Determining Frames

John Burton, D. Ed. LPC

This article concerns the way in which we frame or categorize the information we observe. While the
title states, determining frames, this conveys two messages of very different meaning. Yes, we
categorize information and the category in which we place the information tends to determine how we
respond. But, the other meaning of determining frames is that we can consciously determine or
choose in what category to place information. Thus, we can allow a more resourceful response by
building a custom frame.

It seems we categorize information to give meaning to our observations. But surely we also categorize
information in order to organize smaller chunks into larger, more manageable general files. A crucial
question in the process of categorizing information is just what we pick to focus on from the whole to
use as the meaning-making piece. Each event we experience receives a theme of sorts. If you eat at
a restaurant or go to a movie, each of these experiences receives a theme. The restaurant or maker of
the movie gives this theme, supposedly summarizing the contents. You may eat at an Italian restaurant
or a Mexican restaurant or a vegetarian restaurant. You may watch an action movie or a comedy or a
mystery. You get the idea. Experiences in life get categorized, supposedly based on the most
outstanding feature of the experience. This most outstanding feature then forms the nucleus of a
perceptual gestalt.

Its rather amazing that a single feature of an event can dictate the whole category of an experience.
The Italian restaurant also serves a salad with each entre. So what if the restaurant owner decided to
call it a salad restaurant? We can choose what feature of an event to focus on and make the feature of
the whole experience. We can also shift from one feature to another, giving a whole new meaning to an
event, old or new. And this is where your personal power resides. The power to determine the meaning
of any event, or change the meaning of any event. Now, this meaning must be believable, not just
deception. The meaning must rest on solid, factual evidence or the category wont be legitimized and
positively influential.

To illustrate how this categorizing process dysfunctions and functions well, Ill briefly present two client
cases. The first case involves a man who came to see me because he was experiencing symptoms of
depression as a result of his physical pain and lifestyle restrictions. Well call this client James. James
told me he was really concerned about himself and his abilities. He felt he was losing his mind and
going crazy. I asked what he meant by this and in what ways he thought this was happening. He told
me how hed been dropping many things around the house lately. When he cooked hed drop utensils or
ingredients. When he was cleaning up around the house he noticed how hed drop various items. (I
suppose I could have pointed out that these drops were happening during productive times, but I
believed hed dismiss the evidence) This perceived sudden increase in dropping things led to him to
concluding that he was going crazy. I guess we could look at his frame as his feeling that he was
losing control in life.

As an intervention strategy I decided to strictly focus on his perceptions and the contents of his
perceptions. In particular I relied on the Gestalt perceptual categories of similarities, continuation and
figure-ground. Similarities refers to the tendency for us to notice items of a similar nature. Now the
theme of this similar nature makes all the difference. You can notice in the room where you are now
sitting, all items colored blue or green. Or shift to think about categories of boats or any category of
items with features in common. In James case, he was noticing the category we might call, things he
drops.

Continuation refers to how we tend to get on a perceptual theme and just sort for the same material.
This concept resembles the Newtonian principle of a body at rest tends to stay and rest and a body in
motion tends to stay in motion. We tend to notice, over time, the same theme or category. Not only do
we notice how items are similar, we continue to notice how items are similar. Sort of like the old
phrase, everywhere you go, there it is.

The third Gestalt category is known as figure-ground. When we perceive a group of information, some
part of this group becomes our primary focus, reducing the rest of the group to background material. If
you listen to a piece of music from a band, you could just focus on the piano portion. The piano music
becomes the figure while the rest of the instruments music becomes the ground or background. When
we perceive, we select some portion of the whole to focus on unless we do what might be consider a
sort of eastern religion method of noticing an indistinguishable whole with no segregating. If you watch
a football game you can focus on just one players position out of the whole team. Or you could focus
on the whole movement of the teams, taking a sort of meta-position like the coach, to notice patterns
or trends.

Now back to James. To begin with, I asked him to think about a general example of similarities sorting.
I asked him if he ever noticed after he bought a new car, brand new or just new to him, how he then
noticed just how many of the same car and same color there are on the road. Most people can relate to
this principle, and so did James. And why did I start with addressing his similarities? Well, if you can
stop similarities sorting you can stop a particular continuation. And I believed James was just over-
focusing on times when he did drop things. As a result of his focus hed built a category from stringing
these similar dropping events together.

I pointed out to him that he could notice all the cars on the road that are similar to his but in the
meantime hes ignoring all the other cars that are different. And which is more? Once he understood
this I applied the perception to his dropping things and wondered if this might also be true for him. I
asked him to estimate the percentage of time when he drops things compared tot the times he holds on
to things. He naturally found that he held things much more often than he dripped them. Now we have
shifted the focal point to the opposite, holding on to things. This shift of focus represents a reversal of
figure-ground, switching dropping for holding.

Now we utilize continuation but apply it to holding to hold his perception in place better. I ask him to
think over time about just how many things he has ever picked up and held, choosing only to put them
down when he wants to do so. This got him to searching through his memory for like instances,
similarity, of holding. Once we collect similar events that are resourceful, we utilize the new focus or
figure and then invite continuation to hold this new frame in place. Of course we need a name for this
frame to give it life, so to speak.

I asked him what this larger, more enduring perception of his holding things effectively means about
him. James stated that he guessed he was not crazy. I then pressed for a specific meaning to take
the place of the old. He said his ability to hold things meant he was OK. We discussed his meaning of
OK and found it was quite a relief for him to realize he was fine mentally. Now we can come back to
the fact that these dropping incidents happened in the midst of productive behavior such as cooking
and cleaning (meta to the dropping). James can then place these behaviors these constructive
behaviors within the frame of OK and fine representing factual evidence that these frames about
him are accurate.

I dont want to suggest this example was the only work we did, nor that this simple intervention fully
took care of his presented depression. But this collection of principles that go into making frames was
called on in various ways over several sessions to dispel and shift his frames from crazy and
depressed to relieving, resourceful frames. Now his physical pain and its life interference no longer
says anything about his sanity and can at least co-exist with him without exacerbating his mental states
and then in turn, exacerbating his physical pain. He knows he can operate from the frames of OK and
fine.

There are several general principles identified within this brief article. Ill highlight them here so you can
notice them and find examples of them in your life. First, notice how we each end up relying on the
foundational NLP concept of deleting, distorting and generalizing. In order to make a frame, any frame,
we utilize this threesome of delete, distort and generalize. But what is their opposite? Identifying and
using the opposite leads to deconstructing a frame. Use whatever terms you like but I use including,
factualizing and specifying. The process of including defeats deleting. The process of factualizing defeats
distorting and specifying defeats generalizing. Think about it and notice.

The second principle expressed in this article is what amounts to the gestalt of frames. Each frame
forms a gestalt made up of information with a focal point or theme. This frame theme holds the frame
together and further relies on such gestalt perceptual principles as similarities, continuation,
simplification, closure and figure-ground.

These perceptual principles greatly influence what we observe, how we observe it and what meaning we
give our observations. So a frame results from a gestalt or, whole. This whole stems from a particular
focus on a particular item or group, thus defining the frame.

What drives us to select the particular object or subject of our focus is a whole other matter. But of
greater importance is that we can intervene on our own behalf and choose to make our own frames for
the experiences of our life. And if you take those frames that may seem to visually appear upright, lay
them down before you, they may just make wonderful stepping-stones into the future you desire. After
all, frames dont just assess the current conditions, they suggest ideas about how to respond, don
they?

For readings to delve further into the ideas presented here consider:

Micheal Halls book, Frame Games

John Burtons and Bob Bodenhamers book, Hypnotic Language; Its Structure and Use

About the author:

John Burton, Ed.D. LPC holds a Doctorate in Counseling from Vanderbilt University. He is Certified as
Master Practitioner of NLP. Dr. Burton maintains a private practice in Greenville, S.C. and teaches
graduate school on a part time basis. This November Crown House published a book he co-authored
with Bob Bodenhamer, D. Min. entitled, Hypnotic Language, Its Structure and Use.

E-mail John Burton: jkburton@charter.net

864-467-1077

2003 John Burton - All rights reserved.