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You are here: NLP > NLP Articles > Origins and Evolution of NLP, Part 1
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The Origins and Evolution of NLP
Dr. Joseph Riggio
Master NLP™ Trainer and Architect of The MythoSelf® Process
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 Part
I, The Meta-Model
NOTE: This is the first in a series of articles by Joseph Riggio. Joseph intends
to lead a journey through the evolution of the methodology and applications of NLP
from the earliest writings of Bandler and Grinder to the more recent developments
forming what we now think of as the NLP model.
What is now know as Neurolinguistic Programming, or NLP, has its origins in the
early 1970's when a student Richard Bandler and a professor of linguistics by the
name of John Grinder at the University of California, Santa Cruz, began a process
of discovering how masters and wizards in the domain of therapeutic communications
performed what these researchers began referring to as magic. What distinguished
the work of the individuals whom Bandler and Grinder studied was their unprecedented
success with cases and clients that other reputable and otherwise successful therapists
had had no success with before. The few individuals whose work Bandler and Grinder
studied included renowned names such as Fritz Perls, M.D. of Gestalt Therapy fame,
Virginia Satir the internationally famous Family Therapist and Milton Erickson,
M.D. the premier Medical Hypnotist of the twentieth century, to name a few of the
more well known and distinguished exemplars that formed the basis of what would
become known as Neurolinguistic Programming.
The initial work that Bandler and Grinder embarked upon began largely coincidentally.
Bandler had an opportunity to observe Fritz Perls working and as a master mimic
Bandler modeled the behaviors and performance of Dr. Perls when he was working with
clients. Part of what Richard Bandler modeled included the language and communication
patterns of Dr. Perls, including his non-verbal communication patterns - his tone,
rhythms, attitude, etc.
Subsequently Richard had the opportunity to replicate Fritz's style of working with
students at the university and remarkably generated results similar to those attained
by Perls himself. He brought this to the attention of Dr. Grinder and they agreed
to do some research regarding how this was possible when Richard had no formal training
or education either in psychology or as a (psycho)therapist. The result of this
research, as well as similar research into the patterns of other folks like Virgina
Satir, laid the groundwork for what would later become known as Neurolinguistic
Programming.
What Bandler and Grinder found was a pattern of communicating used by these master
therapists when working with clients, what they called the Meta-Model of Language1.
This meta-model is formed from three sub-patterns of communication, Generalizations,
Deletions, and Distortions, they identified that people use when linguistically
modeling their experience. These sub-patterns formed the basis of what Bandler and
Grinder went on to describe in terms of conditions of wellformedness, constituent
structure and logical semantic relations - together these sub-patterns form the
basis of the intuitions native speakers of a language use when communicating that
make communication meaningful, both to themselves and others.
Bandler and Grinder developed a method of using the language patterns to access
the way an individual represents the world to themselves and others using the Meta-Model
as they describe it. They further identified specific sub-patterns of language utilization
that lead to specific cases of ill-formedness, which comprise the larger patterns
of the Meta-Model's Generalizations, Deletions and Distortions. Using this information
they developed a training process for therapeutic communication using these sub-patterns
leading to greater linguistic wellformedness, which they playfully refer to as "Incantations
for Growth and Potential2." The representation of the world as contained in the
language an individual uses becomes for the individual the world as they know it
to be for all intents and purposes, their "Map of the World," a phrase often used
by Bandler and Grinder when presenting this work.
The individual's Map of the World then forms the basis for their choices, the decisions
they make and the behaviors and performance that result from their choices and decisions.
It is the link between perception, cognition, behavior, performance and outcome(s).
When the language a person uses to represent the world is "ill-formed," generating
a misrepresentation, their behaviors and performance will subsequently be ill-formed
as well. By re-representing the world in language that is "richer," more complete,
specific and precise, the Map of the World that the individual is acting upon will
be closer to what they have actually experienced and are experiencing. This results
in behavior and performance that is more wellformed, leading the individual to generating
outcomes more in line with and closer to what they want and expect then could ever
be realized when acting upon an ill-formed representation of their experience.
Another thing that Bandler and Grinder suggest is that with a richer description
of experience available an individual will have access to a greater number and variety
of choices. This in turn will lead to making more high quality choices and better
decisions, this is what became known in NLP circles as greater "resourcefulness"
a topic discussed at length by virtually all Neurolinguistic Programmers. The expectation
is that with greater resourcefulness an individual will have access to a wider range
of behaviors - "flexibility" - that generate a performance manifesting in more of
the individual's desired outcomes regardless of the context - therapy, education,
business, relationships, etc.
What Bandler and Grinder had described was a way of accessing how an individual
represented their experience behind the language they used to describe it consciously.
They referred to the conscious description as the "Surface Structure" and the representation
that generated the description as the "Deep Structure" of language. Using the terminology
of transformational grammar they refer to the accessing of the "Deep Structure"
in generating the description that became the "Surface Structure" as a "Transderivational
Search" or T.D.S. The Deep Structure is a more complete linguistic representation
of their experience, while the Surface Structure is a less complete representation
based on choices that are rule governed as a result of the TDS they make. When the
Surface Structure description leaves out essential information that is contained
in the Deep Structure for making high quality choices and wellformed decisions the
individual's behaviors, performance and the outcomes they produce will suffer as
a result.
The essence of the research leading to the formation of the Meta-Model and it's
use as a therapeutic tool is described by Bandler and Grinder in their book, "The
Structure of Magic," first published in 1975. Using this tool an individual is led
to a more complete, specific, precise and wellformed linguistic description and
subsequent conscious representation of their experience. At that time this work
was received as a seminal breakthrough in therapeutic communication. Bandler and
Grinder believed they had found the holy grail of therapy, defining what caused
therapy to work and codifying it in a way that could be replicated with others.
Many others agreed with them, including reviewers of their work in publications
such as "Science" and "Psychology Today."
Building on the base of linguistic analysis and modeling of excellent therapeutic
communication presented in "The Structure of Magic" Bandler and Grinder began building
the larger model and methodology that we now call Neurolinguistic Programming or
NLP. Using this model it became possible to replicate the performance of the therapeutic
masters and wizards by those who did not have the intuitions these masters and wizards
had developed, but instead by using a reliable, replicate model of communication
based in the recognition and utilization of language patterns that Bandler and Grinder
identified, codified and described in detail - the impact of this was revolutionary,
reducing the time it took to produce the results attained by giants in the field
of therapy from decades to days. To say the least overnight Bandler and Grinder
became an acknowledged threat to the established hierarchy in the world of psychotherapy.
Bandler and Grinder continued their research and discoveries presenting their findings
in books that followed including "Patterns of the Hypnotic Techniques of Milton
H. Erickson," a book that deals with the structure of ambiguity and its artistic
usage in therapy and communication, they also co-authored books describing what
they began calling Neurolinguistic Programming (NLP), which include "Frogs Into
Princes," "Tranceformations," and "Reframing." In subsequent articles in this series
we'll review the continuing development of NLP and what these books and those that
followed by both Bandler and Grinder, as well as other NLP authors, contributed
to the methodology and application of this breakthrough in the technologies of therapy
and professional communication.
1 Richard Bandler and John Grinder, The Structure of Magic, 1975 Science and Behavior
Books, Inc. - pp. 24-25
2 Ibid - Chapter Four, pp. 57 - 110
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