The Life Script

A script is a personal life plan which an individual decides early in life and is based upon his or her interpretation of the external and internal events which affect them. The script is a decisional model - this is very important - if I chose my own script then at any time given the right circumstances I can choose to make a change in my script. (When this change takes place in therapy the client is said to have made a Redecision.)

A potential script decision is made when a person discounts his own free child needs in order to survive. Only after several discounts does the decision become part of the script unless the situation carried a great deal of significance such as the death of a parent or sibling. Script Decisions are the best the child can manage in the circumstances. Yesterday’s best choice made by the child in a land of giants may now be very limiting to the grown adult. People follow their script because of the pay off, a familiar feeling, attempting to avoid the loss of love and in an attempt to gain love.

SCRIPT MESSAGES come from:

1) MODELLING by parents, siblings, others demonstrating how to = the Programme (accepted Adult messages).

2) ATTRIBUTIONS, the big person in Parent defining the little person in some way, e.g. “You’re just like .....”.

3) SUGGESTIONS, indirectly giving the message from parent, e.g. “Keep at it until it’s right”. Be Perfect).

4) INJUNCTIONS from the child ego state making demands on the person, either DO or DON’T.

NB: Messages can frequently contradict each other.

DRIVERS (Described by Taibi Kahler) From the Parent Ego State stating that the child will be OK if he/she follows a message which says:-

You will be OK if you..... Try Hard - Be Strong - Hurry Up - Be Perfect - Please Me –

TWELVE INJUNCTIONS (Described by the Gouldings in the book Changing Lives Through Redecision Therapy). Injunctions come from the infants parents scared or angry Child ego state:

Don’t be, Don’t be you, Don’t, Don’t be Important, Don’t belong, Don’t be close, Don’t be well / sane, Don’t think, Don’t feel, Don’t be a child, Don’t grow, Don’t succeed.

It is important to note that the child responds to these injunctions and makes a script decision... It is these negative script decisions which will possibly causing difficulty as a grown up. Permissions are also given to the child, these will be the opposite to the injunctions, e.g. Do think, etc.

The OK Coral: 

One of Berne's best know concepts is the idea that folks are born OK, The phrase I am OK - You are OK has become a part of folk language... In infancy, often pre-verbally the infant will make a decision as to how they related to others and themselves ... This is called their existential life position. Early life experiences will determine the person’s Existential or Life position. Once decided upon, the Life Position influences how the person thinks, feels and behaves. There are four basic life positions and Frank Ernst developed these into the well known OK Corral.

The script can be elicited in various ways, the questionnaire being one, and it is drawn out on a script matrix.
The script matrix is one of the earliest pieces of work done as a Transactional Analyst. The analyst will then design interventions based upon the information within the matrix. In therapy the injunctions are always to be dealt with first rather than Drivers which may well be the thing that keeps the person going. E.g. "I will be perfect then I can live." -- No matter how tempted don’t invite this person to stop being perfect, until they
have made a decision to live regardless of how imperfect they are!

SCRIPT QUESTIONNAIRE

These questions are designed to gain information from the client which enables the therapist to construct a script matrix, a picture of both the messages which were passed onto the infant and the decisions which the
infant made. (These 10 questions are based on Maggie and Jeff White’s article in the Jan 86 TAJ.

1. Imagine your mother sitting front of you and saying: “I am happy with you when you ... ..”

2. Do the same for your father.

3. When you were little, what was it about you that most upset or scared your mother?

4. When your mother lets you know that she does not like you being like this, what do you feel?

5. What do you do when you feel like this?

6. What was it about you that most upset or scared your father?

7. How do you feel when he lets you know this?

8. What do you do when you feel like this?

9. What phrase or sentence describes your mother and her life best?

Introduction to TA … “ TA 101 Notes” by Dave Spenceley TSTA

www.psihoterapieat.ro /// www.ta-psychotherapy.co.uk

10 Things You Must Give Up To Move Forward

If you want to fly and move on to better things, you have to give up the things that weigh you down – which is not always as obvious and easy as it sounds.

Starting today, give up…

1. Letting the opinions of others control your life. – People know your name, not your story.  They’ve heard what you’ve done, but not what you’ve been through.  So take their opinions of you with a grain of salt.  In the end, it’s not what others think, it’s what you think about yourself that counts.  Sometimes you have to do exactly what’s best for you and your life, not what’s best for everyone else.
2. The shame of past failures. – You will fail sometimes, and that’s okay.  The faster you accept this, the faster you can get on with being brilliant.  Your past does not equal your future.  Just because you failed yesterday; or all day today; or a moment ago; or for the last six months; or for the last sixteen years, doesn’t have any impact on the current moment.  All that matters is what you do right now.  Read Awaken the Giant Within.
3. Being indecisive about what you want. – You will never leave where you are until you decide where you would rather be.  It’s all about finding and pursuing your passion.  Neglecting passion blocks creative flow.  When you’re passionate, you’re energized.  Likewise, when you lack passion, your energy is low and unproductive.  Energy is everything when it comes to being successful.  Make a decision to figure out what you want, and then pursue it passionately.
4. Procrastinating on the goals that matter to you. – There are two primary choices in life: to accept conditions as they exist, or accept the responsibility for changing them.  Follow your intuition.  Don’t give up trying to do what you really want to do.  When there is love and inspiration, you can’t go wrong.  And whatever it is you want to do, do it now.  There are only so many tomorrows.  Trust me, in a year from now, you will wish you had started today.
5. Choosing to do nothing. – You don’t get to choose how you are going to die, or when.  You can only decide how you are going to live, right now.  Every day is a new chance to choose.  Choose to change your perspective.  Choose to flip the switch in your mind from negative to positive.  Choose to turn on the light and stop fretting about with insecurity and doubt.  Choose to do work that you are proud of.  Choose to see the best in others, and to show your best to others.  Choose to truly LIVE, right now.
6. Your need to be right. – If you keep on saying you’re right, even if you are right now, eventually you will be wrong.  Aim for success, but never give up your right to be wrong.  Because when you do, you will also lose your ability to learn new things and move forward with your life. Read The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.
7. Running from problems that should be fixed. – We make life harder than it has to be.  The difficulties started when… conversations became texting, feelings became subliminal, sex became a game, the word ‘love’ fell out of context, trust faded as honesty waned, insecurities became a way of living, jealously became a habit, being hurt started to feel natural, and running away from it all became our solution.  Stop running!  Face these issues, fix the problems, communicate, appreciate, forgive and LOVE the people in your life who deserve it.
8. Making excuses rather than decisions. – Life is a continuous exercise in creative problem solving.  A mistake doesn’t become a failure until you refuse to correct it. Thus, most long-term failures are the outcome of people who make excuses instead of decisions.
9. Overlooking the positive points in your life. – What you see often depends entirely on what you’re looking for.  Do your best and surrender the rest.  When you stay stuck in regret of the life you think you should have had, you end up missing the beauty of what you do have.  You will have a hard time ever being happy if you aren’t thankful for the good things in your life right now.  Read The Happiness Project.
10. Not appreciating the present moment. – We do not remember days, we remember moments.  Too often we try to accomplish something big without realizing that the greatest part of life is made up of the little things.  Live authentically and cherish each precious moment of your journey.  Because when you finally arrive at your desired destination, I guarantee you, another journey will begin.

Source: http://www.marcandangel.com/2012/08/20/10-things-you-must-give-up-to-move-forward/

From: http://www.marcandangel.com/

Suggesting Self Hypnosis...PART 2

Hypnosis is a method of systematically shutting down the conscious mind leaving the subconscious open and susceptible to new ideas. First the body is made to be still and calm, then the eyes are fixated and closed. Breathing is slowed and controlled as the body slips into relaxation, the mind urged into the subconscious realm. The senses have been nullified one by one leaving the client relaxed but at the same time focused only on the sounds reaching their ear, the sounds connecting directly into their subconscious mind. Once into the state of hypnosis the mind is perfectly poised to have changes made to its long held belief system, changes made by something known as hypnotic suggestion.

So what exactly is hypnotic suggestion?

A suggestion can be simply defined as an act of offering a thought or an action to another person, but while a suggestion is given when that other person is in a state of hypnosis this becomes a hypnotic suggestion. In regular waking state someone might tell you ‘your eyelids are feeling heavier and heavier with each moment that passes, as though they are longing to close’ but your critical conscious mind would consider the idea and most likely reject it out of hand. However under hypnosis this critical aspect of mind is subdued leaving the whole mind more responsive to suggestions, and given the exact same command as above the eyes will typically close almost immediately. Auto-suggestions are suggestions that you apply to yourself when in self hypnosis.

Hypnotic suggestions are designed to have positive effects on the mind and body in numerous different ways, and are basically a series of instructions aimed at making the mind realise it’s own potential. As humans we fail the majority of the time because we fundamentally believe we will fail, and is the core reason highly confident people tend to achieve far more than persons with low confidence and self esteem. A saying goes that if anyone could bottle confidence they would instantly become a millionaire. Hypnosis does not come ‘bottled’ but with due time and thought hypnotic suggestions are a great tool for bringing personal success through many different means, including boosting confidence and maximising the potential of the mind, and could very well be worth an absolute fortune to anyone willing to learn it’s secrets. In trance state suggestions can be used to alter perceptions, attitudes and behaviours to either STOP unwanted traits such as negative addictions or habits, or to START wanted changes such as weight loss or stop smoking.

Hypnotic suggestions come in a variety of different forms that fall into some easily defined categories:

·         Direct Suggestion (aka Primary/Authoritative): A simple straight suggestion that tells you exactly what to do. ‘You will notice your eyelids feeling heavier and heavier until eventually they will close and you will feel relaxed’ This is the traditional style of suggestion pioneered by James Braid, deemed authoritarian as it is worded and spoken just like a command.

·         Indirect Suggestion (aka Secondary/Permissive): was made famous by Milton Erikson and is the opposite of direct suggestion. Indirect suggestions are insinuations or the rhetorical, anything that has a concealed meaning in the same way a metaphor would work. Indirect suggestions are used a lot in TV adverts, music and images combining to produce a scene that will translate to the viewer’s subconscious in a way perhaps not so obvious straight away. For example it is not just a video of a Land Rover moving through the countryside to opera music, subliminally it is representing the power and prestige owning such a vehicle would represent…

·         Verbal Suggestions: are spoken instructions as in the examples above.

·         Non Verbal Suggestions: are any suggestions that are unspoken. These can include physical manipulations of the body (physically swaying the body gently), mental imagery (as shown via pictures or video) or tone of voice (sounds rather than words e.g. breathing) used to promote relaxation and trance.  These suggestions can be very helpful in hypnotising those with a language barrier or those that have strange associations with certain words that are best avoided. Non Verbal suggestions are the most ancient of suggestions and can still be seen in ‘shaman’ rituals of indigenous tribes based on dance, movement, images and rhythm to induce trance.

·         Post Hypnotic Suggestion: these suggestions are designed to trigger an effect AFTER coming out of Hypnosis, e.g. ‘every time I close my eyes and think the word ‘RELAX’ I will be brought back to my visualisation of lying on a beach watching the sunset’. The time frame can range anywhere from minutes, days, weeks or even years after the suggestion was planted, depending entirely on how the suggestion is worded. In the example the word ‘RELAX’ would be the ‘post-hypnotic cue’…the trigger for the suggestion to kick in.

·         Relaxation Suggestions: ‘My whole body begins to feel calm, and as it does so I notice my mind relaxing in the same way’. These suggestions ease the mind and body in preparation for deeper levels of hypnosis and further suggestions. They are frequently used most at the onset of hypnosis.

·         Deepening Suggestions: make the trance state more enhanced often by focusing on a single task. e.g. ‘My hands are locked together so tight the harder I try to pull them apart the tighter they will lock together and the deeper into hypnosis I will go’

·         Imagery Suggestions: create mental scenes or pictures to work directly or indirectly in producing a mental environment where alterations can be made to attitudes or connections made to one’s experiences. A common use of imagery in self hypnosis is to find your mental ‘paradise’ or ‘happy place’ where every aspect of your surroundings is as you want it to be and where they are totally comfortable and relaxed.

Many suggestions will combine aspects from the different categories to form one single set of instructions, the content of which is dependant largely on the goal of the suggestion as well as the personal choice of the individual constructing it. What will your auto-suggestion be?

COMING SOON...

You know the basic rules of self hypnosis, but how to actually apply them to YOU and YOUR OWN situation?

For more info on self hypnosis, try http://www.hypnos.info/self/selfhypnosis.htm