Meta Model Violations and Symbolic Landscapes

The Meta Model is a powerful NLP tool for reconnecting a client with their "deep structure" based upon their "surface structure". In English this means that when we talk about our experiences we by necessity omit (delete), change (distort) or generalize like crazy (if you will excuse the expression), simply because words cannot capture the detail, complexity and uncertainty of reality.

Meta Model Violation: Impossibility

Meta Model violations are (or more accurately are contained in) language patterns that inherently contain distortions, deletions or generalizations. One example might be:

"I can't do that". This implies there is some impossibility to the action "that".

Meta Model Violations have a direct impact on the symbolic landscape. Let's return to the example above:

In term of the Symbolic Landscape the meta model violation "I can't" suggests impossibility and implies either

• There is an obstacle between "I" and "that" to prevent the "I" from "doing" the "that" or
• The "that" cannot be "done", it is fixed or locked in some way or
• The "that" could be done but requires some resource that the "I" does not have

The standard meta model question is:

• What stops you?

Having asked this question we hope to have more information about the type of impossibility that exists in the client's landscape.