GSM During the mid to late 70's when people learned that Bandler and I were considering modeling Ericksonian hypnotic patterning, we received numerous requests pleading with us not to make explicit the patterning - the typical justification for us ceasing and desisting with the modeling was that once made explicit, there would be abuse of the patterning by ill-intentioned people. There were several things that convinced me personally to go on with the modeling and to publish the resulting model: 1. people intuitively use significant portions of the Ericksonian patterning (causal linkage, embedded commands, presuppositions...) anyway. Who knows with what intent - what was (and to me, still is) clear is that for someone to take responsibility for the consequences of their actions presupposes that they can identify both the patterning that they are employing and the consequences that flow from it. At the point where Bandler and I did the modeling, no explicit patterning of Erickson existed (with the abstract exception of Haley's nicely turned out work in Strategies of Psychotherapy - note a work that did not reach the precision of how to actually create and deliver communications in the complimentary, symmetrical and meta-complimentary categores (borrowed from Bateson and) applied with good effect by Haley). 2. we were responding to a request from Bateson to apply the technology of modeling to a master of unconscious communication - one from whom he (Bateson) had for decades hoped to capture the enormously effective patterning and for which purpose, he had dispatched members of the MRI group (Haley, Watzlawich, Weakland, Jackson, Fisch...) albeit unsuccessfully). We were, of course, ourselves fascinated by the precision and effectiveness of the patterning itself. 3. Finally, I reasoned (and this is the portion of my present response most immediatlely revelant to your questions about "protecting" ourselves from content manipulations) that it would in the long run be more effective to make explicit the patterning and thereby alert anyone who has such concerns to the precise form of the manipulations involved, thinking that forewarned is forearmed. There is a simplier response to your question, and one in which you may find more solace. Anyone who has developed and maintains a good positive working relationship between conscious and unconscious processes "knows" when they are being targeted by inappropriate (content) manipulations - even those utilizing Ericksonian patterning - while this has distinct forms in different people, it is typical that in such a context, the person feels a sense of unease and a strong desire to leave the presence of the person offering the inappropriate content manipulations. They typically act congruent with these feeling and leave the presence of such a person and refuse in the future to have anything to do with this person. Thus, there are at least two answers to your questions about such content manipulations: 1. a intuitve positive working relationship between conscious and unconscious processes 2. a well-trained appreciation of the patterning itself through mastery of the Ericksonian patterning itself John