Yesterday evening I went to the grocery store to buy some provisions. I hadn’t really eaten much during the day and was a bit hungry. I remembered the old adage that you should never go grocery shopping when you’re hungry because, if you do, you’ll buy things you don’t need. Luckily, I noticed the Dunkin Donut shop next door and decided to have one donut as a precaution.

So I’m standing in line at the donut shop and the guy in front of me (actually, he was the only other person in the store since they closed at 6) asked for a dozen donuts. The counter girl said “if you buy six you get six for free at this time of day.”

Immediately my inner Homer Simpson took over all bodily functions and I walked out a few minutes later with a dozen donuts of my own.

Talk about a trance.

Another category of presupposition, Stressed Sentences are you verbally stress something in the sentence.
(compare the difference of the indicated voice stresses in the following:

I’m especially impressed at the FANTASTIC breakthroughs you’ve made.

I’m ESPECIALLY impressed at the fantastic breakthroughs you’ve made.

This past weekend a group of about 20 stellar humans came together for a class in Neo-Ericksonian Hypnosis in New York City. I was pleased as punch to introduce or remind the assembly of basic tenets and essential skill sets of the art of communicating hypnotically.

We spent the better part of the first day doing very little of what most people think of as hypnosis. We did do an open-eyed trance exploration in groups of two (which, in itself, was different from the stereotypical trance induction) but most of the day was sharpening our non-verbal communication skills and sensory acuity.

Of course, there was some theory and the inevitable diagrams (I love drawing diagrams),

and there were the video clips from TV and audio clips that helped add some VAK interest to the proceedings, even if folks were pretty much getting the ideas without technological assistance.

By day two we were starting playing with Ericksonian Hypnotic Language Patterns, trance tonality, and therapeutic story telling. The students were fantastic in their willingness to open themselves up to new ideas and ways of looking at hypnotic realities. I was afraid I might lose one or two during the movement trance (Qigong) or the “Both/And Logic” trance exercise but they dove right in. True Trancernauts all.

Now class, if you are reading this, I do hope you will get busy on your homework sooner rather than later. December gets a bit busy for most people after the solstice. It might be smart to  write those metaphors while it’s all still fresh in your minds…or not.  ;)

I look forward to hearing them in January when class resumes, the adventure continues, and we  go deeper into the world of Hypnosis.

Reverse Meta Model
If you are new to this blog, the explanation of what is meant by this phrase is explained in earlier posts. Here are two more categories of presuppositions that are very useful.

Change of State Verbs

(change, transform, turn into, become)

Often, when you change one small behavior, you soon transform the entire gestalt.

Change of Place Verbs

(come, go, leave, depart, enter)

If I’ve gone when you arrive, you can enter through the side door.