AGS Saturday Seminar 10 May 2003
"Improving
Relationships"
Presented by Dave
Hewson
The aim of this
seminar was to improve
our personal, work
and social relationships
by reducing the
number of useless arguments and over heated debates
that may damaged
these relationships.
This was accomplished via training in the use of several GS formulations.
|
A |
ware that my life is often complicated and
“sub-optimalised” by less-than-perfect management of relationships, I rushed to
David’s seminar to see what “the use of several GS formulations” may have to
offer.
I was not disappointed. One of my chief frustrations is the repetitive nature of some of
my errors, relating in self-talk along the rhetorical lines “I never seem to
learn anything … How can I move ahead?”
|
D |
avid started by reminding us of “the seven” learning
techniques (Of course, we’re careful about “compartmentalizing” a list, not
expecting the coverage to be truly comprehensive or mutually-exclusive!):
Testing, recalling
and reviewing ideas
- repetition.
Structuring
internally,
- by applying
hierarchical relationships, visualizing graphically.
Structuring
externally,
- by relating to a
context.
Getting
extensional
– Using the
subject matter in a practical sense.
Making inferences
(advisedly!),
-building upon the known into the unknown …
Multi-coding (as
used in NLP)
- use colours, shapes etc.
Attention
management
- small blocks of
material, multiple presentation modes.
We considered the bell-shaped graph of “Output vs
Stress”, each of us wondering how our individual effectiveness/stress
relationship could be gauged and managed.
The charting of Anxiety, Stress and Boredom against
Challenge vs Skill was an evocative exercise for me, as the management of
challenge in relationship to skill is I big issue for me in my (IT-oriented)
professional life.
|
M |
ixing of meanings means many major misfortunes! As g-s practitioners, we would hope to look
for true meanings as expressed by others, and not allow ourselves to lapse into
“semantic nitpicking”.
I remember a real-life case:
·
A pair of fleeing armed robbers were cornered by
Police.
·
One of them, a teenager, was carrying the gun; his
elderly mate was unarmed.
·
The old one said to the young: “Give it to him!”
(pointing to the Policeman).
·
The young one shot the policeman.
·
In Court, the young one said “I thought my mate was
telling me to shoot the policeman.”
·
The old one said “I was not telling the idiot to
shoot, I was telling him to hand over the gun!”
You don’t have to be a semantic pedant to see the
potential for dangerous misunderstanding here.
My venerable Uncle Harry, when asked by a passer-by
“Do you have the time, mate?” would reply “Yes”, and continue walking. Was he utilizing linguistic opportunity to
optimum effect? Alas, my own personal,
family and professional life is not devoid of such “mixed-meaning” debacles.
|
A |
ssumptions of G-S was our next topic. (I had some difficulty with this, preferring
a description like “Assertions” or “Principles” etc.) We considered the three Big Ones:
·
A map is not the territory,
·
A map is not all of the territory, and
·
We can make maps of maps (self-reflexiveness).
One doesn’t have to search far into typical family life
to find abundant examples of these principles!
This little case study illustrates some of the hazards of responding to
a response:
Jack: “The bacon’s
a bit crisp today!”
Jill: “Well, why
don’t you do it yourself, then!”
Jack: “I didn’t
say there’s anything wrong with it, just that it’s crisp.”
Jill: “You’re
always whinging about everything – I can’t do anything right”
Jack: “I was only
talking about the bacon.”
Jill “I know what
you really meant … etc.” (Mapping the
map!)
The group had a variety of suggestions on how this
escalating feedback could be reduced, by taking care with the “mapping”
process, referring to the “original” map, and not getting carried away with
responses to responses.
We observed some spectacular consequences of using
“Either / Or” terms to describe complex situations, for example:
·
(Re terrorism) “You’re either for us or against us”
·
(Re Iraq) “The Coalition of the Willing” will do the
job
·
(Re Australian society) “We’re racist / democratic /
egalitarian … etc … “
Language which is not at all clear on the distinction
between “fact” and “opinion”, can be a serious hazard. Consider the following:
·
“She is just a bitch!”
versus
·
“From my perspective …”
Consider Milton’s “meta-mapping” as a useful device (as
above).
|
H |
aney’s “Uncritical Inference Test” can usually be
relied-upon to stir-up the passions of pragmatists and pedants! A mildly complex and tricky passage followed
by 48 questions, really illustrated the dangers faced by lawyers all of us in
assuming that different people would interpret the same words in the same way.
Confusion between description(“what is”) and
prescription(“what should be”) is a perennial stumbling-block. What about the distinction between:
·
“Should I be able to get to the Church on time ?”
(question of probability)
versus
·
“Should I give my child a talking-to ?” (a question of
wisdom)
|
A |
nother cause of arguments is “lack of specificity”,
for which the g-s solution is “indexing”.
That is, the avoidance of over-generalising.
There is such a huge advantage in limiting the scope
of the statement (or the discussion).
What if Jill, as above, declined to build-upon and project from Jack’s
statement about the bacon, and simply said “Yes” when Jack said “It’s crisp”?
|
U |
nwillingness to say “I don’t know” can be a problem –
“The second-most-feared statement in the language”. Not hard to think of some examples here!
|
P |
unctuation is a great device in written language,
difficult to translate when spoken. How
often do we find statements like:
·
“She nags, because he drinks!”
or
·
“He drinks because she nags” ?
Quite likely a recursive causality.
|
E |
xpectation management is one of the most basic but
oft-disputed elements in education, personal-relations and government. “How much effort should the Government
expect of the unemployed?” “How much should I expect of my spouse?” What should I expect of my children?” And most importantly, “What should I expect
of myself?”.
These are almost rhetorical questions, yet we must
struggle with them constantly!
We considered “pseudo-equations” like:
·
Happiness = Actual / Expectations (But what about when expectations approach
zero?)
versus
·
Happiness = Actual – Expectations
We can play around a lot with the mathematics
(“semantemantics”) here … What about the fact the the variables Actual and
Expectations, above, are not independent?
Is it not true that the Actual will often depend greatly on the
Expectations? Etc.
To finish-up, here’s a little summary of Dave’s nine
ways to avoid/resolve arguments:
1.
Bypass the mixing of meanings.
2.
Be aware of the Mapping process – Watch out for
responding to responses!
3.
Keep away from either/or terms (“allness” references).
4.
Hone our “fact-inference” skills.
5.
Avoid confusion between description and prescription
(“what-is” and “what-should-be”).
6.
Be specific: Use dating and indexing to limit the
scope of generalizations.
7.
Say “I don’t know” when necessary.
8.
Use punctuation (written or verbal!) to clarify
structure of sentences.
9.
Practise expectation management.
Anyway, it was all great fun for our little seminar
group, and we seemed to agree that applying these principles would be a great
help in managing personal relationships!
~ Happy Relationships ~
Disclaimer:
This little collection of notes by Robert does not purport to be an
"official AGS record"; just some little, partial subjective personal
impressions. Please feel free to dispute and contribute material and
recollections.
Robert James.
ooo000ooo
Seminar for June: “Ethics"
"So act as to
make thyself a better time-binder,
so act as to
enable others
to use their time-binding capabilities more
effectively." (Weinberg).
Is this the
"Golden Rule" of general-semantics?
at the personal,
community and global level.
If this doesn't
matter, then what does?
Location: Gavan's
Presenter: Robert James