BRACE™ for Fantasy
Definition: Fantasy is an
active cognitive process in which memories, which are ultimately rooted
in sensory systems, are reconstructed and cultivated in order to
covertly act-out positively and/or negatively reinforcing experiences in
the domain of the imagination.
Beliefs: Fantasies reflect beliefs about related aspects of
life and living, ranging from values and motivations to expectations and
overt behaviors. Beliefs are the primordial foundation and life source
of fantasies.
Values: Values make up the raw material of fantasies. Values is
another term for reinforcers. People “work” for and against things
according to the value they attribute to them --- i.e., positively
reinforcing value (work for) or negatively reinforcing value (work
against). Values are operational and functional in both the covert and
overt domains of the individual, but one’s values may be more or less
apparent to others, and that may be more or less by intent. Values are
learned. Values also change according to experience and circumstance.
All cultivated thoughts and all volitional behaviors involve value
judgments. Value judgments is another term for decision-making, which is
a cost-benefit analysis of related values, from the perspective of the
individual in question, weighing this against that, to do against not to
do, or perhaps, to be against not to be.
Motivation or Function: All fantasy activity is motivated for
reinforcement, positive and/or negative. That is, “fantasy has
function”: 1) to acquire and/or maintain positively reinforcing
experiences (i.e., pleasure/comfort) and/or 2) to escape, decrease,
delay or avoid the onset of pain/discomfort.
Content: There are no time, space, or reality constraints and
limitations in the domain of the imagination, except for the capacity of
the individual to efficiently abstract and perceive complexity. And,
legal and moral constraints are optional, but the principles of learning
have their full and usual effects in the domain of the imagination.
Fantasies, cultivated and acted-out covertly and/or overtly, involve
real learning processes, which strengthen and weaken related thoughts
and emotions, as well as the objects of desire and related behaviors.
Fantasies
may be fleeting or prolonged, approach or avoidant, active or passive,
mild or intense, adaptive or maladaptive, rationale or irrational,
engrossing or tangential, desirable or undesirable, etc., Fantasies may
be more or less reality based, more or less legal or moral, more or
less constructive or destructive, more or less physical or
psychological, etc.,
Focus:
Fantasies may be past, present, or future oriented. Past oriented
fantasies range from efforts to imagine (construct or reconstruct) a
childhood experience to conceptualizing alternatives to what one did or
did not do --- i.e., what one should or could have done or not done
instead. Present oriented fantasies are related to perceived immediate
opportunities or possibilities based on current context and present
situational stimuli. Future oriented fantasies are based on anticipated
situations or events, or constructed situations into which one projects
one’s self.
Behavior: Covert fantasies and overt behavior obey the same
laws of the universe. Thoughts function as units of behavior and there
are always overt indexes of cultivated covert fantasies --- i.e.,
rehearsed covert behavior and related cultivated experiences. Such
“overt indicators” may be more or less subtile, more or less
idiosyncratic, and more or less adaptive, but always present. On the
surface, behavior is measurable and observable. Related beliefs, values,
motivation and expectation are not. Behavior (as well as thoughts) has
form and function.
Consequences:
Each time a
fantasy is “cultivated,” it changes, differentially reinforcing the
perceptions, emotions and behavioral predispositions of which it
consists. Fantasies are dynamic, never static.
Thought and
behavior consistent with a fantasy reinforces the fantasy dynamics. When
people put themselves in situations in which the elements of a fantasy
are perceived as existing, they are creating opportunities for the
fantasy to reach fruition. Such thought and behavior strengthen all
related component parts of the fantasy, some sensitization and some
desensitization, some thresholds raised, some lowered. Fantasy activity
always consists of things that are strengthened and things that are
weakened, reinforced or punished, and you can not have one without the
other. All things in a cognitive, behavioral, or motivational class are
interrelated and mutually reinforcing. There is a summation of effects,
and consequences are cumulative.
Bottom line
is, fantasies are cultivated, and what is cultivated reflects who one is
and determines who one is becoming. The domain of the imagination is the
stage for self-creation.
Russell L.
Smith
www.BRACEanalysis.com
