First and Second Order Change

(Gregory Bateson interpreted by Don Elium 2005)

First Order Change  (Note: Pressure goes down at first)

1. Do more or less of something to decrease pressure. A BEHAVIOR CHANGE.

2. Underlying conflict not identified nor resolved

3. Nothing significant and new is learned

4. Efforts bring temporary relief yet pressure/discomfort returns to previous level (because underlying conflict not named and worked with to loosen the grip it has on the present moment.)

5. Old Story Still Told and still can’t talk about underlying conflicts that are causing the pressure and “damned if you do and damned if you don’t” continues to be the story told.

(Note: In first order change "pressure" is the enemy and it is decrease by just moving it around and around to different places within the closed system of marriage---through denial, lying, and controlling (fight, flight, freeze, fawn)

Second Order Change (Note: Pressure goes up at first) TRANSFORMATION — A change in capacity

1. A CHANGE IN THE FOUNDATIONAL AND FUNDAMENTAL Point of View that relooks at all things. A DEVELOPMENTAL CHANGE that supports actions that matches more of what is actually occurring NOW.

2. Identify and address Underlying conflict. Destructive Double Bind is diffused by talking about what is actually happening and the double bind of “damned if you do, and damned if you don’t”. Talking about it, while tolerating the uncomfortable without criticism and absolute blame starts to ease the bind making room for identifying and addressing the underlying conflict.

3. Learn significant and new things (to address the newly defined underlying conflict.

4. Define and Choose who you want to be in this situation FROM THIS NEW WAY OF SEEING THINGS (from WHAT IS ACTUALLY NEEDED instead of letting reaction choose for you). — this is the difference between a behavior change and TRANSFORMATION.

5. The New Story (narrative) can now begin to be told about the same perpetual situations  and  experienced with NEW CLARITY and compassionately and talked about in kinder, yet sometimes more uncomfortable, ways.

(Note: In second order change, "pressure/discomfort” is actually a more immediate but its  intent is a friendly urge/force that is consciously used to transform the people and the relationship into something entirely new----and often surprising to both people---for the better that is anchored in NOW and not just changing words around or putting new labels on old things. It is a fundamental development growth into more maturity and awareness.

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Communication improves when the underlying conflicts, that are very uncomfortable, are discovered, acknowledged, and addressed in a significantly different ongoing manner.

Second-order change is doing something significantly or fundamentally different from what you have done before. The process is usually irreversible. Once you begin, it becomes impossible to return to the way you were doing things before.