Modal Operators

Question 1

What are modal operators? What do they do, how do they work?

Notice how your experience changes with each sentence, particularly where your attention goes, and how you feel:

     “I want to look out the window.”

     “I have to look out the window.”

     “I can look out the window.”

     “I choose to look out the window.”

Answer 1

A MO is “mode of operating,” a way of being in the world and relating to part of it, or all of it. A MO is a verb that modifies another verb, so it is always followed by another verb

Example : “I have to work.” “I can become successful.”

MO is a verb that modifies how an activity is done

Question 2

Categories of Modal Operator

Answer 2

Motivation
a. Necessity: “should,” “must,” “have to,” etc.
b. Desire: “wish,” “want,” “need,”etc.

Options to satisfy motivation
c. Possibility: “can,” “able to,” “capable,” etc.
d. Choice: “choose,” “select,” “decide,” etc.

Question 3

Modal operators of motivation and options

Answer 3

Desire and/or necessity motivates us to act and change, and possibility and/or choice makes this possible

People often feel stuck and trapped by “have to’s,” and limited by “cant’s,” and these are the most obvious kinds of limiting beliefs that people have

MOs of desire and choice are often de-emphasized, or even ignored, but they are equally important, and they are a mirror-image to necessity and impossibility

For instance. when someone experiences a “have to,” usually it is unpleasant, and s/he wants to have other choices. Put another way, “have to” and “not possible” are equivalent to “not possible to choose other more desired alternatives.”

Every belief in our capabilities will have a MO in it, and many limitations will have either a MO of necessity or a negation of another MO.

Working at the level of MOs, and the beliefs that they are embedded in, is usually at a considerably larger chunk size than working at the content level of a particular limitation, and because of this, any changes that are made will generalize much more widely

Question 4

Intensity of modal operators

Answer 4

Necessity has a relatively narrow range of intensity, but there is a definite difference between “absolutely must” and “should,” or “ought to.” Since many people think they “should” do things that they seldom or never actually do, there are “necessities” that are less than absolute.

Desire has perhaps the widest range of intensity, ranging from a faint inclination to smoking lust!