The annual Conference of NLPNL, the French equivalent of the ANLP, took place on January 27-28, 2001 in Paris. I was fortunate enough to attend as one of the speakers and this article is a description of the format and content of the weekend.
The way the Conference is organised is different to its British cousin. Firstly, three presentations were given to the entire conference of about 120 delegates. This year, as all the speakers were English or American, each presentation was translated. In addition, there were a number of group activities which encouraged the delegates to share their experiences and to create an atmosphere of community.
The Conference was opened by the President, Dr. Jean-Gérard Bloch. Penny Tompkins and I were the first to speak, and it was both an honour and, since we had never been translated before, unknown territory. Fortunately we had the delightful and experienced Aude Limet translating and we soon established a rapport and rhythm.
Our presentation was entitled "Metaphors of Change". We introduced the idea and methodology for facilitating a person to self-model their own metaphors using David Grove's Clean Language, a process we call Symbolic Modelling. Being translated was relatively simple while we were describing the process. It got more complex once the demonstration started. I facilitated an English-speaking Frenchwoman in English while Penny meta-commented on the process and Aude translated all three of us! The effectiveness of Clean Language relies on the accuracy with which the client's words are utilised by the facilitator. This was graphically illustrated when the demonstration subject unexpectedly began questioning Aude's translation of her metaphors!
As often happens, the participants got a real sense of how the process works when they experienced it from the 'client's' perspective during the exercise. Once a person's Metaphor Landscape (the perceptual space around and within them which is populated by their symbols) becomes psychoactive and they have an embodied experience of the significance of their metaphors, they learn the value of self-modelling.
In the afternoon Joseph O'Connor presented "The Myth of the Well-Formed Outcome" in which he introduced some principles from system's thinking into the traditional NLP outcome elicitation technique. For example, he had the participants discover what happens when a 'random element' is impacts on an outcome. Each delegate threw a die to determine which of six questions or statements (prepared by Joseph) they should select and consider in relation to their outcome. There was an air of anticipation and excitement as participants scurried to discover their random element and then to reflect in groups on the meaning and difference it made.
On Saturday evening there followed a highly creative process of reflection and synthesis. The participants divided into groups of five or six in which they described their overall experience of the day. Then each group created a metaphor encompassing all of their descriptions, which they presented to the other delegates. A professional storyteller, Claire Descamps, who had been observing the Conference, took note of these metaphors and created an impromptu story incorporating every group's contribution. An entrancing end to the day ... except it wasn't. The group had to accomplish one more activity ... the Conference dinner.
On Sunday morning Dr. Don Beck from the USA introduced us to 'Spiral Dynamics'. Don, not an NLP'er, has developed his model from the work of Clare Graves and it is aligned with the ideas of Ken Wilber. In very simplified form, Spiral Dynamics proposes that individuals and societies develop in a natural progression of values and world views. If NLP were to incorporate the ideas of Spiral Dynamics it would mean taking into account the developmental nature of personal and cultural evolution. This could be a stretch for some NLP'ers because it proposes that not all values and beliefs are equally evolved and therefore some 'maps' are 'higher' and more advanced than others "since they encompass greater complexity in their value codes. They are not better or more worthy of respect. Each new map must, in Ken Wilber's words, 'transcend but include' all those who came before, and anticipate those on the horizon."
Don is not only a theoretician; he is actively involved in using Spiral Dynamics for cultural change. He was invited to No. 10 Downing Street in a search for ways to implement 'Third Way' initiatives in the UK and abroad. He has discussed racial issues with President Bill Clinton and reconciliation strategies with President Nelson Mandela.
In summary, the Conference was an uplifting, thought-provoking and thoroughly enjoyable experience for me. Apart from being held in one of the world's most beautiful cities, our hosts' gracious hospitality and the participant's willingness to learn combined to create a memorable weekend. We are indebted to Jennifer de Gandt of NLP Sans Frontiers for inviting us, translating our hand-outs, and generally looking after us, Joseph and Don.
One of the Conferences' key aims was the creation of an NLP community spirit and President, Jean-Gérard told me that he would like to foster greater links between the NLPNL and ANLP. I hope this happens and France and Britain further develop a European NLP Community.
James Lawley is co-author of Metaphors in Mind: Transformation through Symbolic Modelling. For access to over 50 articles and for details about how to order your copy of the book, visit www.cleanlanguage.co.uk.
Contacts:
NLPNL: perso.wanadoo.fr/nlpnl
Jennifer de Gandt: NLPSF@aol.com
Joseph O'Connor: www.lambent.com
Don Beck: www.spiraldynamics.com
The French organization NLPNL (which by some twist of Gallic logic stands for 'Association francophone des certifiés en programmation neuro-linguistique') had their 11th congress in Paris in January. I went to assist Penny Tompkins and James Lawley on an historic occasion, the first presentation of Clean Language as a foreign language - English - in a foreign language - French. The workshop was entitled 'Le Changement par les Métaphores: Introduction a l'Utilisation du "Langage Propre"'.
So a new, and I think beautiful, phrase has entered the French language. 'Langage propre' has a special sense in French. Not only does 'propre' mean 'clean', as in 'proper' or 'accurate', it also has the meaning of 'own', as in 'voir avec ses propres yeux' (to see with one's own eyes). I hope the French will take their new double entendre to heart, for it describes more precisely than English can the 'proper ownership' of language in the therapeutic context. Those of us who work in Symbolic Modelling and Grovian Metaphor believe it is the client's own words that count, not the therapist's. And if a client's language is the conscious symbolic expression of unconscious sub-symbolic processing, asking Clean Language questions of their symbols (and the aggregation of those symbols in metaphor) is an entirely propre, accurate and appropriate means of honoring their experience and facilating them to self-model effectively.
This was the first time Tompkins and Lawley have presented Clean Language in a foreign language. It was never going to be an easy ride, but as you would expect from this pair they were never less than brilliant. There were unusual challenges. In his demonstration James asked questions in English of an English-speaking Frenchwoman who answered in English, and for the benefit of the French-speaking audience both questions and answers were repeated in French by an interpreter. This meant that the bilingual client had no choice but to process James's interventions and her own responses twice over - doubly affirming, you might think, but it also prompted her to interrupt her own process several times to correct the translation, and by the time it came to ask the next question the facilitator might have forgotten much of what the client had said in response to the last. Despite these constraints the subject became deeply involved in her own process.
In the break-out exercise I worked with NLPNL's President, whose English is good but not perfect, while my French is basic. We agreed that as client he would respond in English, but feel free to go into French if English did not come easily. As facilitator I would reflect as far as I could his exact words, English or French, after which my questions could be in French or English as I chose. At the time it felt - and may sound now - like a recipe for a disaster, but strangely it went well.
I believe this is because Clean Language is clean, whatever the language. It works uncontaminated by therapist supposition, interpreatation or personal metaphor.
In fact my client lapsed naturally into French as the ritual syntax of the process took over and he found himself exploring the deeper structure of his experience. I guess it would have been more of a struggle if his answers had been long and complicated, and of course it required us to have at least a smattering of the other's language, but the experience has allowed me to appreciate David Grove's innovative work in a new light. The underlying methodology of Clean Language is strict, but as a medium of therapeutic communication it works very flexibly and forgivingly. I would have no hesitation now in facilitating someone in a two-language encounter once a reasonable level of rapport has been reached.
Those interested in different languages will find working drafts of the questions in French, Dutch, German and Italian on the www.cleanlanguage.co.uk website. Have a browse, and send me or James and Penny comments and suggestions, particularly if you have used your own version with clients in these or any other languages.
Which French version of 'And what would you like to have happen?' would you use - Et qu'est-ce que vous souheitez qu'il se passe? Ou et qu'est-ce que vous auriez voulu qu'il se passe? How would you start in German: Und was möchtest du geschiehen haben? Oder Und was möchtest du was geschieht? Any Spanish-speaking therapists out there? Greek? Serbo-Croat?
© 2001 Philip Harland
Philip Harland is a neuro-linguistic psychotherapist and counsellor specialising in Symbolic Modelling and autogenic (client-generated) metaphor therapy. More details at www.davidgrove.com/therapists. You can contact Philip by emailing philipharland@blueyonder.co.uk. Philip has an active private practice and limited time, but tries to respond to all feedback on his articles and to genuine requests for information or assistance, and if unable to help personally will refer you to colleagues or other agencies. Other areticles by Philip on this site are:
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