Another category of presupposition, Repetitive Verbs and Adverbs are verbs and adverbs beginning in “re.” Some examples include repeatedly, return, restore, renew. If you “return” something, it presupposes you borrowed it in the first place.

And you’ll discover that trance helps you restore  your whole body.

John was going to renew his subscription.

If you repeatedly do that, it might get stuck that way.

Here’s another category of presupposition. This is still in the realm of reversing the meta model because if we heard our clients using language like this we might choose to question their presupposition using the meta model.

Repetitive Cue Words are words that imply - or presuppose - that the action referred to has occurred and can or should be repeated.

(too, also, either, again, back)

I suggest you do a swish pattern again.

Well, you can also quote Ericksonian.info if you cite the site.

It’s a wonderful thing to have dessert, too.

Sally wasn’t long and tall either.

Comparative As

This is a form of a presupposition that uses the sentence structure listed below. What is being presupposed is a comparison that is non-specifically stated, but that gets a bit overlooked because of the “as” used twice.

(as………as)
I don’t know anything as powerful and profound as Ericksonian Hypnosis.

It is very hard to find a treasure trove of Hypnosis Information as profound as www.ericksonian.info.

There has never been a TV show as far-sighted as Star Trek.

Comparative

(er, more, less)

The more you study Sleight of Mouth the less slight of mouth you’ll be.

She’s sweeter in the morning.

It’s faster to fly when you have the time.

Ordinals are words like first, second, third, next, another. Words that imply more than one. This is one of my favorite categories of presupposition.

I think we’ve made some great progress in our first session, don’t you?

OK, one thing you are going to love about this new car is its styling.

I was cutting the grass when another rabbit ran out from under a bush.

This category also refers to time.

Complex Adjectives

are words like “new, old, present, former, and previous.”

Once you’ve mastered complex adjectives you’ll never go back to previous skill levels.

We are trying to return our house to its former glory.

Avid NLP learners rate dougobriensblog.com as the new must-read web site.

Hypnosis is about out growing old ways of thinking.

One can’t imagine the present standard lasting long.

Here’s another simple presupposition. This one has to do with time.

Subordinate Clauses of Time

Like these: before, after, during, as, since, prior, while, yet, now, again

I have noticed that as people practice they gain greater fluency.

While kids text constantly their attention is bifurcated.

When you find friends who stand by you when the going is hard, cherish them.

She rode the horse which sold for the highest price that year again.

It’s Tuesday. Has the guy that always wears cowboys boots comes in yet?

After you read this you will find you want to use these skills daily.

Here’s another simple presupposition (where what is being presupposed is essentially the existence of the thing.)

Relative Clauses These are complex noun phrases where the noun is followed by a phrase beginning with who, which, or that.

I have noticed that people who practice their skills become most proficient.

It’s the kids who text constantly who worry me the most.

When you find friends who stand by you when the going is hard, cherish them.

She rode the horse which sold for the highest price that year.

Tuesday afternoons the guy that always wears cowboys boots comes in.

Reverse Meta Model
A “Presupposition” is something that is pre-supposed or accepted to be true in advance of any discussion. So if you and I were arguing about whether the moon were made of green cheese or not (everyone knows it is swiss cheese) it may not even be NOTICED that we’ve both accepted as a fact the existence of a moon. If one of us were from Mars we might not be aware of moons as a thing. It is actually pretty amazing how much we presuppose. How much we believe without seriously calling it into question.

Of course, when we hear other people doing this with their language, we can use the meta model to call it into question. (I guess “calling it into question” might be another name for the meta model.) As the therapist, however, we sometime may choose to deliberately presuppose certain things into our communication. Thus we reverse the meta model.

SImple Presuppositions

Bandler and Grinder’s book, “The Structure of Magic” is a treasure trove of incredibly useful presuppositions.  Here are five “simple presuppostions:”

1. Proper Names

(Presupposing that this specific person exists)
Won’t you be delighted when Agent Scully walks through that door?

2. Pronouns

(…that this general person exists)
Won’t you be keen when she walks in?

3. Definite Descriptions

(this specific thing exists)
I liked the woman in the blue uniform.

4. Some quantifiers

(all, every, some, few, many, none, each)
Everyone has many potentials that they are unaware of, yet are there.

5. Generic Noun Phrases

(Noun phrases standing for a whole class)
I have often considered the great communicators of our time to be poets.

I suggest you write out several examples of each one above. Because, when you write them, you know you know them and they will be yours to use. Or perhaps I am wrongly presupposing that that is of interest to you.

Neo-Ericksonian Approaches

Comparisons

I am blessed with having stellar dentist who took time from his vacation to see me last week. Seems I had a bit of a dental emergency and needed a root canal. Fortunately, I was on a staycation and could easily travel to see him. He fixed me right up, gave me a script for penicillin and made an appointment for a few weeks from now.

And - as great as that is - did I mention I had a root canal?

Them mothers hurt.

So as I was driving back from New Jersey I reflected on how amazingly fortunate I was. As little as a hundred years ago dentistry was pretty barbaric. Throughout the 19th century, there was no separate field as dentistry and tooth extractions were done by barbers! I’ve been barbers who hurt me when they cut my hair! But seriously. people DIED from complications of dental problems such as mine. They’d get an infection in a tooth - pull it out to try and save the patient, but without things like penicillin, people would frequently die from these infections. Heck, Bayer only invented aspirin in 1899. I had been given four ibuprofin.

So I started to feel pretty good driving along the Garden State Parkway. I mean I was in pain but the ibuprofin was starting to kick in, I was ALIVE, I had a prescription and a positive prognosis.

I was reminded of a simularity between Milton Erickson, MD, the great Hypnotherapist you may have heard of, and Thich Nhat Hanh, Vietnamese Zen Buddhist Monk, teacher, author of Peace Is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life.

In both these great teacher’s teaching, the both make use of the common experience of a tooth ache. Milton was once doing a session with a client and asked her, “Do you have a toothache?” She said no. He said, “Isn’t that nice?”

Thich Nhat Hanh has pointed out that when we have a toothache, we focus a great deal of our energy upon it and wish it would go away. When it finally does we can be very happy.

What if could feel that way all the time?

A friend of mine, for a few days once, thought she had breast cancer. She was certain of it. Then was told that she did not - that she was clean. Don’t ya know the rest of her day went pretty well? Nothing else matters after that. Life is good.

I had a client just recently with whom I used similar a sort of comparison. She was feeling limited in her choices, so I said I knew how she felt. I told her that I’d worked for a few years in the Department of Complementary Medicine at New York’s Columbia/Presbyterian Medical Center and would make my rounds of the 6th floor transplant wing, where the guys were all waiting to get a new heart. They couldn’t leave that wing because of the extreme fragility of their condition. I described how on certain holidays, like New Year’s eve, hopes ran high cause hearts often became available on those days.

I didn’t, of course, leave the discussion there, but by the time we both left the office that day, we were both really grateful to be able to walk under our own power and happy to enjoy the life we’d been given.