Know How: Guided Programs for Inventing Your Own Best Future
by Leslie Cameron-Bandler, David Gordon and Michael Lebeau
DESCRIPTION: Have you ever wondered why some people have what seems to be a natural ability to achieve success and fulfillment, while others seem to be doomed to a life of repeated failures, disappointment and frustration? Would you like to understand talented and gifted people in a way that provides you with a choice to be more like them–a choice that offers you the talents of those who achieve success and fulfillment naturally? If so, read on. The purpose of this book is to give you that choice.
The following pages are the result of an exciting collaboration that has led us literally out of our own minds and into the fascinating life experiences of others. Several years ago we began to identify genius and excellence in important everyday situations, and our curiosity about talented and gifted people has led us to a fascinating discovery about how they are able to do those things that they do so well. We have distilled those patterns of success into simple, easy-to-use formats. Our purpose in writing this book is to provide you the formats–the thinking processes, perceptions and behaviors–that naturally lead to success and fulfillment in several of life’s most challenging and potentially rewarding areas. As you read through each chapter you will be participating in a presentation and exploration that is designed to involve you in an ongoing learning process. You will be learning and changing as you read and enjoy each chapter.
The thousands of people we have helped change over the years have consistently expressed to us their surprise at discovering that change need not be difficult. It used to be thought (and still is in some circles) that making pervasive life changes is very difficult. Making major personal changes was equated with an ordeal–complete with pain, struggle, and sacrifice. This gauntlet orientation was based upon the assumption that (1) deep-seated problems and primordial issues needed to be uncovered and dealt with before desired experiences could be attained, and (2) there was no existing method which made possible the transference of successful or desirable life experiences from one individual to another.
Our experience in assisting people (both individually and in training seminars) to get what they want has demonstrated something very profound: The majority of people do not need therapy as much as they need an opportunity to learn HOW to organize their perceptions, thinking processes and behaviors in ways that naturally lead to success. Once people know how, they translate their learnings into action and fulfill their desires rather than choosing to deny themselves those desires.
The following pages are a coalescence of a portion of our accumulated knowledge concerning the solutions to commonly experienced problems. In each of the areas covered we have described both those who respond successfully and unsuccessfully. This gives you the opportunity to find yourself and to understand the basis for your own successes and stumblings. As you identify yourself among the examples of people whose behaviors have led to a lack of success in a given area, remember that there is nothing wrong with you. You simply have not yet had the opportunity to know how to respond in those problem situations in any other way. This book gives you that opportunity–the opportunity to know how.
We believe that it is possible for you to acquire talent and to manifest natural excellence in any area of life. We wrote this book to direct you toward actualizing this belief. The following pages contain a sampling of the formats we have created from our explorations into the structure of talent and natural excellence. We present them to you with the hope that you will use them to enhance your existing talents, as well as to gain control of presently frustrating areas of your life. Read on and enjoy yourself as you acquire those skills that will make your dreams and desires come true.
EXCERPT: Dessert. Three friends–Arbuckle, Wally and Eileen–are enjoying a delicious meal at a fine restaurant. After finishing their main courses, while all three are rhapsodizing about the meal and remarking how full they are, the waiter appears at their tableside with a pastry cart loaded with cakes and pies. The waiter asks, “Now, who would like dessert, hmm?”
Arbuckle is more than a little overweight. He often talks about how he is going to go on a diet “soon,” and he knows from his own experiences of wheezing up a flight of stairs and from the cautionary magazine articles that he has read that he really must lose some weight. He recognizes that if he does not lose weight he will become more and more physically incapacitated and limited, and he does not want that to happen. Despite all this, Arbuckle orders a slice of pie. When his surprised friends ask him for an explanation, all he can say is, “I can start dieting tomorrow. This is just too delicious to pass up.”
Wally (who is not overweight) also thinks the pie looks delicious, and confesses to wanting a slice. Even so, Wally ruefully declines, saying, “Naw, I’ll regret it later.” He then offers the excuse, “I’ll wake up in the middle of the night with heartburn if I eat any more.”
The pie looks just as tasty to Eileen, but she too turns it down. “Pie has never agreed with me. I always get heartburn,” she explains. Arbuckle attempts to talk her into giving it a try, since she may have finally become immune to its effects, and if not, she could become accustomed to it by eating a little at a time. Eileen just waves him off. “Listen,” she says, “I’ve been through this movie before and I already know how it ends.” No pie for Eileen.
What is striking about this example is that different people in the same situation can have very different responses. You say, “Well of course they had different responses–they’re different people!” But having said that, do you take the next conceptual step which is to realize that if those individuals are having different responses to the same situations, then it is not the situation which is determining the response? Rather, it is the way in which each is thinking (the structure and content of that particular person’s internal processes) that determines what responses he or she will have within a given situation. Thus, responding with anxiety, anticipation, inadequacy, or confidence during an interview, waiting for the phone to ring or finding a way to make it ring when you want a date, or deciding to marry or remain single are all determined to a very great extent by how you process information within each of those situations. If you change the nature of those internal processes, you will alter in some way your feelings and actions.
TOC:
A World of Difference
Into the Looking Glass
The Five Fundamentals of Success
Wishing to Having
Eating
Exercise
Temperance and Temperaments
Sex
Loving
Parenting
BACKCOVER: . . . illustrates how people can go out and achieve what they want, rather than just daydreaming about it.
Medford Mail Tribune
. . . so packed with positive presuppositions that they could produce change even if the reader did not engage in using the formats.
Changes Bookshop Review
If self-improvement is high on your list of things to do, then . . . [Know How] can surely help you change into the future self you want.
Stephanie Craig, The Arizona Daily Star
Unlike many other psychological self-help titles, [Know How’s] incorporation of daily problems surrounding sex, exercise and eating patterns, and parenting provide examples of how the program can work for change, emphasizing goal-setting and strategies for achievement rather than ethereal possibilities.
Diane C. Donovan, The Midwest Book Review
INSIDEFLAP: . . . a substantial commitment to changing your life and the way you view the world. Liz Visser, Human Potential Magazine
An especially well-deserved commendation for Know How for superlative work. A significant contribution for the self-help/self-improvement bookshelf that will stand the test of time.
James A. Cox, Editor, The Midwest Book Review
This helpful guide can help readers acquire skills, improve sex lives, achieve goals, control diets, avoid substance abuse, become better parents, and be happier people.
Concise Book Reviews
. . . suggestions for shaping a more positive future . . . drawing from the experience of high achievers.
EAP Digest: The Voice of Employee Assistance
. . . one of the most important chapters is that dealing with parenting, teaching how to create the kinds of nurturing and mutually-enjoyable relationships that parents would like to have with their children.
International Council of Sex Education and Parenthood Newsletter
What distinguishes this book from the wealth of other self-help books on the market is the thoroughness of this approach.
Eric Robbie
The Journal of the National Association of Hypnotists and Psychotherapists
Congratulations, FuturePace Publishers for originating what seems a fresh approach to step-by-step mental techniques for achieving your purpose in life.
Broox Sledge, The Book World
The book is clear and concise and the exercises are simple but thought-provoking.
Healthful Living, A Life Science Publication
AUTHOR BIOS: The authors are known internationally as co-developers and leading researchers of Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP), and as creators of Mental Aptitude Patterning. They have written several highly-regarded books on personal development including Solutions, The EMPRINT Method, and The Emotional Hostage.
AUTHOR’S COMMENTS: There is within our culture a great diversity of responses to apparently similar situations. A moment’s consideration of your own experience and behavior and that of those around you will undoubtedly furnish you with many examples. Perhaps you procrastinate, putting off chores, work projects or assignments until the last moment or until it is too late. Certainly you know of someone who gets their assignments done promptly. (There are even those who anticipate assignments and do them before they are asked!) Maybe you are one of those individuals who takes care of your health, abstaining from unnecessary drugs, unwholesome foods and eating practices, while making sure to get enough exercise. You can easily identify acquaintances who drink to the point of getting drunk, smoke cigarettes, eat poorly, overeat, or have been promising themselves to start regular running–for the past several years. Or perhaps you have low self esteem; that is, you have little sense of personal purpose or importance. You can probably think of people who obviously think very highly of themselves (and some of them with little apparent justification). How is it that some people achieve their business, financial or career goals, while others seem to find only a recurring lack of success and frustration? Is it just luck? Is it genetics? What makes it possible for you to procrastinate, and someone else to get things done quickly; for you to take care of your health and someone else to ingest potentially harmful drugs and foods; for you to think little of yourself while others find themselves to be worthy? How is it possible that some people have regrets, are able to plan, are able to carry out plans, be jealous, be Pollyannas, be curious, be bored, be vengeful, be hopeful, be self-sacrificing, be hedonistic, remember every occasion with a greeting card, or forget their own anniversaries? Obviously, there is a tremendous diversity of experience
We believe all of the experiences and behaviors we have just listed are the direct result of the perceptual and cognitive patterns of the individuals who have those experiences and behaviors. In other words, how an individual perceives and thinks about the world determines that person’s experiences of, and responses to, the world. A person who procrastinates is using a combination of perceptions, evaluations and behaviors that result in that person being able to put things off until later. Not being able to operate without the imposition of those perceptions, evaluations and behaviors is what makes procrastination an attribute and a problem, as opposed to being incidental and not a problem.
Although the person who procrastinates may or may not appreciate having that attribute, it is an attribute nonetheless. Moreover, whether that person realizes it or not, procrastination can be a resource. Every one of the experiences and behaviors we have just mentioned (plus the thousands we did not) can be a blessing if used in the appropriate situation, or a curse if used in an inappropriate situation. For instance, if you need to write a grant proposal or lecture presentation it is obviously better to be motivated to get it done as soon as possible rather than procrastinate. But what happens to the person who wants to get things done right away when he goes on vacation? For the person who vacations in the same way he runs his work crew, the attribute of being able to procrastinate might be very useful when vacationing. Similarly, the asceticism that makes it possible for a person to remain svelte by eating sparingly may become a tremendous burden if applied to getting emotional needs met.
It is our contention that the best choice is to have the widest range of useful and gratifying behaviors possible within any given situation. Having this choice allows an individual’s response to be determined by that person’s intended or desired outcome, rather than by the automatic triggering of an inbred and (perhaps) inappropriate reaction.
A default response, on the other hand, occurs when an individual has only one, automatic response within a particular situation. For the person who needs to write the grant proposal or lecture material but cannot seem to get to it, procrastination is a default response in that he has only one response to the context of “paper due”: procrastination. Similarly, promptness is a default response for the person who would like to ignore writing a grant proposal but nevertheless feels compelled to work on it. For these two individuals, procrastination and promptness become choice responses when they can choose to respond in either (or neither) way.
