December 19, 2013

December 19, 2013

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

Dear Reader, 

 

When he was a child, this writer used to go fishing with a telescope fishing rod that was made out of fiber glass. He was very proud to possess this fancy tool and always handled it with great care. After he had used it, he would pack it into a special long bag, which he would store into a protected space. The rod illustrates something about SVB. The thinnest piece, reaching across the water, comes out of another piece, which is thicker. This piece comes out of an even thicker piece, which comes out of the thickest piece, which you hold in your hands. Similarly in SVB everything that is said exactly and beautifully fits with what was said before, there is a connection between everything you say. In SVB we experience a cumulative fit.  

  

There is no link between what is said and what preceded it In NVB. Consequently, there is stagnation instead of growth. A tree cannot be made to grow. It grows by itself when the circumstances for growth are available. In NVB the circumstances for interaction are missing. We have died psychologically because we are used to NVB. We think SVB is for idealists, martyrs, revolutionaries, saints or other supposedly special human beings, but they never achieved it either. They are in the same boat as everybody else. Their way of talking is determined like yours, by how people have communicated with them. Being born with a golden spoon in one’s mouth couldn’t result into SVB any better than growing up under impoverished circumstances. The distinction between SVB and NVB wasn’t and hasn’t yet been made. Once it is made we will see the difference between when we have it and when we don’t. By that time, the difference no longer matters. Differentiation between what it is and isn’t only occurs when SVB isn’t possible. 

The distinction between SVB and NVB is of no importance once SVB is happening, once we are enhancing each other by how we interact. People who achieve SVB are always surprised and relieved to see many distinctions, which seemed so important during NVB, fall by the way side. We keep reiterating distinctions that perpetuate NVB. NVB is always strengthened by those, who are less willing or capable of making the distinction between SVB and NVB than we. As long as we ourselves can’t make the correct distinction, we too are tormented by it. We may be willing to make the distinction, but that doesn’t mean that we can. The feeling of uneasiness that goes with this, stops most people from exploring SVB. This awkward negative feeling is bound to continue as long as the distinction is not made correctly. What you get then is that certain people are supposedly depressed and that others are supposedly healthy. This is total nonsense, because in their way of communicating, they both still produce NVB, not SVB. 

An expert in SVB is needed. This author claims to be this expert. He does so reluctantly, because, on the one hand, he knows that SVB can’t be learned in any other way, but, on the other, he also knows that experts aren’t sufficient. The notion of an expert is determined by the fact that few people know about it. If SVB becomes popular, the idea of experts becomes irrelevant. Also, how this writer became an expert will not help others to become one. The development of their behaviors is rooted in a different reinforcement history than this author. The expertise of this author pertains to how SVB can help us to come to grips with our individual history of reinforcement. By looking at ourselves through the lens of how others have interacted with us, we can begin to understand our own behavior. This author understands his own behavior as determined by how others have interacted with him. He is only capable of having SVB with those who, like him, are persistent in finding out about the cause of their own behavior. Those who think they are causing their own behavior are incapable of learning anything about SVB. Even if they would read these words, it wouldn’t make any sense, because the task remains that they must learn to recognize their own NVB, while they speak. Even if the books we read are written by experts, writing or reading about it is not going to change the way in which we communicate.       

December 18, 2013

December 18, 2013 

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

Dear Reader, 

 

This writer calls himself a Verbal Behaviorist because he wants the reader to know that his work is an extension of B.F. Skinner’s work on operant conditioning. Speaking, listening, writing, reading, being understood, understanding, studying, learning, overt speech and covert speech, involve operants, which are increased or decreased by their consequences. Whatever was reinforced it is more likely to occur in the future. This author would like one particular kind of behaving verbally to occur more often. That is why he advocates for Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB). This refers to the use of language in which our communication really works, in which we understand what is said or written, in which we really learn from each other, in which we really feel understood by each other, in which we really enhance each other.

Once SVB is known, it will reinforce itself. It is not known because we have not differentiated between the two dimensions in which we interact with each other. Only in SVB are we in contact with each other and with ourselves. In Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB), we are neither in contact with ourselves, nor with each other. In NVB we dissociate from ourselves and each other. In NVB we are incapable of being in touch with our environment, with other people because we are not in touch with ourselves. We live in a world full of NVB, because we are estranged from ourselves. We fail to make contact with others because we are not in contact with ourselves. We accept NVB as our normal way of interacting, because we don’t and can’t think of other people as our environment, because we are used to a spoken communication that is dissociative in nature. 

Only in SVB is it apparent that contact with ourselves is equivalent to contact with others. Contact with ourselves is a function of our contact with others. Once our contact with others is lost, we are no longer in contact with ourselves. One can’t exist without the other. Contact with others never leads to loss of contact with our selves.In NVB we imagine that we are in contact with each other, that we are part of something bigger: our family, team, religion, political party or country. The price we pay, for our fantasy to belong, is that we disconnect from ourselves. This happens due to how we talk. It is hard to believe, at first, that most communication disconnects us from ourselves, but once this truth has been accepted, it becomes obvious how all our problems are related to our loss of contact with our selves. Loss of contact with our selves, strangely, became the basis of our relationships, because our supposed contact with others required us again and again to give up on our contact with ourselves. We will continue our misunderstanding about human relationship if we don’t look into how we interact.

Another way of saying the aforementioned is that our dominant way of communicating, which should be called NVB, although it kept the illusion of human relationship alive, prevented us from imagining our real connection with ourselves and others. Once SVB is established, we notice there was no need to image it. SVB couldn’t be imagined. In SVB we communicate the true nature of human relationship. Experiences of deprivation, neglect, abuse and rejection, could and would only make us long for and dream about idealized human relationship, which is NVB. However, only in SVB do we realize and enjoy the experience of continuity and safety of real human relationship. 

    

Our very notion of an ideal self, of aspirational or sacrificial thoughts, derives from aversive circumstances. It would not come about in an environment that is enhancing. Instead of looking out and changing our environment, we pretend to be looking in and we believe to be working on our non-existent inner selves. Human beings have tried in vain to achieve more trust, courage, confidence, faith and morals. What is the need for that when our environment makes it happen? We did not long for what was possible, we have longed for the impossible. If we had wanted for others what we had wanted for ourselves, we would have had what we wanted. Under the right circumstances we can be ourselves and we know that only this experience can really connect us.   

December 17, 2013

December 17, 2013

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

Dear Reader, 

 

Imagine you know how spoken communication can be improved, but nobody wants to hear about it or talk about it? Only once in a while there is a person who wants more teaching. Your teaching depends on the readiness of someone who wants to be taught. No matter how much you know, you can’t help those who don’t want to be taught. There is nothing wrong with what you know. You worked hard for it and you know it through and through, but nobody wants it. However, you know that people would want it, if they knew what it was, but they can’t want it, because they don’t know what it is. 

It is from this dilemma that this writer is writing these words. There have been thousands of people already that have shown interest in SVB, but they all came and went. One person, far away, only available by letter, once in a while lets this writer know he is still willing to be taught. Through the years many letters have been written to him by this writer. He also received many letters from him. Each time this is a delightful event. His student is an artist, who uses colored ink to write with a brush on rice paper. This writer has a closet full with his letters. It took him a long time to get his student to make more sense in his writings. Initially, the letters were ramblings about everything and nothing, but as the years went by, they became more coherent and interesting. He began to write about what is really going on. The letters replaced the hours-long conversations they used to have when they were together back when this writer lived in the Netherlands. 

There was and still is this writer’s goal of changing the whole world, by changing how we communicate. It is a huge task he has taken onto himself. The science of spoken communication has been discovered and is now waiting to be implemented. This writer can no longer try to reach people. He has done that and he has seen the poor results. It did not result into what he envisioned, but he is not disappointed, because his success was proportionate to that what was possible. 

This writer knows that if more would have been possible, then more would have happened. Very few people are capable, based on their history of reinforcement, to grasp and hold on to SVB. To grasp it is one thing, but to hold on to it is another. Of course, there is nothing to hold onto. Holding onto is figuratively speaking, but those who are capable of holding onto SVB, like this writer, are holding on, because there is nothing else better to do. By holding on, this writer continues to be benefitted by SVB, even though he can’t teach it to others and doesn’t have the energy anymore to approach them. 

This writer’s approach behaviors are worn out and outdated. He is tired of going after people and he realizes his own limitation. This writing is his last attempt to reach others. These words don’t sell and aren’t fancy. They weren’t meant to be. They aren’t having academic appeal. Like anyone who speaks their own voice, this writer doesn’t like or need to quote others. He has his own say and since these words have been used by millions of others, he doesn’t think of language as belonging to one person, who gets some special treatment. Words are sounds, vibrations produced by air coming out of our mouth. 

We have made language into a sordid affair. The idea that someone can have property rights on names and phrases is an infringement on our freedom of speech. Nobody owns anything. We simply fool ourselves. When we die, we can’t take anything with us. Wise, knowledgeable words fade away in the face of death. Nothing remains. These words are not going to do what this writer had wanted them to do. They will be forgotten. Unless someone with a similar behavioral history gets a hold of these words, SVB is not going to stay alive and will die with this author. This writer feels a sense of relief with his legacy. There is peace in the fact that one can do only so much. Knowledge is limited and so is our ability to understand. This writer believes that we need each other to know and that that alone is reason for us to communicate, scientifically. According to this writer, science is the only ongoing dialogue which has any real meaning.

December 16, 2013

December 16, 2013

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

Dear Reader, 

 

Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) is a way of communicating, which is absolutely possible, but which we keep missing. It feels great to have SVB and yet we do not allow ourselves or each other to feel great when we talk with one another. We do the exact opposite: we make ourselves and each other feel terrible. Because we keep doing that we produce Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB). We are so used to it that we do not notice that NVB makes us feel the way we do. When there is a moment of SVB, we stop our NVB, have a little breather, but then we go right back to NVB, completely ignoring the experience we had with SVB. No matter how brief, the experience was there. To have and maintain our sanity, the SVB experience has to be there. 

All sorts of explanations can be given as to why we keep producing NVB, but none of that produces SVB. To have SVB, NVB must stop. This is only going to happen when we experience more SVB. Our ability to stop NVB improves by having more SVB. The goal of this writing is to create more SVB. The goal is not to stop NVB. This process is best compared to parents, who reinforce appropriate behaviors, but ignore, as much as possible, a child’s inappropriate behaviors. In SVB our focus is on building desirable behaviors. 

We waste our time and energy by talking about what we don’t want. Every time we talk about what we don’t like and why we don’t like it, we produce NVB. Talking about aversive stimuli produces NVB. Talking about enriching, reinforcing stimuli produces SVB. It is as simple as that. When we don’t perceive noxious stimuli, there is no need to talk about them, but the moment we perceive them, we are going to talk about them, we need to talk about them, whether we know it or not, admit it or not, or are aware of it or not. Noticing aversive stimuli doesn’t require conscious awareness. We have an innate ability to detect danger in our environment. The moment this mechanism is activated, we are no longer capable of having SVB. 

Our need to communicate in order to survive danger is a biological matter. The sound of our voice and the sensations we experience within our body tell us if we feel safe or not. These nonverbal cues can make verbal communications impossible and unnecessary. Our verbal expressions only make sense in a state of well-being. When, due to a threat, a fight-flight-freeze response is triggered, we can’t produce SVB and are only capable of producing NVB. We don’t sound good, because we don’t feel good. We sound fearful, because we are full of fear. We sound tense and anxious, because we our experience is tense and anxious. Although we may not have consciously noticed it, we have perceived aversive stimuli. Some people say that they have a gut feeling that something is wrong, but the reality is: they feel threatened. There would be no fear response, there cannot be a fear response, if there is no stimulus eliciting it. Whether we are dealing with a perceived or a real threat is not the question. In both cases there is our fear response.

Our emphasis on the arbitrary distinction between an imagined threat and a real threat blinds us to the reality that both are still perceived as aversive, and, therefore, can trigger the same alarm reaction. This is especially true for our spoken communication. NVB, in one way or another, is always involving the proximity of an aversive stimulus. We can identify this stimulus by paying attention to what is asking and demanding our attention. We can give words to whatever asks our attention. By listening to the sound of our own words, we become aware of whether what we describe is aversive or reinforcing to us. 

When our experience is aversive,, we notice this by how we sound. Once we are aware of the NVB that this produces, we produce SVB again, because we now describe and accept our negative emotions. SVB occurs when in our spoken communication we detect our negative emotion, which undermines our interaction. By going back and forth between SVB and NVB, we create more SVB, but once the distinction has been made, we must maintain the environment in which SVB can be continued and NVB be decreased to a minimum. After the discovery of the medicine our goal must became to prevent disease. 

Prevention of NVB is different from decreasing it. As long as we are trying to be kind and doing the best we can, we may think things will be improving, but they are not. The decrease of NVB does not matter much. It is possible to create a setting in which SVB can continue, but such an experiment is meaningless when it comes to prevention. It is a good exercise in finding out what is needed, but it is not going to result in prevention. Likewise, prevention of a disease is not going to occur because we have discovered a medicine. It will occur only once if this medicine is given by those who have it to those who need it.

A momentary decrease of NVB will again and again be followed by its resurgence. There have been many times, during, but especially after wars, in which human beings have dreamed and talked about different ways of interacting, but none of our treaties have created lasting peace. It is ridiculous that we continue to talk about the Middle East Peace Process. Politicians model to citizens across the world how to have NVB. SVB is world-peace in a nutshell. It is time to retire outdated constructs. We are not after one feel-good session of SVB, we are thinking about disseminating SVB so that NVB can be prevented.

We keep trying to re-invent the wheel, but we need to stop doing that.

SVB is nothing new. Once we have it, we know that we have it, we know that we have had it and that we can have it and should have it. We need to be reinforced for what we already know and have known for so long. The fact, which does not go away, is that we don't know what we know. Just because our stupid way of communicating is not up to par with what we know, doesn’t mean that we don’t know, or can continue to live in our cocoon of blissful ignorance. To the contrary, we are tormented and haunted by what we know and what we can’t seem to forget. NVB will never satisfy us and always leave us doubtful about what we have missed while we insisted on continuing our misery.  We can’t be happy about the replacement of genuine communication. Although we can recognize SVB, we do not know it. We do not know SVB. We know NVB, but mistake it for SVB. We are conditioned by NVB. SVB is lacking in our lives, because we keep NVB going. 

The repetitive character of this writing may strike many readers as overdone. This writer, however, knows that before SVB will begin to sink in, it needs to be repeated many, many times. It will not stick by reading about it once or twice. It is not going to stabilize by you having only one SVB conversation. You need to have many SVB conversations before you will begin to see a difference. If you want quick results, SVB is not for you. NVB will give you quick results, but SVB takes a lot of time. This writer has had thousands of SVB conversations and he knows how much work it takes, before it can begin to have its own momentum. SVB does not come cheap and it requires work. One does not get paid money for the work one does on SVB. 

There are two problems, which remain, even once we acknowledge that there is such a thing as SVB or authentic human interaction.  The first problem is that we just can’t stand the idea that we don’t know how to communicate and that we are most of the time pretentious.  This is such a big deal, that we rather endlessly go on with our NVB than that we admit that we really don’t know how to communicate. The second problem is that to learn SVB, we have to listen to and work with an expert. This expert is not a guru, mystic, master, visionary, or some exceptional, super-smart individual, but an ordinary human being, who, due to his history of reinforcement, was lucky enough to go on with something that anyone else in his situation could have gone on with, but which nobody has explored. This writer has not met anyone, who explored the possibility of ongoing spoken communication, SVB, in which communicators become more connected with each other and with themselves, in which people understand each other and listen to each other, in which the communicators say things which they have never said before, in which people acknowledge that the possibility to communicate like that only exists under specific circumstances. Due to his past experience and research this writer became an authority on SVB. That is for most people extremely annoying. People usually want approval for their NVB and want to argue that it is SVB, but once they speak with this writer, they can no longer go on with that.