CRV and Resistance

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0><tr> <td valign="top" colspan=2 height=82 BGCOLOR="#003333" TEXT="#F7F7FF"> <div> <FONT SIZE="5" COLOR="#FFFFFF" FACE="Arial" ><B>Philosophy</B></FONT><B>     |   </B><B>  </B><A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Philosophy"><U><B>home</B></U></A></div> <div>                                                   </div> <div> </div> </td> </tr><tr> <td valign="top" width=210 BGCOLOR="#003333" TEXT="#F7F7FF"> <div>  <A NAME="crv_resistance"><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="1x1.gif" HEIGHT="1" ALIGN="bottom" WIDTH="1" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" ></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id26_lear.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Selected Writing: On Lear"><U><B><IMG SRC="0be15150.gif" border=0 width="21" height="21" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></U></A><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#66CCFF" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><---Language  as a Metaphor:  Translation as a Model for Understanding Johathan Lear's Analysis of Freud's    Concepts</B></I></FONT></div> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#111111" FACE="Arial" ><A HREF="id27_myth_metaphor.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Selected Writings: Myth"><U><B><IMG SRC="0be15150.gif" border=0 width="21" height="21" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></U></A></FONT><B><----</B><I><B>Myths, Metaphors and Mental Worlds:  An Incorporative Model for Describing Ego Dynamics</B></I></div> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#111111" FACE="Arial" ><A HREF="id28_karla_faye.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Selected Writing: Karla Faye"><U><B><IMG SRC="0be15150.gif" border=0 width="21" height="21" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></U></A></FONT><B><----</B><I><B>Texas' Stone of Stumbling:  On the Occasion of the Texas Execution of Karla Faye Tucker (February, 1998)   </B></I></div> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#111111" FACE="Arial" ><A HREF="id47_the_dynamics_of_culture__.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Selected Writing: Management "><U><B><IMG SRC="0be15150.gif" border=0 width="21" height="21" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></U></A></FONT><B><----</B><I><B>The Dynamics of Culture In Relation to</B></I></div> <div> <I><B>Management </B></I></div> <div> <I><B>Philosophy and Methodology</B></I></div> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#111111" FACE="Arial" ><A HREF="id49_making_a_stray_cat_prolific.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Selected Writing: Making a Stray Cat Pro"><U><B><IMG SRC="0be15150.gif" border=0 width="21" height="21" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></U></A></FONT><B><----</B><I><B>Making a Stray Cat Prolific:  Thesaural Imaging and Remote Viewing</B></I></div> <div> <A HREF="id80_cassirer.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Selected Writings: Cassirer/Buchanan"><U><B><IMG SRC="0bd18180.gif" border=0 width="24" height="24" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></U></A><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#66CCFF" FACE="Arial" ><I><B>Cassirer, on the Expressive Form of Mythopoeic Thought: A Foundation for Buchanan's Concept of Ambiance </B></I></FONT></div> <div> <A HREF="id50_influence_med__concept.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="New Med. Paradigm"><U><B><IMG SRC="0be15150.gif" border=0 width="21" height="21" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></U></A><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#66CCFF" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><----Influece of Conceptual Models on Today's Health Care: The Physician as Dr. Goodwrench</B></I></FONT></div> <div> <A HREF="id50_influence_med__concept.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="New Med. Paradigm"><U><B><IMG SRC="0be15150.gif" border=0 width="21" height="21" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></U></A><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#66CCFF" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><----Influence of Conceptual Models on Today's Health Care: The Physician as Dr. Goodwrench</B></I></FONT></div> <div> <A HREF="id51_altizer.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Altizer"><U><B><IMG SRC="0be15150.gif" border=0 width="21" height="21" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></U></A><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#66CCFF" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><----Altizer's Christian Atheism:  Philosophy or Theolgoy?</B></I></FONT></div> <div> <A HREF="id53_they_die_young.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="King Memorial"><U><B><IMG SRC="0be15150.gif" border=0 width="21" height="21" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></U></A><FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#66CCFF" FACE="Arial" ><I><B><----They Die Young:  In Memorium to Dr. Martin Luther King</B></I></FONT></div> <bR> </td> <td valign="top" height=398 BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#080000" bgproperties="fixed" background="23d88583.jpg"> <bR> <bR> <bR> <div> <I>Dealing with Resistance in CRV</I></div> <bR> <div> By</div> <div> Bill Stroud, Ph. D.</div> <div> Copyright, 2004</div> <bR> <bR> <div> I get a little nervous when someone tells me to relax.  And when I'm told, “just forget it,” the “it” lights up in my mind like a neon sign.  (I won't even mention how frustrated I get when I try to be spontaneous.)  No wonder Descartes sounded like a drunken sailor when he described how he realized that he could not doubt that he was thinking because he would have to be thinking to doubt that he was thinking.  </div> <bR> <div> In his book, <I>Psychotherapy by Reciprocal Inhibition</I> (1958), Joseph Wolpe observed that certain psychical dynamics can not be operative at the same time.  According to Wolpe, certain mental states reciprocally inhibit each other.  I.e., one can be relaxed or one can be phobic, but only one or the other, because there is no room in the psyche for entertaining both at the same time.  As regards remote viewing, my dilemma is the opposite of that addressed by Wolpe:  I suffer, not from reciprocal inhibition, but from <I>reciprocal initiation</I>.  Trying to forget makes me remember.  But by now, dear reader, you must wonder if I am going to have you read sentences that declare that you are not reading.  So let me move on to explain how this mental monkey puzzle relates to the dynamics of Controlled Remote Viewing.  </div> <bR> <div> When one realizes that he or she has an Analytical Overlay/Stray Cat, traditional instruction directs the viewer to set it aside immediately.  Mr. Dames goes so far as to instruct a student to lay down his or her pen as a symbolic gesture of putting the image out of mind.  (I tried this once and found that picking the pen up again reminded me that I was moving on with the session, ignoring [Darn!] that image which comes to mind again.)</div> <bR> <div> How frustrating.  I can quietly sneak up on a friend, tap him on the shoulder and surprise him from behind.  But try as I may, I can't sneak up on myself.  However, I've learned a few tricks that seem to help me outsmart my own mind.  And these tricks I learned from a master in the management of mental dynamics:  the late Milton H. Erickson.</div> <bR> <div> Erickson was an expert at initiating what he called the “trance state” of hypnosis. He distinguished himself in personalizing hypnosis induction procedures in contradistinction to the traditional and standard “ritualistic” inductions.  (Example of the ritualistic induction:  “You are getting very sleepy,” etc.)  By being careful not to resist a client's resistance, Erickson adapted his induction procedure to the particular stance taken by the client. This became known as the “utilization” method, and it was developed from his study of the dynamics of resistance.*</div> <bR> <div> * See Milton H. Erickson, <I>The Nature of Hypnosis and Suggestion</I>:  Vol. I of <I>The Collected papers of Milton H. Erickson on Hypnosis</I>.  New York:  Irvington Publishers, Inc., 1980, pp. 177 ff.</div> <bR> <div> After studying how clients often resist efforts to put them into the trance state, Erickson concluded that the dynamic of resistance seems to follow a basic law of the mind:  <I>resistance to a resistance compounds that resistance</I>.  Put another way, we all seem to have a basic tendency to respond “like for like,” i.e., we resist resistance.  When someone yells at us, we reflexively raise our voices in response.  We often tell someone to be nice-but in a hateful way.  And if someone is trying to make us do something, our first response is to say No even if what is being demanded is something we really would like to do.</div> <bR> <div> Erickson developed strategies for dealing with this compounding aspect of resistance.  He structured responses that tended to neutralize the reciprocal compounding loop:  resistance triggering resistance triggering resistance . . . .  When a young man challenged Erickson one day, saying to him, “Dr. Erickson, I'll bet you can't hypnotize me!”  Erickson responded:  “You are absolutely right, young man.  I can't.  But you will notice that as we talk your left arm is perhaps getting heavier and heavier.”  Erickson did not resist the resistance.  He “went with the resistance” (utilization technique: “you're absolutely right”), and, as the experts in Akido often say, “danced with the enemy” by actually augmenting the move of the opponent, thereby throwing him with his own momentum.  </div> <bR> <div> This paradox was humorously illustrated by Erickson in his account of how he solved a problem his father had in getting a calf to go into the barn.  The animal balked so stubbornly that his father could not push him forward regardless of how much he tried.  But young Milton solved the problem:  He simply walked over to the calf and forcefully pulled the tail of the calf.  The animal immediately moved forward resisting the tug on his tail, thereby giving young Milton exactly what he wanted.*  It was Erickson's</div> <bR> <div> *<I>The Collected Papersof Milton H. Erickson</I>, Volume I, <I>The Nature of</I></div> <div> <I>Hypnosis and Suggestion</I>, edited by Ernest L. Rossi.  (NY:  Irvington Publishers, Inc., 1980,  p. 412.</div> <bR> <div> ingenious strategic formulations of similar strategies for neutralizing resistance that led this author to develop a few tricks for dealing with the problem of resistance in his remote viewing sessions.  However, not reciprocal inhibition, but of <I>reciprocal initiation</I> is the name of the trick.  Also, whereas Erickson applied his strategy to others, I found a way to apply it to myself.</div> <bR> <div> For instance, I use a form of the Ericksonian approach in dealing with what Buchanan calls the Preview of Coming Distracters (P.O.C.D).  When I begin a remote viewing session, it is as if Gabriel starts trumpeting out to my mind announcements of all the things that are going to disrupt my work.  (“The phone is going to ring”; “The clock is going to chime”; “UPS will knock on my door as soon as I get started.”)  At first, doing a Set Aside of these portents of doom was about as effective as trying to be unconscious.  How could I  set them aside by giving them attention?  Now, however, I use a little Ericksonian trick:  I invite the distraction in; I do not fight it.*</div> <bR> <div> *[Viktor Frankl utilized this dynamic in a therapeutic intervention that is called paradoxical intention.  For instance, for a client who always blushes when he gets up in front of a group, Frankl would have him, upon facing the next anticipated occasion for the reaction, try to see just how red he could make his face.  Frankl found that inviting in the symptom in such cases tended to discharge its power.]</div> <bR> <div> I intentionally state in my Set Aside procedure how I will make use of an anticipated distraction, i.e., how I will turn it into something positive and neutralize its intrusive nature:  “Yes, the clock may chime.  And if it does, it will be a cue to my unconscious-like a posthypnotic suggestion-to surprise me with some aspect of the target.”  “If the UPS man knocks on my door, I'll take advantage of it and have a break and during that break my unconscious can work. (The same dynamic that works when I can't remember something while trying hard to remember; yet, directing attention to some unrelated thought will allow the forgotten to pop into my mind.)”  <I>Converting the mental intruder into an invited guest takes away the automatic response mechanism of resistance</I>.  (“It takes two to fight!” My fight is over because my enemy is now my friend.)  </div> <bR> <div> Erickson also used another technique for neutralizing resistance, the double bind.  In setting the stage for hypnosis, he would ask a subject something like the following:  “Do you want to go into hypnosis sitting in this chair or in the chair over there next to the table?”  Any response given by the subject would be a step toward acquiescing to the invitation to go into the trance state.  This little procedural jewel has a manipulative aspect to it and does not rank as high in my list of accolades to Erickson.  </div> <bR> <div> *Many sales training sessions started using this manipulative dynamic:  “Mr. Jones, do you want me to make your payments on the first of the month?  Or would you prefer the 15<FONT SIZE="1" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" >th</FONT>?”  Either response is a commitment to buy!   At least with Erickson, the intent was totally dedicated to the benefit of the subject.  In sales situations, it is primarily a tricky way simply to close a sale.</div> <bR> <div> However, beyond the dynamic of a double bind, I believe this strategy of Erickson functions at another level:  it structures a complexity by offering several candidates for attention and diverts the mind from a singular focus.  This can be illustrated by applying the dynamic to what Buchanan calls the Preview of Coming Attracters (P.O.C.A.).*</div> <bR> <div> *[Lyn Buchanan, <I>Controlled Remote Viewing:  Course Training Manual</I>.  Alamogordo, NM:  Problems Solutions Innovations,  p. 6.</div> <bR> <div> For instance, in starting a session, I will often get what I have christenen “a haunting hunch.”  I imagine what target the tasker has most likely chosen for me.  To counter this dynamic with a non-resistance response, I now do a Set Aside of the intrusive image or concept by acknowledging that my hunch might well be correct.*   But I will make a</div> <bR> <div> <I>*</I>Buchanan's instruction covers this aspect of non-resistance fairly well.  He suggests that the student structure his or her  Set Aside of the P.O.C.A with some expression such as “Yes, it may be, but I'll not worry about that now.  I'll check that out later.”  I must admit, however, that making this statement seems to remind me of what I'm not going to worry about.”</div> <div>    </div> <div> further elaboration by listing several other possible Gestalten that the image might represent.  <I>It is easier to neutralize the impact of a list of several objects than a single one. </I> I call this <I>focus dispersion</I>.  For example, if it so happens that my tasker has just returned from the airport, I am likely to jump to the conclusion that he will choose something related to flying-and an image of an airplane comes to mind.  I will list it and then continue with the Set Aside:  “Yes, it may be an airplane.  But it could be a bird.  It could be a kite.  It could be an arrow going through the air.  It could be a leaf wafting its way to the ground.” … And on and on until I run out of other possibilities.  Ignoring several figures seems easier than ignoring only one. This <I>focus dispersion</I> seems to work by generalizing the <I>figure</I> aspect of the figure/background dynamic and, as a result, the mind, as it were, zooms out, expanding toward a complexity and generalization instead of zooming in on a particular.</div> <bR> <div> I think of Erickson every time I try to securely hold a wet bar of soap by squeezing it tightly in my hand.  It shoots out like a missile and produces the opposite of what I am trying to accomplish.  And I am amazed just how this dynamic expresses itself in so many different settings.  For instance, living on the Gulf coast of Florida, I have learned a valuable lesson that is constantly preached by lifeguards on the beach:  “Don't swim against a rip tide.  Swim parallel to the beach until you are out of its current.”  How like the lesson concerning the futility of resisting resistance in a remote viewing session:  fight a Stray Cat and it will claw you mercilessly.  Invite it in and it will sit quietly-often with a message from the unconscious tied to its tail.  </div> <bR> <bR> <div>   </div> <div> <TABLE BORDER="2" CELLPADDING="2" CELLSPACING="1" WIDTH="516" BORDERCOLORLIGHT="#C0C0C0" BORDERCOLORDARK="#808080" FRAME="BOX" RULES="ALL" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0" BGCOLOR=#000066 > <tR> <tD VALIGN=TOP HEIGHT= 138 ><NOBR><div> <IMG SRC="0a66f830.jpg" border=0 width="111" height="131" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> </NOBR></tD> <tD VALIGN=TOP WIDTH="378"><bR> <div> Bill Stroud, of Oxford, Mississippi,, has an extensive background in three areas: theology, philosophy and psychology (B.D, Th.D., Ph.D). Although semi-retired, he is active as a speaker, free-lance writer and a workshop presenter for educational and service agencies.  He presently is an adjunct professor in the Department of Philosophy and Religion at Ole Miss University.</div> </tD> </tR> </TABLE></div> <bR> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>