I attended the 49^th Annual Alfred Korzybski Memorial Lecture in New York City held at the Yale Club on November 3^{rd, 2000}. This meeting was begun in 1952 and is considered the "annual meeting" of the Institute Of General Semantics that honors the work and contributions of Alfred Korzybski. Robert Pula, Director Emeritus of the Institute of General Semantics, presented the 49^th Memorial Lecture entitled "The Impact of Korzybski at the Planetary Level". I also attended the one-day colloquium entitled 50 Years Later: The Legacy Of Alfred Korzybski". The focus of this day was to have panel discussions and exercises related to "the role general semantics plays in our lives, the directions the discipline has taken and the impact of cultural changes over the past 50 years on the way we teach and present general semantics."

The banner in the front of the room read: 
LEADING A REVOLUTION OF HUMAN EVALUATING™

The purpose of the meeting was to honor the work of Alfred Korzybski and to promote GS research and findings and provide education in GS principles and methodologies of GS. A tag line I heard that seemed to describe it best for me was "Preserving the integrity and so the potentiality" of GS.

Several key contributors and presenters were in attendance such as Bruce & Susan Presby Kodish, Milton Dawes, Robert Pula, Rachel Lauer, Irene Ross Mayper, Tom Nelson, Jeff Mordkowitz, Homer Moore, Ruskin Bourland (the late David Bourland’s son), Steve Stockdale (who attended one of our 3 Day trainings in Florida), and several other individuals with long-term involvement in the Institute of General Semantics and Societies of General Semantics.

I had the pleasure & opportunity to meet with Milton Dawes, receiver of the J. Talbot Winchell Award given annually to an individual who has significantly furthered and spread General Semantics. Milton, an Institute Seminar Staff member, and I met for lunch. He & I had an in-depth discussion on GS and neuro-linguistics/neuro-semantics and I got to ask some "burning" questions I had related to key principles and concepts in General Semantics. Milton was extremely receptive, considerate and excited about my level of interest and the interest our "group/Society" is showing in General Semantics as indicated in our work with Neuro-Semantics.

His primary message that struck me was that of "General Semantics is easier said than done" and "We need to do more that we are talking about so that we make a difference". One other quote that I particularly related to was "GS cannot do anything. YOU have to do it." He also stated "we need to come down from our higher order abstractions and create bridges to what we want to share and to what someone would want to be listening to."

Robert Pula, who presented the memorial lecture, had open-heart surgery, quintuple bypass, on Oct 5, 2000. He indicated that that was an instance of a "lower order situation" that demanded attention. The lecture marked the 50^th year since Alfred Korzybski’s death and the 67^th year since publication of "Science & Sanity". He stated, and I quote, "If we had 50,000 people in a stadium there to hear about GS, what would we do with them? Nothing." He said this as he truly believes, as was reflected in his speech/message, that the work of GS is "much more subtle and much more quiet" than other movements and that GS "is concerned with alerting us to how we are affected by symbols". He indicated that GS is not in the business of curing or life saving but in educating people in how to live more sane lives. One quote from Pula that struck me was "How we talk to others is a direct reflection of how we ‘first’ talk to ourselves" and "most of our problems don’t come from outside but are self generated problems".

I did get to ask Robert Pula about spiral theory and references he has found on the topic from his extensive research and review of the GS archives. He gave me several references and introduced his newest book, "A GENERAL SEMANTICS GLOSSARY: Pula’s Guide to the Perplexed", a great little book. I read it in its entirety that night. I recommend it strongly. Very concise, well written and geared towards advancing your knowledge of basic and advanced General Semantics. I will be releasing some writings on "Spiral Influence and Spiral Theory" which will include my findings in Robert’s work in the coming weeks to the Society eGroup. Robert did indicate that when Einstein was asked what he thought of Korzybski’s "Science & Sanity" book he stated, and I quote, "That’s a crazy book."

I took the opportunity to explain to many people in attendance what we are doing with the Society Of Neuro-Semantics, our Neuro-Semantic trainings and our interest in incorporating many General Semantics tools into our training and coaching models. People were very interested and enthused about our involvement and interests in incorporating GS in our work and efforts.

The Institute of General Semantics, IGS, hosted panel discussions throughout the 1 day colloquium training on Saturday addressing how GS will continue to make an impact worldwide towards establishing "non-Aristotelian" systems & through providing access to training in General Semantics models. Much of the day was spent in identifying target markets and methods of delivering the trainings and information on GS to these markets. The issues that the IGS faces are familiar ones, indicative of the need for precision marketing, strategic planning and massive action to meet the outcome of worldwide impact through GS.

We did get to a few exercises in related to what GS principles and tools you apply and the difference they have made in your life and what principle of formulation you’d like to know more of. I realized how much I knew already and how much more I want to know.

All too common were the questions on what groups of people to focus on, what method of training to best represent the GS material, how to make training in GS more interesting and exciting to get more involved, how to increase the ease of application and application value of GS to the general public, what the simplest method of teaching GS would be, how to explain GS in the most simplistic manner that would interest people, etc. It seems the IGS is searching for ways to accelerate their results and to rejuvenate their movement through identifying "leaders of tomorrow" and teaching methods that can help spread the word on the value of GS and expand its influence around the world.

The main question I picked up on was "What’s going to happen for GS into the Future? How are we going to take it into the future?" It seemed the answer to these questions were many. Some mentioned the need to get GS into the hands of younger people in High Schools, Colleges, etc. Others indicated the need to train Business Executives and connecting with other groups like Transformational Learning movement, Adult development movement, etc. What was apparent was that the ‘lead’ trainers in GS are looking for ways to teach GS, ways that are modern, experiential, fun, engaging, different and interesting, e.g., games, stories/metaphors, visualization, music, movement, dance, drawing, and more. They are making an effort to reach as many people as possible with as many methods possible.

Another individual I met was particularly enlightening. Her name was Charlotte Read. She was Alfred Korzybski’s personal assistant and long-time Institute supporter. Charlotte is over 90 years old. She had such a grasp of GS and a very simplistic way of talking about it and obviously ‘living it’. Here are a few of her quotes I gleaned from a small group exercise with her personally: "What I say to my self about ‘anything’ is not it. It is just what I am saying"", "AK had a saying, ‘Expectations, I don’t know. Let’s see. What are expectations on the verbal level?" Hmmmm. "Always go back to the non-verbal level." "Our feelings are not the experience." "Inferring ‘about’ something, well that’s an inference. Can we check that out"? "AK used to say, ‘If you doubt so much, doubt your doubt." She reported that she finds valuable the GS principle of ‘non-allness’. I quote, "I always question whatever I think, what else." "Am I judging? How sure am I of that?"

Charlotte’s message when asked what her hopes and dreams were for GS and the future:
"Begin with ourselves. Get really excited and do something about it. Connect with other groups going in a similar direction and mobilize the energy of different groups where we are going together. Learn from each other and give a real push towards Sanity & goodwill." I got a real sense of the energy and the power of her application of the principles and what affect it has had on her through her presence. Her commitment and dedication to GS was celebrated as they applauded her for her dedication and long-term service.  I think we as neuro-semanticists can benefit from her message.

At the end of the day, we celebrated with music, expressive dance, and a social hour. Robert Pula (piano) and Milton Dawes (drums and harmonica) played music for the group. All in all I found it an extremely valuable experience and a very rewarding one. I will continue to learn GS.

For more information on general semantics, visit their website at http://63.249.235.6/. There site is in the process of being "moved". LEARN USA WebStore will soon carry GS books located at www.learnusa.com

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me at 1-813-221-5466 or Elvis@neurotechnics.org