Category: NLP

Categories
NLP Travels

You never know until you get Feedback

For nearly a year now I have been putting my thoughts, my ideas, my observations down in this blog. Some of my offerings have been to help readers to understand aspects of items from my courses (click to see Mind Map), other offerings have been how I have seen the world from my eyes (index).

I have had one or two comments of how the blog is received, but I never really knew, is it good, is it bad.

How can you know? I have a counter that tells me how many “hits” per page I get, but is it accurate? I subscribed to another counter which gave details of where people lived, how long they stayed, what operating system they were using, what they had for breakfast. But that hit counter gave me a completely different count.

I gave up the idea of relying on these forms of reports, they are an indication only, a pointer to the real thing. If I took the first counter I was unhappy, but take the second counter, I was “over the moon”, extremely happy.

I just did what I enjoyed, I wrote, attached some photographs to describe my world, Phillip Holt’s World, knowing that some people would be unhappy with what I wrote, whilst others would be more than happy.

I was not out to, I do not set out to make people upset, what ever they read they will go on their transderivational search, put their cat on the mat, their understanding onto what I am saying.

If I say “car“, what do you see in your minds eye? Probably your car and where it is parked right now. But there are hundreds of makes and models of cars, and certainly different parking lots as I have readers from so many different countries. So we all get different messages. Read my blog on George Miller, 7 /- 2.

Yesterday was a down day for me. It was extra hot here in Bukit Mertajam, Malaysia, and it was raining one minute, sunny the next, thunderstorms, the humidity was high along with the temperature, my emails are not working, a modem  had installed was not working, my plans for the day were thrown out due to the arrival of relatives, I had an accident in the hire car. Big oh poo poo day.

I put together a blog on my travel across to the Island of Penang, (Crossing over to Penang Island), just a 15 minute drive away. I was not happy with the result, but it was what I wanted.

This morning I received a comment (click to read) from one of my ex translators, Deniz, who is living and working in Paris.

Her comments made me happy, made me realise that people appreciate what I write.

How often do you give feedback to people? (insert the word positive please).

So to Asu, thank you for the wedding photographsof Murat you sent last night , and your little black dress, you look glamorous.

To Sahika, Mehpare, and Leila, sorry for not getting back to you re dates of courses.

To Rory, yes we will hold the next Stage Hypnosis course in the Royal National Hotel London, this March.

To all I have not mentioned, thank you for you support and feedback. I appreciate it.                                index

Categories
NLP Travels

There will always be danger and monsters, Inoculate yourself.

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 In Malaysia

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.

Categories
NLP

Carpe Diem

I have just watched a video given by Steve Jobs for the Stanford Commencement Speech of 2005 in the USA.

In his speech for the graduation of students, he tells three stories, in my view a little inappropriate for those who had studied hard to get their qualifications, having had spent hours cramming facts and figures into their heads.
 
He tells that he had dropped out of college without gaining qualifications, only doing what subjects he wanted to do, those subjects that he had an interest in, yet he become one of the most successful and richest people in the world by applying what he had learned.

He tells how at the age of twenty he had set-up Apple computers, but at the age of thirty he was sacked (Dismissed) from his company, but then went on to set-up and create two more highly successful companies.

He tells how he discovered he had cancer, and was only given months to live, but within a few hours it was found that this cancer was a rare strain and could be treated and removed.

He had followed his dreams, those things that had inspired, motivated him, gave him great interest, those things that he loved to do in business and relationships, to become successful, but he had faced death, as he said, the one certain thing to happen to us all our lives.

From his message it seems he is saying that we should not follow others, that our life is limited, that death is just around the corner.

I think we should follow others, know their strategies, how they do things, become a success, and I believe we should take what is appropriate for us and apply them to our lives, add on to these discoveries, teaching others along the way, not for those or us to become “Little Phillip” or Steve Jobs.

I believe that we should not look at death in the face, it will happen, but we should live our lives as the FIRST DAY OF THE REST OF OUR LIVES, follow our dreams, with a smile on our face and happiness in our hearts.

Carpe Diem, the only Latin I know, enjoy the present day, live for the day.

Great speech, worth watching.

Categories
Culture NLP Travels

Culture. It changes.

On occasions in my training courses I am told, “this is *?&$£: culture, and it will not change”.

What is culture? I think it is beliefs, the way we are raised as children, and the influences of our parents, peers, the media, religion and the governments, but on a grand scale, that is as a country, a city, a town, a street, a family, where those beliefs and way of life are shared and lived.

I was born into a proud family, both on my father’s and mother’s side, not a rich family, but one that worked and saved hard for the future. We had high morals, respecting our elders and those less off than us. My family wanted the best they could afford, without begging, borrowing, or taking credit from banks.

Travel was a major adventure, even to go 15 miles would be planned for days. We stayed in our local community, it was the culture of our family and locality.

It was after I started college education and my computing career that I started to travel further and further from the nest, and experienced different communities, working practices and ways of living and working. My cultural behaviours and beliefs were changing.

Phillip Holt wearing thobebiggest difference in beliefs and culture happened when I went to work in the Islamic country of Saudi Arabia, where a woman had no rights, could not drive, could not be with man unless they were married or family. There were no clubs, pubs, theaters or cinemas, no entertainment. Religion was restricted to Islam and no other. Their dress was completely different than that of the British, with their headdress and white thobe. It was their culture that I had to fit into, and I did for nearly six years, although I did not wear their dress style.

My travel for work and holidays to different countries continued to the far corners of the world, China to Peru. Cultures and beliefs being completely different, country to country, and region to region within those countries. My biggest cultural exposure was marrying Mee Len, a Chinese Malaysian.

The more I travel the more I see cultures beginning to change and to merge, where beliefs are beginning to become similar, but not the same.

Simple things like food. Every country or region has its’ specialties. But food is food, it is the way we prepare it, cook it, the ingredients combined to make it, the presentation and the way we eat it. Lamb is lamb, chicken is chicken, beef is beef and rice is rice.

The emergence of outlets such as Starbucks, Gloria Jeans, MacDonnell’s, Kentucky Fried Chicken, Pizza Hut, kebabs, Indian and Chinese restaurants, in virtually every town in the world is changing the way we eat, for good or bad. These food outlets would not exist if the local people did not want them or eat in them.

The culture of preparing and eating at home, going for convenience food, is changing the culture of communities.

Television, radio, newsprint and the internet is introducing culture and beliefs of one community to another, and the young of the community want what they see, they want the food, they want the fashion.

Retail outlets like Zara, M&S, Carafour, Tesco, Walmart, sell the same products in their shops in London, Singapore, Ankara New York or Madrid, and the purchasing public buy it, changing the dress culture.

We are becoming one in the affluent and younger people, it is the older of us that hold on to the old dress, styles or culture.

The culture of travel is changing as we become more affluent, we buy more cars, we use public transport rather than walking, we tend to travel further from our homes to work, and take convenience food for lunch and snacks.

As we travel further to work and to study, the family structure changes. The family culture is breaking down. This is happening not only in 1st world counties but in 3rd world too, as people seeks work to support their family and changing life styles.

We are loosing cultural differences, and it is happening more quickly day by day. I am sorry to say nothing will stop it, culture has never been static, like language, it is always modifying to the influences of the environment, the community, and our knowledge as they change.

For those who do not like this change or loosing their culture, they can become entrenched in their beliefs of the old ways, and can become very aggressive in their views, often going to extremes to display the culture they believe in, with their dress and behaviour.

We should celebrate our cultural differences and keep them, but we should respect other peoples and communities beliefs and cultures.

We will never stop cultural change.

Click to read next blog about culture.

Categories
NLP Travels

Culture

My travels take me to many places around the world, and these places and people have many customs and beliefs. These customs and beliefs will range from behaviours, dress, food, and politics to religion. The latter two I keep away from.

My problem is that as I visit and give more trainings in these far places (click to see countries I visit), I am introduced to even more culture, and as I forget what country or region I am in, I can make big mistakes.

Simple things like hand movements, simple words, touching, looking, how I eat food, drink, or blow my nose, can cause offense. And, I do not intentionally.

OK, there are times when I intentionally shock my participants with what I do. It is done for a purpose, but that is another matter.

Simple things like blowing my nose. In Turkey it should never be done whilst eating at the dining table. The trouble is I did not know this until recent times. How often have I eaten a spicy meal, hot chillies, that make my nose run, it is not that I have a cold, but my nose really runs, and how often have I blown my nose? I cannot have it dripping can I?

Sorry people who have taken me for a meal and I did wrong.

In China or Malaysia, South East Asia, they eat noodles, which can be called spaghetti in Italy and the rest of the world, as far as I am concerned they are one of the same. In China, they scoop the noodles into the mouth, and the excess is bitten off and is allowed to fall to back onto the plate. In Italy it should all be placed into the mouth whole, none should be dropped back onto the plate.

Sorry Donatella, when I ate like a Chinaman at your friend’s restaurant in upmarket Rome.

In some countries it is rude to show the souls of the feet, that is one reason when people sit on the floor they place their feet beneath them like in a yoga position. My knees do not bend that way or that much. I have tried, but it seems I am not built to do that.

Sorry, I suppose I should have some replacement knees.

The classic sign to indicate to stop is to place the flat of the hand towards the person you wish to stop. Most police forces use it to stop traffic. But then it can be a rude sign to some cultures. Another sign to say stop is to run an outstretched hand across the neck, to cut or finish. In Italy this is a bad sign used by the Mafia.

Sorry people in Italy.

I Muslim counties, cultures or beliefs, it is sometimes not done for a man to touch or shake a womans hand, one of the most natural ways of meeting someone, thus we have the NLP Handshake Interrupt exercise. (click to see).

In some cultures, it is not the done thing to show any form of affection or gratitude, for example the kissing of cheeks we see in Mainland Europe or the Middle East. It is certainly not done by the British, but I have gotten used to it.

Sorry those of you in the Chinese community, especially the family in Malaysia and Bing, my brother-in-law.

Perhaps the answer could be that we all wear a big sign around our necks, which states and says what is acceptable to us and what is not. It would then be easy for me not to cause offense to others by my words and action, and for others not to upset me, like jumping the queue. (click to read).

But then, people who have been on my courses can cope with culture differences, they may not like the differences, but now they can accept them and smile.

To the rest of you. Sorry in advance.

Can you let me know of differences in culture and beliefs you know of, by posting a comment below so I can be prepared?

Categories
NLP

NLP Diploma Gaziantep, Turkey

Today we finished a two day NLP Diploma course in Gaziantep in Southern Turkey.

A lovely group of participants joined together to enter the world of knowledge and NLP.

                                                
Categories
NLP Recommendation

Recommendations in Turkish

From the NLP Practitioner course held in Istanbul, Turkey in December 2007, with myself and NLP-Time, we had three recommendations which you can view here.


Istanbul, Türkiye’de Aralık 2007’de NLP-Time ile birlikte düzenlediğimiz NLP Practitioner kursu katılımcılarından üç katılımcının kurs hakkındaki görüşlerini izleyebilirsiniz.
Categories
Hypnosis NLP

The NLP Handshake Interrupt

In NLP (click to see courses) we look at the Handshake Interrupt or Pattern Interrupt.

Actions or processes we do on a regular or in fact irregular basis, will follow a pattern, a sequence, which will be automatically followed, without us on a consciously being aware of what is happening.

Take shaking someones hand. As a person walks up to another, they will often offer up their hand to shake the other persons hand, and that person will automatically raise their hand to grasp and shake the hand. It is automatic.

If one of the people fails to return the handshake grasp, the one receiving the hand will fell very uneasy, they will not know what to do. If at this time, that person is offered an easy achievable task or action, that is not against their beliefs, culture of religion, they will most likely follow that suggestion.

In the video, we can see participants in trance after being offered by Phillip Holt to shake their hands. This offer was withdrawn just before the grasping of the hands, and the participants hand raised into the air and suggestions made that it will hang there as they go into a deep trance.

                                           

Categories
NLP

Friends becoming NLP Practitioners

                                                              Richard Bandler’s Society of NLP, NLP Practitioner.
 
A lot of laughter, a few tears, much relaxation and loads of great learning of language, culture, human nature, processing of information, strategies, ended with many changes being made, perhaps a few fears and phobias being left behind.

Thank you ladies, it was a great time together. 

Categories
Coaching Memory Mind Maps NLP PhotoReading

New Dates, New Trainings, New Beginnings

Today has been a sorting out day, my paperwork, my filing, my future courses, my car.

In the UK, we have to MOT our cars every year. MOT stands for Ministry Of Transport, and is a test of the road worthiness of a car over a certain age, and when complete, a test certificate is issued, allowing you to tax the car, thus being able to use the car on the UK highways.

Everything is computerised. The car has an identification, so the garage, conducting the tests of the lights, body, tires, brakes and emissions, etc, enters the details onto the Department of Transports computers.

I can then go on-line on my computer to the vehicle licensing computer of the DVLA (Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency), enter a reference number, that computer checks that the car has the above MOT, and that the car has valid insurance, and before you can blink an eye, my credit card is £230.00 more into debt.

To pay for all this, the test, the license fee and tax, I need to work, and it is with regret that I have to part company with NLPGrup in Turkey as they have not been paying me for my work, although they have been paid by participants and companies.

So today I have been talking to more companies in Turkey and Bahrain for courses in the coming months.

Two companies in Turkey will be representing me, NLP-Time, and Gap Consultancy in the south of Turkey. Visit their web sites by clicking on their names for dates and courses.

In Bahrain I am talking to and will be working with Dr Leila Edwards of The MakeOver Experience, visit their site for more information and dates.

I will look forward working with these for me new companies, to meeting old and new participants and companies.

Like in Richmond Park, the trees have down times, when they have difficulties, the environment is not good, but that down time will be replaced by good times and new good growth, arising from the ashes will come the Phoenix.



Here I come.