Michael C.,Dr. Grinder, Ms. St. Clair,   Now i've been thinking about this whole "provide me with a sensory based description" thing...and for the last past few days i've unconsciously racking my brain in regard to this.  Doesn't seem like an unreasonable request at all. Your just asking for a sensory based description.  Well, i'm thinking that in my opinion one can not provide a satisfactory sensory based description...drum roll please... because there isn't one.     For example someone earlier in the thread posted,  "If a person claims to be feeling or experiencing state X, and a practitioner asks this person "How do you feel ABOUT feeling state X?"  The answer - is a meta-state."  For example, right now I am feeling curious.  If I ask myself how I feel about feeling curious - my answer is that I feel satisfied that I feel curious."    That's a good example.  And something I thought of but it's not a Meta-State...of at least in my opinion its more of an application...so kinda like it is and it isn't.  Remember were talking Semantics here!    Also earlier written by someone,      "To summarize, if I have a phobia of bees then: 1) When I hear or see a bee or bees my heart rate increases, my hands sweat, my vision blurs and I lose my sense of balance, which is a reaction to my internal representations of a revivified past memory, which I am associated to.  This is a primary state. 2) When I dissociate from that memory, I am creating a different set of representations, in which I am seeing myself react in the above state.  This decreases my perspiration and my heart rate, etc..  You might call this a third position move, but Michael calls it a Meta level move, because the representations he argues are "about" the previous state: a meta state."    In my opinion that's not a Meta-State, it's an application of a Meta-State.    Get it? Meta means in my experience something to the effect of, "Of, About, Above, Beyond"    For example you can not access a state of Meta using the standard state of elicitions of you know... Remember a time when you were really meta...Imagine a time when you were really meta... well I suppose you could but you'd have to do it in sensory based terms which would in that scenerio would be a misnomer.  It's kinda like proving that hypnosis exists, you can't do it because the term Hypnosis is a misnomer.  Once a Meta-State is presented in sensory based terms it is no longer a Meta-State per se.  It's now something else.  (This is just my thinking out loud.) A Meta-State is a Conceptual State, an Abstraction...I think this is why Hall considers it the next step in NLP...You see NLP is all about being Sensory Based...representing things in sensory based terms, Meta-States is about adding abstraction to NLP...when something is abstract it can not be sensory based at the same time...it's one or the other...(you can challenge that statement with Michael's either-or Meta-Model distinction or understand that this type of thinking, I think is part of why some consider MS apart of NLP and why some don't, either-or.)  Get it? Michael I feel was Adding Abstraction to NLP so now we have Abstraction and Sensory Based both sides of the coin.  I think what this debate boils down to is: Is NLP just Sensory Based? or Is NLP Sensory Based and Abstract?  make sense?  I think the point can be debated either way! Depends if we stick to just NLP is only sensory based as a criteria.  If that's the case than NO MS is not apart of NLP...it's NS it may share some of NLP's roots and draw from it but it's not NLP.  If NLP encompasses both the levels of abstraction and Sensory based referents then yes MS is apart of NLP.  Depends on how you want to think about it...no wrong or right way...I onced watched a T.V. and one of the characters on the show was talking to one of my personal heros and said, "People are going to believe what they want to believe, I know what I do." I'd actually like to get on last thing out before I end this post and ask for feedback, comments, flames...I've noticed some people referring to the term Meta as being Disassociated and even perhaps non-feeling...This just is not my experience by the way non-feeling is a feeling... Meta doesn't always mean disassociated...now I can't think of anybody on this site specifically or any where else for that matter that thinks this way...and you are entitled to your opinion if you think this but I have noticed it some where, I heard it some maybe through grapevine...(with the california raisins, oh yeah!)...People can be Meta to something and still be associated... It's like if I watch two people in a dialogue and I stand to the side and observe, I can still be Meta and notice what's going on and still be in my body... (noticing how I feel, perhaps curious about what's going on)...though I suppose it maybe argued that I am Disassociated from the scenerio...again we get into the wonderful world of Semantics where any thing can mean just about any thing... My definition of a Meta-State is, or better yet this is how I draw the distinction... Primary State --> About something out in the world! Meta-State --> About something in your mind! Okay now, please feel free, question me, offer feedback, comments, and i'll even accept a few flames as well just for good measure...here is my disclaimer though I am not an expert in NLP, I just practice what I conceive it is...I'm not an expert in NS or MS...so if you want to just dismiss this whole article because I am not a expert please feel free to...I welcome the opportunity to play around with these ideas!  I remember Gregory Bateson once said something to the effect of, "Wisdom is when two people openly discussing one's differences without the intent to change the other."  So with that in mind...I welcome your responses.