Articles by this Author
Ethics of Change Work
A response to a request by John Grinder (co-developer of NLP) for information about David Grove's work and Symbolic Modelling as examples of processes that involve "transactions that are designed to provoke change without the imposition of the agent’s own material."
When the Remedy is the Problem
This paper investigates how attempting to apply a remedy to a problem
can sometimes perpetuate or exacerbate that problem or create another
problem, and then the attempted remedy is itself a problem. We draw heavily on the work of Paul Watzlawick and his colleagues in the 1960s and 70s at
the Brief Therapy Center of the Mental Research Institute in Palo Alto,
California.
Feedback loops

What is a feedback loop?
What are the ten principles of feedback loops?
What difference does it make to think in terms of feedback loops?
These notes reveal all.
Preferences: What and How We Like
How do you know:
° you like/dislike something?
° how much you like/dislike it?
° you prefer it to something else you like less?
Modelling the embodied how we know we prefer one thing, person or activity over another.
Metáforas en la Mente
El artículo "Metaphors in Mind: A Case Study" de Penny Tompkins y James Lawley - traducido al español por Pedro Henríquez
When and How to Use 'when' and 'as'
‘When’ and as’ one of the primary ways to cleanly invite clients to attend to an aspect of their perception of their Metaphor Landscape. These notes describe how ‘when’ and ’as’ can be used:
- To enhance the effectiveness of your questions by more precisely directing the client’s attention
- To specify or frame the context in which the question is answered
- In a variety of ways
- At different times in the process.
Le Clean Language Revisite
La traduction de cet article, Clean Language Revisited: The evolution of a model (2004). Dans cet article, Penny Tompkins et James Lawley expliquent les évolutions de la méthode depuis ses débuts et proposent une nouvelle métaphore de la perception en Clean Language. Traduction de Eric von Saenger.
Clean Language Revisited: The evolution of a model
We published our first article on David Grove's Clean Language,
Less is More, in 1997. Since then our model of Clean Language has undergone two revisions. Here we document these changes and explain why they happened. By charting the development of our thinking we demonstrate how modelling over the long-term is an evolutionary process.
Body Awareness
Notes about the relationship of the Mind-Body and Body-Mind:
1. General quotes
2. Thoughts of Moshe Feldenkrais
3. What is the body?
4. Body ‘communication’
5. Body metaphors
6. The embodied nature of meaning and metaphor - balance
7. Recommended reading
The Jewel of Choice
This 3-part article contains a transcript for each of the two sessions where Penny Tompkins and James Lawley worked with a participant on a Symbolic Modelling training in 2001. The transcripts are annotated to explain some of the modelling involved and the purpose for each question. In part 3 the client describes - both in words and drawings - the changes she experienced during the sessions, and what happened in the following 6 months.