Week of Psychiatry: Andy the Paranoid Schizophrenic

In the 1980s, you had Andy the paranoid schizophrenic. It was one of the favorite stories of Bandler, one of the creators of NLP. I always thought it was a dick story until I saw the video.

Andy was in a facility because he saw people coming out of the TV. You know "The little house on the prairie? So he saw those guys coming out of TV. Not very inspiring and it drove him crazy.

Bandler sat in the facility with the audience all being psychiatrists and did his "thing

He taught Andy how to deal with those people who came out of TV. He said, " You know those pencils with an eraser?

'Yes'

'Here you have one, an imaginary pencil for imaginary people' (it sounds better in English).

Andy could erase those people with that pencil. He had fun with it. Bandler also taught him that he could blur their voices, move them further away and more such fun tricks. Andy gained more and more control and felt visibly better.

Then Bandler did something genius. He said, "Andy, do you know how much money men would pay for this what you can do?

'Um... No...'

'Certainly a million Andy...'

'Only they wouldn't have those fokking people from Little house on the prairie come out of the TV then, but they would put it on Playboy Channel and have hot horny bitches step out of it...'

You saw Andy switch channels, then facial expressions and then voices....

He was visibly really enjoying it. For years he had been in that facility and this was really quite a breakthrough.

Would you think...

After two hours, the psychiatrists thanked Bandler, flattened Andy, put him in a straitjacket and carried him off.

End of the exercise for Andy. Bandler thanked them again for this fun demo.

That was the 1980s.

Nothing has changed. Still many Andy's are trapped. Not only that, now even more than a million are taking antidepressants. If Andy could do anything else then, people certainly can now.

Only they are not taught it. Outrageous is not even the right word. Criminal is better. It's psychiatry week. Hip Hip Hip Hooray!

Let's toast to all Andy's!