NLP: NEURO-LINGUISTICPROGRAMMING: TECHNIQUES FOR

YOUR BEST SELF

Hack Your Mind for Healthier Relationships, More Self-Confidence, Better Communication, and Finding Clarity in Your

Vision

ByAvery Wright

Amazon Kindle Edition

NLP: NEURO-LINGUISTING PROGRAMMING© Copyright 2019 by Avery Wright - All rights reserved.This eBook is provided with the sole purpose of providing relevantinformation on a specific topic for which every reasonable effort has beenmade to ensure that it is both accurate and reasonable. Nevertheless, bypurchasing this eBook you consent to the fact that the author, as well as thepublisher, are in no way experts on the topics contained herein, regardless ofany claims as such that may be made within. As such, any suggestions orrecommendations that are made within are done so purely for entertainmentvalue. It is recommended that you always consult a professional prior toundertaking any of the advice or techniques discussed within. This is a legally binding declaration that is considered both valid and fair byboth the Committee of Publishers Association and the American BarAssociation and should be considered as legally binding within the UnitedStates. The reproduction, transmission, and duplication of any of the content foundherein, including any specific or extended information will be done as anillegal act regardless of the end form the information ultimately takes. Thisincludes copied versions of the work both physical, digital and audio unlessexpress consent of the Publisher is provided beforehand. Any additionalrights reserved. Furthermore, the information that can be found within the pages describedforthwith shall be considered both accurate and truthful when it comes to therecounting of facts. As such, any use, correct or incorrect, of the provided

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Table of Contents IntroductionPart One: What Is Neuro-Linguistic Programming?

Chapter One: Origins of NLPChapter Two: What Does It Mean?Chapter Three: How Does It Work?

ModelingNon-JudgementObserving Yourself and Your Life

Chapter Four: Benefits of NLPYou’re the Master of Your ExperienceIt All Comes Down to How You BehaveRelationships and NLPIt’s Not Just Your Mind, It’s Your Whole HealthBusiness AcumenAwareness

Chapter Five: Glossary of NLP Terms Part Two: Neuro

Chapter Six: The Mental ComputerChapter Seven: Connections and AssociationsChapter Eight: Mind Maps and Filters

Mind MapFiltersBasic NLP Filters

Chapter Nine: Representational Systems

Chapter Ten: Beliefs, Values, Attitudes, and BehaviorsChapter Eleven: Thought Patterns and Early Life ProgrammingChapter Twelve: The Voice Inside the MindChapter Thirteen: Personality ProfilesChapter Fourteen: Present State vs Desire StateChapter Fifteen: Submodalities

Part Three: Linguistic

Chapter Sixteen: Understanding LanguageChapter Seventeen: The Meta Model

DeletionDistortionGeneralization

Chapter Eighteen: DeletionUnspecified NounsUnspecified VerbsComparisonJudgementNominalization

Chapter Nineteen: DistortionComplex EquivalencePresuppositionCause and EffectMind Reading

Chapter Twenty: GeneralizationsModal Operation of PossibilityModal Operation of NecessityUniversal Quantifiers

Chapter Twenty-One: The Milton ModelMilton Model and Meditation

Chapter Twenty-Two: Pace and LeadHow to Pace with Someone

Chapter Twenty-Three: Accessing ResourcesDeletionDistortionGeneralization

Chapter Twenty-Four: MetaphorMaking Metaphors

Part Four: Programming

Chapter Twenty-Five: Learning New ProgramsChapter Twenty-Six: Using Creative VisualizationChapter Twenty-Seven: Elicitation and CalibrationChapter Twenty-Eight: Anchors and How to Use Them

What Makes a Good Anchor?Chapter Twenty-Nine: Congruence and Incongruence

CongruenceIncongruenceParts Integration

Chapter Thirty: Eye Movement IntegrationEye Accessing Cues

Chapter Thirty-One: ReframingChapter Thirty-Two: Rapport BuildingChapter Thirty-Three: Physiology of Excellence

Conclusion

Introduction

“You can’t always control what happens, but you can control the wayyou deal with it.” — Richard Bandler

We all have an idea of who we are, what we look like to the outside world,and how we are or are not accomplishing our goals. We all have anunderstanding of our existence and have learned how to exist in this life withour preconceived notions of our identity or beliefs. We have all learned fromour parents, our caregivers, and our early life-role models what it means to bea grown-up, having relationships, or be successful. So many of us, too, are unhappy, stressed, and anxious. So many of us arelooking for ways to find a better approach or outlook on life. Often, we trythings, the passing fads, or the mainstream diets and find that they don’t workfor us. Many of us continue seeking, looking for a way to improve our careers andhave more confidence, make more money, and have more general life successbut find ourselves feeling like we miss the mark, comparing our results, orour failures to all of the other people in the world who seem to have it figuredit out. How did they do it, you may ask yourself? Why is that person successful andno matter how hard I try, I can’t seem to break ground with my struggle toimprove? What do I have to do to have the success I want in my life and feelbetter about my outcomes?

All of these questions and more are the kind of questions you will answer inthis book. The concept of Neuro-Linguistic Programming may be new to youor something you know only a little about, and this book will cover all thebasics to help you know how to understand your mind, the process of howyou think and experience your life, and how to make real changes that havelong-lasting benefits to the way you feel about yourself, your work, yourrelationships, and your life. These tools and techniques are not a gimmick. They are a formula to teachyou how to communicate with yourself by uncovering how you do things andwhat causes the patterns of behavior in your life that keep you stuck in a rutor not where you want to be. You will learn a variety of strategies that havebeen in use for many decades and practiced by some of the most successfulpeople in the world. There are several approaches out there to help you improve yourunderstanding of yourself and how to achieve what you want. Neuro-Linguistic Programming, or NLP, is a technique that actually helps reframeand restructure your thoughts to live a more confident, content, and curiouslife. Learn what so many others have found to be true: NLP changes the way youthink to live more fully, positively, and exactly as who you are every day.

Part One: What Is Neuro-Linguistic Programming?

“True learning involves learning other ways of doing what you can doalready.” — John Seymour

Chapter One: Origins of NLP Back in the 1970s, two students at The University of California in Santa Cruzgot together with an idea. Richard Bandler was studying informationtechnology, and John Grinder was a lecturer of linguistics. Bandler wasresearching mathematical formulas, and Grinder was explaining all of thecomponents of the origins of language and how we speak. The two teamed up with an idea to mimic or “model” some of thecontemporary experts in the movement of personal growth and therapy. Theexperts were Gestalt therapist; Fritz Pels, mother of modern family therapy;Virginia Satir; and hypnotist, Milton Erickson. To give you a broader understanding of how the concept of NLP was created,let’s breakdown these three different therapy approaches. Gestalt therapy was actually founded by Fritz Pels, and the practice was tohelp clients understand the present moment in their lives, rather than puttingemphasis on perceived possibilities based on past traumas or experiences.The word gestalt translates from German to mean “shape.” It is essentiallythe shape of someone’s behaviors, or negative thought patterns and howthose ideas further shape the client’s experience, blocking their ability to feelself-worth and awareness. Virginia Satir was revolutionizing the approach to what is called “familyreconstruction therapy” in the mid to late 1960s and introduced the idea ofbecoming fully human through understanding the triad of the mother-parent-

child relationships. In effect, it informed the process of human validation. Milton Erickson also specialized in family therapy, using the methodsoutlined by Satir, and he was also a hypnotherapist, using a variety ofrevolutionary techniques to engage the client’s unconscious mind to allow fora more short term, solution-oriented therapy, seeing greater change overall inthe client, in shorter periods of time. Each of these therapies pulled together through the work of Bandler andGrinder created Neuro-Linguistic Programming. The therapies include tactics to achieve change in the mindset of the clients toapproach life and understanding of the self with greater awareness andpositivity, reframing the concepts of identity and experience throughconscious awareness of thought patterns and behaviors. All put together, NLPis born. According to its founders, NLP was never intended to be considered or calledtherapy, rather it was created as a system based on therapy to develop the selfand improve communication with oneself. So, what does Neuro-Linguistic Programming actually mean? Chapter twowill dig deeper into the essence of what this technique means, one word at atime.

Chapter Two: What Does It Mean? The term Neuro-Linguistic Programming might make this type of self-improvement sound more complicated than it actually is. So, let’s break itdown to give you a broader understanding of what this means: Neuro—The word neuro refers to the mind. The entire practice of NLPrelates to your mental state, your internal computer, and all of the images,connections, and associations you make with the use of your senses. It refersto how the mind influences your body and has control over the way it movesand operates. It also refers to not only conscious thought but unconsciousthought as well. The conscious and unconscious thoughts are akin to the image of the iceberg.Psychoanalyst and pioneer in therapy, Sigmund Freud, offered the conceptsof the states of mind using a picture of an iceberg: everything above the wateris the conscious mind, thoughts, feelings, memories, and wishes that you areaware of at any moment. This is also where your memory can reside. Beneath the water is the unconscious mind, the place where we store all ofthe thoughts, feelings, memories, and emotions that we are not aware of—thefeelings beneath the surface that we hide or deny. Many of these feelings andexpressions are hidden in this place in us because they may feel or seemunpleasant and therefore, we prefer not to recall, or re-experience them. Linguistic—Simply put, linguistics is the study of language: the words,statements, tone, structure, and so forth. It is the interplay between sound and

meaning of a letter, word, or phrase. More than that, it is about communication. Language is how we expressourselves, our ideas, thoughts and feelings, our fears, our goals, andambitions. Language is how we verbally communicate our wants and needsand our desires. It is how we tell stories. Communication with the self is a huge piece in the concepts of self-help andself-development. It isn’t just the way we talk to and about others; it’s howwe talk to and about ourselves. Programming—Essentially, this means that your brain is programmed andre-programmed throughout your life and experiences. It relates to the patternsof thought, behavior, and habit that can have a positive or negative impact ona person’s life experience. It is a process for making those examinations andchanging the “program’ that our mind runs all the time. If you learned or received ideas early in life that the only way to receiveacknowledgement and praise was to do things perfectly, then you will havethe mental programming that you are only worthy of love if you are“perfect.” This kind of programming can have a detrimental impact on yourlife relationships, work, and experiences. Changing the programmed thoughts of our minds is part of the NLP processthat helps you realign with yourself in the present moment and to have amore positive outlook and understanding of your experiences. So, to put it all together, Neuro-Linguistic Programming is the use of specific

mental restructuring and reprogramming techniques through the use oflanguage to help you live and be the person that you are and to feel thebenefit of a positive mental language and communication with yourself andothers. Many of us use negative self-talk, and we usually never imagine that anyoneelse would do the same thing. We perceive our reality based on our ownexperiences, just like everyone else. We will detail more of that in the nextchapter.

Chapter Three: How Does It Work? Now that you know a little of the background and what NLP is, you canbegin to understand how it works. The main components of NLP aresubjectivity, consciousness, and learning. So, under the umbrella of mentalcommunication reprogramming, you find these concepts to actually engagethat process. Subjectivity—All of our experiences are subjective. This means that noperson experiences anything exactly the same way as someone else. Eachperson’s experience is based on their personal beliefs, feelings, thoughts, andso forth and therefore cannot be experienced like another. Two people canlook at the same piece of artwork and see something completely differentbased on their upbringing, gender influences, personal histories, and traumas,and all the other experiences that form a person’s conscious reality. When we look at the world, our mind’s look inside for other experiences wehave had to make a comparison to the experience we are having at themoment. Our memories provide us with a great deal of connections andassociations that lead our thought patterns and understanding of our world tothe present moment. Our experiences are largely based on our five senses, and the language weuse to think about or describe our experiences. For example, the same twopeople viewing the same painting will experience it differently because oneof them is seeing something in the bottom left corner that reminds them ofthe smell of a room in their first house and the way that house looked and

felt, associating a previous experience through the senses with the painting.Our senses inform our experience, and we may function similarly on amechanical level, but no two people can know the same thing the same waydue to our own conscious identity. Consciousness—This is the state of awareness about your experience. This iswhat you know about your thoughts and emotions, self, and experiences. It isnot just awareness of the world around you and all the people and things in it,it is also awareness of your internal self. When you are looking at the painting in the art museum, you know you are inan art museum because you chose to go there that day. You know that youare looking at a piece of artwork and that other people are as well. You knowthat the temperature is a little cold, and you are glad you brought yoursweater. You are aware that the painting you are currently viewing is acertain size, shape, color, and texture and that it has a certain kind of styleand history. You also begin to notice and have awareness about how thisparticular painting makes you feel, what it reminds you of, and how long ithas been since you have enjoyed looking at a piece of fine art in a museumand how much you missed the experience. Consciousness is always informing your experiences. It is a bundle of senses,feelings, thoughts, and subjective interpretations about the moment in thetime you are in. Our conscious behavior is greatly linked to our unconsciousmind. If you recall from earlier in the text, the unconscious is where we storemuch of our thoughts and feelings that we are unaware of most of the time.Our fears, worries, doubt, thought patterns, and early programming live inthis space, and without realizing it, the patterns of the unconscious impact

how we consciously exist. So, if you are looking at that painting and enjoying it in the present moment,consciously aware of all of it’s attributes, recognizing your subjectiveexperience to it, you may not be recognizing that your feelings of theexperience are linked to even deeper meaning and behavior, like that youhave stayed away from the art museum for so long, because you dropped outof art school even though you really wanted to be a professional painter, butwere given the idea by your family that it is impossible to be a successfulartist. This is just one possible example of the infinite examples of how areconscious and unconscious minds work together to influence our subjectiveexperiences. Learning—learning comes from imitating what others have alreadysuccessfully done, proven, explored, experienced, created, and so forth.Marie Curie was responsible for discovering and pioneering the science ofradioactivity. She studied science at a university and learned what othersbefore her had discovered and implemented into our collective agreementabout science. She then took what she learned to discover more and created adeeper understanding of science through her study and work. While workingto uncover the essence of her studies, she had to repeat the processes multipletimes until she found the accuracy she was looking for, which led to herwinning a Nobel Prize for her discoveries. The point here is that the process of learning comes from an imitation ofbehaviors that work, to create a beneficial result. In NLP, it is called

“modeling.” When you model someone’s behavior, you in effect learn thatbehavior to achieve a positive result. If someone is capable of understandingthe science of radioactivity, you can look to that person’s methods to putthem into practice to achieve the desired results. We may not all be pioneers,but we can certainly learn from them. In NLP, learning how to model behaviors that reframe our thinking tobecome more positive and engineer a new approach to our lives is part ofbreaking the loops and patterns we have been programmed to run constantly. An example of this would be as follows:

A person is constantly stuck in a behavior loop. Let’s say that behaviorloop is smoking cigarettes.The external behavior (smoking) always creates an internal response.The internal response is very likely, “I should quit. This is bad for myhealth. I will probably get cancer.”The internal response will likely cause an external response, which isto smoke another cigarette because it makes you feel less stressed andrelieves the anxiety of nicotine cravings.That external behavior of smoking another cigarette, creates thatinternal response again, starting the loop all over.

So, if you are wanting to learn, or model, a different behavior from thesmoking loop, you would have to engage in a completely different behaviorpattern. You learned to smoke, you can change what you learned, and replaceit with something better.

ModelingThis is the heartbeat of NLP training: modeling. NLP is the study ofexcellence, and modeling is what makes obvious the behaviors and patternsof excellence. Essentially, modeling is the process of replicating humanexcellence to become excellent. What modeling asks is:

How do successful people behave?What do they do to achieve their results?What do they do differently from people who are not at their level ofsuccess?

Modeling is considered a way to discover someone’s system of beliefs andtheir physiology or normal functions of your whole system. Modelingsearches for and interprets a person’s mental strategy and how thosestrategies affect their thinking and behavior, causing the external and internalbehavior responses. A simple example of modeling could look like this:

You usually procrastinate when responding to important emails.You discover the model you use for responding to emails.You alter the problematic features that lead to procrastination.You promote a more productive email response by changing the modelthat caused you to procrastinate.

If you change the sequence you do something, the order in which it is done,

then you will create a different result. Using the above example, you mayhave procrastinated on your email responses because you opened them andread them but chose to save them for later because you didn’t feel you hadproper time to type thoughtful responses. You uncover the model you use by recognizing that you open and read youremails at an inappropriate time, a time when you will not be able to respond,leaving them for another time. Then, they just enter an endless stack ofemails you are meaning to get to. The change comes when you decide to change the approach. You have beenused to doing it one way, but if it doesn’t work well, why continue to do it? Decide to open, read, and respond to your emails at the same time. Don’topen it unless you know you can respond to it. When you take a newapproach or change the sequence of the experience, you alter both theexternal and internal response. When you reply to the emails in a timelymanner, your internal response is one of confidence and productivity, whichis much more positive than the self-criticism and anxiety of procrastination. Modeling is learning. Many forms of learning will take a concept and justkeep adding information to the process, without ever really taking away whatdoesn’t work, building upon an already flawed system. Modeling takes theelements of something and subtracts from the whole to find out what worksand what doesn’t. You basically are refining and distilling the qualities ofexcellence to drink in and utilize at will. It’s not magic; it’s modeling. You can’t be Einstein, but you can think like

him. With modeling, you can discover exactly what made a visionary likeAlbert Einstein successful in making mathematical discoveries. You willnever achieve exactly what he did, however, you can learn to think the waythat he did and make other important discoveries. The process of modeling, refined: What + How + WhyWhat = behavior and physiologyHow = internal thinking strategiesWhy = supporting beliefs and assumptionsModeling = direct observation of a successful model (what), explored byasking questions (how + why). You can model any human behavior if you are able to master the beliefs,physiology, and strategies. Throughout your NLP training, you will learn several different techniquesand tools that all fit into the concept of modeling. Non-JudgementOne significant aspect of NLP and the way it works is that it is entirely non-judgmental. Since all of our experiences as humans are subjective, then howcan we judge ourselves, or anyone else? How can we call anything a failure,or a success if all failures and successes are subjective? That is why in NLP it is beneficial to know that there is no failure, onlyfeedback. We have a tendency to judge ourselves based on our thoughts or

beliefs about ourselves. If we have believed for a long stretch of our lives thatwe are not successful unless we look, feel, work, and love like everyone elsedoes, then we will feel like we are failing when we don’t meet thoserequirements. However, when you remodel and reframe your understandingof your experiences to reflect a non-judgmental and non-comparativeapproach, you will find a greater ability to thrive in your life. Your mind will always want to make comparisons to what you have alreadyexperienced, but you cannot compare your worth, progress, or success toanyone else’s because we all have our own reality of experiences. This is part of what NLP teaches you. You can learn how to live fully,curiously, and compassionately when you recognize that you neither fail noranyone else. You can only learn and improve. When you are curious aboutyour life and your process, then you are not in judgement of it. Curiosity isobservation without judgement and NLP is about observation. Observing Yourself and Your LifeTo become comfortable with the techniques in this book, you will need to beopen to learning from your observation of yourself. The practices of NLPrequire that you can seek and search within and closely identify your patterns,thoughts, and beliefs. This may come easily for some, and more difficult forothers, but with practice, it becomes a part of your everyday knowing andunderstanding. What you can learn from yourself and your experiences is how you becomecapable of getting to the place you want to be in your life—yourrelationships, your career, and yourself.

There is more than one way to observe, and you will learn many of thesetechniques in later chapters.

Chapter Four: Benefits of NLP You’re the Master of Your ExperienceWhat happens when you limit yourself? Do you even know you are doing it?Without even realizing you may have been fostering self-limiting beliefs foryour entire life that you aren’t even aware of. Deep down inside you may feellike you aren’t as successful, beautiful, or worthy of love as other people.You may tell yourself through your regularly scheduled mental programmingthat someone else is always better than you at xyz, so why bother trying? Thankfully, that isn’t actually how you have to live your life. You can changeall of those self-fulfilling prophecies and limiting ideas of who you are andwhat you mean to the world with NLP. When you began to learn and understand what thought patterns cause you tobelieve you are not worthy, or that you don’t deserve success, you can knowhow to change them. The big picture is that the thought patterns in your mindthat you run like computer programming contain all of the limiting beliefsyou say, think, and feel. When you learn to run new ideas and mentalprocesses and teach yourself more positive communication and techniquesfor managing your internal state, you can begin to live the life you actuallydesire. Becoming the master of your own mind is one of the many benefits of thiskind of training. If you can understand how you behave and how you react toor experience the world, then you can learn how to change what doesn’t workor fit with your ideal life.

No one can truly control the way you think and feel, except you. This is animportant lesson. Once you realize the benefit of that, you are on the righttrack. No one can actually cause you pain without touching you. NLP shows you how to understand this: only you have the power to createthe thought patterns or change them, that cause you to have severe or intenseemotional reactions to everyday life and the people in it. We are not governed by others’ state of mind, or emotions, or the situationswe find ourselves in unless you allow yourself to be. When you learn thetechniques of NLP, outlined later in the book, you can begin to understandhow you are the master of your experience, and once you master that, youcan:

Improve your communication with yourself and othersBetter understand the motivations of yourself and othersEnhance the overall health of your lifeReduce and eliminate anxiety, stress, and worryCreate more successful and efficient models for accomplishinganything in your lifeLearn a higher degree of behavioral and emotional flexibility indifficult times.Have the attitude agility to inform your life in a more balanced way.

It comes down to what you want to change, and if you don’t like the waythings are in your life or the way you feel, you are the one who can changethat.

NLP empowers you to learn how to do this: how to shift and reframe oldthought patterns and programming that keep you locked in doubt; how tobecome more attuned to your true self; how to act resourcefully in stressfultimes; and how to see that we are all living life through our own subjectiveexperiences and can afford each other greater compassion and respect. It All Comes Down to How You BehaveWhat causes our behaviors? Where do they come from? Many of us maycatch ourselves reflecting back on a moment and wishing we had behaveddifferently: held our cool, been less anxious, been more outgoing, not thrownthat first punch, acted more respectfully, and less aggressively. So, what determines how we behave? Can it be isolated and understood? Ofcourse! One of the main benefits of NLP is to crack into the patterns ofthought that lead to behavior. Our behaviors can be extremes or blends of optimism, pessimism, aggression,passivity, assertiveness, trust, and envy. So often, the way we act is the resultof many deeper layers of information in our minds; things that we may noteven realize are occurring because they are such unconscious thoughts andattitudes. What you learn from the techniques in this book are methods to uncover theessence of how your behaviors influence your experience and where theycome from. You will also learn how you can change behavior. An example of this might be that you have been wanting to lose weight for a

while and you try diets and exercise, but nothing sticks. Your behavior ispassive because you aren’t asserting your will to accomplish your goals, andalso envious because you are supposing that you need to lose weight in orderto measure up to others’ ideal of beauty. You may also even sport apessimistic behavior because you have given up after many attempts thatdidn’t work. NLP helps you identify the deeper patterns of thought that cause thesebehaviors so that you can learn HOW to change them. A lot of psychotherapyfocuses on unfolding behavior patterns by looking at the why behind thebehavior. NLP focuses more on the how. Relationships and NLPRelationships are one of the main focuses of our lives. As human beings, welong for connection. We search for it, we test it out with romantic partners,we plan it out with business colleagues, and we learn how to haverelationships with our family and friends over long periods of time. Because we are human, there will always be ups and downs in ourrelationships, because we will experience them in our own lives as we growand learn and take on more experiences. The part of relationships that gets left unchecked, more often than not, iscommunication. When things fall apart, sometimes it’s because we reactedinstead of communicated. When things are tense and fraught withawkwardness, it’s because communication isn’t a part of the relationship:good communication, that is. You can communicate with anyone in any wayyou see fit. Your beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors will inform the way you

speak to everyone in your life. If you have a tendency to communicate through a filter of stress, anxiety, lackof trust, and feelings of worthlessness, your relationship will suffer the sameconsequences. If you communicate with an aggressive tone and name call orbully, your relationship will always feel hurt, wounded, and unsafe. Part of the learning and modeling of NLP is language (linguistics). The waywe speak and communicate informs our whole experience, as much as theway we behave and how we perceive reality. These techniques help you tolearn how to communicate more effectively with everyone more effectively,not just your spouses, or your business partners. It’s Not Just Your Mind, It’s Your Whole HealthWhen you began reading this book, you learned that NLP meant Neuro-Linguistic Programming. It translates to studying the process of humanthought; how the brain expresses itself in life and creates your experience.It’s all about the mind. But, what about the body? NLP doesn’t just benefit your mental state andyour capacity to change your thoughts and patterns; it connects to your wholephysiology. The brain tells the body what to do, involuntarily and voluntarily.It stands to reason that not just your emotions and mental capacity can benefitfrom these techniques. The body so greatly impacted as a result of practicingNLP. NLP focuses on language to help us learn our mental thoughts, but our bodiesuse just as much language to communicate to ourselves, with others and in

our experiences. It’s called body language. A lot of how we communicatedoesn’t come from our words but from our body language: the way we holdourselves, how we gesture, where our eyes look when we are thinking,remembering, or talking, how we sit or stand, or where our arms are when weface someone new to make their acquaintance. We say so much with ourbodies, and NLP helps to recognize the method behind all of that. Building rapport is one of the NLP techniques that focuses on your bodylanguage and how you connect with others. You can learn new ways of beingopen, creating a comfortable experience, and being confident in all walks oflife. Beyond body language, there is also the aspect of your physical well-being.A large part of our consciousness is our awareness of our physical self: doesit feel good or bad? Achy and sore or flexible and nimble? Do I feel proud ofmy body or ashamed? Do I feel healthy or unhealthy? Many of us are concerned about the matter of our health, both mental andphysical. Utilizing the tools provided by NLP helps you to reframe yourpatterns of self-care, diet, exercise, and ability to heal yourself. The conceptsof this training aren’t to get you to lose weight and stay on your diet; they aregoing to give you the tools to know how to change the patterns in your lifethat keep from reaching your goals. Business AcumenNothing says “professional” like an outstanding resume, career advancementand promotion, motivational leadership and employee rapport, and healthyoverhead. Our work life is a major part of what so many of us value: it’s what

puts food on the table, pays the mortgage, and sends the kids to school, it’swhat enables you to take that vacation over the holidays, and it is how manypeople value their worth. Our professional success weighs heavily in the rounded life. Our sense ofpurpose in what we do to earn a living and accomplish more of what we feelwe are good at on a professional level, informs who we are, how we feelabout ourselves, and how we relate to the world of business. Enough of us struggle to find advancement and contentment in what we doprofessionally. Some of us try hard to climb the ladder with little success.Others of us have no problem climbing the ladder but don’t get on well withour employees and find work stressful as a result. There are those of us whoare working a job that we know isn’t who we are, or what we want, to thegreat detriment of our personal happiness. When we are looking forsomething better in our career, some of us don’t take the leap and stay withthe security of the job that pays the bills. What if you could learn ways to create the work life you want? How would itfeel to have the job success you are looking for, at the company you want tobe at, with the pay rate you want and having the fulfilling and engaging workrelationships that help you grow as a professional? NLP has the key to all of that and more. Many companies, businesses, andemployers utilize neuro-linguistic programming to train their managementteam, and also their whole company of employees. Why? Because it pavesthe way for better performance and efficiency, increased productivity, moretime to focus on results and not problems, happier, more motivated staff,

greater customer satisfaction, and a healthier bottom line. There is no secret magic to NLP: it is simply learning how you think andexpress yourself to create your life experience. It shows you that if you do notlike the way you feel about where you are in your life, you can change it byunderstanding how you think and how to change what doesn’t work. You may not be looking toward NLP to help you in business, but once youstart learning the tools and understanding the concepts, these practices carryover to all parts of your life and apply themselves. It is ultimately about youroverall experience, not just your professional one, but the results of NLP willgive a boost to your work, or company performance in such a big way, it willno longer feel stressful, unproductive, or lacking what inspires you to strivefor more. AwarenessWhat is the point of any of this without the benefit of awareness? All of theseconcepts in this book achieve one major outcome: self-awareness. The pointof NLP isn’t just to improve your relationships or your work performance; itisn’t just helpful to get you in the right track to lose weight and exercise. Theonly way to accomplish any of these goals is through self-awareness. How much of your life do you actually spend, going through the motions,playing your cards right, and following the routine you have always known?How often do you distract yourself from what you are really experiencingand feeling at any given moment? We are not here to be mechanical robots,following orders, running the computer programs in our minds, living thestatus quo, and maintaining the ideas we learned as children.

We are here to learn, grow, and experience our lives in this world. We arehere to improve upon what we have already learned and experienced. Theway to do this is through awareness. When you become self-aware, you canlearn from yourself and your experience; you can identify what makes youbehave certain ways in certain situations; it gives you self confidence becauseyou no longer question yourself, or your motivations- you simply seek tounderstand them. Awareness helps you to identify what no longer works in your life. You cancome to terms with how to change when you know what needs to change: inwalks awareness. What you learn from neuro-linguistic programming, you are learning, in anutshell, awareness. Bringing into focus what really makes you tick, how youlearned your beliefs and values and whether or not they still work for whereyou are in your life, changes your approach to every experience you have.

Chapter Five: Glossary of NLP Terms

ModelingThe process of adopting behaviors, beliefs, language, and strategies ofexcellence from others in order to construct a model of what they do,and how they do it, to practice excellence.

RapportThe ability to relate to others that promotes feelings of trust andunderstanding.

Eye Accessing CuesThe theory that different eye movements access different sensoryexperiences that connect to different neurological aspects of our brains.Eye Movement Integration is the therapy that uses this theory to healtraumatic memories or experiences.

ElicitationThe process of guiding someone in a particular state, e.g. puttingpeople into different moods, or bringing them out of moods with ourwords, behaviors, and attitudes by asking them to recall a time whenthey felt a particular way.

CalibrationRecognizing when people are in different states, e.g., noticing thesubtle and different expressions of another person’s state of mind byseeing the change in their facial expression, body language, and tone of

voice.

AnchoringRefers to making a connection with an internal reaction to an externalor internal trigger allowing you to reassess and realign your response.This technique allows you to feel the way you want when you dobecause you can quickly identify triggers and reframe them.

Perceptual PositionsThis is the concept of “stepping into someone else’s shoes to see theirpoint of view.” Divided into different positions, this is a technique toallow you to understand the experience of another.

Representational SystemThe way we encode information into our minds through our sensoryexperiences, including all five senses (taste, touch, smell, hearing,vision). They all work together to form maps of our experience andthrough our mental filters provide us with our preferred system ofseeing and experiencing the world.

SubmodalityIn your representational system, your modalities are the five senses.Branching off from each sense is a sub-branch or submodality thatgives greater detail and description to the quality of the sensoryexperience. ReframingThis simply means, changing your frame of reference, or altering the

context or representation of an issue or situation.

Parts IntegrationA process which allows someone to reframe or eliminate unwanted andpersistent behaviors through the use of creative visualization to bringtwo opposites into one whole, meaningful intention.

Break StateA sudden change in the context of someone’s verbal communication orbody posture to elicit a rapid change and also to commit the newlylearned information into deeper memory. Break states take your focusaway from what you are identifying consciously and unconsciously sothat you can return to it again with greater results

DeletionOne of the three main thought processes of the Meta Model, deletionintentionally, or unintentionally leaves out one or more portions of ourexperience or perception while we are making internal representationalsystems.

DistortionOne of the three main processes of the Meta Model, distortion occurswhen we alter or change information to make it something it is not,creating incorrect information in our representational systems.

GeneralizationOne of the three main thought processes in the Meta Model,generalization occurs when we take one experience or perception and

is represented through a whole system of experiences. One experiencedbecomes generalized to the whole of experience.

The Meta ModelA series of questions designed to increase thought specificity,challenge the current model of a person’s thought and expand theirexperience of the world.

The Milton ModelA trance-like state combined with abstract, vague questioning thatallows the person in the trance to come up with their own meaning outof the communication. It is based on and built around hypnotherapyand the line of questioning used in the Meta Model

Part Two: Neuro

“There is no such thing as reality, only our perception of it.” — BeckyMallery

Chapter Six: The Mental Computer When you are born into this world, you have a body, organs, and blood; youhave your senses your muscles and your bones. It is all one lovely andelegant machine that is controlled, manipulated, and functional because ofyour human computer: your brain. At birth, the brain is a jumble of wiring that takes time to organize itssystems. It takes months for you to learn how to use your arms and legs andhow to put food in your mouth. It takes time from there, to learn to crawl andthen walk, burble and then speak, how to communicate, and even when wedon’t have language yet. From the time we are born, we are always learning something. Consciouslyand unconsciously, we are learning how to be human. We have billions ofneurons in our brains by the time we are adults and each one of these neuronshas trillions of connections that fire information like lightning at 250mph. We are electrical. Like a computer, we store information through all of theseconnections in the form of our sensory experiences, our memories, ourfeelings, and our thoughts. Our internal computer has the ability to visualizeimages from the past or present with our eyes open or closed. There is nolimit to how much information our brains can store. Unlike computers thathave limited space to hold information, there is no known limit to how muchinformation the brain can hold over the course of our lives. It is the place thatregulates our entire functionality.

The brain is also plastic, meaning it can change. It is malleable, like themuscle, but when left without exercise, the mind can stay in patterns ofthought that limit growth. When you continue to exercise the mind, learningnew things, improving memory, and creating new neural pathways, orstrengthening already existing, positive connections, you broaden your abilityto exist more fully, positively, and openly to what the world offers you. Understanding how your brain functions is important in understanding howNeuro-Linguistic Programming can benefit you. How we process informationis how we learn from our experiences and inform our beliefs about ourselves. Reality is everything that exists outside of you: other people, everything onearth, the cosmos, the universe. Our brains have the ability to receive twomillion bits of information in a second, however, we don’t actually receivethat much data, or input, due to the way we process our experience. From the reality of what is outside of us, we create our own idea, or map, ofreality through our senses. We end up deleting, distorting and generalizingthe bits of data we are able to receive so that it shrinks from two million toabout 133, 000 bits of information. We write our own story of reality,deleting information that we could receive but because of our internaldialogue, assumptions and personal beliefs, we end up comparing what ishappening to our own understanding, memory, history, and personality. This is how we define the meaning of something: through our perception ofreality through our experience and understanding of ourselves, we assignmeaning and value to each experience. Until we know what it means, wedon’t know how to think or react.

This meaning leads to a feeling, or state of mind, which leads to a response,or action. If you say something is scary, it is because your mind, based onprevious experiences, determines that the something is scary. If you decide tochange your perception of something, you can decide that it isn’t scary. Itonly is because you say it is. It is because you use language to describe it asthat.

Chapter Seven: Connections and Associations Let’s think back to those neural pathways. The brain has billions of neuronsand trillions of connections. Our memories are made through our infiniteneural connections, and our ability to recall information comes from thoseneural connections. When we form a neural connection in our brain, wecreate a channel or highway for that same bit of information to travel everytime you think of that same thought. This is how thought patterns can getcreated. When you are used to utilizing the same thought patterns andprocesses all the time, you strengthen those neural pathways, making themmore available and more deeply connected and rooted in your brain function. When we form habits, whether they are good or bad, we are concentrating onthe same thought function, even when it is an unconscious habit, and manyhabits are unconscious thought processes. The same thought functionrepeated multiple times a day, many times a week, often over a year, willcontinue to stimulate and deepen the neural pathway associated with thatthought pattern. So, let’s put it into an example. Every time you make a mistake whilepracticing the piano, in your head, you think the word “stupid.” Your brainbegins to form a neural pathway and connection to you playing the piano andthe feeling of stupidity. As you continue to practice and make mistakes, youcontinue to reinforce the word stupid for making mistakes while learning thepiano. Eventually, the more you practice, the more mistakes you makebecause your brain is already programmed to think ‘stupid’ if you fumble atall. As this feeling becomes stronger, you become less interested in playing

the piano because it just makes you feel dumb and you would rather be doingsomething that didn’t make you feel that way. Your brain was able, in a short space of time, to associate learning the pianowith feelings of stupidity causing you to eventually give up playing becauseyou’d prefer not to feel that way. Why did you make that connection? Whydid you label your mistake as stupid? Most likely, from an association orconnection to something else, another thought pattern, or learned behavior. Itmay have come from a strict instructor whose demand for perfection causedyou to doubt your ability. It might have come from an earlier life experiencethat taught you that making mistakes is unacceptable. Regardless of the root cause, it exists in all the neural channels in the mindand if repeated enough can become a thought pattern that will extend into ourbeliefs about ourselves. We associate everything we know with what we have already learned andexperienced, and what we are learning at the moment. Our entire experiencecan be based on connections and associations made in our minds. That takesus back to the concept of subjective reality that you read about earlier. If your mind is always making connections and associations, don’t you thinkthat you can change whatever negative thoughts you have to become morepositive? Remember, the mind is malleable, flexible, and capable of change.

Chapter Eight: Mind Maps and Filters Mind MapEvery connection and association you make in your daily life experiencebecomes a part of your map. If you have never seen images of neurons in thebrain, they look like a starburst, or an egg that has been cracked on a pan andhas many branches coming off of it. These branches form and intricate neuralhighway that puts together all of the information you need to store and utilizeyour experience of life. If you drive a car, then you have probably looked at a road atlas; it covers amassive territory, the whole country, even, and is built up of significanthighways, roads, and landmarks. Your mind maps your journey in a similarway. You won’t see roads and highways, but you will relate to your sensoryexperiences as part of this life atlas. Mind maps are impressions of reality based on our senses and how theyinform our experience of life. They are selective, with the ability to leave outmany pieces of information to present the most clear-cut representation ofyour current reality or life territory. Whatever map you make is based onwhat it is that you notice or whatever it is you want to change. Our map of reality is unique to us. No other human being on the planet hasthe exact same map that you do. FiltersIn addition to having your own, unique mind map, you also have filters.

Filters act to determine what sort of world we live in; a sieve for ourperceptions of reality. If your filters are in alignment with qualities ofexcellence, then you will go through the world looking for it; if your filtersare in alignment with seeing problems in everything, then that is what youwill find. If you have a lot of limiting beliefs due to negative thought patterns, beliefs,and perceptions, then the world will be lacking for you. The same world canbe full of beauty and opportunity, depending on how you choose to filter. The language we use acts as a filter. Every unique person will have acompletely different feeling about a word like “sunset.” Every person’s maphas a different sensory experience of a sunset. Beliefs are filters, too. What you believe to be true, will certainly influenceyour outlook and how you behave. NLP is a filter, as well; it is a system that doesn’t require that you changeyour values or beliefs, but that you approach life with a desire to experimentand a spirit of curiosity. It’s just a model for excellence, but doesn’t claimany objective truth: you are unique and cannot be generalized, but these toolsand techniques are a filter, none the less. Basic NLP FiltersNLP breaks these filters into what it calls frames. There are five behavioralframes in NLP. They are: First Frame = outcomes rather than problems

This can also be called the “blame frame.” Focusing on problems rather thanoutcomes leads you to question “why do I have this problem,” instead of“how can I change this to make it better.” Second Frame = how rather than whyAsking “how” instead of “why” will give you an understanding of thestructure of a problem. If you just keep asking “why” you won’t get closer tothe “how” of solving the issues. Third Frame = feedback rather than failureIn NLP, we say “there is no failure, only results.” Failure is just a word todescribe getting a result that you didn’t want which gives you feedback forgetting the results that you do. Fourth Frame = possibilities rather than necessitiesWhen you see something is possible, it shifts your focus. Fixating on anecessity leaves little room for expansion. We all have necessities, but if weadhere to a limited reality, we miss all of the opportunity that possibilitiesoffer. Fifth Frame = curiosity and fascination rather than assumptionsAny approach to learning new things and opening up to making changerequires some curiosity and interest. When you only make assumptions, youstrictly filter your reality, disallowing a more rational experience. The map of your life is a colorful mural of all of the experiences of your lifethrough your senses. You continue to build upon it every day and when youlearn NLP tools, you give yourself new highways to drive on that lead to the

path of excellence.

Chapter Nine: Representational Systems Your mind is a beautiful, unique mosaic of remembered and reconstructedsensory impressions. All of your maps are formed in this way. We utilize thesame neural pathways to experience things directly, as we do internally andindirectly. When we are conjuring a memory, we are lighting up the neuronsand parts of the brains that had the same experience at the time the eventactually occurred. Basically, what that says is, we are using our senses to outwardly perceive theworld. We use the same senses to inwardly re-present the experiences that wehave. There is such a thing in NLP called Preferred Representational System. Whenyou have a preferred system or map of reality, it means that you gravitatetoward one of the senses more than any other. So many of us think primarily in images, but not everyone processes thoughtthat way. Some even consider it difficult. Other people might talk tothemselves more, needing more of auditory experience, while others mightbase their choices on how they are feeling about a situation. Those of us whoappreciate the finer flavors of life may organize their whole lives around thenext amazing meal. Some people rely significantly on their sense of smell toalert them to danger, or beneficial experiences. A majority of people think and feel mostly through images, sounds, andfeelings. We all use all of our senses, but the one that feels the smoothest and

practiced is where a person’s talents and skills tend to lie. Here is an exampleof what I mean:

Visual—Architect/DesignerAuditory—Musician/ComposerKinesthetic—Athlete/ActorOlfactory—Perfumer/HunterGustatory—Chef/Food Critic

We all use all of our senses, and our Representational System is built on oursensory experiences. How do you prefer to experience your reality?

Chapter Ten: Beliefs, Values, Attitudes, andBehaviors

Building upon the idea of our neural connections and thought associations,we continue into the topic of what gets created from those connections. Ourminds find ideas and either keep them for certain reasons or discard them,depending on the person and their motivation. There are two kinds of motivation: intrinsic and extrinsic. Intrinsicmotivation is something you do (activity, past time, exercise, hobby, schoolof study, career) because you find it interesting and rewarding. Extrinsicmotivation is any of those things you do because you want to earn a reward,or conversely, avoid punishment or negative consequences. From these types of motivation and through our neural connections andassociations we gain through experience, we develop our system of beliefs,our values, attitudes, and behaviors. They all stem together like a tree or evena neuron in your mind with branches of connectivity: The roots, feed thetrunk, which feeds the branches, which grow the leaves. So, imagine your system of belief like a tree. Starting with the roots, webegin with beliefs. A belief is an idea that a person will hold as truth. When we call somethingtruth, we usually do so because of certainty, probability, or evenmathematical evidence. They stem from several different roots, like culturaland societal norms, including the religious practices of your community, or

family; beliefs have roots in your own personal experience and experimentswith life in general; they have roots in what other people might say, or teach,like a mentor, educator, or entire school system. The process of gainingbeliefs goes through all of the potential root avenues and each one is usuallyquestioned and examined until it can be called truth by your internal beliefsystem. Once this belief is your truth, you are likely to defend it. Next is the trunk of the tree: your values. This is what is important to you.They are born of belief, in that your beliefs will inform you of what youvalue. A value is a life standard for how you organize your life and makedecisions. In order for someone to be able to have clarity, responsibility andconsistency in the decisions they make, they must know and understand whatthey value. Being able to articulate what holds importance for you is how youmake life choices. Beyond the trunk spreads the branches: your attitudes. Attitudes representyour mentality about others and your present circumstances. Your attitudehas a direct impact on the decisions that you make that ultimately lead tobehavior. Attitudes, as you may have guessed, stem from your underlyingvalue and belief system. If you are not able or willing to commit to anybeliefs, or values to guide your experiences, your attitudes will be negativelyinfluenced leading to certain attitudes and behaviors like, a need to please,peer pressuring or bullying, worry, anxiety, excessive concern about othersopinions and ideas about us, convenience, political correctness, and more. The leaves of our tree are our behaviors: how we act, especially towardsothers.

Our choice of behavior is an external representation of an internal experienceor thought process. Our behaviors are a result of our roots, trunk, andbranches. If your tree is built on lack of faith in anything, value only in howyou can win, and an attitude of self-righteousness, then you might have someaggressive and potentially negative or harmful behavior towards yourself andothers. If your roots are made out of belief in good education, valuing careersuccess with an attitude of respect and professionalism, then your behaviorsare likely to be beneficial to your life goals with an openness to the life goalsof others who are on a similar path. Having an absence or lack of awareness about what you believe, or findimportant can limit a rational attitude that can lead to undesirable or negativebehavior. Knowing what you find truth in and what has importance for you, iswhat gives you the attitude toward your life that provides the action you takein it: your behavior. And don’t forget the motivation. Your tree is grown in the soil of yourintrinsic or extrinsic motivation. Do you believe or value something becauseit is interesting and rewarding for you? Do you believe in or value somethingbecause your afraid that if you don’t you’ll be punished? It is good toquestion your motivation when you are realizing your truths and values. Your tree of life is what holds you up, and knowing what you believe andfind important is part of the process of awareness and will give you greaterinsight into how to approach NLP for the improvement of your life.

Chapter Eleven: Thought Patterns and Early LifeProgramming

Branching off from our system of beliefs, there are even more layers tounderstanding our thoughts and realities. Your values and beliefs can becomea part of your thought patterns and early-life programming, but if you receivenegative messages? Our thought patterns and neural connections about how we feel about theworld and ourselves, how we relate to our experiences and other people, areborn early and life and reinforced throughout our childhoods. We are in thehands of our parents, caregivers, teachers, relatives and peers, and if they arereflecting negative modeling to you, because they themselves didn’t receive apositive mental attitude, then you are going to learn those patterns and havelittle understanding in childhood of how to correct those negative neuralconnections. As we get older, we can either gain awareness and learn better, more positiveforms of processing our emotions and experience of reality, or we can stay inour thought patterns, or programming: this is just how we are and alwayswere and that can’t change. When you believe that, you are simplyreinforcing your negative thought pattern about yourself, instead ofcorrecting it with better information or modeling. The great thing about Neuro-Linguistic Programming is that it teaches that ifyou don’t like the way you feel about something, change it.

You have the power to change your thought patterns, even when they seemdeeply ingrained because they accrued in childhood. You will learn all thatand more in later chapters, but first, you have to identify some of the waysnegative thought patterns and programming can show up in your beliefs andvalues, attitudes, and beliefs. Negative thought patterns can sometimes be called cognitive distortions. Athought pattern is anything you regularly repeat; that can be habitual, as inunconsciously carrying out habits, repetitive thinking that causes undesirablebehavior, regular reinforcement of negative thoughts and emotions. Some examples of this are:

Making AssumptionsWhen you make assumptions about a person or a situation, you aredeciding without evidence or communication that you know whysomeone might be acting negatively toward you, or why things aren’tgoing well. This is jumping to a conclusion, without making anyinquiries as to whether or not your assumptions are correct. This cancause a lot of anxiety, worry, and doubt, in addition to a false reality,especially if you are dealing with other people. When you anticipatesomething will turn out badly, you convince yourself that it is fact,when it is just a negative thought pattern that leads nowhere. CatastrophizingDisaster at every turn, no matter what. When you create a thoughtpattern of catastrophe you magnify/minimize experiences, blowingthings way out of proportion to unrealistic ends. This is the land of the

“What If?” question. What if everything falls apart? What if I don’t getthat promotion and raise and my wife leaves me and takes the kidsbecause I can’t afford the mortgage anymore? What if global warmingkills me before my time? The situations could be as minor as a mistakeyou make learning the piano, or the outcome of witnessing someoneelse’s achievement at something.

Black and White ThinkingEither this or that. It is either perfect or a failure. Black and whitethought patterns are what we do when we polarize a situation. All ornothing experiences leave little room for color and appreciation for thedynamic quality of any experience. A lot of perfectionists’ work in thisthought pattern, always declaring in their mind that it can only be oneway; good or bad; this, or nothing else.

OvergeneralizingWhen you have very little evidence or understanding, but you come toa conclusion anyway, you are over-generalizing. So, if something badwere to happen, you may have the thought that it happened once, so itwill happen again. One unpleasant thing leads to a string ofunpleasantness that ultimately ends in defeat. This can fall into thecategory of negative “If/Then” statements. “If they haven’t called meback yet, then they have hired someone else for my dream job.” Withvery little idea of the reality, your thought pattern creates one.

Thought-ScreeningAnother way to describe this is to call it “filtering.” When somethinghappens, the thought pattern here is to focus on the meat of the

negative aspects and filter or screen out, all of the positive and neutralaspects of the situation. It is a kind of tunnel vision that leaves littleroom for clarity and understanding. This can happen naturally and innon-negative ways, simply because we are just used to our lives beinga certain way, and we filter out what can be uncomfortable, unknown,or uninteresting to us.

Emotional ReasoningThis is a thought pattern that many of us encounter simply because wehaven’t been taught or learned effective or healthy ways to process andunderstand our emotional experience. With emotional reasoning, youhave the belief that what you are feeling is an accurate representationof the truth of your situation or reality. You see your feelings as thetruth of what you are experiencing, rather than experiencing the realityand allowing yourself to rationally involve yourself with all thecomponents of it, not just the emotional side effect.

Should TalkThis is common in everyone; “I should” sentences. When we say weshould do something, or we should have done something, we arecriticizing ourselves.1. I should exercise before I do anything else today.2. I should have written that report yesterday.3. I should diet.4. I should be better at xyz.5. I should have been better at xyz

These examples barely scrape the surface of “I should” statements, but they

give you a picture of how we distort our thoughts and create this kind ofmental pattern to keep us in a negative or suffering state of self. When youare always stating, “I should”, you are saying that you made a mistake or willmake a mistake and shame is going to follow. How are you identifying whatyou should and shouldn’t do? Is it from your beliefs and values? Is it fromcomparison to others and their attitudes and behaviors? What NLP begins to teach you is how to reframe a thought pattern, like “Ishould…” and change it to “I could” or “I can.” Language is significant in theway we construct our thought patterns. Reorganizing your mind tounderstand your own thought patterns and how to alter them to give you amore meaningful, confident, and open-minded approach to your experiencesis just the beginning. The way you can achieve more success in your life,whether it be through your career, education, relationships, is to look insideyour mental constructs, and see how your thought patterns truly affect yourlife experience.

Chapter Twelve: The Voice Inside the Mind Birthed out of your neural connections, belief systems, thought patterns, andearly life experience is the part of you that is always telling you someinformation about who you are and what you are doing: your inner voice. This part of your mind is there for a reason. It can be helpful, even when weare not realizing it; it can also be hurtful, criticizing our every move. If weexperience a difficult, challenging, or negative early life, in which our rolemodels demonstrate hurtful attitudes towards us or others, we learn tointegrate those concepts into our behavior. We witness our friends, family, and peers’ express attitudes in certain waysthat teach us, or model, how we should act. This is how our inner voice canbe born critically. You may not have a critical inner voice, brought up in acaring, open, well-grounded and rational environment, where you were giventhe tools to understand and express yourself in a healthy way. This kind ofexperience does exist, but often times, even when parents or teachers aredoing a good job reflecting positive attitudes, there are underlying influenceson their own personality type or life experience that models their behavior asother than what they think. This is often called “projection.” They may have all kinds of cognitive distortions and thought patterns thatthey don’t even realize they have and so without knowing it, they areimparting their model onto you. Everyone’s experience is subjective.Remember that.

So, when you have an internal voice that criticizes and shames, that bully’sand deprecates, how do you handle it? What is the effect of this voice on yourwell-being and your ability to thrive? Does it help or hurt? If you haven’t introduced yourself to your inner voice, now would be a goodtime. It will never go completely away. Part of Neuro-linguistic Programmingis that you engage with your inner voice and change the way it communicateswith you. It is, after all, your voice. Of course, you can change it. That little voice doesn’t feel so little when we hear it say things like, “Youare being foolish or acting stupid!” “You can’t get anything done on time.Pathetic.” “No wonder she left you, you are a loser.” These incredibly harmful words and statements, when expressed to the selfthrough the mind, cause emotional and mental damage. They can also seepout into your behavior, the way you treat others and how you move throughyour life. When you have awareness about this internal voice, get to know it. Whatkind of voice is it in general? Critical? Worrisome? Urgent? Scared? Does ithave a more positive tone, like clarifying? Encouraging? Patient? Instructive? Next, look for how your inner voice responds in certain situations. Is it tryingto protect you in some way? Is it discouraging you from embarrassment ormistakes? Does it welcome opportunities to improve? What is the intention ofthe voice within? Learning how your inner voice works with you, or against you will prove

valuable as you move ahead in further chapters.

Chapter Thirteen: Personality Profiles Moving further through the layers of the self and the mind, we come topersonality. There are many different profile tests to give you an idea ofpersonality. Some of it you are born with and other times it is developed asyou grow and are modeled ideas, behaviors and attitudes. In Neuro-Linguistic Programming, there are five basic personality types toconsider when identifying your behavior and thought patterns. They are:

Self-ExpressiveThe self-expressive personality type has the attitude or behavior thatasks, “Is this situation, or action, going to help me feel more uniqueand special or not? Am I going to be just like everyone else orspecial?”

CompetentCompetency is about intelligence or looking smart. The competency-based personality type will look for opportunities to avoid seemingunintelligent or be noticed for their wisdom and intelligence. Theymight ask questions like, “Will this experience provide moreaccomplishment for me, or elevate me in the company, or is it a wasteof time, or will it make me look stupid if I fail?”

Freedom-BasedThe questions of the freedom-based personality type are, “Will thisexperience give me more freedom and creativity? Or is it going to limit

me and box me in?” The impetus for freedom is to know whether whatyou are engaging in is going to limit you or halt your freedom fromdoing what you want when you want.

Security-BasedFor the personality type who is security-based, they will inquire ifsomething is safe or not. The choice to do or not do lies in whether youwill have certainty about the outcome. Security-based personalitieswon’t take a risk if it doesn’t feel sure.

BelongingThe sense of being included, involved, or part of a team related to theneed to belong as a personality type. The question here is: “Is thissituation or action going to include me? Or will I be rejected?”Rejection is the fear of the belonging personality type, and manychoices are made to belong to avoid exclusion.

When reading through the five basic NLP personality profiles, did any popout at you? Are you able to honestly profile yourself? You may have aprominent one, and another that impacts you on a lesser scale, but still has apresentation in your behavior or attitudes. If you are not sure which feels like yourself, ask yourself the questions fromeach personality type. See if you can create some awareness about yourselfand how you are. Personality types aren’t all you are. There are too many layers to any personfor you to fit into such a short, simple description. Profiles like this illustrate

how you see reality. They are the part of you that makes comparisons anddetermines the meaning in each of your experiences. There is no good or bad personality. Think of them more like styles ofclothing you like to wear. They don’t truly define who you are, but they comefrom your genetics, your upbringing, your experiences, and the modeling youreceive in your life. Knowing and understanding what kind of personality you have is part of theprocess of Neuro-Linguistic Programming. How will you know how to talkto yourself, if you don’t know what motivates you?

Chapter Fourteen: Present State vs Desire State Understanding your states of being, you have the present state and desiredstate: one is where you are now, and the other is where you’d like to be soon.The difference between the two is the problem you are trying to solve or thefeeling you would like to change. For both states of being you have behaviors, thoughts, and feelings. Thebehaviors of the present state are different from what the behaviors will be inthe desired state. This is also true of thoughts and feelings: you will thinkdifferently and feel differently in the desired state than you do in the presentstate. Hence, the desire for change. To make that change and move from the present to the desired state, you needresources. What are resources? Your resources are your internal pantry of thoughts,feelings, energy, and so on, that builds your map of reality and gives meaningand purpose to your journey through life. Your resources change as much asyou do, and as often as needed. So, what are some resources?

MotivationCourageStaminaConfidence

CalmRelaxedCompassionConcentrationFocus

When you can learn the skills and techniques to create and utilize yourresourceful states at any time, then you can achieve any goal you determine.NLP is the practice that identifies how to improve those skills and exercisesfor anchoring your resources to use at any time can be found in Part 4.

Chapter Fifteen: Submodalities There are three main ways of thinking: sounds, pictures, and feelings. Yourmind has the capacity to take in and store so much more information, evenmore than a computer, but we refine it and simplify it to be these threeconcepts. When you recall information, you are conjuring these main modalities ofthought. Those main branches break off to form even more specific andrefined experiences: submodalities. It is the distinction of what kind of sound,image and feeling. Submodalities tend to be opposite pairs. Examples include:

SoundsLoud or softBrassy or mellowWarm or brightRapid or slow

PictureSharp or hazyNear or farLight or darkGrey or colorful

Feeling

Hot or coldGood or badSick or wellHappy or sad

Having the ability to offer more clarity to the description of a moment in timewill help you in your progress. The more distinction, the clearer theexperience. The clearer the experience, the better able you will be to use youremotional resources to create lasting change the way you want.

Part Three: Linguistic

“If thought corrupts language, then language can also corruptthought.” — George Orwell

Chapter Sixteen: Understanding Language Without language, how could we say what we mean? Before language,people were able to communicate mostly using gesture, body language, facialexpressions, and verbal sounds that expressed a feeling. Words are theframework of everything we currently understand and comprehend. If you arefeeling a certain way, there is a word associated with that feeling so you cansay it out loud and acknowledge it or tell someone else how you are feeling. Sometimes, even with our great vocabularies, we can certainly fall short ofwhat we want to communicate. There are the times you get stumped whensomeone is waiting for you to respond to their question of “how are youfeeling,” and all you can seem to do is look down and to the right. Even when we don’t know what to say exactly, there is always a word for it.Words have power. Words can transform any moment, any sensation, anyfeeling. Look at the list of phrases below. They are short and simple, but they carry somuch force and meaning:

You’re fired.I’m pregnant.I quit!Welcome home.The test was positive.Danger ahead.

Do not enter. Simple words put together can pack a mighty punch. We use wordsconstantly to describe our experiences, to relate to people, to ask questionsand explain, to write work reports. Our brains are also constantly using wordsthrough our inner voice to communicate to us from within. The inner voice knows the same words that you do, because it is you, and thatvoice can be cruel and unforgiving in its speech, or kind and compassionate. Communication means that we agree what words mean. In order tocommunicate, we have to be able to exchange words that both peopleunderstand in order for it to be clear and successful. If I am speaking Frenchand you are speaking Russian, then we might have a hard time helping eachother find the way to the train station. Our realities are subjective and so are our language maps. When you are ababy, you learn words and their meanings from your caregivers and teachers.We can all agree that words have universal definitions that we can all agreeupon, but the way language is used and the feeling behind it, isn’t universal. The deeper meaning of words relates to anchoring, which is an NLP tool thatyou learn in greater detail in Part Four. Anchoring is any trigger that elicits anemotional response. Words have meaning because of their anchoredassociation to objects, experiences and people. Here is a list of words that might elicit an emotional response or anchor:

EsteemHeckleZestyPersistentVulnerableDenialHardenedPunctual

One thing to keep in mind is that our thoughts are not determined by ourlanguage. We can think in ways that cannot be expressed in words, try as wemight. How do you think various types of visual art came into existence? Theimage of experience had to be created without language. We can create the same image in our minds without using words, but sooften, even in the subconscious, we will find the word that best describes amoment in time, or a way we want to feel, or a goal we want to achieve. Understanding the power of words is part of NLP training. Start making a listof words that matter to you or that you associate with excellence. Get outyour dictionary and your thesaurus and start building your personal library ofwords and phrases that will help you on your path. When you look for the words that matter to you, ask yourself some questions:how does each word make you feel? What negative word is replacing abetter, more positive one? How does this word fit into my present state andhow will fit into my desired state?

Your words will lead the way.

Chapter Seventeen: The Meta Model The ability to use language well is an essential tool for anyone who has tocommunicate for a living. If you work with many employees at a largecompany that deals with other businesses across the country, you will be inconstant communication with everything and everyone. Whether you do itwell or not is a subjective matter, but there are those who have mastered thetools of communication who can be modeled for their excellence. This brings us to The Meta Model. The basis of the Meta Model is that it useslanguage to clarify language. The way our brains think as we are deciding what words to say goes a littlesomething like this:

1. Deep thoughts that involve several sensory pieces of data andinformation.

2. Generalization of all of the information being brought up in the deepthoughts.

3. Changed thoughts that are more refined from their original complexity.4. Distortion of information to accommodate the current situation.5. Pieces of the original, deeper thought, now even more simplified.6. Deletion, or removal, of seemingly unnecessary details.7. Surface structure of the thought.

What all of this means is that we filter a great deal of the information wecommunicate. Our unique, sensory experiences are a part of our behavior and

beliefs, but when we must use words to connect and relate to others, we lookfor ways to express the true nature of our own reality. What the Meta Model shows is that our minds will delete, distort, andgeneralize information as we communicate. What you think you are saying,may not be what you are saying. That is why language is so valuable andimportant. The words you choose to describe yourself, your life, and yoursuccess weigh heavily in the actual experience. Deletion—omission of specific details from the map of the situation orexperience; selective attention. Distortion—representing information differently than how it was originallyexperienced; creating, manufacturing, and manipulating original sensory data. Generalization—taking one element of your model and mapping it representan entire category of experience. The Meta Model gives you the option to expand your awareness withlanguage by going through the following steps:

1. Gather Information2. Clarify Meanings3. Identify Limitations4. Open up choices

This model is one of the major resources of NLP and when you learn it,understand it and practice regularly in your life, you create a deeper

awareness of how to model the excellence you want in your life. All you have to bring to this model for it to work is curiosity, fascination, andthe desire to understand yourself by asking the right questions.

Chapter Eighteen: Deletion Like with most things, there is a positive and a negative. Deletion is theprocess, whether consciously or unconsciously, by which you omit certainaspect of your sensory experience. It is sometimes impossible to take in allthe senses of every moment in time, so our brains will detect what is not ofvalue and not pay close attention to it. An example of this could being at acrowded work party and having to tune out all the other noise so you can hearthe conversation with the person standing in front of you or trying to watchthe basketball move across the court at the game, tuning out the crowd andeven the players because you have your eye on the ball. The negative side of deletion would be possibly ignoring kind words from afriend because you can only focus on the negative part of an experience ornot hearing important information about your flight because you're anxiousabout making it to the gate on time. The point is that you create awareness around how you may deleteinformation, positively or negatively, from your experience. The way to dothat is through asking the right questions. Unspecified NounsThis language asks, “Who or What, specifically?” In order to have clarity in what we say, we must offer specific information,otherwise, there will be questions. If you state something like, “They neversaid anything about it,” then the question becomes, “Who never said?” Who

are they exactly? Other examples of this could be:

It’s a matter of taste. What is a matter of taste?They ruined the game. Who ruined the game?It could have happened differently. What could have happeneddifferently?Animals are dirty. What animals?

When you are delivering and expressing the information you want to impart,even to the self, clarity and specificity saves you a good amount of time andfocuses your thoughts to paint the picture clearly. Unspecified VerbsThis language asks, “How, specifically?” It is important to know how things are done. Knowing how helps you torealize the steps are taken, or what needs to happen next. If you say tosomeone, “You will have to learn this,” then the question arises, “How will Ilearn this?” It would be more specific and clarifying to state, “You will haveto learn this by reading, studying, and memorizing the information.” Examples of Unspecified verbs:

They travelled to Rome. How did they travel to Rome?She hurt her arm. How did she hurt her arm?I am trying to figure it out. How are you trying to figure it out?

He helped me. How did he help you?They made art. How did they make art?

When you communicate with yourself and others by answering the questionof how, you paint a bigger picture of your experience. Instead of deleting thehow, you allow it to fill in the gaps of the experience and paint a broaderstroke of understanding. ComparisonThis language asks, “Compared with what, specifically?” Making a comparison usually means there is more than one object, scenario,or experience involved in the description of something. In order to make acomparison, you need something to compare to. If you only say, “I handledthat sales report badly,” then the question arises, “Compared with what othersales report? Compared with another colleague’s report?” Much of the time, our comparisons have a detrimental impact on our mentaland emotional well-being, because we are supposing that something else isbetter, stronger, wiser, or more capable than we are. This limits yourexperience and keeps you in loops of making comparisons that leave anunrealistic mark on the map of your experience. Examples of comparison:

New, improved margarine is better and tastier. Compared with othermargarine? Compared to the way it tasted before?He is better. Better than who? Better than you? Better than he was

before?They handled that badly. Worse than what?

Comparisons are often unrealistic, although they can have their value whenyou are communicating. Sometimes, you have to make a comparison toinform the map of your reality or to try and understand someone else’s. Whencomparisons limit the outcome of your desired reality, they can be replacedwith something better. JudgementThis language asks, “Who says…?” Judgements are close relatives of comparisons. They don’t need to worktogether or involve each other, but they often do. Take one of the aboveexamples: They handled that badly. The question becomes, “In whoseopinion did they handle it badly?” Judgement is formed because of our own subjective understanding of reality.Because of our unique experiences, we see the world through our own mapsand filters, which leads to judgement and its brother comparison. Examples of Judgement:

It’s obvious that he will win. To whom is it obvious?They have the best ideas. According to who?I’ll never be the one. Based on what evidence?It is clear that this won’t work. Who is it clear to?

Judgement has the ability to muddle clear, rational thinking and can be apowerful thought pattern that leads to disappointments. Understanding thatwe all have our unique reality, making a judgement can be a fruitless act. If you are a judge in a courtroom, your profession is to make judgements, butyou do it through a very clearly defined and culturally accepted system oflaws and rules. Our own realities have the beliefs, values, attitudes, andbehaviors that we create through our own experiences. If we are to be thejudge of our own life courtroom, we must be sure to ask the question, “Whosays?” NominalizationThis language asks, “How is this being done?” When a verb that describes an ongoing process becomes a noun, you have anominalization. An example of this concept is the following statement: A demonstration of our work performance occurred at today’s meeting. The word demonstration is a verb and a noun, together. A clearer way ofputting it would be: We demonstrated our work performance at today’s meeting. We were able to demonstrate our work performance at today’s meeting. Nominalizations turn processes into things which is a very misleadinglanguage pattern. The words used can be manipulated in ways that have little

to do with our sensory experience. To clarify a nominalization, all you haveto ask is, “Who is doing it, and how is it being done?”

Chapter Nineteen: Distortion Distortion allows you to take in information through your sensory perceptionof reality and change it into something more meaningful, or different,deleting certain things and incorporating others. You take in information andchange it with your mind to the desired effect and results. Distortion can be useful and it can cause issues. If you distort your reality toofar, you walk the realms of illusion and delusion, but understanding thelanguage of distortion can help you ask the questions that allow for a morecreative and unlimited reality, rather than a delusional one. Complex EquivalenceThis language asks, “How does this mean that?” Complex equivalence relates two separate sentences or thoughts to have thesame meaning. If you say, “You are not laughing…you are not having a goodtime,” there is an accusation being made. How, then, does not laughing meanthat someone is not enjoying themselves. Utilizing complex equivalence means that you are taking one experience orthought and making it equal to something else, but it is through your ownperception of the world, your own mind map, that you make verbal orthought accusations. Other examples of complex equivalence include:

He never wrote me back. He’s not interested.They sold it. I guess they didn’t want it anymore.She left her gift here. She didn’t like it.I thought I could get the job. I am not qualified.He failed the quiz. He’s not intelligent.

Complex equivalence is a gross misunderstanding of all people and allexperiences. We only make these kinds of statements through our own,unique perception of reality, so the question arises, “How does this meanthat?” PresuppositionThis language asks, “What leads you to believe that?” Presupposition is just another term for assumption. Assumptions limit ourchoices because we decide that something is a certain way before we have anopportunity to know for sure if it is. Many presuppositions come in the form of “why” questions.

Why don’t you listen to me? Presupposes that the person isn’tlistening.Why haven’t you changed? Presupposes that the person hasn’tchanged.Why aren’t you getting closer to this? Presupposes that they aren’tgetting closer.

Other presuppositions appear when you use the words “since,” “when,” and

“if.”

Since they aren’t here, they must not be coming.When he acts like this, he is angry.If she doesn’t call, it means that she doesn’t want to talk to me.

Since/When/If questions are also tricky and assumptive:

Will you be leaving now since everyone else has? Presupposes youhave intentions to leave.Are you going to do the dishes when dinner is over? Presupposes thatyou are planning to do the dishes.Are you going to take the leftovers if there are any left? Presupposesthere will be leftovers to take.

When dealing with an assumption, it is usually better not to make them at all,but to ask yourself and others, “What leads you to believe that?” You find outmore about how you think, as well as, how others think, which is the basis ofNLP and of modeling excellence. Successful people don’t make assumptions;they ask questions to form better understanding to have the best behavioroutcome for their experience. Cause and EffectThis language asks, “How exactly do you make yourself do this?” The law of cause and effect states that if a certain thing occurs, then it willlead to another occurrence. If/then statements are prominent in the languageof cause and effect. The English language encourages thinking in these terms,

but through our sensory experiences, we can distort reality but informing ourexperience of uncertain outcomes because of certain actions. Examples of If/Then statements are:

If they are not going to respond, then the deal is off.If he can come over to this idea, then I will have succeeded inconvincing him.If we are not on the same page, then we need to break it off.

When dealing with others, you may feel that if you stand up for yourself, thenyou will be disliked and excluded from the group; or if you say a specificthing to a specific person, then you will make them feel a specific way. Thislimiting belief can cause you much stress and anxiety; it is not in the hands ofanyone to control another person’s state of being and awareness. Theresponsibility of another’s feelings is too heavy a burden. We generate our own feelings and perception of those experiences; thereforeno one can make you feel a certain way. No one causes your experience.Saying “You make me feel…,” is a recipe for distortion. An example of this would be:

He makes me feel sad. How exactly do you make yourself sad by whathe is saying to you?She ruined my experience. How exactly did you make yourself feelunsuccessful in your experience with her?They never make me feel welcome. How exactly do you make yourself

feel unwelcome when you are in their company? Another word that implies cause and effect is “but.” You might say, “I woulddo the chores, but I am not ready to.” Other examples of “But” statements are:

I would change careers, but it seems like too much work.I long to go on vacation, but the office would fall apart if I did.I need to finish this report, but I won’t be fast enough for the deadline.

Cause and effect will occur naturally in the world and demonstrates what canhappen as a result of something else happening. If you practice askingyourself how you make yourself feel in a situation, then you will not bedistorting reality based on anyone else’s. Mind ReadingThis language asks, “How do you know?” Mind reading is a mystical skill that many people claim to possess, and theyadvertise their abilities under the moniker “psychic.” In terms of languageand in NLP practices, mind reading falls into the category of presuming weknow what someone is thinking or feeling, without any actual evidence tosupport the idea. This can manifest in two ways:

1. Presuming you know what someone else is feeling

2. Presuming that someone should know what you are thinking Example statements of trying to read someone else’s mind:

You are not happy.I can tell that she isn’t feeling well.I know what gets her upset.He was just angry and wouldn’t admit to it.You haven’t tried hard enough to know.

Example statements of believing someone else should be able to read yourmind:

Can’t you see what I am going through?You could clearly see that I was upset, and you didn’t consider how Ifelt.If you knew me, then you would know what I want to form this.Why aren’t you seeing my side?He never gets me.

Attempting to mind read will distort your reality in such a way that youbecome more limited in your emotional and sensory experiences. Believingthat you can truly grasp someone else’s mental state, or that they should beable to do the same for you is delusional. In NLP, to reframe the language ofmind reading, you can ask the question, “How exactly do you know?” If you don’t know exactly, then you have to continue questioning until youdo. Mind reading leads to presupposition, and the idea is to not assume

anything without more knowledge. If you don’t know, ask; first, you mustadmit that you don’t know. How could you?

Chapter Twenty: Generalizations A generalization, like most other things, can have a positive or a negativeimpact. On the positive side, some generalizations help you organizeinformation in your mind map. For example, when you are a child you beginlearning simple words like cup, ball, and dog. If you learn a word like “knob”you also learn that there are doorknobs and volume knobs on the radio, knobsto turn on the lights and knobs on top of pot lids. You generalize “knob” toencompass all knobs. On the negative side, you can organize information in a way that inhibits andlimits your experience in the world and can inaccurately assume certainthings about yourself and others. You may have an uncomfortableconfrontation with a member of a certain religious background, and you thengeneralize all people of that religion to be confrontational. You may have abad experience in a relationship with a woman, and then generally believe acertain thing about all women and dating. Modal Operation of PossibilityThis language asks, “What prevents you?” Modal means mood, when you are talking about verbs. The operation is theverb, signifying the function or action of something. The possibility is whatmight happen or come true. When we think of this idea in terms of language,we are saying that something needs to be done to achieve an outcome but willcome about negatively or positively.

This is the realm of the words “cannot” and “must not.” Everything has itsopposite, so with modal operators of possibility, that would look somethinglike this:

can or cannotpossible or impossiblemust or must notshould or should notwill or won’t

When you are saying either of these words in the examples, you are definingwhat is possible in your map of reality; you are creating possibility orpreventing it with the language that you use. Examples of statements using modal operators of possibility:

I can’t change who I am. I am the way I am.I simply couldn’t refuse.It would be impossible for me to accept this offer.I won’t allow it.I must not listen.

In order to identify what prevents or promotes possibility in your life, youmust ask the right questions:

What prevents you from changing?What prevents you from refusing?What prevents you from accepting this offer?

What prevents you from allowing it?What prevents you from listening?

If you are saying you can’t or it is not possible in your life, it is time to learnto question these statements: What prevents you? What would happen if youdid? When you allow for more opportunity and possibility, you can make moreinformed, balanced choices. You are also in a better awareness of what youwant, not what you believe is possible based on your current map of reality.Limiting possibilities with language only limits the experience of life you arehere to enjoy. Modal Operation of NecessityThis language asks, “What would happen if you did/didn’t?” The second modal of operations that creates generalizations in our experienceis a necessity. These operators are more about what you need rather than whatis possible or impossible. Like the modal operators of possibility, necessityuses much of the same language:

Must or must notShould or should notOught to or ought not

This language relates to consequences and asks the question, “What wouldhappen if you did or if you didn’t?” It relates to cause and effect but asks adifferent kind of question.

For example:

I must not be late for this party. What would happen if you did arrivelate?I shouldn’t speak unless I am called on in class. What would happen ifyou did speak up in class regardless?You should call her back immediately. What would happen if youdidn’t return her call right away?You shouldn’t talk to those people. What would happen if you did talkto them?

Modal operators of necessity help you determine consequences to actions. Itis a very creative process and many inventors, artists, and visionaries have toask these questions all the time. What would happen if I rearranged theformula? It would become E = MC2. You get the drift. In order to open the limitlessness of necessity ANDpossibility, the language you use must ask the right questions so that youdon’t back yourself into the corner of “I can’t” or “I shouldn’t.” That is howyou over-generalize an experience that can be felt more fully with curiosityand openness to all possibilities, based on what your current needs are. Universal QuantifiersThis language asks, “Always? Never? Everyone? Since generalizations take a few instances to represent a whole group, therehave to be no exceptions to the details of the information in the way that theyare organized. They have to fit into the general idea. Generalization

categorizes information so that it can be more easily understood since we areperceiving massive amounts of information daily. In order to properly categorize our experience, we will sometimes useuniversal quantifiers to remove any possible exception to our generalization.These quantifiers appear as words like “all,” “every,” “always,” “never,” and“none.” Some examples of universal quantifier statements are:

I never enjoy my time at the museum.I always walk this route.It’s all or nothing.Every time this happens, I get a headache.None of these products looks okay to me.

You can also make generalizations with universal quantifiers without usingthese specific words:

Chinese food tastes bad.Owning a home is too expensive.Poets are insufferable.Dogs are better than cats.Politicians are liars.

In order to expose and alter this kind of language, you have to ask thequestion, “Has there ever been a time when…?”

Has there ever been a time when Chinese food did taste good to you?Has there ever been a time when you enjoyed a poetry reading?Has there ever been a time when you did enjoy your time at themuseum?

Using this type of question gives you or someone else in your life anopportunity to rethink and reframe their statement. There may have been atime, in which case generalizing that all Chinese food is bad is inaccurate. Sometimes, the answer to the question “Has there ever ben a time…?” is No.If someone answers no to that question, then you can reframe the experienceby asking, “Do you actually like Chinese food? Do you think that it all tastesterrible to you because you don’t like it, or because you think it’s all bad andthat no one else could?” Generalizing is limiting. Your unique experience of life doesn’t have to belimited. Much of it comes down to knowing how language impacts yourreality, and how questioning your thought patterns is an effective tool forcoming into better alignment with what you want, not what can never happenor always fails.

Chapter Twenty-One: The Milton Model In Part one of this book, you received some of the histories of how NLP wasborn. One of the key therapists that was modeled by creators Bandler andGrinder was hypnotherapist, Milton Erickson. Erickson’s approach to helpingclients involved the same idea of the Meta Model and the use of language tounderstand our unconscious thoughts and conscious behaviors. Thedifference is that the Milton Model utilizes the concept of a trance state,induced by the therapist to engage with the client in their most relaxed state,before sleep. The reason for creating a trance experience is that the client is then able tohave a more direct link to their unconscious thoughts. When we are in aconscious, active state, we may be deleting, distorting, and generalizing in amore up-tempo manner and may not achieve the considerable depth ofunderstanding the unconscious motivations of our experiences that can beachieved in trance. Once in a trance state, utilizing the conscious mind of the client, you helpdistract them from anything complex and that could filter their experience ofwhat they are looking for within their mind. You keep the mind of the clientbusy by helping to fill in the gaps for them so that overthinking isunnecessary. This distraction is achieved through the use of language andhelps the client stay in trance and focused on the unconscious. The Meta Model is more about precise meanings, while the Milton Model isa vaguer use of language to extract the most appropriate meaning for the

client in the moment. While in trance, a person may find their internalresources with greater ease and have more profound results and greateraccess to those resource discoveries. That is not to say that the Meta Modeldoes not provide those results: the two models are complementary, yetcontrasting approaches to achieve the same result. The object is to help the client determine and access what resources they havealways had, especially ones they want to utilize, but have not been able todue to negative programming from early life and other modeling experiences. The Milton Model will work best for people who are working with otherssince the idea is that person A helps person B achieve a trance-state touncover unconscious meanings of sensory experience. You can certainlydevelop a practice to use the Milton Model for your own benefit usingmindfulness meditation. Milton Model and MeditationIf you have ever practiced meditation, then you may already know what itcan feel like to achieve a trance-like state of consciousness. If you have notpracticed meditation, then now would be an excellent time to start. Meditation requires that you sit in an environment or body position that feelscomfortable. Connect to your breathing to allow for slower deeper breathsand let your whole body relax. You can spend several minutes just focusingon the breath until you feel completely relaxed. When you are working on your own, you have to be your own guide and findthe right meditation tools for you. For some, it may a guided meditation

recording of someone’s soothing voice that helps you get into the state. Afterseveral practices, you will be able to go through the steps of achievingrelaxation without listening to anything but your own thoughts to get you tothat state. For others, listening to meditative music, such as singing bowls orrecordings specifically designed to connect you to your unconscious. Whatever works for you to help you enter a deeply relaxed state will besomething you can repeat when you need to enter a trance stay. Once youunderstand the concept of how the Milton Model works, you can use thelanguage to answer your own questions intuitively. Hypnosis works best with a guide, but if you want to dig deep into your ownunconscious, get comfortable with practicing meditation regularly. If you are wanting to assist others with NLP by practicing the Milton Model,you will need to make sure you are comfortable helping someone achieve atrance state and guiding them through their mind. To simplify the way the Milton Model works, it can be broken down into 3basic steps:

Pace and lead the person’s realityDistract/utilize their conscious mindAccess the unconscious and the hidden resources within

The following chapters will break down how to utilize the Milton Model tomodel excellence.

Chapter Twenty-Two: Pace and Lead The concept of pacing and leading is a way of saying, building rapport togain trust (pacing) so that the person will feel comfortable being led throughtheir subconscious (leading). For any person to make significant changes intheir behaviors and attitudes while working with another person, they mustfeel safe and secure, otherwise, there will likely be resistance and objection. How to Pace with SomeonePacing is a lot like building rapport. What that means is that you create acomfortable bond with someone in some or all of the following ways:

Mirroring/Matching—body language, posture, gesture, tone of voice,breathing rhythm, etc., to create comfortParaphrasing—recapping what someone just said so that there isunderstanding that you understand what the person has said.Agreeing—showing them that you agree with what they say so theyfeel validatedParroting—repeating back to them exactly what they say withoutadjustment or embellishmentDisplaying Similarities—pointing out ways that you are alike so thatthey can feel a comradery with you

You can use these techniques to pace with the person so that you are inalignment with their reality. Essentially, all you have to do is describe theircontinuous sensory experience as they are going through the leading; whatthey must be seeing, hearing, feeling, etc.

When you help someone enter a trance, and you are pacing with them, be anassistant, not a director. Allow their natural abilities to fall inward and relaxto guide the experience. Mirror their breathing rhythm and speak in soft, lowslow tones. Pace your speech to the speed of their speech. When you use language to pace, consider the following concepts:

Don’t Say: Now you will go into a trance.Do Say: It is easy to close your eyes and relax into the depth of yourmind.

Don’t: Tell the person what to do or make suggestions about how theyfeelDo: Lead their attention to what is inside their mind.

Don’t say: You will feel more relaxed if you try breathing moredeeply.Do say: Your breath becomes slower as you become more relaxed.

Essentially, the process of pacing and leading could be compared with guidedmeditation: allowing a person to find their own level of relaxation andassisting them through their unconscious sensory experience to locate theirmental resources. As you begin to guide or lead the experience, a helpful way to keep theexperience flowing smoothly is with the words you are using. To allow forsmooth transitions between ideas and prevent jarring someone out of their

trance state, connect thoughts together by using words like “while,” “as,”“and,” and “when.” Some examples of that are:

As you walk through the kitchen, how do you feel?When you see that picture, what comes to mind?While you are focusing on your breathing you can go deeper into yourmind.After you have come to this point you see a colorful light and walktoward it and open up to it with your body.

This is a great technique for pacing and leading to access the unconscious forthe emotional resources you and they are looking for.

Chapter Twenty-Three: Accessing Resources The Meta Model finds what we delete, distort, and generalize through ourconscious use of language. The Milton Model mirrors this by finding whatwe delete, distort, and generalize through our unconscious language. Becausethe experience is vaguer, it allows the person, or client, to find the greatestmeaning with the least amount of content. So, since the models are mirrors for gathering the same resources andachieving a similar result to access the meaning and resources, you will usesome of the same language parameters identified in the Meta Model. This is how in pacing and leading you distract and utilize the conscious mind. DeletionUnspecified Nouns: It is known that humans can go into trances and learn tomake changes. (Known by whom? What humans and how will they go intothese trances? How do they make these changes?) Unspecified Verbs: While you think about the last time you heard someshout, you may remember a feeling. (How do I think about it? How did I hearit? How am I remembering?) Comparison: It is better to go deeper into a trance. (Better than what deeperexperience?) Judgement: It is good to see how relaxed you have become. (Presupposes the

person is relaxed.) Nominalization: As you sit with a feeling of calm and relaxation, you areaware of the possibilities of finding your resources. (the less you specifyinformation, the less you influence, or clash with the person’s experience). DistortionPresupposition: Remember that presupposition makes assumptions.

You might wonder when you fall into a trance. (Presupposes that youwill at some point.)I wonder if you feel or notice just how calm you are becoming.(Presupposes that you are becoming calm.)You can relax while your unconscious mind is discovering.(Presupposes that your unconscious mind is in the act of discovering.)

Cause and Effect: A subtle form of cause and effect is the language oftransition noted earlier in the chapter. Words like “as,” “while,” “when,”“during,” and “and” all mildly suggest “if this, then this.”

While you breathe deeply you fall deeper into your mind. (The cause ofthe effect of falling deeply into the mind is breathing deeply.)During your journey through this memory, you will see a room. (Theeffect of seeing a room in your mind is caused by going on a journeythrough your memory.)When you see the image, you will have a feeling. (The effect of feelingsomething is caused by seeing an image.)

A stronger form of cause and effect language would be the use of the word“make” to lead the client more deeply.

Looking at the window across the room will make you relaxed andcalm. (The effect making you relaxed is caused by looking at thewindow.)Finding your internal resources will make you have more awareness.(The effect of making yourself more aware is caused by finding youremotional resources.)

GeneralizationUniversal Quantifiers: Remember that universal quantifiers add specific timeor concept: always, never, and everyone.

You have the ability to learn from every experience.Your unconscious mind is always working with you to find solutions.Everyone has the ability to change.

You can also use the language of generalization to adhere to vaguer pacingand leading, to create a better ground for discovery through assistance insteadof cuing.

You may begin to wonder how you will feel once you begin todiscover more of your unconscious mind.

You are not telling the person what they will find or how they will feel whenthey do find something. You are generally speaking about the possibilities.And speaking of possibilities, Modal Operators of Possibility are also an

effective language tool for accessing resources. Modal Operators of Possibility: This is the language of can versus can’t.

You can’t begin to know what lies under the surface of you until youlook. (This statement also presupposes that once you do look under thesurface, then you can know).

All of these language tools work for both Meta and Milton models. Knowingand understanding the linguistic component of how NLP works will help youengage more fully with the tools from modeling excellence.

Chapter Twenty-Four: Metaphor A metaphor, as used in NLP, is a general means of covering any story orfigure of speech with an implied comparison. You may have already learnedfrom many metaphors in your life; many children’s fables, parables, andallegories use the concept of metaphor to teach a lesson. Since people like to discover, instead of being told, a metaphor is an elegantway to achieve that. The change in the setting, characters, time, and generalissue allows the person listening to become more engaged and less resistantto what is being learned or modeled. The person listening will be more likely to engage in a trance state becausethey can focus on how their own thoughts relate to the story being told; theycan just listen and find a comparison. The pace of the metaphor must mirror the pace of the problem that is incomparison. This creates an even greater connection and understanding in theunconscious mind, and the only difference is the outcome. And when the outcome is finally revealed, the listener has already understoodhow it relates to their current problem or situation and can reframe the entiremetaphor to match their own experience. Some more detailed examples of metaphors are: Simile: Uses “like” or “as” to make a comparison

White as a sheetCold as iceTough as nails

Parable: Uses figures of speech to teach a moral lesson. Aesop’s fables arean excellent example to look at and are also considered fables.

The Tortoise and the Hare (success depends on using your talents, notonly having them)The Ant and the Grasshopper (if you want to succeed tomorrow, youhave to start working today)The Country Mouse and the City Mouse (poverty with security isbetter than a luxury in the midst of fear and uncertainty)

Allegory: Uses rhetorical devices to reveal the hidden meaning of a literalconcept.

The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, by C.S. Lewis, is a Christian,religious allegory.Animal Farm, by George Orwell, is a political allegory about theRussian Revolution.The Wizard of Oz, by L. Frank Baum, is an allegory about the social,economic, and political life of 1890’s America.

Complex metaphors are excellent distraction tools for the conscious mind,allowing the unconscious to search for and find meaning in the comparisonsthey can make to their own life. Even if you didn’t live during the Gold Rush

(Wizard of Oz), you may feel like Dorothy, lost in Oz, in your own life. Yourmind will naturally relate to metaphors as you unconsciously relate throughyour own mind map and representational system to find meaning andresources. The unconscious mind naturally appreciates the relationship between allthings. The relationship between the Earth and the Sun, up and down, fastand slow and the relationship between life and death, young and old, andhappy and sad. Creating a successful metaphor to resolve the issues of life is an NLP toolthat you can use for your own growth and model for excellence, as well asyour relationships to your family and romantic relationships and friends andcolleagues, too. When you build metaphors to understand your own or other people’sexperiences, it is important to make sure that the relationships betweenelements of your story are the same as the elements of the issues you want toresolve. This will create a better understanding and resonate more deeplywith the unconscious mind. Making MetaphorsGood stories create expectations and then satisfy them. Living life excellentlyfollows the same pattern. Metaphors help create an understanding of yourjourney toward excellence. Making metaphors uses both the Milton and Meta Models as well as pacingand leading, anchoring trance, smooth transitions, and a plot that relates to

the person you are making a metaphor for, even if it is just for you. So many fables, parables, and fairy tales are significantly generalized to beable to encapsulate more people’s ability to relate to that story. When it isgeneral and vague, it can relate to everyone’s unique map of reality. To create a metaphor, you need the following steps:

1. Consider the Present State and the Desired State (see Part Two,Chapter 14)

Find the elements of BOTH states-location-people-objects-activities-time of day/length of time-representational systems-submodalities

2. Replace the elements listed from the Present State and the Desired

State (the problem and the solution) with a different set of problems,keeping the relationship the same. Let’s use the fable of The Tortoiseand the Hare as an example:

Present State = the beginning of the race-hilly, rural landscape with a long dirt road to run on-running a race-from early morning until it is over-contenders: tortoise and hare

-representational system of tortoise: slow, gentle, patient, desireto win-representational system of the hare: fast, lazy, confident, desireto win Desired State = the finish line-place that determines the winner at the end of the road-later in the day-reward of winning and competing-fair game

This just gives you an example of how you can outline a situation utilizingthe concept of the present state and the desired state. It’s usually best to startfrom that point so you can identify where you are coming from and whereyou would like to go so that you can fill in the details of the story with richerrepresentational systems and submodalities. Let’s take the moral of the Tortoise and the Hare and use it to build ametaphor for a more likely life situation: success depends on not only havingtalents but also using them. Present State: In line for a promotion at work and there are several otherapplicants. Elements of Present State: You have worked for the company for years andknow everyone in the office very well; you are confident in your work andhave been rewarded in the past. You know you can win the promotion basedon this reality. There is another applicant who is new to the company but has

demonstrated stellar work performance and competency. Desired State: Promoted to the position you interviewed for. Elements of Desired State: in the corner office with a raise; congratulated bythe company for your obvious win. Benefited by the promotion in your homeand family life. Kicked back in your chair with your feet on the table, takinga much-needed rest from all your hard work. So, now that you have the present and desired states accounted for, you cancreate the rest of the metaphor. Since this metaphor is being used with TheTortoise and The Hare, we will presuppose that you are the hare, and the newcompany member is the tortoise. Get the picture? Using an example from an already known fable helps toidentify the structure of how to begin creating your own metaphors for life.When you incorporate the language of the Meta and Milton Model, plus otherNLP tools, you can greatly improve your ability to connect with yoursubconscious resources. It is a tool to displace the focus of the listener whichallows them to focus on and search their subconscious. The structure of ametaphor is the pace in pacing and leading, and it ends with an outcome,which is the point of practicing and learning NLP: modelling excellence toachieve excellence.

Part Four: Programming

“Experience is not what happens to you, it is what you do with whathappens to you.” — Aldous Huxley

Chapter Twenty-Five: Learning New Programs The tools and techniques of Neuro-Linguistic Programming are unique to thistype of learning. Remember, it isn’t therapy, but it is based in therapypractices that involve understanding the present moment in your life, workingthrough your human experience by relating to family patterns and techniquesof hypnotherapy, that go deeper into the mind to uncover more of ourunconscious behaviors. What you will find in this toolbox, accessed and used together with practicewill take you through four stages of learning, until it becomes a part of howyou live. When you learn something new, your mind works in a certain way:

1. First, you have unconscious incompetence, in which you don’t evenknow what you don’t know. You simply don’t know that you don’tknow, but it is in front of you, ready to be modeled.

2. Next, you are incompetently conscious, meaning that you are wellaware of what is required to do something, or perform a function, butyou are still learning the process and may experience the discomfort ofthe learning curve.

3. Then, consciously competent, you are understanding of what you havelearned and can practice it but haven’t quite mastered it.

4. Finally, in the learning process, you come to unconsciously competent,when you easily understand and perform your new skills, blendingthem together with your overall conscious awareness. This is doingsomething a certain way without realizing you know how, likebrushing your teeth or driving a car.

As you work through these next chapters, you will engage in learning,unlearning, and relearning systems of thought and language that can informyour experience. What you learn, over time, will become a part of how awareyou are of yourself, your reactions, behaviors, and attitudes and will give yougreater capacity to understand these connections in others.

Chapter Twenty-Six: Using Creative Visualization So much of what you learn in NLP requires the use of your creativeimagination. As you read in earlier chapters, your mind’s ability toexperience, store, and recall our memories comes from our senses. Often,without even being of aware of it, we form internal pictures in what isreferred to as “the mind’s eye.” In this place, you can see and re-experienceyour past, imagine a future moment, and reframe perceptions of reality. When you use NLP, you are engaging with your sensory perceptions andlearning how to understand the way your brain works. We neither canrecreate or re-experience things that have already occurred nor can we knowthe future exactly as it will happen. We can only truly perceive the detail ofthe present moment. That is how your creative visualization can be useful when you are practicingNLP techniques. You will use your mind’s eye often to recall past incidencesso you can reframe them and reintegrate them in a new way. You will also beable to Future Pace, a term in NLP that involves visualizing yourself in afuture situation so that you can preemptively experience the way you want itto go with the confidence you want to have. Future pace takes any kind of topic, problem, challenge, or limitation andallows you to see it as though it were happening in your mind. When you usethis technique, you can integrate the parts you want and eliminate the partsyou don’t. Parts is equivalent to behaviors, attitudes, or negative thoughtpatterns.

Here is an example of what that can look like: Let’s say you have a big presentation at work coming up and it could put youin line for that promotion you have been desiring. The last time you gave apresentation it didn’t go the way you had hoped because you felt nervous,unprepared, and worried that someone was going to give a more well-plannedand confident work report. Preparing for this upcoming presentation, you can use the future pacingtechnique. This technique is usually performed after you have integratedsome other NLP training tools, however, the point of this example is tooutline the concept of visualization and the impact on your mental processthat it has on a future event. So, before you have this presentation, create a mental rehearsal in your mind.It is important that you close your eyes when doing this so that you can trulysee the image of the experience. When you imagine yourself in the conference room, notice how it feels. Doesyour posture change? Do you begin to feel uncertain or insecure? If theanswer is yes, then you can utilize some visualization to help you reframeyour potential experience. Remember a time in your life when you felt confident and secure. Remembera time in your life where you felt well spoken and calm. Remember a time inyour life where you felt a sense of achievement and accomplishment. Holdthose feelings in your mind and your body.

Keeping your eyes closed, imagine yourself in this state of awareness whilegiving your presentation. Imagine a color that makes you feel all of thosepositive feelings. Imagine that while you are feeling those positive feelings,the color is bright and encircling you. You can also imagine a smell that youfind uplifting, refreshing, and energizing. Bring in the smell of citrus like anorange and have that color bright all around you. As you are rehearsing yourpresentation in your imagination, anytime you start to feel less confident,anxious or flustered, see the color dimming and the scent dissipating. Youwill notice this change in your behavior more if the light dims and the orangeis no longer the aroma of awareness. When you have this sensory awareness of your experience changing, thenyou know how to rekindle it. Turn the light back up so that it is brighter andput a whole basket of oranges in the room. Cover the floor with oranges ifyou have to. When you draw awareness to your change in attitude and behavior, you canchange it and using creative visualization as a tool to do this will be usedthroughout the NLP techniques in this book. You can use creative visualization for anything in your life and there is noright or wrong way to do it. Remember, you have a totally unique brain,unlike anyone else’s. The ideas you come up with when you visualize belongto your subjective experience and will always be most meaningful to you theway you see them. It is an amazing way to connect to your creativity, in general, which is

another one of the amazing benefits of NLP. When you use your own mind toimagine, you can think way outside the box of patterns and behaviors youhave been running in your mental programming for so long.

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Elicitation and Calibration Beyond our mental perception is our ability to perceive the feelings of othersthrough their tone, language, body posture, and eye movements. When youare working to understand your problem, or someone else’s, you may beacting to elicit a response to help them calibrate their behavior to a newresponse. Elicitation is how we bring out someone’s feelings or reactions to aparticular experience, conversation, memory, and so forth. You may have hadexperiences with colleagues or family members where you have made astatement or asked a question and witnessed them slump, sigh, and leave theroom. In your mind, you are wondering why they responded that way andmaybe not so much how you elicited that kind of response. When you want to help someone, or yourself, recalibrate a particularbehavior or response, you must first elicit and model the response you aretrying to calibrate. Let’s say you are working to help someone feel moreenthusiastic in their work environment. They have been feeling discouragedbecause they have been operating under the belief that they are always thelast in line, never getting a reward or recognition for their hard work. Without even hearing the words, you can see in their posture that they aresitting with their shoulders hunched forward, head drooped low, and have afurrowed brow. If you empathize with that posture, you reinforce it. If youwant to elicit enthusiasm and encouragement, you model it to them.

When you ask them to remember a time that felt enthusiastic about theirwork, witness their body language change, their tone of voice soften, theireyes look in a different direction and their head lift up, readjusting to sit moreupright in the chair. We say so much more with our bodies and our voice thanwe actually do with our words. So, if you want to elicit a more enthusiastic response from someone, sit infront of them with an enthusiastic posture and encouraging tone of voice.Model the softness in the tone and relaxed back and head. Elicit enthusiasmby being it. Calibration is actually recognizing when someone is in a particular state.This occurs most often unconsciously because you aren’t even aware that youmight be noticing that someone is feeling “off” because of their facialexpression or low energy. You take it in and it becomes part of the mind mapyou build about the experience that you are having. Calibration isn’t mind reading, it is being observant and using yourunderstanding of mental processes to make an assessment of someone’sparticular attitude or mental state. You get better with practice, but what itdoes is help you to recognize not only your own motivations for your actionsor reactions in certain experiences but others too. Being able to understandthe process of others helps you maintain more balanced, healthy, andtransformative relationships. Here is an activity you can practice with a friend, colleague, or loved one togive you an example of how calibration works:

1. Ask your partner to think of a person their life that they really like andrespect. As they picture this person, notice the subtle changes in eyemovement, head angle, and any changes in breathing. Do the eyessoften? How does the head tilt? Does the breathing get relaxed orquicken?

2. Allow them to describe the person. Pay attention to their facialexpressions, muscle movements, body shifting. Also, notice the tone oftheir voice. Does it lengthen and soften or change pitch or cadence?

3. Process this subtle information: these external expressions arereflections of inner thought.

4. Now, ask your partner to imagine a person that they dislike and repeatsteps 1–3. Notice the differences between their external expressionsbetween the person the like and the person they dislike.

5. Now that you have these references, go back and forth between them.Ask them to imagine each one again for a few moments, withouttelling you which one they are thinking of: you will know which one itis by reading the physical cues you have learned from them by elicitinga response from them.

Beyond this exercise, realize again, that most calibration occursunconsciously. If you are asking your romantic partner if they are ok and theyrespond to you a certain way, you may pick up on more than just the wordsthey use. They may say, “I’m fine,” however you are also receiving theirfacial expression, tone, body language, and other cues that elicit a differentresponse from the verbal one they offered. When you can understandcalibration, you can pick up on more than just their verbal expression andfind ways to utilize your understanding of the moment to find the deepermeaning in their experience.

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Anchors and How to UseThem

When you think of an anchor, what comes to mind? We all have a differentmap of reality, so it could be any number of ideas, images, or sensations. Youmight have seen in your head the classic image of a ship’s anchor: the big,heavy-metal, hook that gets thrown over the side of the ship to make contactwith the sand below to hold the ship in place. In NLP, that is basically what an anchor is: a stimulus that triggers aphysiological state. In the case of the ship, the stimulus is the literal anchorthat triggers the boat to stop moving, which is its change of state; frommoving to not moving. Psychological anchors work in this way and are greatly linked to ourmemories and our previously occurring, sensory experiences. You may hearsomeone say, “That really triggers me.” They are referring to an anchor andusually when someone makes an expression like that, it is because there issomething in their past that occurred that when replicated in some fashion,through their reality and filters, elicits the same emotional response. Our anchors are personal. They are created through repetition, being usedover and over again. They can also be created from just one experience. If ina certain situation the emotional reaction is strong enough and the timing isjust right, an anchor can be created. Many people who have suffered atraumatic experience may have that kind of anchor.

Anchors can be words, colors you associate with certain experience orsituation, sounds and smells. Our triggers are connected, like most things inour minds, to our sensory experiences. Take, for example, seeing the colorred. What do you associate with the color red? Many of us might associate itwith the word “STOP.” Stop lights and stop signs are painted red. When wesee that color while driving, we are unconsciously compelled to stop. That isan anchor. When you smell burning, either from toast in the toaster that gotset in for too long, or the hairs on the curling iron that was turned up too hot,you unconsciously associate the smell of burning with something “off.” Thisis an anchor. There are anchors that can be useful and those that are not and even theuseful ones can feel unpleasant. Separating them into categories can help yousee that an anchor isn’t good or bad; anchors are simply a change in state.Habits, like driving a car and following traffic signals, would be considereduseful. Hearing someone honking their horn at you is an anchor to alert youthat you aren’t paying attention. Seeing a cop car is often an unpleasantanchor to get you to check your speed and slow down, and sometimes to alertyou that you are in the wrong and there will be consequences. All of thesecould be useful anchors for someone. Anchors that are not useful to a person could be any number of things.Having anxiety before speaking in front of the class is an anchor. If youassociate public speaking with fear or panic, then you are working with ananchor that isn’t helpful or useful. Walking into your lecture hall and seeingthe words “POP QUIZ” written on the blackboard is another anchor thattriggers the same effect.

The anchors that are useful to us might not need to change, but the ones thataren’t certainly can. Our phobias and fears, left unexamined, are connected tounhealthy triggers that limit the experiences we actually want to have. Changing your anchors can aid you in find the enjoyable moments from yourpast that you can connect to and associate with the present moment, therebyforming a new anchor that will be more beneficial to your success in life.When you use or create an anchor that is useful to your performance as aperson, you create new resources to offer you the kind of reality you want. The Two Stages of Forming Anchors

1. Choose the emotional state that you WANT2. Associate that emotional state with an ANCHOR so you can conjure

that state of mind whenever you want or need. Have you ever noticed how some high-performance athletes will performsome kind of routine or ritual before they go up to bat or prepare for a freethrow? That is an anchor. When they perform those small actions, they arepulling forward the emotion they need, be it focus, concentration, stamina, orstrength. It could look something like the cues a baseball coach gives to the pitcher sothey know to throw a fast curve ball. Even outside of sports, you can createan anchor to prepare for your presentation before a board meeting thatinvolves closing your eyes, putting your pointer fingers on the side of eachtemple, reciting, “You got this,” and then starting your speech. What Makes a Good Anchor?

In order to have a good anchor you just need to follow a few, simple rules:

1. Make it unique and distinctive2. Make it easy to repeat again3. Connect it to your senses

Making it unique means that it needs to be different from any other anchorsyou may already have. You might not realize just how fluid your movementsare when you start your car. You probably do it the same way every time, andthat is an anchor. When creating a new anchor, decide on something thatstands out to you, but that would be conspicuous to anyone else. Subtle handgestures or reciting of a mantra can be very effective. Making it something you can repeat, means not overcomplicating the anchor.You want to refine it down to one, two simple things, rather than a complexseries of hand movements and eye rolls. Holding your right hand so that yourmiddle finger and thumb touch gently is a good example. Placing your handover your heart and patting it three times is another. Since anchors can alsobe words, sounds, images, and so forth, try to keep these ideas simple, too.Picturing sunshine on your face or seeing a trophy and nothing else would do.Saying the words, “I am ready!” would be plenty to get the point across. Itneeds to be easy to revisit and repeat. Connecting it to your senses means using anything visual (sight), auditory(hearing), kinesthetic (touch), olfactory (smell), and gustatory (taste). In allprobability, you will mostly just use the first three senses when creatinganchors, and you can use more than one sense to create an anchor.

If you want to remember the senses, you can use this outline: VAKOGV = visionA = auditoryK = kinestheticO = olfactoryG = gustatory For the following exercise, and in most cases that you create anchors foryourself, you will only be utilizing VAK. This type of anchoring is referred to as resource. Resource anchoringdemonstrates that the key to peak performance in our lives is resourcefulstates. When we are resourceful in our emotional experiences, we areunlimited with how we can handle any given situation. Think of your internalresources like you would any resources in your life. Your pantry is full ofresources to feed your body and keep you alive. Your mind and body are fullof emotional resources to do the same thing. Here are the steps for creating a resource anchor:

1. Sit comfortably in a chair or stand.2. Think of a situation that you want to change (respond differently to).3. Choose an emotional state that you have experienced before that you

want to bring up in this moment (e.g., courage, joy, calm, humor,grace, confidence).*This emotional state is your resource.

4. When you have determined the resource you want to anchor, locate inyour memory a specific moment that you felt that emotion. Choose themoment that is most clear or intense feeling. (If you have not yetexperienced the resource you are wanting to anchor, then use yourimagination. Your experiences have given you examples of whatconfidence looks/feels like, so use those images from your experience).

5. NOW FOR THE ANCHOR—this is where you determine the VAK ofwhat your anchor is (visual, auditory, kinesthetic). Use an empoweringsymbol or object that represents the feeling (V). It can even be animage you picture from the last time you felt that resource. Choose aword or phrase that resonates with the resource emotion. (A) You canalso connect a certain tone to it if it needs to be soft and soothing, forexample, or empowering and exclamatory. Create a gesture, posture, orboth together, that elicits a physical experience (K). You can gentlyand slowly pull on your right earlobe or pronounce your chest to lift ithigher and more proudly. You can simply place your palms togetherand touch your fingers to the bottom of your chin. Whatever youchoose for each anchor, make it different from other things in your life.

Now you have created an anchor. That is just the first part of the process. Ifyou want to commit your anchor to your reality, then you need to bring it intoreality. Here are the steps for implementing your anchor:

1. From your position, either seated or standing, you need to alter yourphysical moment. Bring it to your body by either standing from sittingor simply step forward if you are already standing.

2. As you change position, relive the resource feelings you are attemptingto anchor, be it confidence, bravery, calm, etc. Bring that emotion intofocus as you stand or step forward.

3. Remember that time in your life that you felt that way. Really allowyourself to see it and feel it.

4. Move back into your original position after you have relived thisresource emotion from your past experience. (This experiencedemonstrates to you how to recreate your resource feeling.)

5. NOW FOR THE ANCHOR—When you reach the peak of the desiredfeeling bring in your VAK. See your image, say your word, or phrase,make your gesture. Connect this anchor to the height of the emotionyou are experiencing.

6. Repeat anchors the same way every time to elicit the same response.7. Once anchored, create a break state by breaking away from the

experience and thinking about something completely different, like thesecond to last digit in your social security number. This allows yourneural pathways to have closure with the anchor so that no otherexperiences can be connected to it. It’s a clean break.

8. Repeat this process a few times or as needed to anchor your anchor soto speak.

Once you have created and implemented your anchor, you can use itwhenever you need that resource. Right before a test, you may need to anchoryour focus. If you have created an anchor for concentration, then you can useit throughout your test. You can add more than one emotional resource to the same anchor. Thistechnique is called stacking resources. It can be done with the same steps

above, but instead of creating a break state to close the mind loop for youranchor, you continue the steps again to anchor another resource emotion. Inthe same example above for needing concentration in a test, you may alsoneed confidence and stamina, so you would be able to include all of that inthe same VAK anchor. Another way to use anchors is what is called Collapsing Anchors. Thisrevolves around 2 different feelings felt at the same time. Usually, they arefeelings that oppose each other, such as happy and sad, or angry and calm;essentially, one is negative and one is positive. The idea behind collapsing anchors is that if you drop both anchors at thesame time, your mind is confused and only one anchor can remain intact. Thenegative anchor, the one you are hoping to change, is altered and replacedwith something better. To identify this, you can use a sentence structure like, “There are times whenI feel like this (negative anchor), and in these situations, I would prefer to feellike that (positive anchor). This is a good format for identifying the emotionor state that you want to change, the resource emotion that you want toanchor and that both have value to the situation. Like your life experience, your anchors are unique to you. They are a majorcomponent in how NLP actually works and gives you the ability to havemore emotional choice in your life. Start practicing these techniques withyourself, or implement in your relationships and work experience.

Chapter Twenty-Nine: Congruence andIncongruence

Where does conflict come from? We all live in the same world, but we allmake different models of it. Conflict starts if we begin to demand that what isof value to us should be as important to everyone. We create different mapsof life and we all have that right. What shapes and informs our map of realityis what gives us meaning and a sense of purpose. CongruenceThe word congruence means agreement, harmony, compatibility. Ourinternal congruence, our balance within, occurs when all of our verbal andnonverbal behaviors are supportive of our desired outcomes. It is our powerand our strength. Simply put, our harmony within ourselves is our harmonyin the world. If you haven’t felt that balance within for some time and you want toremember what it feels like, think back on a time in your personal historywhen you really wanted something. When you have recalled that memoryand feeling, then you can begin to understand the feeling of congruence. Many small children live in this state. Think about the character Ralphie fromthe film A Christmas Story. The entire movie is about his longing for a Red-Rider BB Gun and every time he talks about it to a grown up his eyes glazeover and he can stop grinning. That is congruence. Incongruence

So then, it stands to reason that the opposite of that would be incongruence.When you operate from this place, you a getting mixed messages fromwithin, like an out of tune guitar string that doesn’t sound quite right with therest or a color that just doesn’t go with the rest of the décor, but you can’tquite explain why. If you are often out of balance your getting uncertain information from yourunconscious mind which can lead to self-sabotage and muddy actions.Incongruence is a signal from the self that you need to discover more beforemoving ahead; you need more information. You can identify incongruence in yourself by recalling a time in your lifewhen you felt any qualms or reservations about a situation or plan of action.Did you experience feelings of uncertainty? When you are recalling this time,do any feelings come up in your body? A change in posture? A change inbreathing? Perhaps there is a sound, color, or image that correlates to thismoment in time. Anything that is present in the experience that points towardyour uncertainty and feelings of not wanting to fully commit. Whatever comes to mind first in that moment is your incongruence signal. InPart 1, you were introduced to the concept of submodalities. Identifying yourincongruence signal is easier if you use submodalities for identification. Wasthe image in your head near or far? Was the sound loud or soft? Was thefeeling good or bad? The more clarification to give, the more clarity you get. Work on finding out through these simple techniques what makes you feel

congruent and incongruent. From this understanding, you will be able tobetter determine what kinds of changes you would like to make to better yourlife experience. Here is a technique to help develop more congruence that involves creativevisualization: Parts Integration

1. Identify your conflict2. Visualize the conflict on one of your hands3. Recognize what the opposite behavior is (ex: angry vs calm)4. Elicit the opposite behavior to appear on your hand5. Personify the behavior or feeling (ex: give anger a scowl and a frown

and calm a look of contentment.)6. Determine the intention. What is the purpose of the behavior?7. Have the personified behaviors/feelings turn and face each other and

see them acknowledge that they are part of the same whole.8. List what the resources are for each behavior—each has a part to play

in life.9. Merge the two together by bringing your hands together.

10. You have integrated two parts of the same whole. Practice this skill often to achieve regular congruence.

Chapter Thirty: Eye Movement Integration When you search for information in your mind, what happens? On aninvisible level, our neural pathways lighting up, sending surges of electricenergy throughout, our synapses firing off. This we cannot see on the outside,but if you look at a person who is searching for data in their main computerafter you ask them when the last time they ate sushi was, they are going toactually look somewhere with their eyes. Eye Movement Integration is an NLP concept that focuses on how our eyemotions in accordance with our body movement correlate to our thinking.Once again, it is all about the senses. Depending on which direction youreyes look, right or left, up or down, you are accessing a particular sense. This movement, sometimes referred to as Lateral Eye Movement (LEM), isactually accessing and activating different parts of the brain while you aredigging for information on a neurological level. NLP refers to them as accessing cues because it is an indication of howsomeone might be accessing information. There is an innate connectionbetween eye accessing cues and our representational systems that you learnedabout in Part 2. Most of the time, it is hard for a person to be able to have consciousawareness of their own eye accessing cues, because it is occurringunconsciously in the moment, but if you are aware of what sense correlates towhich eye movement, then you can direct yourself to a particular memory or

feeling by positioning your eyes in the direction to assist your brain inaccessing the information. It is very useful for understanding how other people think. Your workcolleagues in meetings, or your family members, perform these actions everyday, you just may not have noticed before. Start looking for these cues todevelop a better understanding of other people’s thought processes. Havingawareness can be beneficial in influencing others and being more open totheir subjective experiences. Eye Accessing CuesVisualization: eyes straight aheadVisual-Constructed image: eyes up and to the rightVisual-Remembered Image: eyes up and to the leftConstructed sounds: eyes to the right sideRemembered Sounds: eyes to the left sideFeelings/Sensations: eyes down and to the rightAuditory/Internal Dialogue: eyes down and to the left According to studies, most right-handed people have this eye pattern. It issuggested that it could be reversed for left-handed people, but there isn’tconclusive evidence to back this up. Using eye accessing cues is an incredibly useful NLP tool, especially inrelationships with other people. Knowing and understanding what each cuepoints to can help you understand another person. Learn the cues and thenbegin a practice of making observations with the people around you in yourlife. You can have a greater understanding of another person’s thoughts when

you practice this skill. It can benefit you as a way to get to the bottom of thoughts and feelings thatare more deeply hidden than others. Many modern therapy practices utilizeeye movement integration, another name for this tool, to help client’s lookdeep into their psyche for the feelings or past experiences that have causedthem difficulty in their lives. If you are learning NLP because you want to incorporate these skills in orderto help other people, then you will need to understand eye accessing cues. Asyou dig into the areas that need change, you will need to be observant ofwhere the other person is “looking” in their mind.

Chapter Thirty-One: Reframing Imagine an image: a piece of artwork, a fine landscape, and a mentalphotograph of a memory. Now picture a frame to surround the image. Is itsimple and black? Gold and ornate? Is the frame another picture? How does itlook now that it is in the frame you imagined? Does it change the picture? All of the events in our lives have meaning to us and the meaning depends onwhat frame you put it in. If you change the frame you change the meaning.When the meaning of a situation or experience changes, it follows that yourresponses, behaviors, and attitudes will also change. NLP teaches the skill to give your life greater freedom and choice: that is thepurpose of reframing. Failure is a point of view; so is misfortune. When you learn these skills, youreframe your experience and the way you react to the world around you sothat what seems like hardship, transforms into a blessing in disguise. Excellent examples of this are fairytales: stories that turn an unlucky orcursed experience into good fortune and a happy ending. Another example of reframing that turns something that might be negative atfirst to something positive in the end. Saying that pouring rain cancels theball game is a misfortune for some, but the farmers in the area rejoiced in thelong-needed rain for their summer crops and celebrated good fortune as aresult. Reframing.

There are two types of reframing: context and content. Context = The SettingThis is circumstance: whatever forms the setting for an idea, statement, orevent; the place where it can be fully realized.Context reframing will work best with a statement like:I’m too….I wish I could change this… Reframing the context asks the question:When would this behavior be useful?Where would this behavior/attitude be a resource? Content = The FocusContent reframing works best with statements like this:I panic when I have to give a presentation at work.I get angry when people don’t do what I say. Reframing the content asks the question:What is the positive value of this attitude?How else could I describe this behavior? If you are unable to answer these questions in a way that can positivelyreframe the behavior or attitude, then it will be an opportunity to modeldifferent behavior and access different resource emotions to change theexperience into one you want.

You can’t stop the rain from falling on the last game of the season, but youcan change your emotions and behavior about certain experiences in yourlife.

Chapter Thirty-Two: Rapport Building Have you ever sat down in a crowded restaurant at lunchtime and seen all thedifferent ways people interact with each other? You can tell almostimmediately who has a rapport and who doesn’t. Rapport is a relationshipbetween two people, or a group, who communicate well and have empathy,harmony, and affinity with each other. To understand rapport, you have to ask this question: how can you respect orappreciate another person’s experience while keeping your own integrity? Rapport leads to empathy which promotes trust, confidence, and participationin the people around us. If the people in our lives feel trust and confidence,then they have the ability to be themselves and speak freely from their ownfeelings and experiences. Rapport is the skill that teaches you how to create that bond of trust andresponsiveness. If you actually want to know how to refine and build thisskill, look at people have a rapport. What does it look like?

Communication flowsBody language and tone of voice synchronizesPostures matchEye contact is secure

There is a lot of mirroring, but this is not the same as mimicry. Mimicry isusually obvious and can be offensive, which dramatically decreases rapport.

People in rapport match in posture, gesture, and eye contact. It is actually proven that you can build rapport with just about anyone bymatching their body language, tone of voice, and eye contact. It is verycomplimentary and puts the other person at ease right away. Sometimes, youmay not even realize you are doing it; it just naturally occurs. If you arewanting to practice this skill to help your relationships both at work and athome, then pay attention to the way that it works so you can recreate it. You will have to develop that awareness and ability to observe in order to fallinto rapport with each person. Everyone is different, so it will always changefrom person to person, but what doesn’t change are the basics to focus on:

PostureGestureEye contact

If you want to get more detailed than that:

Mirroring posture: body weight distribution, basic stance, breathingrhythmMirroring gesture: arm and hand positions, gesticulations, enthusiasmin motionMirroring Eye contact: looking in the same direction, making eyecontact with the same timing and duration, softening or widening eyesMirroring Voice: tone, speed, volume, rhythm, cadenceThe only two ways you can limit your ability to gain rapport arethrough an inability to perceive these qualities in another person (e.g.

posture, gesture, speech) and your skills with matching. All of the mirroring and matching is best and most effective when subtle andconspicuous. Anything exaggerated will take a wrong turn and you will findyou steer to the other side of rapport, which is the lack of rapport. The skill of building rapport is useful in all parts of your life. When you havea rapport with others, you not only inspire confidence in them, but you alsogain more confidence in yourself.

Chapter Thirty-Three: Physiology of Excellence Your physiology is your body function. Much of what NLP focuses on is themind and mental state; however, the body greatly informs so much of ourthoughts, actions, and behaviors. Your posture or stance is a direct reflectionof what you may be feeling inside. When you feel confident, you stand tall,proud, and robust. When you feel insecure, your shoulders hunch forward,your head hangs down, and your toes turn in. Try something right now: think of something really sad or the last time youfelt depressed. Hold it in your thoughts. As you are thinking about this sadmoment or feeling, look down at the floor for a few moments, consideringthis sad moment. Feel the emotion. Continuing with that emotion look up atthe ceiling for a few moments. Is the feeling still present? Are you able to hold onto the feeling of sadness? Probably not. When you make a subtle change in your physiology you makea change in your emotion or mental state. Your body and mind are alwaysworking together to make one, beautiful experience. Now, think of someone you consider to be successful or accomplished.Picture them in your mind. How are they standing, or gesturing? What kindof posture do they have? Is your posture anything similar? If you want to express more confidence and security, change the way you arestanding. Change the way you are breathing. Change the way you hold your

shoulders and your head. When you imagined that figure of success just a moment ago, did you alsoimagine yourself standing that way? If you didn’t do it now. Stand up andadopt the posture of the successful person you imagined. Be specific. Thinknot only about the posture but also the gestures they would make or the waytheir eyes might look around at a crowd of people. The way we think affects our bodies and how we use our bodies has animpact on the way we think.

Conclusion Nothing in this life is as unique as your own ability to create the world youlive in. Every one of us is on a journey, searching for the answers tobecoming happier, healthier, wiser, and more successful. We all have somany intricately detailed experiences that color and shift our realities furtheras we grow older: we are always changing and transforming. NLP is a guide for you to know how you make decisions, how you can learnnew behaviors, how you can use language to interpret and understand yourreality, and how to enhance your experience of success and excellence. NLPteaches you the tools and skills you need to be more confident, caring andsolution-oriented about your own life and the lives of others. You have the power to learn and model excellence. You have the power tochange what you want in your life. You have the power to find your rich,internal resources and bring them forward at the exact moment they areneeded. All of the people in this world that you consider successful or models ofexcellence are successful and excellent because of a certain structure forunderstanding themselves and their goals. We are all unique; no one has thesame reality. What you take away from this book is not how to be exactlylike someone else and their success but how to understand the concepts andstructure of success to make it a part of your own unique experience. Now that you have an understanding of NLP works, you can practice andrefine these skills and incorporate them into all areas of your life. You can

experience more of your life and make it more of the life that you want byknowing how your mind works and how to reframe problems, issues, andimportant moments to be non-judgmental, effective and resourceful. What you gain by modeling and practicing NLP is confidence,resourcefulness, influence, mental and emotional efficiency, flexibility,compassion increased learning ability, more success in business, moreconnected partnerships and relationships, and more. The possibilities of what you gain from NLP are limitless. So, keeppracticing! Keep modeling! Keep realizing the truth of your reality andchange what no longer works. Bring your new skills into your life every dayand feel the benefits. This is your mind map. This is your story. Tell it theway you want. You are ready. Finally, if you found this book useful in any way, a review on Amazon isalways appreciated!