Changing Values in the Hierarchy — Full 4-MAT Presentation Script

Presenter: Dustin Total Time: 20 minutes Has Demo: Yes (demo on Demo Day; say "demo goes here" during presentation) Level: Master Practitioner (Course 6 — Values 2.0)

1. WHY — Motivation (~7 min / 35%)

Goal: Build the reason to care. Why do values matter? Why would someone want to learn to change them? What's in it for the audience?

So let's talk about values. And not the fluffy motivational poster version of values — the real version.

"Values are the content of our mind that determines our choices for behaviors. And then those behaviors, those actions that we take, they determine our results."

Think about that for a second. Values are not just nice words like integrity or honesty or love or results or money. They are not just words we all like. Values are what you do or don't do. They determine what you pay attention to, what you discard, what you think is good or bad, right or wrong.

"Values are one of the most primitive or prime filters that we use to go from millions, billions, trillions — values determine what we pay attention to. Values determine what we discard. Values determine what we think is good or bad or right or wrong."

So here's what most people don't realize: your values change. They absolutely change.

"The content of your values change based on your rites of passage, what things you're going through in life, based on situations, environment, global events — values change. Values change."

Think about what happens when someone gets knocked backwards during a crisis. Maybe they were firmly in values level five — confident, self-directed, ready to take on the world. Then a global crisis hits and they find themselves back in values level four because the stress knocked them backwards. And it's the entry of that doubt that prevents them from re-establishing.

"People will say, 'Oh, well, I want to start my own business, but you know, we're in a recession. So I don't want to start my business in a recession.' To which I say, that's literally the best time to start your business. Because if you start your business in the hardest circumstances, you don't know any differently."

Here's the thing. If you are trying to move to the next level — for your career, for yourself personally — then you're going to need to understand your values. Specifically, what they are, what yours are, how to determine if you have the right values for what you're trying to do.

But here's the real power in this — it's not just knowing your own values, although that's important. If you're working with other people — if you work with teams, lead a team, coach a team — and the values aren't aligned, then you have half the team putting their feet on the gas pedal and half the team putting their feet on the brake pedal. And that's where performance breaks down.

"I'm going to go and make a bold statement and say most teams are out of values alignment."

So what we're building toward today is understanding how to get values, how to determine if they're the right values, how to change values, and how to implement that in a group setting. Because when values are in conflict or in the wrong order, people feel stuck. And when you know how to shift them, you give people — and yourself — real clarity and real power.

"All the things that happen in our environment are designed to test us, not to break us, but to see if we can discover what we're made of."

2. WHAT — Information (~4.5 min / 22%)

Goal: Teach the concepts. Definitions, theory, background. What are values, toward/away-from, hierarchy, elicitation, conflicts. Do NOT explain the change technique steps here.

So what are values in NLP? Let me give you the framework.

Values are contextual. You have different values depending on which area of life you're looking at. We typically break life into six segments: career, family, relationships (intimate), personal growth and development, health and fitness, and spirituality. For today, we focus on career because that's relevant to everyone here.

"If you just say, 'I want to elicit your values,' and you're doing that in terms of life, that's too chunked up. It's just not enough context. You've got to define the context before you go down the values road."

Values tend to be nominalizations — high-level abstractions. Values are more abstract than beliefs, which are more abstract than attitudes. If someone gives you something too chunked down — like "going out for lunch with my coworkers" — you chunk them up: "What's important to you about that?" Until you get to the nominalization level. Teamwork. Growth. Freedom.

Values elicitation uses three methods:

Standard NLP elicitation — Ask "What's important to you about your career?" three times, emptying the buffer each time.
Motivation strategy — Right before someone feels totally motivated, there's a V-K synesthesia — a feeling that precedes motivation. That feeling label is a value. You ask: "Can you remember a time when you were totally motivated? What was the last thing you felt just before?" Repeat until you get a repeated word. Usually one to three values come out.
Threshold values — Show them the list and ask: "All of these being present, is there anything that would cause you to leave?" Then: "Is there anything that would cause you to stay?" Oscillate until you get repeats or a blank.

Values hierarchy — the order matters, not just the list. Your number one value drives the majority of your behavior. You rank them, rewrite them in order, and test them — first backwards (you'll get a flat response), then forwards (and you'll see their nervous system light up).

Toward and away-from values — This is critical. Someone might say "money" but really mean "away from poverty." Both produce action, but the focus determines the result.

"You get what you focus on. If you are focused away from poverty, then ultimately what you're going to do is bring yourself back to poverty over and over and over again."

That's the yo-yo effect. You move away from what you don't want, lose motivation as you get farther from it, make a bad decision, and end up right back where you started.

"We are very tricky, conniving little creatures and we will use fancy words to sound like we're thinking positively when the truth is we're moving away from what we don't want."

Values conflicts come in three types:

Toward vs. away-from (sequential incongruence) — The value sounds positive but is driven by what you don't want. Resolved with timeline therapy.
Toward vs. toward (simultaneous conflict) — Two values compete: you can express one but not the other. Money vs. freedom. Resolved with parts integration.
Away-from vs. away-from (simultaneous incongruence) — Both values are avoidance-based and in conflict. Resolved with both timeline therapy and parts integration.

"Every time, incongruent behavior is a result of conflict in the values."

And here's the good news: after timeline therapy — clearing the five major negative emotions and one limiting decision — 50% of people lose ALL away-from focus in their values. The other 50% see it decrease significantly. Parts integration resolves the direct conflicts. And that cleanup often changes the hierarchy naturally.

But sometimes, even after all that cleanup, a value is still too low for the person's goals. And that's where the technique comes in.

3. HOW — Exercise (~3.5 min / 18%)

Goal: Read the script/steps for the Changing Values in the Hierarchy technique. Explain exercise setup. Say "demo goes here."

So here's the situation. You've done a full breakthrough with someone. Timeline therapy, parts integration, the works. You re-rank their values. And let's say money is still sitting at number four. For someone trying to become an entrepreneur, that's not high enough.

"If the client needs a value that's either missing or too low in the hierarchy, if they need that for their goals, then we can do this. It can be done. And when you change a value, you change its impact on behavior."

The technique uses submodalities — because submodalities are how we encode meaning. Values are ultimate meaning. So by changing the submodalities, we change the position in the hierarchy.

Critical rules before we begin:

"I would never change the number one value ever. I would always leave the number one value where it is under any circumstances."

The number one value impacts behavior more than any other. If you put something in its place, their whole life changes. If you move money from number ten to number one, they become a crazy obsessed person whose entire life revolves around money. So: never change number one. Number two, number three — fair game.

The Steps — Changing a Value in Hierarchy:

Let's say we want to move the number four value (money) into the number two position.

Step 1 — Elicit submodalities of the value you want to move (value #4)

Say: "In the context of your career, when you think about how important money is to you, do you have a picture?"

Then go through the submodalities checklist (page 36): Black and white or color? Near or far? Bright or dim? Location? Size? Associated or dissociated? Focused or defocused? Changing or steady? Framed or panoramic? Movie or still? Any important sounds? Any important feelings? (If yes: location, size, shape, intensity.)

Break state. Clear the screen.

Step 2 — Elicit submodalities of the number one value

Say: "In the context of your career, when you think about how important [value #1] is to you, do you have a picture?"

Same checklist. Record everything.

Break state. Clear the screen.

Step 3 — Contrastive analysis

Compare the two sets of submodalities. Draw a line between everything that's different. Those are your potential drivers.

Step 4 — Pick one driver to back off on

"Pick one driver that you're not going to change completely, just one. And I'll give you a clue — it's either the location or it's association/dissociation."

Location is always the first choice. If value #1 is right in front of their nose and value #4 is up to the left, you move #4 to halfway — maybe in front of the left eye, not all the way to center. If location is identical, use association/dissociation. If you need a backup: size works too, because size and location are analog (you can do 50%, 80%).

"Visual submodalities have the most impact on meaning."

Always back off a visual submodality, not a kinesthetic one.

Step 5 — Map across

Go back to value #4. Say: "In the context of your career, when you think about how important [value #4] is, do you have a picture?"

Then change everything to match value #1 — except the one driver you're backing off on. Move it partially. Change everything else to match.

Lock it in: "You know that sound Tupperware makes? Lock it in."

Step 6 — Test

Hand them their values list WITHOUT numbers. Ask them to re-rank as quickly as possible. What you should see: number one stays number one, the value you moved becomes the new number two, and everything else falls down.

Exercise Setup:

Groups of 2 — same partner you've been working with
Elicit submodalities of value #1 and value #4
Do contrastive analysis
Identify which driver you would back off on
Do NOT make the actual change — it's not ecological without a full breakthrough and integration time
About 10-12 minutes per person, then switch roles

"Demo goes here."

(On Demo Day, Dustin will demonstrate the full Changing Values in the Hierarchy technique live — eliciting submodalities for two values, performing contrastive analysis, and walking through exactly how the mapping across would work, following the demo format from transcript c6-838071202.)

4. WHAT IF — Future Pace (~5 min / 25%)

Goal: Self-discovery. Let them teach themselves and each other. Three questions.

Alright, so now I want to open this up.

1. What questions do you have?

(Take questions from the audience. Common questions from the transcript to be prepared for:)

"What if both values have very similar submodalities?" — Get more specific. The location is usually the differentiator. Even if they say "it's in front of me" for both, ask: is it right in front of you, or arm's length? The specificity matters.
"What if one value has feelings and the other doesn't?" — When you map across, just remove the feelings. But always back off on a visual submodality, not a kinesthetic one.
"What if the location is the same for both?" — Go to size. Size and location are analog — you can adjust them by degrees.
"When would you actually do this with a client?" — Typically not during the breakthrough itself. Give them a month or two to integrate after timeline therapy and parts integration. If they come back and still haven't "popped," then you change the value.

"When you do a full breakthrough, that might be all they need. They might not need you to change the value. So this is kind of like one of those things that's a judgment call."

A couple of important context points to share:

First — this same technique is the foundation of team values alignment. When you get an executive team aligned on common values, and then meet with each member individually to adjust their personal hierarchy to match, the impact is enormous.

"Think about the cost of having values misalignment. Everybody's capable of doing a good job, but you're being pulled in different directions. It's costing them way more than you charge to have a misalignment."

Second — remember the practical application. Once you know someone's values, you can use their exact words in your communication.

"By using people's values words, you light them up a little bit like a Christmas tree."

Whether you're making a proposal, coaching someone, or leading a meeting — use the words from their values list, in order of hierarchy, and watch what happens.

2. What did you learn?

(Invite 2-3 people to share their biggest takeaway or aha moment.)

3. What do I need to know?

(This is your chance to tell me anything — what worked, what didn't, what you're still unclear on. This helps me as a trainer understand where you are.)

Metaphor Suggestions

The 5 metaphors (10 min total, ~2 min each) are delivered separately from the 20-min presentation. Below are metaphors and stories drawn from the source material, plus notes for Dustin to develop personal ones.

From the Source Material:

The Toward/Away-From Money Walk — Gina's physical demonstration of the yo-yo effect. Imagine "money" is at one end of the room and "poverty" at the other. If your focus is on getting AWAY from poverty, you work hard, move toward money, but the farther you get from poverty, the less motivated you become. Someone offers you a vacation you can't afford. You say, "I deserve it." You blow through your savings and end up right back against poverty. Now your energy spikes again. That's the yo-yo. But if your focus is TOWARD money — it's slower, steadier, and you never yo-yo back. This works for fitness, relationships, anything.
The Darren Hardy Stopwatch Story — Darren Hardy (editor of Success Magazine) tracked his time in real estate and discovered he spent less than 20% of his day on profit-producing behaviors. So he put a stopwatch around his neck and committed to wearing it until he flipped that number to 80%. You look crazy wearing a stopwatch around your neck if you're not a track coach. But if money is valued higher than looking crazy, you'll do that behavior — because you value it. That's what happens when a value moves up in hierarchy.
Gina's Breakthrough Discovery Story — Long ago, Gina was sitting in a massage therapist's office staring at the bulletin board. One card said: "Do you need a breakthrough to the next level?" She took the card. Walked into the office with no expectations. The practitioner did timeline therapy, parts integration, hypnosis — Gina had no idea what any of it was. She just went along with it. Had a huge breakthrough. Years later, she's sitting in the Tad James classroom and they start teaching the same techniques. She runs up after class: "Did you teach that practitioner?" "Yeah, she's a graduate of ours." The universe sends you signals — first in whispers, then a little louder, then the cosmic two-by-four.
The Company with "Integrity" on the Wall — Some companies plaster the word "integrity" on their wall, but it's really driven by "away from dishonesty." And they're dishonest all over the place — because you get what you focus on. Even when a value sounds great on the surface, if it's 80% away-from at the unconscious level, the behavior it produces will be incongruent.

Personal Metaphors for Dustin to Develop:

(Personal story about a time a value was in the wrong position in your own hierarchy — and what shifted when you moved it, or when you realized the order was off)

Tip from the source material: You don't have to explain every detail to a client. If they're wholly coachable, you can just plow through the technique. It depends on who they are. But the toward/away-from concept is powerful as a standalone story — most people doing goal setting think they're focusing on what they want when they're actually focused on what they don't want.

Timing Summary

Section	Target	Content
WHY — Motivation	~7 min (35%)	Values drive all behavior, values change over time, crisis/values levels, teams misaligned, "what's in it for me" — clarity + power to shift
WHAT — Information	~4.5 min (22%)	Values are contextual, nominalizations, 3 elicitation methods (standard/motivation/threshold), hierarchy & ranking, toward/away-from, 3 types of conflicts, timeline therapy & parts integration cleanup
HOW — Exercise	~3.5 min (18%)	Changing Values technique: elicit submodalities of value #1 and target value, contrastive analysis, back off one driver (location preferred), map across, lock in, test by re-ranking. Exercise setup: groups of 2, do analysis only (no actual change). Demo goes here.
WHAT IF — Future Pace	~5 min (25%)	Three questions: What questions? What did you learn? What do I need to know? Address common Q&A, team values alignment application, using values words in communication
Total	~20 min

Changing Values in Hierarchy

Listen along — TTS audio of this script