Going Meta

Lets talk more about what it means to ˜˜stay with the facts.

Think of the world as being made up of thingsthis dog over here, that telephone over there, Mexico down there, this rock at my feet. The existence of these things is usually not in question. The fact is, they are objects in the world and probably no one but an ivory-tower philosopher is going to dispute their existence. The world is full of objects.

In my head is a representation of those objects (the objects themselves are not in my head, of coursemy brain has created its own picture of them and that picture is in my consciousness). We are going to call thoughts about the real things in the world, the facts in the world facts like ˜˜Jimmy is taller than Belinda˜˜object-level thoughts. If I think ˜˜this report is late, that is an object-level thought. It is a fact that the report is late.

We need, for our purposes in this book, to distinguish between object-level thoughtsthoughts about the facts of the worldand opinions about the object-level. We highlight this difference in order to make the point that its the opinion level that causes us the problems. The name well give to this opinion level is ˜˜ meta-level . We say ˜˜meta because opinions about things are kind of one level higher than the things themselves (˜˜meta is a prefix meaning ˜˜beyond or ˜˜of a higher order).

The meta-level concerns the meaning we apply to the object-level. The report may be late, but in my opinion, over and above that fact, the late report is just one more late thing from this employee, and its driving me crazy. The opinion is the meaning I am applying to the lateness of the report.

There is nothing inherently wrong with the meta-level. It serves us well. It gives us beauty. While a mountain is just a mountain, when I look at a mountain I import into my experience my meta-level thoughts about its beauty. The meta-level also concerns morality. If someone says an untruthful thing, they just said what they said. The meaning we import about the matterthat saying untruthful things is wrongthat comes from meta-level activity. Meaning gives us, well, meaning. Dogs dont celebrate poetry. Humans do. Kitty cats dont take on a mission to keep peace in the world. Humans do. Bumblebees are busyyou could even say they even have a purpose about thembut they are not aware of their purpose. They are just fulfilling. They operate at the object-level. Humans operate at the object-level and are motivated at the meta-level. They have purpose.

Meta-level thoughts and statements are about object-level things. They address the desirability or undesirability of things. They also refer to truth or falsity, goodness or badness, acceptance or rejection . They produce meaning. That meaning drives us forward in the most profound way. From meaning we see religion, spirituality, purpose, value. We see self.

However, like everything in the world, there is a darker element to the meta-level. The types of people described in this book have problems that come right out of meta-level thinking. Meaning is crucially important. It takes a fair bit of security or self-esteem to resist the temptation to run with meaning in ways that affect us negatively. If your boss says there are layoffs coming, its hard to take that statement and stop there. No, the possibility of layoffs reflects on your future security and that merits some attention, right? Well, were not talking about dispensing with meaning. But it needs to be managed.

Some of our meta-level thoughts get some of us into trouble. The Transcendence Model helps people whose meta-level thoughts lead them to periodically undesirable feelings and behavior. For example, worriers take the facts, extend them into a possible future, and create a new possible meaning at the meta-level. ˜˜If I lose my job, I wont be able to pay my mortgage! is not an object-level concern. The mortgage is at the object-level. The pink slip is at the object-level. The phone ringing when the bank doesnt get the payment is at the object-level. But the scary thoughts are at the meta-level. They are based on meaning. Weve seen this in light of the worrier. Now think of the other five types:

• Controllers create meaning out of what they perceive to be out of control. A project may be going this way and that, at the object-level, and the controller brings in the meta-level perspective that things are out of control. ˜˜Out of control situations are undesirable, he thinks to himself. He steps in to ˜˜fix it.

• The fake creates and operates on meaning when she fabricates and projects an image for others to see. She is not just randomly picking an image for us. She prefers the chosen image. To her, it is good. And if she frets over the difference between what she believes or feels versus the chosen image, it is because somewhere in her head she has made the judgment about the hypocrisy. It is bad.

• When the attention-seeker feels lack of the affection he so craves, he is operating on the meta-level belief that he is not okay without attention. He waves his flag out of meta-level discomfort. He seeks meaning through being noticed by others.

• Victims create meaning by thinking about and attributing blame. Rather than staying at the object-level and dealing with the facts, they create a whole new world out of meaning. Their meta-level attention introduces blame. There is no actual blame in the world, of course. You cant touch blame. Oh, you can show a cause-and-effect relationship between two events, but you cant, at the object-level, show how the value judgment implicit in blame is justified.

• Prisoners get locked away by associations they make between their object-level perceptions and their meta-level beliefs and feelings. They import meaning to circumstances that they later regret importing.

The experience of self is at the meta-level. Its one of the intangible things. Self is not an object in the world. You cant touch a self. You can touch a person physically but there is no direct access to the self. Self is an intangible judge of objects, a subject to which we now turn in more detail.