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NLP Techniques: Creating confidence

Stuart — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 03:49:59 +0000

Objective: to create a higher level of resourcefulness and confidence

Step 1: Stand Up. Close your eyes and think of a time when you experienced confidence.

Step 2: Scale up the intensity of your feeling from 1 (not very intense) to 10 (very intense). Increase the intensity of the colors, brightness and size of the mental image.

Step 3: Imagine yourself transferring the feeling into an empty spot in front of you, and notice this empty spot taking on the energy patterns of your confident state.

Step 4: Break state.

Step 5: Now, think of a problem that you have that you would like to have more confidence in, anchor this problem using a kinesthetic anchor.

Step 6: While holding the kinesthetic anchor, step into this Circle of Confidence and notice the difference. Allow the intensity of the feeling of confidence to flow back into you while you face your problematic situation.

Usually by this time, the feeling of confidence would be more powerful and allow you to be more empowered in the face of problems.

In testing this, of course, the effectiveness of NLP methods will vary from person to person. If the technique doesn’t work, it’s likely that it’s due to the fact that you are a unique individual who needs unique solutions. To find out how you can get customized coaching for confidence, click here.

NLP Glossary – Submodalities (detailed)

Stuart — Sat, 01 May 2010 05:12:51 +0000

Submodalities are like mind codes. The way it is explained is that it is a “sub” element of a modality, comprising visual, auditory and kinesthetic modalities of perception.
photo credit: h.koppdelaney

What do I use submodalities for?

Generally, submodalities are used to change the way we represent or perceive information in the mind. While this can be quite heavy to understand, think of it as a new software that you want to install into a computer.

Your mind carries a “template” of thought. This “template” is filled with your experiences based on certain codes in your mental template. This template of codes can be found in this submodality checklist.

What parts of experience are coded by submodalities?

Situations represent the context of your experience. Submodalities are the structure of our experience. Submodality Techniques are the process you use to change your experience.

I’ll give a variety of examples to illustrate this.

Do you realize that there are movies that give you a different feeling, simply based on the lighting they use in the movie? For instance, a dark movie that brings out more mystery would be “Batman: The Dark Knight”. notice the visual effects bring out a much darker, ominous feeling.

However, looking at a much more lively and vibrant scene in a show like “Sex In The City”, you’ll discover the colors are much different. The mood and rhythm of the entire movie is different, bringing out a different flavor in the movie.

How do I use submodalities?

Since we know that submodalities are like the elements that movie directors use in order to shift the way we experience the movie, then it is clear that by creating these changes in our mind, we literally become our own movie directors.

Using The Submodalities Checklist I have on this site, you can easily compare and contrast the effect within the submodalities in your mind. So I’m warning you ahead of time, until you have received proper NLP Practitioner training, it is highly unlikely that you will be able to fully grasp the way submodalities can work, even though I’m giving a detailed description here. You’ll need supervised practice most of the time in order to gain the maximum benefit out of using the submodalities.

Submodality Comparisons

First of all, submodalities are a way to understand the way we think, and how we construct our reality. For instance, taking two different emotional states, you can discover their differences through contrastive analysis.

Contrastive analysis is the process in linguistics to compare sentences and to identify the difference it makes to our mental representations.

Statement #1: Happy young boys play enthusiastically.

Statement #2: Colorless green ideas sleep furiously.

Notice both statements follow the exact same sequence grammatically, but one makes sense and the other does not, thereby enabling a linguist to determine the effect of syntax (structure of the sentence) versus the semantics (meaning).

In the case of linguistics, we use contrastive analysis with sentences. In submodalities, however, you use situations and contexts. Think of the time you are working at your office and compare the time when you were stressed and the time you were energized. You will be able to detect the difference between two experiences quite easily, and therefore know how they were coded.

“So what?”

By understanding the way they are coded, you can:

change the way you perceive and therefore experience a context.
shift a negative experience in that context and adjust it so that it appears more positive.
shift a positive experience in that context and adjust it to become even more positive and powerful.
utilize processes that make change more habitual and natural

Example: Submodality shifts

I had a client once who had a build up of panic just prior to doing a presentation. In his mind, the audience was bright, loud and big. All I did was to get him to adjust the audience in his mind so that they were of the appropriate size and volume that made him comfortable to speak to them. He reported that he could not change the size of the audience, but said he could make himself turn into a giant in his mind so that the audience was in awe of him. This shifted his emotional state when speaking on a stage.

Example: Submodality utilization

A client once asked me how to be more motivated. So I asked what kind of pictures and sounds she made when she feels motivated. Generally, it seemed that she made brighter and closer pictures (compared with less motivated ones) and said “yeah!” in her mind whenever she was motivated.

The client has just accessed a resource state, which I can now utilize.

In this case, I got her to think of the context in which she was not motivated, or in a place where she had to be more motivated. She said it was her work. As a result, all she had to do was to perceive the workplace as brighter and closer in her mind, and as she was about to get things done, say to herself “yeah!”. This created a very obvious change in her physiological state: face flushing, smiling, and posture shifted to become more upright.

Example: Submodality Process

Another client had a phobia of snakes. Taking the image of a snake, she freaks out and goes into a phobic state, tearing and screaming. After the image is taken from her, she regained her composure. We first shifted the representation of snakes by thinking of a way to represent the data in a more comfortable way. She changed the snake to feel smooth to the touch (instead of slimy) and her favorite color. We even got her to imagine that the snake was like a baby she could cuddle. We brought in a real snake and she embraced it like a baby with little effort, because now the perception of snakes (domesticated pythons) was much different than before.

Conclusion

There are many other ways to utilize submodalities, and even in this post, I’ve barely scratched the surface. To be able to become masterful at submodalities, the processes and strategies you learn to shift a person’s emotional state must be learnt. In NLP, many people have invented dozens of useful and powerful strategies that can be applied in different situations. I’d advise you to learn how to model.

Learn NLP: Emotion Management Technique

Stuart — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 01:47:36 +0000

A lot of people tell me that in the spur of the moment they aren’t able to deal with emotions that are overwhelming. I thought about it and figured that I’d been in that position myself several times but managed to cope.

There are two ways to do this, but the easiest way is to utilize a verbal trigger to get you into a dissociated mode, something like a personal code. A phrase like “What’s going on” can help. This forces you to get some awareness. If another person responds to you in a negative way, saying “where is this person coming from” or “what is this person’s highest positive intent” can also dissociate you from just purely reacting and assuming negative things about your interactions.

This, however, requires you to assume that people have a positive intent behind any behavior. This is a basic presumption that to hold in order to make this works.

Emotional Management Technique

Step 1: Use your internal verbal trigger.

Step 2: See yourself floating out of your body and above the situation like a “helicopter view”.

Step 3: Ask for the highest possible purpose or intention for this situation or event. Step into the shoes of that person and go out into the future considering what outcome they want, or what possible good can come out of the situation.

Step 4: Consider new possible responses in light of the positive intention and re-associate into your body.

Learn NLP – Success And Prosperity

Stuart — Mon, 25 May 2009 10:12:47 +0000

First of all, let me state what might be a little obvious here – many people aren’t driven by success. They are driven by failure. So, if this post kind of gets you wondering why I am talking about money as it relates success and prosperity, it’s not my intention to say that success and prosperity is ONLY about money.

photo credit: pasotraspaso

Okay, disclaimer over.

Let’s look at using NLP for creating wealth and prosperity. I’ve observed that there are a number of people who appear to be wealth and prosperous who have certain characteristics about them. There is a certain path through which they travelled to arrive at the destination of “success”.

I had written before that “mastery” is not just about skill and that it really is about perseverence. The idea that hard work really gets a person to achieve their goals sometimes eludes people.

The other thing is that most of these people don’t consider it hard work. They actually enjoyed doing the things that they did. They were obsessed with doing the work they had to do.But, how does one obsess about something they have no passion to do?

Well, it brings to mind moments in my life where I had little passion to achieve something. When I was much younger, I hardly had the motivation to get things done, let alone finish my homework in school or prepare for examinations. Because I hadn’t taken much of it seriously, I didn’t have much of a focus for anything.

It seemed that learning how to play the piano was easier for me to do than to submit my homework on time. I didn’t improve because I was “driven”. I merely made a “wish” to get what I wanted, and I did. It was less about “pain” than it was about making a decision, even though I admit that pain is sometimes a useful way to drive oneself toward success. Some people, however, don’t know how to do this, and end up filling themselves with bad emotional states that drive them but also make them sick.

I find that people who are successful overall have a nice blend of success in many areas of their life, particularly in relationships, money and health. I find this particularly intriguing. It no longer is a balancing scale of two sides, but three. Of course, it means there is potential to make this idea more complex – what if we had 4 or 5 balancing poles, etc… but I’m not going to go there yet.

So it begs the question – what really causes someone to drive their health, wealth and relationships? I believe it is the way in which we make decisions on a regular basis.

I suspect that you know how to stay healthy already. It simply takes exercise. Sure, additional strategies can help you to develop your body properly, but you really just need to keep your body exercised. Even if you don’t know how to exercise, you could probably do some research or ask someone.

I suspect that from reading, you already know that you have to create wealth through multiple streams of income, through prudent spending and the like. Even if you don’t have strategies to run a business or trade, you know you can learn these things from people who do know.

I even suspect you know how to create a loving relationship. It’s the way you communicate, and yes, even if you don’t know how to do it, it’s not that tough to learn – by communicating with your loved ones.

So does it mean that success and prosperity is all about action? It seems pretty simplistic, right? You might even question the purpose of this article.

But I think at a deeper, fundamental level, this is what everyone wants to hear – that there is something more than just action. Ever tested an action plan? Maybe you were really good at starting something but never was able to follow it through. Maybe that’s the issue rather than motivation.

In other words, we know that people who succeed are able to sustain their effort over a period of time.

Ask yourself: how long have you been able to sustain an interest enough to become good at doing it? Has there ever been a time where you were able to keep doing something (exercise, diligent work, effectively listen to others) over a sustained period of time? Why?

This sounds even more simplistic, doesn’t it. It implies you haven’t been doing enough. But when I look at people who don’t sustain their progress, it becomes a tell-tale sign that there’s something else at work here. If you don’t do what you are supposed to do, what do you do instead? Is this where all your attention has gone to?

Remember – while we enjoy doing certain things because we prefer it, does not mean that we should be allowed to indulge in that. Whenever we have no time/money/relationships, it’s likely that we did not create enough space for them and keep track of what did exist in the first place.

I think that to be driven to do something, you need a very strong reason. You need to have access to the “why” and that usually can sustain you. What do you want to achieve? How clearly can you see yourself doing it for the next few years? How much better can you get at doing this?

As you create a clear mental picture about what you want to get, it might even be good to review the reasons why this is so important to achieve. Even if it isn’t, make an excuse and consider how bad it could be for you and the people around you if it isn’t achieved. This is a basic propulsion system as described by NLP. Emotions, as it seems, can drive us to move in the direction we want once we notice the importance of that outcome – the reasons why.

By driving the process into an unconscious habitual mode, we need to first of all believe that what we want to achieve is compelling and worth doing, and that we can do it. This is the basis of the belief change process as described in NLP as well. All you need to do to make your beliefs more compelling are to explore how other beliefs of yours became compelling and follow the same process that you did previously: literally, self-modeling. When I doubted I was a good speaker, I realized I was constantly comparing myself with other people. When I shifted, I discovered that I stopped making those comparisons and started focusing on the people who were in the seats. For me, believing in myself was more of looking at someone’s need and helping them to reach their goals, than a popularity contest of who’s better.

If you believe you can handle your life well across those three areas, it is likely you will produce the relevant results. If you find these areas important, you will find yourself obsessing about them so you can achieve positive results. Once that happens, working hard at life becomes a passion rather than work.

Learn NLP – Time Management

Stuart — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 03:04:34 +0000

It’s been obvious that there are resources in our life that we need to control. So far, “knowledge” seems to be a resource that people can control with the use of appropriate learning skills. “Money” is a resource that people can control with the appropriate sets of skills an dbeliefs as well.

However in most cases, “time” is a resource that a lot of people don’t really know how to handle. It may seem that there’s no “skill” that you can learn to control time, unlike knowledge or wealth. Well, by now, you probably know that’s bogus.

Let’s take a look at the factors that allow you to handle time effectively.

#1 – Focus on what drives you.

In NLP, we understand the concepts of values: our inner motivational driving forces. If you have not really explored your own personal values, you should. It is the way in which you define these values that enables you to handle time properly. After all, clarity of hierarchy is the thing that gives you clarity of priorities.

#2 – Audit your values regularly

It’s no use if you’ve brought your values to consciousness but don’t review them. Review and audit them regularly to remind yourself of why you do what you do.

#3 – Establish the right beliefs about time.

If you are unaware of limiting beliefs about learning or money, you’ll find that you end up not being able to learn and probably not having enough money. Likewise, if you are not aware of your limiting beliefs about things you do, you might end up losing time. For example, when do you say you “don’t have time”? What are the common elements that are associated with those things that you don’t have time for? No time for:

Handling details (schedules, receipts, etc)?
Meeting new people?
Household chores?
Quality time with your spouse?

Conversely, what do you have time for instead, where there is no resistance?

Watching re-runs?
Drinking alcohol?
Habitual smoking?
Window shopping?

This will uncover things about yourself you need to explore.

#4 – Control your internal representations.

Did you know that when you are rushed for time and when time disappears, it’s pretty much when you don’t keep track of it? Well, technically, even if you were handling your tasks well, time also seems to fly – but you have evidence that you’ve got your work done and you know you’ve used time well.

Go back in your mind and ask yourself what is the difference between (a) the times when you had lots of time and did not produce results compared with (b) the times when you got things done.
Notice what submodalities are different. Look especially in terms of the types of mental images. You might find that in (a) you had many fleeting images of different things in disarray in your mind, whereas for (b), they appear to be more structured and organized.
Whenever you encounter situations like (a), convert the submodalities into those of (b) using the Mapping Across technique in NLP.

Which reminds me… I have to get some things done now. =D

NLP Expert Teaches: Productive Writing Strategy And NLP

Stuart — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 05:47:27 +0000

If you are a writer in need of speeding up your writing tasks, you probably want to read this article!

I’ve met a number of writers who are exceptionally good in their art, but fall short on their time requirements. Not only do they find that time catches up on them rapidly, they end up with a bad backlog of projects that cause them more stress. The downward spiral is excacerbated.

In order to ensure you are productive in your writing, I’d like to suggest what I call the NLP “writing stances”.

Writing Stance #1: Confrontational

This approach to writing definitely creates a burst of energy for anyone wanting to come out with content quickly. It basically is a shift of your emotional and physiological stance to confront a problem by first acting as if it were a personal issue. For instance, this article was written because I kept seeing so many people who face the productivity problem that I had to write it to “vent” and deal with the frustration as though I was the one with the productivity problem. This emotional state can get you to shift any mental block rather quickly. However, it may need a bit of censoring and editing in case your audience is not used to the expletives that may come out as a result of this stance!

Writing Stance #2 – Curiosity

This is a great stance to take up. When you place yourself in absolute curiosity for your article, you pose questions to yourself as if you were absolutely curious about the subject matter you are seeking answers to. Then, like the unraveling of a murder mystery, you come closer toward a conclusion of the article by means of a natural flow.

Writing Stance #3 – Three Things Factual

I find this approach easier for most beginning authors, or if you really need to get an article up and running as quickly as you can. The reason for this is basically because of a psychological tendency for us to move toward completion. If there are three things to consider, then that’s all you need to focus on. After listing each of the three items and elaborating on them, you’ll find there’s little room for mental blocks – your path has already been laid out!

Writing Stance #4 – Frivolity

Ooh. This one is really an off the cuff thing talking about whatever you observe or sense. It’s like conversational banter, and using each thing you notice around you to bring the reader closer to your point. I mean, I might have had a tall latte from Starbucks in the morning, but don’t just talk about that. Make conclusions about what you noticed. A creativity tool called “synectics” can show you how to creatively link two things in a somewhat meaningful way. For example, you might be writing about the topic of happiness. Hey, I’m sure there are a million and one ways to connect a “tall Latte” to “happiness” in a meaningful way!

Writing Stance #5 – Polarity

It’s very easy to agree with what others write. It’s not as easy to consider why others’ points of view may not be the most developed. In other words, you become a critic of others’ writings and elevate your point to something original or innovative. To do this, you have to use an argumentative approach that debunks the premises of others’ claims in order to come up with something more outstanding or give people the “wow, I didn’t realize this, but it’s a great point” experience.

So you have the five stances I’ve modelled from great writing states… go out there and start writing!

NLP For Habit Creation

Stuart — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 10:19:10 +0000

It’s surprised me to no end that there are people who don’t really teach the NLP techniques properly. For example, in the process of habit creation, it’s extremely important for someone to develop the right concept and capabilities or else their habits won’t get formed in the right manner. It seems that some trainres are using a very formulaic method to teach people, rather than teaching the best way to create the changes for that specific individual.

You can use techniques; at the same time you need to realize that techniques do not define a human being.

Let’s take one habit creation strategy known as The Swish Pattern and discuss this. Common mistakes made by people when using the Swish Pattern include a lack of understanding submodality patterns and driver submodalities.

In the Swish Pattern, you basically want to think about creating a cause-effect behavior pattern.

Think about what you want to do (as opposed to what you don’t want to do). You want to be in a position where this has happened for you. Now for a moment, ask yourself what it would take for you to reach there. What emotional states will help you be resourceful to get here?

So, we have a set of resources that lead to the behaviors that create those results.

Now it’s time to build the habit. Ask yourself waht you want to trigger off this emotion. Do you want to look at something and this emotion fires off?

For example, people who are constantly in a state of lethargy don’t realize they associate certain situations with that lack of energy. If you walk into a room, and you actually want to feel great doing stuff in that room, you must use that image of the room and all its surrounding visual stimuli to trigger off the emotion (say, motivation) you want.

So, now you have something called the trigger image, and the ‘desired’ image.

Using the drivers you learn from NLP, take your trigger image and transition it as rapidly as you can to the ‘desired’ image. Your transition could be distance (i.e. trigger image moves out away from you into the distance followed by the ‘desired’ image moving toward you). You can use brightness as a transition. Use your trigger image, brighten it until it turns into complete white-out, then when it dims back to normal brightness, it reveals the ‘desired’ image.

You must remember to do this several times. The faster you do it, the more associations you make to it. Also, you will get an ‘impact’ when you do it the first few times. However, after those times, you might feel like you’ve lost the impact. That’s normal. You’re supposed to feel that way – because when you look at the desired image, it usually feels as if you already have it. After you’ve rehearsed this several times to the point of “taking it for granted it will happen for you”, you can do a future pace.

When you future pace, you go into the future and see what the trigger does for you. Does the trigger bring out that emotional state and desired image again? If not, why? Could it be that there is a benefit for remaining the same (secondary gain)? Or else, could it be you didn’t make your resources effective enough?

Go back and review your process until it works… or, seriously, get a professional NLP coach to guide you in the process. It’s not that tough to do, and you might find it easier when you have a ground foundation of NLP.

Learn NLP: NLP Representational Systems

Stuart — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 08:59:37 +0000

Learn NLP Language Patterns – Modal Operators

Stuart — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 09:37:48 +0000

Learn NLP Video – NLP Language Patterns #1

Stuart — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 12:52:05 +0000

Start off your learning with NLP Language Patterns – one of the most powerful set of models ever to be developed by the NLP community.