replacing

ne	replacing eliminate a desire or fear by superimposing a stronger desire or fear

negative thinking > achieving negative goals > replacing

Replacement means putting something else in the place of the problem, or putting the problem in another place, or both.

Contrast this with removal, which means either removing the problem from the problem-owner or removing the problem-owner from the problem, or both.

During the transition period, things may often get worse. A replacement stratagem may therefore also require a transition stratagem, bridging from the old to the new.

Town
planning The Polish philosopher Kotarbinski expresses either optimism or irony when he describes social progress from villages to cities. ‘Transition from one stage of harmony to a higher level of harmony [often] occurs through a stage of disharmony; in general, a transition from a stage marked by a positive property to a stage marked by that property in a still greater degree, takes place through a stage marked by the corresponding negative property. For instance, a well arranged village is healthy and possessed of beauty; the same holds for a fine modern city; but the intervening stage was that of slums and overcrowding in a city which had already lost the advantages of a village and had not yet acquired the advantages of modern cities (public utilities, green spaces, municipal transport, etc.)’

Clinical
hypnosis "Geoffrey Young lost a leg in World War One. He later climbed the north face of the Matterhorn with the remaining leg. He used to say that one of the disciplines - perhaps even one of the satisfactions - of the mountain climber was not-listening to the pains of the flesh." [Bateson]
But of course, non-listening is a negative goal. Young needed the Matterhorn, to give him a positive goal that would outweigh and enable the negative goals.

Changing
feelings That unwanted feelings cannot be simply erased or ignored was known to Descartes:
"Passions may not be directly recalled or eliminated by some act of our will; but they may be indirectly controlled by the representation of those things that are habitually associated with the passions we wish to have and that are the opposite of those we wish to reject."
Indeed, we can find clues to this insight in the New Testament. The psychotherapy practised by Jesus is described as the driving out of devils. But if devils are driven out from a person, and nothing is put in their place, the devils will return sevenfold. [Luke XI]

Transference Within psychoanalytic theory, there has been a great deal written about the phenomenon of transference, where the client uses the relationship with the therapist to replace something else, and becomes as it were addicted to the therapy/therapist. A related phenomenon also occurs with management consultancy.
[cf Lacanian version of transference]
"Interestingly, consultants and other change agents often become transitional objects for their client firms: The client refuses to ‘let go’, and becomes crucially dependent on the change agent’s advice in relation to every move." [Morgan]

Phobias One of the precepts of NLP is that all behaviour patterns have a positive function. This includes the way you react to things, the way you think. For example, a phobic response probably has a protective function. Most phobias have a rational core, but are extended irrationally. For example, it is rational to be afraid of large, hostile and rabid dogs. Most people would be nervous in the company of a pit bull terrier that hadn’t eaten for two day. But someone who has a phobia of dogs may get the same physical symptoms of fear from seeing a small, tame dog asleep, or even a photograph of a dog.
A traditional therapy for phobias is desensitization, which tries to eliminate the phobic response. The trouble with this as therapy is that it provides nothing to put in the place of the phobia; the person is not helped to learn new ways of responding to dogs. "If you do systematic desensitization, and you don’t replace the ‘negative’ behavioural pattern with something positive, it takes a long time, because the person will fight. It’s their only defence. That’s why it takes six months, because a person has to randomly put something else in its place." [Bandler & Grinder]
The NLP phobia cure doesn’t remove all fear of all dogs, making it impossible for a person to display proper caution in the presence of a dangerous dog. NLP aims to provide the person with a choice of responses. The person learns to recognize the contexts in which the phobic response (or perhaps a less exaggerated version of it) remains appropriate, and acquires new alternative responses for those contexts where the phobic response is not appropriate.

Addictions Replacement cures for addiction work in a similar way to phobia cures, but in reverse. Instead of giving the addict a physical aversion to the drug, the addict is given an emotional substitute. Instead of heroin, you can have a new hobby, such as carpentry, or perhaps Jesus.
Some therapists assemble the addict’s family, to ensure support. "Describe how much energy is wasted by your concern for this person’s addiction." "If he/she quits, what will you use the energy for instead?" Let us suppose the alcoholic’s daughter says she is not doing too well in school at present, but she thinks if she could use more energy for homework, she would get good enough grades to get into medical school. That kind of thing can be a really powerful positive reason for the father to quit drinking.
But where does the addiction go? Suppose the girl gets to medical school, what does the father do then? And what about the daughter? Many doctors are heavy drinkers, or abuse the drugs they have such easy access to.

Transitional
substitutes "In helping to facilitate any kind of social change it may thus be necessary for the change agent to create transitional phenomena when they do not exist naturally. Just as father or mother may have to help their child find a substitute for Teddy, a change agent - whether a social revolutionary or a paid consultant - must usually help his or her target group to relinquish what is held dear before they can move on. Significantly, this can rarely be done effectively by ‘selling’ or imposing a ‘change package’, an ideology or a set of techniques. The theory of transitional phenomena suggests that in situations of voluntary change, the person doing the changing must be in control of the process. … If the change agent tries to bypass or suppress what is valued, it is almost sure to resurface at a later date." [Morgan]

False
revolution Replacing one elite with another. Most so-called revolutions have merely done this.

Exorcism The elimination of bad spirits. In Christian exorcism, the bad spirits are at least replaced by Jesus, or by the Holy Spirit (Logos).
Furthermore, in one story, Jesus arranges an alternative resting place for the devils themselves: they are cast into a herd of swine. [Matthew VIII, Luke VIII] (It is clear from the Gospel, by the way, that the Gadarene people did not really appreciate the destruction of their pigs for the sake of a psychotherapeutic demonstration, since they immediately drummed Jesus out of town.) In other folk traditions, the resting place for evil is the so-called scapegoat.

Page last updated on January 3rd, 2001
Copyright © 2000-2001, Richard Veryard

Town planning	The Polish philosopher Kotarbinski expresses either optimism or irony when he describes social progress from villages to cities. ‘Transition from one stage of harmony to a higher level of harmony [often] occurs through a stage of disharmony; in general, a transition from a stage marked by a positive property to a stage marked by that property in a still greater degree, takes place through a stage marked by the corresponding negative property. For instance, a well arranged village is healthy and possessed of beauty; the same holds for a fine modern city; but the intervening stage was that of slums and overcrowding in a city which had already lost the advantages of a village and had not yet acquired the advantages of modern cities (public utilities, green spaces, municipal transport, etc.)’
Clinical hypnosis	"Geoffrey Young lost a leg in World War One. He later climbed the north face of the Matterhorn with the remaining leg. He used to say that one of the disciplines - perhaps even one of the satisfactions - of the mountain climber was not-listening to the pains of the flesh." [Bateson] But of course, non-listening is a negative goal. Young needed the Matterhorn, to give him a positive goal that would outweigh and enable the negative goals.
Changing feelings	That unwanted feelings cannot be simply erased or ignored was known to Descartes: "Passions may not be directly recalled or eliminated by some act of our will; but they may be indirectly controlled by the representation of those things that are habitually associated with the passions we wish to have and that are the opposite of those we wish to reject." Indeed, we can find clues to this insight in the New Testament. The psychotherapy practised by Jesus is described as the driving out of devils. But if devils are driven out from a person, and nothing is put in their place, the devils will return sevenfold. [Luke XI]
Transference	Within psychoanalytic theory, there has been a great deal written about the phenomenon of transference, where the client uses the relationship with the therapist to replace something else, and becomes as it were addicted to the therapy/therapist. A related phenomenon also occurs with management consultancy. [cf Lacanian version of transference] "Interestingly, consultants and other change agents often become transitional objects for their client firms: The client refuses to ‘let go’, and becomes crucially dependent on the change agent’s advice in relation to every move." [Morgan]
Phobias	One of the precepts of NLP is that all behaviour patterns have a positive function. This includes the way you react to things, the way you think. For example, a phobic response probably has a protective function. Most phobias have a rational core, but are extended irrationally. For example, it is rational to be afraid of large, hostile and rabid dogs. Most people would be nervous in the company of a pit bull terrier that hadn’t eaten for two day. But someone who has a phobia of dogs may get the same physical symptoms of fear from seeing a small, tame dog asleep, or even a photograph of a dog. A traditional therapy for phobias is desensitization, which tries to eliminate the phobic response. The trouble with this as therapy is that it provides nothing to put in the place of the phobia; the person is not helped to learn new ways of responding to dogs. "If you do systematic desensitization, and you don’t replace the ‘negative’ behavioural pattern with something positive, it takes a long time, because the person will fight. It’s their only defence. That’s why it takes six months, because a person has to randomly put something else in its place." [Bandler & Grinder] The NLP phobia cure doesn’t remove all fear of all dogs, making it impossible for a person to display proper caution in the presence of a dangerous dog. NLP aims to provide the person with a choice of responses. The person learns to recognize the contexts in which the phobic response (or perhaps a less exaggerated version of it) remains appropriate, and acquires new alternative responses for those contexts where the phobic response is not appropriate.
Addictions	Replacement cures for addiction work in a similar way to phobia cures, but in reverse. Instead of giving the addict a physical aversion to the drug, the addict is given an emotional substitute. Instead of heroin, you can have a new hobby, such as carpentry, or perhaps Jesus. Some therapists assemble the addict’s family, to ensure support. "Describe how much energy is wasted by your concern for this person’s addiction." "If he/she quits, what will you use the energy for instead?" Let us suppose the alcoholic’s daughter says she is not doing too well in school at present, but she thinks if she could use more energy for homework, she would get good enough grades to get into medical school. That kind of thing can be a really powerful positive reason for the father to quit drinking. But where does the addiction go? Suppose the girl gets to medical school, what does the father do then? And what about the daughter? Many doctors are heavy drinkers, or abuse the drugs they have such easy access to.
Transitional substitutes	"In helping to facilitate any kind of social change it may thus be necessary for the change agent to create transitional phenomena when they do not exist naturally. Just as father or mother may have to help their child find a substitute for Teddy, a change agent - whether a social revolutionary or a paid consultant - must usually help his or her target group to relinquish what is held dear before they can move on. Significantly, this can rarely be done effectively by ‘selling’ or imposing a ‘change package’, an ideology or a set of techniques. The theory of transitional phenomena suggests that in situations of voluntary change, the person doing the changing must be in control of the process. … If the change agent tries to bypass or suppress what is valued, it is almost sure to resurface at a later date." [Morgan]
False revolution	Replacing one elite with another. Most so-called revolutions have merely done this.
Exorcism	The elimination of bad spirits. In Christian exorcism, the bad spirits are at least replaced by Jesus, or by the Holy Spirit (Logos). Furthermore, in one story, Jesus arranges an alternative resting place for the devils themselves: they are cast into a herd of swine. [Matthew VIII, Luke VIII] (It is clear from the Gospel, by the way, that the Gadarene people did not really appreciate the destruction of their pigs for the sake of a psychotherapeutic demonstration, since they immediately drummed Jesus out of town.) In other folk traditions, the resting place for evil is the so-called scapegoat.