As we go about our life, we take in vast amounts of information, as we see, hear, feel, smell and taste our journey of the world about us. We make representations of these experiences in our mind using these senses, and link these experiences to previous memories, either real or imaginary, by what is know in NLP terms, a transderivational search, searching for examples in our memory bank.

When was the last time you visited a bank? You will remember a time you actually visited a bank, perhaps seeing in your mind the actual bank, maybe hearing the sounds, feeling the feelings of having to wait in a queue, going through that experience again. So you have senses that are remembered.

What would it be like to meet and have a conversation with a Martian? Unless you have been to one of my Stage Hypnosis shows or taken one of my Stage Hypnosis Courses, you would have to make-up in your mind or construct the situation in your mind.

In all cases above, we represent what we are processing in our mind in the five senses, the five modalities, the five representational systems, be that the situation is happening at that time, we remember something, or we make up or construct a situation . 

We have five (5) senses or representational systems, V,A,K,O,G, being Visual (seeing), Auditory (hearing and speech), Kinesthetic (touch, feelings, both internal and external), Olfactory (smell), and Gustatory (taste). We receive information of our around us by these five modalities.

The Visual System

When you see or look at something, you are using your eyes, which is then represented in our mind, we create an internal image. We also create an internal image by daydreaming, hallucinating, fantasizing using our imagination, (visual constructed), or we make pictures in our mind of things we have done, a favourite holiday, restaurant, our home, (visual remembered).

The Auditory System

We hear things with our ears, people speaking, the sound of the radio or TV. Also we talk to ourselves, have an internal dialog, hear what a friend said to us, have a song or tune rolling around in our head, or imagine what someone may say to us, we are using our auditory sense.

The Kinesthetic System

When we touch something, we use our feelings, what is know as the kinesthetic sense. This sense can be made up with external feelings, touching or being touched, or our internal feelings. Emotions can be classed as internal feelings, perhaps remembering your first love, you get "butterflies" in the stomach.

The Olfactory System

The olfactory representational system involves the sense of smell, and is in NLP terms, held in less importance to the Visual, Auditory or Kinesthetic systems. Perhaps this is because it is quite difficult to remember a smell, to actually recreate a smell in the mind. It is understood that the olfactory sensors, the smell receptors are directly connected to the brain and have a direct influence on how the brain processes the information, whereas Visual, Auditory or Kinesthetic systems, will have some brain processing for example involving the visual cortex.

The Gustatory System

The gustatory representational system involves the sense of taste. Again in NLP terms, is held as less important. As you think of having a great meal, it may be difficult to recreate the actual tastes, with visual and kinesthetic senses giving a higher memory.