps ;-)


Steven

[phil]

Helps? Are you healing me? Maslow: 'If the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail'.

Does it follow that healers tend to expect and thus find wounds?

When you talk about being the one who 'understands this work best', and who 'fully understood' engineering, you're referring to a 'knowing' that you experience, a (sensory?) experience named 'understanding' in your system ?

Phil