INTRODUCTION: When people say, “In my mind’s eye I see ___________” or “I have half a mind to ___________” they are expressing themselves correctly. We each have two unique perspectives of past events, experiences and even life in general. It’s not a matter of dominance, but rather sequencing of accessing beliefs and images. Sometimes this is helpful and appropriate. Other times, having the “less helpful” image or memory come up first can hold you back from your full potential and fulfillment in life. Learning how to better access BOTH images and understanding the meaning of each gives us ore options, alternative perspectives, and often more peace of mind.
The articles in this series are from the book “The Other Mind’s Eye” from Allan C. Sargent.
This field of study is pioneered by Allan C. Sargent and Marilyn Sargent. Together, they are your instructors of the Life Strategies Coach Certification and the Results Coach Certification with the Spencer Institute. Although there are other helpful tools, resources, processes and models that are aspects of these two professional training courses, the lessons in this post are key aspects to both.
The structure and applications of Internal Dominant Eye Accessing form the basis of the tools that allow us to begin to answer the question “Why” as it applies to understanding how we code and respond to emotional information. This new technology gives us the structure to develop habits and personal strategies that lead to having more of the good things we want in our lives. Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) is the study of human excellence. It asks the question, “What works, and how can it work even better?” By analyzing (modeling) the specific behaviors and internal thinking processes (strategies) of individuals who consistently demonstrate excellence in their field, those strategies can be identified down to very fine details. Once this has been accomplished, those strategies can be used by others to accomplish the same level of excellence. The same concept holds true for professional goals, interpersonal relationships, and a person’s self-esteem. Behaviors are relatively easy to identify.
The exciting and challenging task is to precisely elicit internal thinking processes, beliefs, and motivations. This task becomes even more challenging because very often, those who are top performers are not consciously aware of their internal thinking patterns that lead to their success. In the early 1970’s, Richard Bandler, John Grinder, Robert Dilts, Judith Delozier, Leslie Cameron-Bandler and others discovered ways to access and identify specific and reliable templates that elicit internal mental processes, language patterns, and behavioral characteristics of successful people. This was the beginning of Neuro-Linguistic Programming.
Neuro represents the internal workings of the brain, Linguistic refers to how language influences our experience both internally and in communication with others, and Programming is how to install effective strategies into our own life. The modeling templates identified in NLP offer a structure to analyze all aspects of any system, including the system that is within all individuals at a personal level, all the way up to and including global politics, and health. As with any field of technology, NLP has specific terminology to represent concepts and principles of interest to the field. Throughout this book, much of the “jargon” used in the field of NLP has either been translated into user-friendly language, or explained as it is presented. It is my belief that anyone with an interest in “What is possible?” will benefit by reading this book, and using the valuable information within it. I would like to take this opportunity to introduce my wife Marilyn Sargent. The format of this book is as an interactive exchange with participants in a seminar on Internal Dominant Eye Accessing that Marilyn and I present together. Marilyn has an extensive background in NLP and has a private consulting practice in Southern California. She has been a part of the discoveries discussed in this book from the very beginning and, more often than not, she has been the test subject throughout the developmental stages.
With this perception, Johnny races home, runs upstairs, and finds refuge in his room as the effects of the stress response fade and his body starts to return to normal. Not only has he lost his appetite for an after school snack, but also he is in no mood to do his homework. Even the possibility of going to his friend’s house to play is out of the question, because the teenagers might spot him, and this time he might not escape so luckily. How Johnny actually responds to a situation similar to this one will generally be somewhere between the examples I have given, since the left and right hemispheres of the brain communicate information back and forth through a network of fibers in the brain called the corpus callosum.
Information stored in Johnny’s brain from previous experiences will also have an important influence on his response to this event. Since the most primary and vital functions of the brain involve survival and personal safety issues, the brain automatically responds to and evaluates events that might threaten a person’s immediate safety. In most people, the right hemisphere of the brain stores emotionally charged memories, while at the same time, the left hemisphere records a relatively unemotional sequence of events. There are two separate and unique pictorial representations for each event in our lives for which an external visual stimulus has been imprinted. Think of how often we have heard the phrase “I see it in my mind’s eye.” Imagine how many possibilities will be opened up by understanding your “other mind’s eye.” When we recall an event with the right hemisphere’s “mind’s eye” our response will be very different than if we recall it with the left hemisphere’s “mind’s eye.” Each hemisphere of the brain records and recalls useful information.
If we consistently utilize the perceptions from only one side of our brain, our choices are limited, often leaving personal issues unresolved. “I have half a mind to…” is another phrase we often hear people use. If this is descriptive of what is actually happening in our thinking process, we may literally be using only half of our potential. Learning how to have conscious control of which hemispheric image to utilize broadens the range of choices and responses available to us. Additional benefits result from being able to integrate information from both hemispheres when dealing with an issue. Some examples have been added in the process of editing. In this book you will learn how your brain codes information for emotional responses, and how to consciously access information stored in both hemispheres. You will also learn simple step-by-step techniques to help you use your entire brain to get what you want in life. The participants (whose names were changed to respect their privacy) offered valuable insights, and asked some very interesting questions. I believe their questions will help to answer questions you may have as you read this book.
Allen C. Sargent Note to reader: To facilitate the smoothness of reading, “he,” “she,” “his,” and “her” are used to connote a singular pronoun, not as a gender distinction.
Discovering “The Other Mind’s Eye”
As with all new discoveries, “Internal Dominant Eye Accessing” is the culmination of information from a variety of sources. In this section, I will give a brief history of the specific pieces of information leading to the discovery of Internal Dominant Eye Accessing, which then led to the formation of “The Hemispheric Eye Model™” (also referred to as “THE Model™”). One of the major tools used for personal change is visualization. Throughout my life, I had a difficult time consciously accessing internal images. Seemingly simple tasks, such as trying to make internal images bigger or brighter, did not have much effect on my internal experiences. Many of us who might be considered “mind’s eye challenged” stand almost in disbelief as those who are “mind’s eye gifted” change and manipulate their internal pictures with ease. I have a friend who gets such vivid pictures in her mind’s eye that she almost has to walk around them.
Visualization comes so easily for her that she can’t avoid getting pictures. After about two years of pretending “as if” I were getting pictures, it finally occurred to me that it might be the way I was trying to access pictures internally that was making the difference. NLP models the structure of excellence by finding the component pieces that are an integral part of a successful strategy. Since I recognized the value in being able to access internal images, I began to find out all I could about how those who are “visually gifted” were accessing their internal pictures. My quest for more visual access led to the discovery of Internal Dominant Eye Accessing. Even people such as myself, who could have been considered “mind’s eye challenged,” remember dreaming, at least to some extent.
Dreaming indicates that some part of the brain is capable of visualizing something that is not actually in our conscious reality. Knowing that many people believe that dreaming involves having access to the right hemisphere, I began to wonder if those who could easily visualize in a conscious state of awareness somehow had more access to their right hemisphere when they were awake than those who had difficulty visualizing. I thought that if I could find out how those who were visually gifted were visualizing, I might be able to have some conscious control of my own internal images. Besides a desire to have better access to visualization, there were four main pieces that led to the discovery of Internal Dominant Eye Accessing. The first piece came many years ago when I was a golf professional.
Jack Nicklaus had discussed seeing the golf ball dominantly with his right eye before he started his back swing. Since he tilted his head slightly during his back swing, it was evident to him that he could not actually see the ball with his right eye any longer, because his nose was now between his right eye and the ball. Since he could still see the ball from this position, he had somehow Discovering “The Other Minds Eye” switched so that he was seeing the ball with his left eye. The important thing I learned from this was that even though we do see out of both eyes, we see out of either the left or right eye more dominantly at any given moment in time. The second piece of information came during a workshop I attended on accelerated learning. In the workshop they discussed how information is received into both the left and right hemispheres from what we see, hear, and feel. The goal for accelerated learning is to input information into all sensory channels in each hemisphere. Recall of the information can then be accessed in either hemisphere through each sensory channel. We will discuss this process in more detail a little bit later.
The third piece I learned at a lecture about Ericksonian Hypnosis. This piece had to do with a naturally occurring shift of hemispheric dominance from the left hemisphere of the brain to the right hemisphere, and then back to the left hemisphere, approximately every ninety minutes. This shift happens out of our conscious awareness and varies slightly among individuals. The naturally occurring shift of hemispheric dominance is known as ultradian rhythms, and, since it plays an important role in how we store and recall information, we will be covering it in more detail later. Natural Shifts in Hemispheric Dominance) The fourth piece came when I had an opportunity to talk with an ophthalmologist about eye dominance, and he demonstrated how to determine which eye is currently dominant (externally). Later, we will demonstrate how to do this, and how it is a valuable tool in learning to access your internal dominant eye.
Knowing that we can identify our external dominant eye, I began to wonder if the same thing was happening internally. I had often been told to “see with my mind’s eye.” What I discovered is that we actually have two “mind’s eyes.” We have one image coded dominantly in the left hemisphere of the brain, and another separate image coded dominantly in the right hemisphere of the brain.In essence, we have two separate pictures and two separate perceptions for each event in our life. They may be similar in many ways, and yet they are different. Which image we are accessing will have a very important impact on how we perceive the world, what we feel our choices are, and how we go about responding to these choices. The Internal Dominant Eye Accessing processes are simple and easy to use with yourself and with others. To understand the processes well, it is important to have a basic understanding of what is going on inside your brain.
One of my favorite quotes comes from a biologist named Lyle Watson, who said, “If the brain were so simple that we could understand it, we would be so simple that we couldn’t.” With this in mind, we are going to keep this explanation as simple as it needs to be, and still have enough information to understand how our brains process incoming visual information. There is a great deal of value in understanding how external information influences our perceptual filters. We will be giving you enough information about how Internal Dominant Eye Accessing works for you to be confident using the processes with yourself and with others. After we have explained the more detailed concepts, you will be able to experience the value of having conscious access to your “other mind’s eye.”
How Perceptions Are Formed
In NLP terminology the word modality refers to our senses. Visual is what we see, auditory is what we hear, and kinesthetic refers to our feelings. In much of the literature in NLP, the sense of smell (olfactory) and the sense of taste (gustatory) are grouped with the kinesthetics, although these modalities may be identified separately. In the more specific category of kinesthetics, there are three distinctions of feelings. One involves tactile sensations, which has to do with our sense of touch and temperature. The second is called proprioceptive and relates to our visceral feelings and body movement. The third part of our kinesthetics we call our emotions, such as happy, sad, worried, and excited. Emotions are our composite evaluations and perceptions from what we see, hear, and feel both internally and externally. I mentioned earlier that I had attended a seminar on accelerated learning. In the seminar, I learned that both hemispheres are receiving input in all of the modalities.
The brain is divided into two hemispheres, both with unique, special functions and abilities.
For most people, the left hemisphere specializes in logical, linear information, such as facts and data. Most of the speech centers are located in the left hemisphere. This is what I refer to as the checkbook world where scheduling, speech, and technical analysis take place. The right hemisphere is more concerned with spatial thoughts and relationships. This is where our identity and how we relate in the world seem to live. The right hemisphere is also where metaphor is processed. We use metaphor to introduce new perceptions, to update limiting beliefs, and to introduce new behavioral options. There is a speech center in the right hemisphere that is responsible for putting the language from the left hemisphere into meaningful phrases.
It is the right hemisphere that has the ability to distinguish the meaning of a word or statement from the tonality of the speaker. For example, “darkroom,” used to develop film, or “dark room,” describing a room without light, is easy to distinguish in normal conversation. The right hemisphere is also where emotionally charged memories are stored. If an event is very emotional, chances are it can be accessed in the right hemisphere. The two hemispheres of the brain communicate with each other by sharing information through a network of fibers called the corpus callosum. The corpus callosum unites the specialties of each hemisphere into a perception that combines the logical, technical skills of the left hemisphere with the relationship and identity focus from the right hemisphere. The transfer and sharing of information between the hemispheres creates our experience from what we refer to as one brain, even though the information comes from the two hemispheres, each with its own cognitive style.
To begin with, we will focus on the retina of the eye where cones and rods take information in and send it to the brain. The eyes can be thought of as being separated vertically into equal halves. Information coming into the eye from the outside of our visual field connects to the retina and enters into an area just behind the eyeballs called the optic chiasm. The information is then transferred into the receiving eye side of the brain. Information received into the inside, or nasal side, of our visual field connects to the retina and travels into the optic chiasm and is then transferred into the hemisphere opposite from the eye that is receiving the input. Essentially, each eye is taking in information that goes to both sides of the brain. If somebody has the use of only one eye, they are still getting information into both hemispheres. Once the image gets to the brain, it is transferred along optic fibers to the visual cortex area of the brain to a group of cells. These cells are the analyzers. They analyze the input sent from the cones and rods of the pupil. The analyzer cells are surrounded by another group of cells that organize the information into meaningful pictures.
Then a third group of cells coordinates the input from the “see” and “hear” into a single perception. At this point, overall evaluation and emotions are created. At the same time this process is happening in the left hemisphere, it is also happening simultaneously in the right hemisphere. An evaluation is going to be formed based on the hemispheric function or cognitive style for each side of the brain. Information processed in my left hemisphere is going to have a logical, linear evaluation. The information that comes into the right hemisphere is going to be processed with attention toward spatial relationship and identity.
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