John Grinder On The Know Nothing State
John Grinder discusses The Know Nothing State and the Demon State
This is a transcription of a talk by John Grinder on the Know Nothing State.
When we were first in Hong Kong, there were two women and one male, monks, out of a Buddhists temple there, who were apparently decision makers for this temple. They came invited by our sponsor.
When Carmen did that (NLP Application) from sitting in 1st position to 3rd - the state that they automatically achieved in this transition, they asked if we would come and teach them how to do this, because this state was equivalent to the state they would achieve after about 3 to 3 and a half weeks of meditation… but it happened in 7 minutes. So they were fascinated by the technology that gave them certain access to classes of state which were highly valued in their traditions.
I think the worst case in NLP now is reframing. Reframing is re-behaving, why did I call it reframing? I don’t know… brain dead for extended period of time? Too much of a know nothing state?
Now, we have got the same problem with Know Nothing states… You can’t say ‘Know Nothing’, its like can you have no kinesthetics in 3rd? If you’re dead then yeah you could (sarcasm)… You can’t ‘Know Nothing’, so let’s take an example, and let me use an example from outside of NLP, and apply it with my climb with Francois Legrand in France two weeks ago.
So we’re climbing and I go into a Know Nothing state, now what the hell does that mean? It means I suspend any interest, reference to filtering of anything except what’s right in front of me… Now I know that’s a lie and I know I’m keeping a lot of the fundamental programs for climbing vertical rock. Like the martial arts, they’re all there, but I don’t know which technique I’m going to use, because the problem solving relationship between my body and the rock dictates which moves are appropriate, and I arrange all of those to be subordinated to Francois…
He is a Six times world champion rock climber, so I’m thinking “every move he makes man, I’m grabbing” (copying him directly). Now, I ended up climbing a higher grade of rock that I ever have in my life – naturally. This is the so called proximity effect.
Through the mirror neurons and the micro muscle movements through Synesthesia, I’m stealing stuff from Francois. So the Know Nothing state means I know all and only those circuits which could be recruited, like the martial artist in competition, which maybe applicable. I make no decision before hand and I make no conscious decisions in the state. My unconsciousness promotes whatever part of the circuitry that I’m carrying which is relevant to what I’m attempting to do.
I don’t think there’s such a thing as a ‘Know Nothing’ state if you interpret it literally… It should be called the “know all or only the things you need to know to succeed”, which is not quite as catchy but it’s more accurate {audience laugh}. I’m sure you’ve all had Know Nothing states it that sense, and that’s with anything that you’re passionate about, that you’re completely focused on.
I realized one of the differences between Legrand and almost every other climber I’ve climbed with, was when I asked him about a famous championship climb, where he invented a hold in order to overcome a puzzle, where everyone went… “What!!!” And I asked him if he could remember that climb and he responded “yeah, what part of it do you want me to describe?” He could give me down to fractions of a centimeter of the size of the holes on this thing.
He had phobia class recall, and by phobia class recall I mean; you know when you work with phobias? And the phobic’s have a complete identical image, often a dynamic video of them and the snake, or the falling tree or the automobile accident, or whatever the phobia. Typically complete visual, auditory, kinesthetic recall and that’s why they’re still phobic… It’s an intact experience that hasn’t been decomposed and sorted out into the categories which I think most of our experience are. It’s one of the few examples where I think we hold a relatively precise representation of what actually happened, everything else in memory seems to be reconstructed.
It’s also an amazing thing which
Martin is investigating about consolidation periods for memory. If I teach you a skill set, for example juggling, and then I move over and take you through the alphabet game (New Code NLP Game), there is going to be retroactive interference with the first skill set, unless I leave a certain amount of consolidation time… how much? Well, (laughs) there is a lot of things floating around. The one thing to be careful about is the famous example of a professor who gave an hour and half lecture promoting the research that demonstrates that human beings have a half hour attention span {audience laugh}. That’s what we don’t want right?
I’m open to renaming the Know Nothing state here, because the community of the New Code people is still tight enough in the world so I think we could promote a linguistic reform. I’m not sure what to call it though…
{Audience: Question} John, is it an extension of the Demon state?
{Professor Grinder: Response} Yeah the Demon state has a nice marketing ring to it (nonchalant response).
{Audience (same member): Question} I’m asking as a piece in your structure? Was that an extension of Demon state?
{Professor Grinder: Clarification} I don’t know if it’s an extension but it’s in the same family of altered state.
{Audience: Curiosity} What’s the Demon state?
{Professor Grinder} The Demon State was a name that Michael Colgrass, a Pulitzer Prize winning composer, gave to a state when he was possessed by the ‘demon of composing music or playing music’… He is a pretty good Jazz player. This is a special state, that all Jazz musicians know about and all composers, I suspect, know about.
He didn’t have a choice (to compose music or not). He had a routine actually that he learned over the years, which when he got a call from, for example the Philharmonic saying “we want to commission a piece Michael, there’s a sentinel coming up…the themes is this…the soloist available are these people…would you take a commission and make a composition for us which will be the highlight of the festival?” He would ask questions such as “what’s the fee, what access do I have to the orchestra and choir for rehearsals etc…” Then, Michael claims that when he made the decision unconsciously. He says he would hear the opening of the composition, the first couple of bars, which would set the theme for the piece of music, with zero effort consciously on his part.
Apparently the information that he provoked in questioning was enough for his unconscious to go “yeah we can do that and here’s an example of what we can do” which gave him the signal to accept the commission. If he didn’t get that (unconscious signal)… then he would not accept the commission.
The Demon State was a high performance state, in which he knew nothing except all that he needed to know about composing music. But this (Demon State) kept him married happily, to Ulla Colgrass for over 45 years… It allowed him to maintain a reasonable relationship with his neighbors, visiting musicians he would jam with, and his son Neal who is very close to.
Remember historically at least in the European culture, I don’t know about the other cultures which are represented here, but in Western European and in Western European derivative cultures, madness and artistry are very closely associated. I take this to be a complete possession by the ‘artistic demon’ of the person in all contexts - that there is no contextualization.
Michael Colgrass succeeded in living a life that he greatly enjoys with his wife, his son and which his friends appreciate, by spatially confining his ‘demon’. He would only unleash his demon in the top floor of a three story Victorian house in Toronto, Canada where he lives. So the only time he unleashes this composition demon is in this confinement and he literally locks the door and locks the demon in. This is a ritualistic spatial anchoring solution to what would otherwise be problematic to his relationship to his wife and to the rest of the world.
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