Category: NLP

I am continually seeking new information, researching facts, improving my knowledge to add to my portfolio of training skills, to pass on, incorporate into my trainings.

I try to read as much as possible, especially items or articles on the human mind, and how we interact with the world about us, and how we can improve ourselves.

There are one or two good magazines that I love to read.

The New Scientist, contains lots of research papers from leading thinkers, scientists, doctors, professors, people like you or me, giving new theories, ideas. It is easy to read , and covers a wide spectrum of science.

FOCUS is a BBC publication, very similar to The New Scientist, perhaps less articles per issue, not so academic, but again covering a wide spectrum of knowledge.

This months issue of FOCUS (175 April 2007 page 52), has an article by Len Fisher in answer to the question “Why do fire walkers not get burned?”

Some NLP courses, and Tony Robins courses, etc, offer the participants the chance to walk the fire, or break the board. These courses offer these amazing feats as evidence of the power that has taken place, but at the end of the course, that is all you can do, walk the fire or break a piece of wood.

I offer the same but more, the knowledge, the change, the power will be in you, and you will know how you did it, and how you can in the future use your own power, confidence, will power and more in any situation.

Lets look at the Board Break. On close inspection of the wood, it will be found that the wood is a soft wood, not oak or mahogany, the grain or wood fibers are not dense or tightly bound. Also, as you look at the grain of the wood, it will be in the vertical plane. So the way the board is held by the facilitator and the way the participant strikes he board, it will naturally split.

Fisher states that the fire walk is a matter of simple physics. He says the key ingredient is that the burning material, it should be a good thermal insulator, a hardwood, and that the fire should have burned for a long time to form a layer of insulating ash before the walk is attempted. The feet should be in contact with the hot coals for as little as possible, about a second over a 4 meter (13 foot) brisk walk.

I demonstrate with the help of a cigarette lighter, with the flame passing over my hand, that it does not hurt, it does not burn me.

I would love to be at a fire walk, with the trainer demonstrating the walk, and I would use the NLP Pattern Interrupt half way down their walk, and shout “STOP”, then watch as they stop, burning and disappearing into the fire, becoming ash.

Learn the NLP behind achieving excellence, make the changes yourself and know why.

Joan of Arc eat your heart out.

I got an email from an acquaintance I have known in the NLP field for a long time.

Their first words were:-

        
                “You seem to have diappeared off the map – or is it me that has moved off your radar?”

I thought of what I had been doing since we last met, that was a long time ago, I think it was helping (me making tea) another great trainer Michael Breen, at a one day seminar on the works of Moshe Feldenchrist.
 

Well I had not disappeared off the map; in fact my map had expanded since I had last seen them. I had visited many countries, China, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Italy, Turkey, Peru, Ecuador and Spain to name but a few.

I wondered which map my friend had been looking at.

Had they not seen my emails I had sent about courses I was giving in the UK?

I was sending signals for people’s radar to pick up.

Perhaps it was that this person had some course that needed to publicised, they think they can get some free publicity. As coordinator of the London NLP and Hypnosis Practice Group, there is a large database.

What map where they working from? Was it just a small map, that of the UK, or were they looking at the wider map, the world?

If you go to WH Smith in the UK, D&R in Turkey, or a newspaper shop in your country, you will see many maps, some of the your area, your interest, but mostly maps of different areas all giving different stories, some showing roads, some showing places of interest, some the geography of the area.

Which one do you choose? Do you get the one that is fit for your purpose, that what interests you, or do you look further afield. There is so much out there.

Which map was my friend on, because it was not on mine?

Apart from my hospital stay and recovery, I had been delivering courses around the world, NLP, Hypnosis, Memory, and PhotoReading, Coaching etc, working on people’s personal problems, phobias, and fears, giving the confidence and empowerment. I have had little time free, I was tired, overworked and under paid.

My friend could have looked at my web sites, at the many photographs, they would have seen some of my work  visit (http://www.nlpnow.net).

We must firstly switch-on our radar, then, we must look at what is there. We miss such a lot by not seeing what is there.

Contact someone today, just to say hello.

Give a smile.

I am often asked if NLP is manipulative, can it be used to make people do things against their will. The short answer is NO.

Every experience, every learning, either at a conscious or at an unconscious (we are unaware) level, will lay down a memory pathway, whether we remember it or not, it is there. It will be used in the future as a reference, to know what is occurring to us at that time, to make an understanding of the situation.

If we are shown what a car is, our brain will store that information, the next time we are presented with a similar image, our brain will access the previous learning and will make a connection and know the new image is a car.

We are influenced by all our experiences.

Therefore, our whole life will manipulate our very existence, as our experiences, our knowledge or learnings increase.

I came across a client who suddenly became depressed, sad, without the usual energy they usually displayed.

Why the sudden change?

What influenced them to make the sudden change?

There are many factors that could be at play, but on investigation it was found that the client had been in a high state of energy for some time. But, problems had occurred.

The clients partner, a highly qualified professional, was well respected in their trade, and competitive.

The company they worked for provide essential services to the community, and as such, received income from a higher authority for the amount of work they did, and the number of jobs or customers they had on their books.

The systems put in place by the higher authority were not secure enough to stop some abuse, for a company to add more fictitious jobs to their books and exaggerate the amount of work they did. 

Of course, this abuse will be found by the higher authority, and audits and checks would be made on the integrity of all companies work.

My client had worked hard, given true value for money, kept to the rules and was really well liked and respected by the company’s customers. But the company’s management gave false information, well they did not inform the higher authority when their customers no longer were with them, they had left. So their customer list was over inflated, too high.

The management had also failed to keep adequate records of the work carried out by my client’s partner, and a history of work done, although a computer database was available at the time.

My client’s partner was asked to help sort out the problem, the problem that was no fault of theirs.

They set about the task, sorting the problem that had been created by others. My client’s partner was always they to do this and the management knew this. They knew my client’s partner would do this extra work without extra pay, and without complaint.

But there was a deadline, a date when the work the records had to be correct.

My client’s partner worked through the lunch hour, stayed late, became tired, but still that deadline approached and more work needed to be done. So the management brought in extra help, someone not as qualified to do the work, who was slow and did not want to work, and this person experienced the strain, the pressure felt by my client’s partner.

The extra help complained to the management, and started blaming the situation, their stress and inadequacies on anyone but themselves, especially my client’s partner, who had no blame, and done more than expected. The management did not counter the extra helps complaints and comments.

This created a very bad feeling in my client’s partner, so much so that they took their feelings back home with them, and pored them out to my client who tried to console support and advice.

The stress and strain was being experienced by my client, they had too. To understand something you have to process the information.

Do not think of a pink elephant. You have to see a picture in your mind of a pink elephant to understand what was being said.

Thus my client was pulled into the stress and strain, and they were brought down the same depths.

Have you ever been with people who are happy, laughing, what happens to you?

Have you been with people who were sad, depressed. What happens to you?

My client coped well in supporting their partner, they felt the stain but did not show it. But one incident, a misunderstanding maybe of language, perhaps the wrong information was given, and the strength of my client was lost.

We must be aware of how we influence others by our actions, our looks, our words, as everything we do will manipulate the way others see and understand the world around them.

With NLP we can reframe beliefs, understandings, views of the world, to help people see things as they are and not as others see them.

If this is manipulation, to bring happiness and wellbeing, then good.