Neuro Linguistic Programming was initially created in 1975 by mathematician Richard Bandler and linguistics professor John Grinder, who began modelling and duplicating the “magical results” of a few top communicators and therapists. Some of the first people to be studied included Hypnotherapist Milton Erickson, gestalt therapist Fritz Perls and family therapist Virginia Satir.
Since then continuous research has developed a powerful body of knowledge about how we process the information coming in through our senses from the world around us, how our brains store and retrieve information, and how we communicate with each other. As this knowledge has developed, so methods of changing the ways we deal with this information have also been developed.
For example, why is it that one person can quite comfortably handle a mouse, while another person is crippled with fear at the sight of one? In this case the brain has developed an image that wrongly links the mouse with danger, triggering the primitive “fight or flight” response, which causes sequences of nerve cell firing to occur and chemicals including adrenaline to be released into our bloodstream.
By its very nature, the fight or flight system bypasses our rational mind — where our more well thought out beliefs exist — and moves us into “defence” mode. Blood is directed into our muscles and limbs, which require extra energy and fuel for running and fighting. Our pupils dilate. Our awareness intensifies. Our sight sharpens. Our impulses quicken. We become prepared — physically and psychologically — for fight or flight. We scan and search our environment, “looking for the enemy.” We may overreact to the slightest comment. Our fear is exaggerated. Our thinking is distorted. We see everything through the filter of possible danger. Fear becomes the lens through which we see the world.
NLP gives us the tools to change this “enemy image” into something non-threatening and remove the unwanted fear or “phobia.” This is just a simple example of how NLP can be used.
Other areas of NLP focus on communication, interpersonal skills, values and belief systems – helping us to understand ourselves and others.
Would you like to:
- Communicate better
- Attract the right person for you
- Create better relationships
- Advance your career
- Improve your lifestyle
- Increase motivation and energy
- Create your desired self-image
In the end it is not a lot different from understanding how to program a computer. Computers are about man-machine interface. NLP is about mind-body interface. The entire process is very similar! Maybe it’s time to learn about your own personal bio-computer — your mind!
