December 4, 2013

December 4, 2013 

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

Dear Reader, 

In SVB nothing is copied by anybody, because nobody can be the voice for someone else. We have to find our own voice. Communication with our natural, resonant voice can only occur if we pay attention to how we feel. In NVB we do not pay attention to how we feel; we dissociate from how we feel and separate from from our environment. In NVB there is no experience of how we feel. Moreover, in NVB knowledge is out of sync with our experience. In NVB we value knowledge more than our experience and subsequently, due to such so-called knowledge, we disconnect from our experience. 

In NVB, our third-person, supposedly objective experience, is disconnected from our first-person, subjective experience. Due to our persistent over-emphasis on the former, the latter protests and is causing us to be continuously distracted from the former. In NVB, lack of attention for our emotions causes us to be obsessed with knowledge. Said differently, when our emotions are not expressed accurately, our failure to do so inevitably leads to ways of thinking which are problematic. NVB enhances and instills self-defeating, unscientific ways of thinking, but SVB restores and increases our experience and allows us to use knowledge in ways which are enhancing for everyone.

The fact that NVB can instantaneously disrupt and make SVB impossible, teaches us that we either are going to continue with NVB or we will continue with SVB. As it stands, we do not even know the difference between SVB and NVB, but once this distinction is made, we notice that our lack of knowledge regarding this distinction was the consequence of our lack of experience of this distinction. The distinction between lack of experience and lack of knowledge is vital for how we interact. Because of our over-emphasis on knowledge, our lack of experience is completely overlooked. We only pay lip-service to our own experience, which indicates that we do not recognize its essential function for human relationship.  Each time we have had SVB, it was because it was possible for SVB to continue, but we will continue to have more NVB if it remains impossible for SVB to occur. Because SVB signifies the absence of NVB and because SVB exposes, analyzes and brings to an end NVB, NVB primarily continues by making it seem as if SVB does not exist. Yet, the stressful impact of NVB is experienced by each of us. Only when we express our stress and discomfort and hear its dreadful sound, will we be able to attain SVB. 

We underestimate the importance of our own experience while we communicate. Because our experience is ignored and because NVB is more common to us than SVB, we believe that communication will improve once we come to know more about it. None of our scientific findings, however, have ever led to such improvement. To the contrary, the more we have come to know, the more difficult it became to maintain our hope that knowledge would one day fix our problematic communication. Although nobody believes anymore that knowledge can enhance relationship, we still continue to push the knowledge-agenda, while we ignore the importance of our own experience. 

Private experience is made unimportant because it is considered to be subjective. What is supposedly more important is objective knowledge. In our scientific quest for objectivity we keep ignoring that human beings have subjective experiences, which must have their expression. By making it seem as if there is only one ideal way of communicating, we block out and ignore the expression of our subjective experiences. As long as our subjective experiences compete with our so-called objective, scientific knowledge, subjective experience is discarded by default. Consequently, the lack of hope that knowledge can improve communication is relegated to our private thoughts. Because individuals keep struggling within themselves between their subjective experiences and the facts of life, they create their own version of objectivity.

The choice for what is believed to be objective is not scientific. What is objective has nothing to do with what we believe. The heart in each human being’s chest is really there. Likewise, individual experiences are really there, even if this means that someone hears voices. Occurrence of so-called mental illness is based on ignorance about our experience. The more we know about our subjective experience, the better we will get at preventing mental disorders. Mental health problems always represent an individual’s demand for attention for his or her own subjective experiences. Again, the idea that the solution for mental health problems must come from objective knowledge is false. Improvement can only result from the deliberate attempt, by a knowledgeable person, to restore the importance of the patient’s subjective experience. However, the therapist is not generally to be considered as the dispenser of the reinforcement. The therapists doesn't know about the SVB/NVB distinction. If he or she knew then he or she would focus on enhancing the client's SVB and decreasing NVB. The reinforcing effects of SVB are self-evident, because individual communicators will begin to trust and express their own experiences. In SVB all communicators will become objective about their subjective experiences.