Absolute certainty
If a person is totally certain about their understanding, they will be closed to even considering other understandings, because their certainty about their understanding locks up the ability to consider alternatives. These are the really tough clients, and this is the situation where Bandler's pattern is particularly useful—to move someone from the absolute certainty (which has only one representation) to the partial certainty (with more than one representation) in which a dialogue is possible. (I think it is very significant in this regard that at the end of the exchange, Bandler says “OK, Let's talk.”) In other words, this pattern is not useful to solve a problem, it is useful to make it possible to solve a problem on level 2 by decreasing certainty on level 3.
