psychoceramics: Re, etc, 3 Christs of Ypsilanti Revisted

["Nikolai Kingsley" <n--@v--.net>]

>I recall reading that Richard Bandler (the psychologist who invented
>neuro-linguistic programming (NLP)) used an unorthodox but related
>technique for dealing with delusional patients.  He would match their
>delusions so precisely that they fell apart.  In one case, he instructed
>staff at a mental hospital to dress as Roman soldiers and went to the
>cell of a patient who believed he was Jesus carrying a large wooden
>cross.  Soon the patient was protesting that he isn't the real Jesus,
>to the point where he remembered exactly who he was, whilst Bandler, in
>Roman garb, pretended to not believe him.



#insert Phillip Adams' short story about a patient admitted to a mental
hospital full of people dressed as various fantasy figures. the doctor asks
him what he wants to be, and he decides he wants to be a duck, so they get
him a duck suit. i can't remember the details of the end, but it was
revealed that the doctor was simply another patient, one who'd chosen a
doctor suit.

nikolai