NLP TechniquesThe NLP Promise
by Laura Interval
Do you understand NLP? If you are interested in self help techniques you shouldn’t ignore Neuro Linguistic Programming. Since it’s inception in the early 70’s, NLP and its principles have had a profound impact on the field of human achievement. When I told a friend that I was trying to get to the bottom of NLP he rolled his eyes and said, “you mean Newfangled Lazy Psychology?” He then proceeded to rant to me why he’s so skeptical of these techniques that have been “over-simplified, over- promised and over-hyped”. It’s true, it does promise a lot. It says we can learn to do anything and do it better than anyone. We can change, adopt or eliminate our behaviors as we desire and therefore can have or be anything or anyone we want. It swears that we are the only ones in our own way and we hold the power to change everything. “And that’s exactly why I like it”, I told him. And that’s why I want to understand it better. To better utilize it. At the risk of exposing my lack of aptitude, I will tell you that most of what I read… and reread… was followed by an audible “huh?” from me. I could follow some of the ideas, but the jargon and theories often confounded me. I have a feeling I’m not alone. So, this is my attempt to present the main ideas and facts of NLP to you in a way that you can comprehend and be able to immediately apply to making changes in your life.
A brief history: In the early 1970s, University of California psychology student Richard Bandler teamed with assistant professor of linguistics John Grinder to develop a process called “modelling” by which they could determine the pattern of ideas and behavior that helps a person achieve a particular task. With the help of three professionals- a prominent psychologist, a family therapist and a hypnotherapist, they developed both verbal and nonverbal techniques that enable us to connect thoughts, speech and action both externally and internally. Most of their original work consisted of understanding how particularly skilled and successful people accomplished what they did. Since then, it has grown and evolved in its development becoming the backbone for a lot of modern self help teachers, Anthony Robbins probably being the most popular. The name Neuro – Linguistic Programming stands for the three most influential components this team found to be involved in producing human experience: neurology, language and programming. More specifically, NLP studies the dynamics between mind (neuro), language (linguistic) and how their interplay affects our body and behavior (programming). All of NLP is founded on two fundamental principles: 1. “The Map is Not the Territory”: As human beings, it is impossible for us to know reality. We can only know our perceptions of reality. It is generally not reality that limits us, or empowers us, but our “map” of reality. The way we experience and respond to the world around us depends on our own “neuro-linguistic maps”. 2. “Life and Mind are Systemic Processes”: Our mind and our body are part of the same system. Anything that happens in the mind happens in the body and vice versa. This is also true of processes between human beings and their environments. Our bodies, our societies, and our universe form an ecology of complex systems and sub-systems that all mutually influence each other. So basically, NLP asks you to presuppose that we live in a world of our own choosing. And the goal is to create an individual “map” for ourselves that allows us to perceive the greatest number of available choices and perspectives.It asks you to just flat out believe. It is a collection of principles operating on presuppositions - on theories. It asks you to act as if they are true, and see what results you get. It asks you not to question their truths but to ask “are they useful?” If you read 50 different articles on NLP, you will get 50 different interpretations. And so, it’s very hard to present facts to a skeptic. It is possible to cite thousands of testimonies of people who swear it works for them. It is possible to tell of my own experience with the positive shift in my life since I have recently devoted myself to these techniques. But, scientific evidence? Not so much. At the end of the day, the question is is it worth a try for you? Positive thinking is a good start but if you stop there, you are practicing a sort of “newfangled lazy psychology”. The main techniques and tools of NLP are listed below. Its main techniques/tools are (click on links for full articles): • Modalities and Submodalities - how you sense the world Lastly, NLP asks us to act. If you want to understand, you must put it into action. “Learning is doing,” they say as the teachers of NLP strive to make excellence learnable. Take a look at the above links, do the exercises, and see if you can believe.
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