Author: nlpnowcom

Post author By nlpnowcom
Post date 08/01/2008

People have often asked me what is a Mind Map as taught in the one day course.

Here is a simple Mind Map of some of the web sites I have under the “C4” classification. “C4” standing for SEE FOR whatever follows, so we have http://www.c4nlp.com , http://www.c4mindmaps.com , http://www.c4photoreading.com, reading in a clockwise fashion to the last one http://www.c4hypnosis.com .
sample Mind Map for Phillip Holts web sites

We start off in the middle with a title or subject that they all belong too, each one, a separate subject matter under the heading of the main, branching out like branches of a tree.

Each branch will contain one word if applicable and possible, (not so with “National Guild of Hypnosis“, but this could have been abbreviated to NGH), and will sub divide as we expand the knowledge.

This can be seen with the main branch C4Coaching above coming out of the main heading C4MORE in the center, and then sub dividing into more branches, “1-2-1“, “Corporate” and “Executives“.

These sub branches are words or pictures which will associate ideas, facts in one word, and will lead to many more sub branches or associations.

A Mind Map should be colourful, and can contain pictures or drawings.

Contact me further if you would like more information or join one of my many courses around the world.

C4NLP, C4MindMaps, C4PhotoReading, C4Coaching, C4Memory, C4Phobias, C4Hypnotherapy, C4Stagehypnosis, C4Hypnosis, C4MORE, C4Training

Note:- Phillip Holt is a licensed trainer to Tony Buzan. index

Hawkers – Eating out Malaysian style

Post author By nlpnowcom
Post date 07/01/2008

It seems that most people in Malaysia eat out rather than prepare food at home. That is the way I perceive the eating situation, as unless there is a lot of people for a big family meal, we go out, or food is brought in.

There are the standard restaurants with table clothes and menus, being mostly very cheap, say 60 – 100 Ringit (Malaysian Dollars) or £10 – £15 for six people, but the best way to eat is to go to the hawker stands.

Hawkers are people who will specialise in one specific type of food or cooking style, and they will set-up a stand, mostly at night, and there they will prepare and cook on demand their single offering.

Here is a family that specialisms in pancakes. They have a small open sided van, parked on the side of the road, and they cook a variety of pancakes with fillings such as corn, crushed peanuts, coconut, black sugar.

Malaysian hawker selling pancakes

Other hawkers will set-up their stands in groups, in open sided restaurants, with each stand advertising what they are cooking. Some hawker restaurants specialise in say fish, or duck and that is all you get, but there will be such a variety within that specialty.

open-sided hawker restaurant hawker stand selling duck

Above, an open fronted hawker restaurant with two portable hawker stands made from stainless steel and glass, with diners sitting on the obligatory plastic chairs, plus a hawker stand preparing a wide variety of duck meals.

Other hawker restaurants will be on a grander scale with vast variety of food being offered. Individuals from the dining group will go up to the hawker of choice, order the meal, and then go and sit at the usual round table and plastic chair with their fellow diners and wait. A few minutes later the meal will arrive. So cheap, 1 or 2 Ringit (Malaysian Dollar), say 50 pence (UK).

;

Hawker restuarant, Downing Street Penang

It is usual that the hawkers pay a rent for their stand to the restaurant/facility owner, and it is the restaurant/facility owner that sell drinks, my favourite being Milo Peng, iced Milo.

NLP Travels

There will always be danger and monsters, Inoculate yourself.

Post author By nlpnowcom
Post date 06/01/2008

There will always be danger and monsters (click to see monsters in my garden in Bukit Mertajam, Malaysia) in life, and there will always be things and people that go against our wishes and wants, that seem to want to harm us.

Grasshopper hiding on a Hibiscus flower.

Just be aware that they could be there, and inoculate against them..

In the medical field, we have been able to eradicate many diseases, for example polio (Rotary Club End Polio Now), smallpox, and it continuous to be a fight to stop these diseases re-establishing themselves.

We can prevent people, animals and plants from getting diseases. In humans, the flu, measles, mumps and rubella to name just a few.

How can we prevent these diseases taking hold?

We inoculate against them.

We give the body a small dose of the disease in the form of an injection, and this small dose will grow and reproduce, and what it does is to allow the body to learn to fight it, to boost the immune system by creating and inducing anti bodies that will attack any future infections.

If you know that you may be traveling to some far off distant land, were there could be some potentially dangerous diseases, you go to the doctor or clinic and ask for an injection to inoculate against catching the disease.

If you are going out, to shop, to celebrate or just to walk, and the sky looks black, heavy with rain clouds, it is sensible to take an umbrella. You are looking forward, preparing for something that could happen. Inoculating.

As you go about your daily life, business, leisure, pleasure, be aware of the potential things that could go wrong, and prepare for them, just in case they do happen.

For me as I travel the world teaching and training (visit my web site www.nlpnow.net for courses) with people from differing cultures and beliefs, I know I am going to say and do the wrong things, I inoculate the participants against my unintended mistakes by telling them I may do or say the wrong things.

In business have a contingency plan for happenings that do not follow the original structure or plan. Inoculate.

If entering a relationship, as a young lady I know was hoping to do, what happens if the other person has no interest, perhaps in this case it turned out that he was gay, something she could not see or recognize as she pursued him? Rather than letting her get hurt by his rejection in the future, I inoculated her by suggesting the possible rejection and why, but allowing her to carry out her quest. She was rejected, but they remain good friends.

Do not dwell or stop doing what you want to do, just because there could be dangerous monsters lurking to get you, just be aware they could be there, prepare, inoculate, but go for your dream.

Tags against, Bukit, Club, dangerous, end, injection, inoculate, Malaysia, Mertajam, monsters, now, polio, Rotary, smallpox

Travels

More Beauty in our Garden, Flowering Orchids

Post author By nlpnowcom
Post date 05/01/2008

Yesterday I showed some of the flowers, beauty, in our garden in Bukit Mertajam, Malaysia, (click here to see), and I have to thank my brother-in-law Thiang who looks after our garden in our absence.

Thiang’s love is orchids, and the climate in Malaysia, hot and humid, is the natural environment for some of them to grow.

Here is just a sample of flowering orchids in our gardens.

Orchid

Orchid Phalaenopsis

Orchid

Orchid Cattleya (wild)

Trichopilia Tortilis

Orchid Cattleya

It is a pity the climate is a little too hot and humid for me to flourish.

If you know the name of the above orchids, please tell or correct me via the comment facility.

Culture Travels

Cultural Family Ties can be Strong

Post author By nlpnowcom
Post date 02/01/2008

It has been a time of celebration on this trip to Malaysia, Christmas 2007, the New Year of 2008, and a birthday.

My sister-in-law Janet, (her Chinese name Ng Mee Chin), who now lives, with her husband Bing, on the same housing estate as we do, having her 70th birthday on the 1st January 2008.

Janet and Bing have three boys, Kin, Keong and Hun, the first two living in Kuala Lumpa, a 4 – 5 hour drive away, and Hun living in Singapore some 10 hour drive, and it seemed that her family would not be back to celebrate her birthday.

The boys had other ideas, and each traveled back to be with her over this period, Hun with his wife Anna and daughter Anjelica, made it over the Xmas period, and we had a birthday party for Janet. Then Keong turned-up two days ago to spend a few days with her. Driving over night, celebrating the midnight change of year in the car, the oldest son, Kin with his wife Li Hoon and children Ching, Shen and Jyun, arrived to spend a few hours of celebration. We had another party.

Janet Ng's Birthday Janet’s family with birthday cake.

Anna and Anjelica minus Hun with another birthday cake

The Chinese culture holds the family ties very strong, gatherings to be as one group, to be together, which in times gone by was workable, but as the family members begin to spread their wings, moving away from the nest to many far and distant places, for all to be together all at the same time has become a near impossibility, and can lead to disappointments, tension and fallouts.

I remember Christmas’s gone by when I was a small boy.

My mother’s family were very close, her brother and sister, Frank and Dylis lived next door to each other, and their mother lived with them. The family would get together with my two cousins, Avryl and Glynis, plus for the family meal, my cousin’s other Grand Father.

Yet, my father’s family were very close too, and they would also gather for Christmas, the four siblings each with their offspring.

Which family should my father and mother spend Christmas with? Problem.

This was solved by my parents by spending alternative Christmas’s with each family.

Even as a small boy, I sensed and saw when we spent time with my father’s family, my mother would be yearning to be with her family, and when we were with her family, my father being a little out of place with my mother’s family.

Then, one brother or brother-in-law, sister or sister-in-law, had fallen out with another that year, and did not want to be in the same room as each other.

Who should be with whom?

Oh Poo Poo. (click to understand)

It was good to observe Janet’s family as a whole family, and to be included into the family celebrations, to have over the festive period other family members, David (Ng Ying Loong), John (Ng Ying Loon), Amy (Ng Mee Ghor) and Thiang (Ng Ying Thiang) popping in and out.

The last time the whole (nearly) of the NG family got together was for Xmas 1999 and the Millenium (2000) in the Palace of the Golden Horses, Kuala Lumpa.

Ng family Xmas 1999

Travels

Hard Hats required

Post author By nlpnowcom
Post date 02/01/2008

Our home in Malaysia, in Bukit Mertajam, can at times be a peaceful place.

That peace can be over-ridden by lorries with straight through exhaust systems, or a new mosque near our house calling for the faithful to prayers with the loudspeakers at full power at 5:30am in the morning, some of the offspring of the Ng family’s nine brothers and sisters, gathering to play and have fun, the animals and birds calling their mates, or the frogs croaking after the nearly daily deluge of rain.

Laughter of some of the NG family children

Laughter of some NG family children December 2007

Opposite to the house is a small patch of what I call jungle, with tall grass, high trees, containing a wide variety of wild life I am sure, including I expect snakes. I have not seen one yet, but my eyes are always aware that there could be the hypnotic python snake Kaa from Rudyard Kipling’s book the Jungle Book, lurking just ready to get me in his gaze.

hypnotic python snake Kaa from Rudyard Kipling's book the Jungle Book

Every so often on this trip as I have been standing in my garden I would hear a crack coming from across the road. Then there would be a pinging or rushing sound as something fell to the ground or fell through the leaves.

In this patch of “jungle” are rubber trees, left over from when the land was a rubber plantation. Then, I understood what was happening.

In the rubber trees are seed pods, which at the moment are ripe and germinated, ready to be scattered and sewn.

The seed pod springs open with a crack, firing the two large and hard seeds great distances through the air like bullets.

Rubber tree seeds and seed pod.

So take care walking under a rubber tree, it might attack you.

It is a dangerous place this jungle, the world we live in.

Watch out, protect yourself, wear a hard hat, there are horrid things and people out to attack you.

English Courses

Learning from a cold or virus

Post author By nlpnowcom
Post date 01/01/2008

So OK I am getting better from the cold or virus (virus or bacteria click to read) I developed, with runny nose, sore throat, and a thick head. But, last night it felt as if I had something stuck in the back of my throat, a pocket type thing, hanging from the roof of the back of my mouth.

What was it?

Had I eaten some strange food that got caught, had I scratch the roof of my mouth?

On looking inside the mouth, I saw the uvula the small finger like thing hanging at the back of the mouth, between the tonsils, if you still have them.
uvula tonsils Diagram showing the human mouth.
It was inflamed and swollen. It is highly infected.

It seems that an infection can be caused by a number of things, including dehydration, well I am drinking a lot so it can not be that, smoking, I gave that up 30 years ago and no-one smokes here, or allergic reaction, it could be that as I have no idea what I am eating, or snoring, I know I do not snore even though people say I do, I know they are lying, or a viral or bacterial infection (click to read Virus v Bacteria).

They say the best thing to do is to gargle with salt water. Well I will give it a try.

As I had no idea what the purpose of the uvula is, I researched I found some interesting information. I know why we have legs and arms, but this thing hanging from the top of the mouth, the soft palate?

It seems it is used to stop food going the wrong way down, in other words down our wind pipe, it is also useful for making sounds.

For a few years I had taken participants learning English in Turkey (click on the Category Archives on the left hand panel “English Courses” for more information), who were on a nine day course from 9am until 9pm, and three times a day, I would teach them some skills using NLP, some relaxation and memory skills, and during the sessions I would teach that language was a whole body experience.

It seems that the uvula plays an important part in language and talking.

When making sounds with the air coming from the lungs, the uvula is used along with the tongue, in English to make guttural sounds, to stop air passing through the nose to make sounds like my wifes family name NG. Different languages use the uvula to make different sounds.

Ok another piece of useless information to add to my collection.

Travels

A Happy New Year

Post author By nlpnowcom
Post date 01/01/2008

To all my friends around the world, may I wish you a Happy New Year.

It is a time to reflect on all we have or have not achieved in the previous year.

It is a time to make promises and wishes to ourselves about those things we want to do in the new year.

Make the New Year resolutions, positive, beneficial to yourself and others, become motivated to do these things, and most of all, see yourself doing these things as if you are there standing in your own shoes at the time to come now.

Live your dreams now. Daydream.

When looking back, we often use the words “what if” and “if only”.

“What if had said this or that?”

            “What if I had done that?”

            “What if this had happened?”

“If only I had said this.”

“If only I had done that”

“If only I could do…….”.

What has ever happened in the past has happened, it is history, let it go, but learn from it. Many people continually do the same thing, time after time, if it does not work, change what you are doing.

“If only I had changed my job or my supplier, I would be so much better and happier off now.”

It did not happen. Get on now and make the changes.

“If only I had not said what I said”.

It was said. If it hurt someones feelings, or was against their belief or culture, and you did not know at the time, then is it your fault, or the other person who could have been a little more tolerant towards you. Learn from your mistakes and say and do it differently next time.

“If only I had not done that”.

As long as you did what you did with good intention at the time, then rejoice. It happened, get over it. Perhaps, you like me, walked into a lamp post, or fell into a hole injuring yourself, and you say :-

“If only I had seen the lamp post”.

You did not see the danger. Next time you will be more aware of things that can go wrong. Learn from it, else you will get hurt again.

When we say “if”, we tend to try and place the blame on other actions, other people, other times, to take the responsibility from ourselves.

Stop it.

There is only one person in charge, and that person is you.

Live your live as you want it to be, not as if it could be, make it real.

Again, HAPPY NEW YEAR, and thank you all who I have had contact with in the past for being there, and I hope to meet with you in a new POSITIVE New year.

Want to know an NLP term, click here or visit NLP Glossary on the left.

Travels

No packaging, so take your shoes off.

Post author By nlpnowcom
Post date 31/12/2007

On a short car ride from my home in Bukit Mertajam, Malaysia, I came across a small biscuit shop, selling homemade biscuits.

The odd thing that caught my eye was that all the customers took their shoes off upon entering the shop.

Taking ones shoes off is not an unusual custom in many countries, in China, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Turkey etc, it is common prior to entering a home to take your shoes off. Some people offer slippers for their guests to wear.

Temples, Hindu and Buddhist, and mosques, all require that footwear be removed. But a shop?

On removing my shoes and entering the shop, it was as if I had traveled back in time, a time when I was in Chasetown, my parents hometown in he UK, as a small boy.

Rows and rows of glass jars, each containing a different variety of biscuits of shape, colour and taste, all neatly arranged and stacked inside the jar. No self service here.

A polite notice had been placed throughout the shop in Chinese and English, saying “NO TASTE”.

There was not a piece of packaging to be seen anywhere. No expensive artwork, no description of what the biscuit was, no what ingredients had been used to make them.

Some spicy Malaysian biscuit.

Traditional biscuits, with Eco friendly packaging. Good idea, but would the big supermarkets take it on I wonder.

Want to know an NLP term, click here or visit NLP Glossary on the left.

Eating Out Travels

A Waterside Restaurant in Malaysia

Post author By nlpnowcom
Post date 30/12/2007

One of the benefits of Malaysia is the wide ethnic range of food, Malaysian, Indian, Chinese, western, it can also be a disadvantage, especially for me who is not that keen on fish.

It is not that I do not like fish, I do, when I would swim and dive with them in the warm waters of the Red Sea, or the Caribbean or South China Sea, or stand in front of an aquarium full of colourful exotic specimens. For me, perhaps as a result of being force fed fish at school as a young boy, and some of the very strong tastes and smells, I do not like to eat them.

Sometimes we have to partake in activities or gatherings that perhaps under normal circumstances we would avoid. So it was for our afternoon meal, eight of the family drove towards the near by coast, to an inlet, where there are a number of fish restaurants.

The open sided wooden structure, perched on the bank of a smelly, muddy inlet, with mangroves on the opposite bank hosting a variety of wild animals, white egrets, monitor lizards. Next to the restaurant were docks or jetties, where small fishing vessels raced in to unload their catch of fish, crabs, shellfish, so fresh and alive.

&
Makanan Laut Jeti Fish Restaurant , next to shellfish packing station.

Restaurant in Malaysia next to a smelly mud bank with the tide out.
The smelly mud bank with the tide out.

The jetty next to the restaurant with a boat racing in with its catch.

The open sided restaurant in Malaysia next to the water, with fishing boats passing by
The open sided restaurant next to the water, with fishing boats passing by.

A busy Makanan Laut Jeti fish restaurant

A variety of sea food was ordered, including, octopus, deep fried battered soft shelled crabs, shellfish going under the name of “La La” (shellfish close to the mussel family), prawns, vegetables and fresh fish picked from the water filled display cabinets. Served with it was a green drink, ampara juice, which tasted like grass, which is said to be good for health. Oh, not forgetting the serving of rice and chili sauce.

Octopus with sauces

Why is it that anything I do not particularly like is always good for my health, or as my mother would say, make my hair curl, or my father would say, put hairs on my chest? None of these things have happened to me.

All the food is as always served centrally, and people help themselves to individual mouthfuls, using the pink and orange plastic plates, forks and spoons.

Bing and Janet Ng

The food actually, as my “Grand Niece” Anjelica would say, was really good. I loved the soft shelled crab, eaten whole, legs and shells, (seen above middle right), the scampi, (top left) served in a deep brown rich sauce was mouth watering, the fresh prawn (top right) coated in fried oat flakes, once out of their shells, were meaty and fresh.

Perhaps the green vegetable called Kan Choi (spinach family) served in Sambal sauce is not to my pallet, in fact I cannot stand the smell or taste, so I had one small piece, neither did I partake in the curried fish, (yet to arrive in the above picture), as my stomach cannot tolerate curries.

Perhaps my dislike of fish meals will change, as I continually try new things on my travels.