From: exudeb@exu.ericsson.se (Dave Breeding, xt-dGR,)
Newsgroups: sci.psychology
Subject: Re: NLP
Date: 8 Sep 92 16:01:26 GMT
Reply-To: exudeb@exu.ericsson.se
Organization: Ericsson Network Systems, Richardson TX


In article 188k0aINNl81@smaug.West.Sun.COM, dab@ism.isc.com (David A.
Butterfield) writes:
>exudeb@exu.ericsson.se writes:
>= When trying to help someone else visualize, it can be helpful to prove to
>= them that they can do it, even if they believe they can't.  One way to do
>= this is to ask them something that they are sure to know unconsciously,
>= like, "How many traffic lights are there between your home and your office."
>= Now, they probably have never actually counted them, so they will have to
>= "visualize" the whole route, counting as they go.  Only after they have done
>= it, do I point out to them that they had to be able to visualize to do it.
>= I have never found anyone that could not do this...
>
>Well, I can tell you how many traffic lights there are between my home
>and my office, but I don't call up any visual image to do that.  The
>way I do it is this:  I mentally project myself along the route from
>my home to my office, and I count each traffic light as I pass it.
>But I don't "see" a picture as I do that.  I have a strong sense of
>spatial orientation, and a "feel" for the positions and sizes and
>shapes of the objects I pass, but no picture.
>
>Dave
>-- 
>	I output a string of symbols and I observe the response.

As I observe your response ;-), I am aware of several directions we
could go from here.

1. If we were in the midst of doing some change work, I would be
satisfied with the ability you describe.  I seems that you are able to
do the things that others do "visually" without "seeing" anything.
That's fine.  It is not important that you actually see things as long
as you have a "feel" for position, size, shape, etc.  I would guess
that you would also have a "feel" for the colors of particular
buildings, and that you would be able to imagine a building being moved
to a different location, or being painted a different color.  If so,
then you would be able to do anything that I would ask of a person who
could "see" these things.

2. If you were curious about how you come to have this "feel" for
things (which I assume you haven't actually touched...buildings, etc.),
then I would be reminded of something one of my early NLP trainers
talked about, that he had once met someone who had a very keenly
developed kinesthetic sense.  For this person, sights, sounds, tastes,
and smells all had a unique "feel".  The best explanation I know for
this is that the original experiences have been translated into
feelings, apparently without loss of information.  Actually, we all do
this to some extent.  Some people can tell you the temperature of a
color, or the color of a sound, etc.  These are called synesthesias,
when the information in one sense "bleeds thru" into another sense.
Very creative people, great artists, musicians, etc. have many
synesthesias.  Mozart described his experience of musical creation as
evolving through all five of the senses until it appeared to him,
complete and ready to transcribe.  So appreciate the abilities you
have,

3. If you wanted to learn to "see" these things (and I think that was
the initial comment I was responding to), then I would suggest the
exercises that I mentioned before, and that you try some "reverse"
synesthesias.  That is, since you know where a given building is, and
its shape and size (and color?), then "what would it look like?" And
don't expect to "see" things as clearly as you see things.  Relatively
few people do.  But you can practice and improve these skills.

This would all be much easier if we could talk face to face, but I hope
this has helped.

Dave (too)
Xref: sparky sci.psychology:3740 sci.misc:1607 talk.politics.misc:44955