Power Hypnosis

Motivational and self-help ideas are not new concepts. Many people use different ways to motivate themselves throughout the day. Those who have more problems and issues in their lives read countless self-help books and watch numerous self-help videos. Some people even do regular motivational exercises in order to help improve the quality of their everyday life.

One approach being used in psychotherapy is the NLP or neuro-linguistic programming. Among the concepts that the NLP uses as a basis, is that a person’s thoughts, perception, and behavior have great effects on the quality of their lives. It presupposes that a person can greatly improve his or her success in whatever aspect of his or her life by modeling or patterning the thoughts, perception, and behavior, of a highly successful and effective person. The NLP has been used to model some highly successful people and their techniques, among them: Walt Disney, for phenomenal creativity; Tiger Woods, for unshakeable attention; Milton Erickson, for irresistible verbal and body language of influence; Warren Buffet, for vast wealth creation; Aristotle, for methodology for building scientific models; Mahatma Gandhi, for visionary leadership; and Mozart, for extraordinary musical intuition.

Because many claim that the NLP help people change by teaching them to program their brains, it is quickly being adapted and applied even by ordinary people in their everyday lives. Many self-help “experts” have likewise used it and incorporated it into their lives. Among these people are Jack Canfield, author of the Chicken Soup series; Tony Robbins, the renowned guru of self-help; and Wayne Dyer, a model for hundreds of thousands of people when it comes to self-actualization and personal success.

Although many of the concepts of the NLP that one would see in many reading materials are confusing and complicated, there are also many simplistic discussions and techniques available. The NLP has been widely used to reduce trauma and phobia, lose bad habits, achieve excellence, improve communication, succeed in business, improve relationships, and improve health.

Because of the wide application of the NLP, it is also quickly becoming more accessible to ordinary people. Most people learn about it by searching the internet and learning from the numerous free resources online. This is the easiest and the most recommended way to first get introduced to it. Afterwards, there are also many books, CDs, and DVDs now available for those who want to learn more. Lastly, more and more training programs on how to utilize the NLP are now available.

Get the FREE ebook that’ll teach you simple NLP techniques to help you succeed in life and leap frog to the top of your game at Apply The NLP Today.

It is remarkable how well-adapted human beings are for agreement. Our neurology has evolved to facilitate connection with other human beings, to allow a group to know more and do more than even its most productive members could accomplish on their own. Different parts of our brain interact to allow us to agree with each other on multiple layers. The different agreements interact so that it becomes easier to agree. NLP (neuro-linguistic programming) and integrated thinking provide models for the next step in the evolution of agreement.

Integrate these five layers of agreement to establish common ground and move forward with any individual or group:

1. Take full advantage of mirrors. Your brain comes equipped with mirror neurons that fire when you watch others. If you see them eat grapes, the neurons fire in the areas that would be activated if you were eating grapes. This effect multiples when someone sees you mirroring him/her. Looking at your smile fires neurons in his/her smile region – where neurons are already active because s/he was smiling first. Of course, the mirror neurons were also active in your smile region when you decided to smile back. You can effectively mirror postures, gestures and expression to create one layer of agreement.

2. Keep the beat. Your brain also comes equipped with centres that monitor dozens of different rhythms and notice when those rhythms are in sync with someone else’s. You can pick up a rhythmic gesture, vocal rhythms, or blinking and breathing patterns. Notice one of these rhythms in someone else, and then send it back with your own breathing, blinking or movements. The synchronization will register in both your brains, creating another layer of agreement.

3. Offer back exactly the words that have been given to you. Agreements are strongest when they are precise mirrors: don’t rephrase in your own words. Just repeat back part of what someone has said to you exactly as s/he said it. In the new context, you might be giving the phrase a different meaning or turning a statement into a question. That’s less important than having someone register that you have heard precisely what s/he said. Being heard is almost irresistible: it creates agreement about communicating even when the communication is about controversy.

4. Create shared language patterns. The easiest form is to ask a series of questions that elicit the same answer – either yes or no will do, as long as the same answer applies to each question in the series. If someone says no to you once, that person is disagreeing. If the same person says “no” five times in a row, s/he is agreeing to complete the pattern that you are suggesting with your questions. S/he can agree by saying “yes” or agree to disagree by saying “no” another time.

5. Just say “yes.” It’s infectious and it signals agreement even when your “yes” is actually a logical “no.” For instance, you might say, “Yes, coffee is delicious and I never drink it this late in the day.” “Yes, it’s true that I disagree,” invites more conversation than “No, I don’t agree.” Although the logic says “no,” the brain also processes the “yes” as a sign of another level of agreement. “Yes” establishes that you are mapping out common ground, not moving on to greener pastures.

It is well known that people are motivated less by logic than by the integration of logic with other factors. Our reasons for making choices and taking action are always a mix of many different processes working together. Building agreement on layers of interaction creates common ground and shared momentum. It’s a great basis from which to identify common reasons and shared interests. And it feels great to be in agreement – on lots of levels.

Linda Ferguson, Ph.D. is a senior partner at NLP Canada Training Inc. in Toronto, Canada. With her partner, Chris Keeler, Linda develops training that allows people to experience stronger integrity and better results. Clients experience rapid, sustainable change and long-term learning about how their thinking drives success. Drawing on fields from the arts to business to neuroscience, NLP Canada Training Inc. provides spring-training for the mind: clients sharpen their perceptions, focus their efforts, and become better at knowing what they want and communicating to get it.

More than 4 million American children ages 4 to 17 have been diagnosed with ADHD; more than half diagnosed are being treated with drugs. (Source. NCQA – National Committee for Quality Assurance)

Additionally almost 50% of children with AHDH have been suspended from school at some point.
ADHD is a neurobiological condition and a developmental disorder which results in problems with impulsiveness, attention span and hyperactivity.

It does not have to be that way. Neuro-Linguistic Programming offers amazing tools for children to take charge of their ‘brains’ and hence their actions. Misunderstood …certainly, drug treatment – not necessarily.

J…had a diagnosis of ADHD, was in Year 5 (aged 10) and had been excluded yet again for the day when I arrived at school. It was lunchtime and he rarely managed an afternoon. I had only read an article on NLP and ADHD at the weekend.

J…was not on my caseload of children at this school, but I needed to wait until lunch was over. I could not believe I had the opportunity to try out this stuff so soon.

I sat with J…, built rapport with him and engaged him in conversation. All the time he was playing with a ‘Rubiks cube’ and giving me virtually no eye contact. During the conversation he told me he had ‘kicked off’ in class. I went through the process I’d only read about at that time. I asked him about the images, sounds etc. he experienced in his head when he was ‘kicking off.’

He told me they were Dexter cartoons , and that the sound was kind of s-l-u-r-r-y. We dealt with his inner images and his slurry sound until he had one fixed color picture and sound was a normal speed.
He even tried to get back his old images, just to check it out for himself.

As we went through the process and ‘chatted’ he fiddled less and less with the Rubik’s cube until finally he placed it on the table in front of him. Wow, he then gave me full eye contact and we just talked a normal conversation.

I told the Head teacher about our experience and she totally took it on board. When a ‘kicking off’ was anticipated she asked him, ‘Do you remember the work you did with Mrs. O.? How many pictures do you have now?

He was able to adjust his internal images and calm himself down. With this input and a change of teacher the following year, not only did his exclusion stop – he was able to go on a one-week residential trip with his class.

Some say their brains don’t work properly. Maybe no one has shown them how!

Following that I became a NLP Master Practitioner and NLP Life Coach, using my NLP tools extensively with children and adults in and out of school.

Pauline Oliver
http://happinesspages.com

Pauline is a retired teacher, now committed to helping others find their own happiness. Pauline believes strongly that we hold our destiny in our hands and that some knowledge is too important not to be shared freely.

One of our clients have recently reported great success in applying NLP techniques in sales environment. They previously closed about 30% of incoming phone inquiries, and after 3 days of NLP sales training with us, they now close almost 90 % of inquiries. This article outlines the basic NLP strategies that I shared with them. Although a written word can not replace live NLP training and practice, you may get a much better idea of what you can do to increase your sales, especially those carried over the phone.

1. Match tonality of your prospective client

Notice if your client talks using high, medium or low tonality. Take care to match their tonality, especially at the beginning of your conversation. For example, if your client talks in low pitch of voice, and your natural voice has got a high pitch to it, step out of your comfortable zone and lower your tonality. This is very powerful way to build rapport with your prospective client very quickly.

2. Talk their language

Listen to your client closely to determine how are they using their senses to process information. Depending on the key words and predicates they use, you will be able to determine which representational system is their favourite and how do they need to be talked to in order to ‘get what you are saying’.

• Visual People
Visual people think in images. They imagine what they want and learn by seeing. So you need to show them your product, send them brochure or e-mail them with graphs and pictures. They will use words such as see, view, bright, show, picture, clear, look, perceive, illustrate, focus, reflect, watch, preview. If you talk to them in visual terms, they will smile, comprehend, understand. They will be comfortable with you.

• Auditory People
Auditory people respond to sounds better than people who use other modes of thinking. They love talking on the phone. Your tonality will be important to them. They will use words such as talk, hear, say, tell, sound, mention, accent, question, inquire and ask. Talk to them in auditory terms – they will ‘hear’ you.

• Kinesthetic People
Kinesthetic People ‘feel’ the world. They will respond best to touch, emotions and gut instinct. They make frequent pauses in their conversations and often use words such as feel, touch, grasp, affect, pressure, grab, cold. Use these and similar words when you talk to them. Do not rush in conversation as they need slightly longer to process information than visual or auditory people.

3. Ask questions – plenty of them!

Effective questions and listening is the bottom line of trust. You will not be able to establish rapport with your client if you cannot listen. Every conversation is relationship, and you are there do discover your needs and values of your client – not other way round! Unfortunately, many sales people overlook importance of effective listening. They talk to the point when they oversell, often past the point when the client is willing to buy. By talking they often buy their product back!

Have a list of relevant open ended questions handy. Ask – and listen! Do not limit yourself to listening to what they say, listen to their emotions also. For example, if they use words ‘happy’ but sound flat, use this information and probe further. By asking questions and paying attention you will remain in control of conversation as you can use what you now know to describe your product accordingly. Link your product to needs of your client.

4. Uncover price at the end of conversation

Once I was asked by lady selling professional services for advice of how to improve her sales. She was happy with amount of inquiries she received, the only problem was, she converted hardly any of them. When I asked her to describe how the phone conversation usually went, she admitted that people usually called to ask about price, to which she promptly gave answer.

There is no surprise that she was struggling to sell. People who are interested in your product or service will often start with that question: “How much will it cost?” If you answer there and then, you have nowhere else to go. Unless they already made their mind up before their picked up the phone, you just lost your opportunity to get to know your client, to build relationship, to uncover their needs and to build value of your product or service.

So what to do when price is the only question on your customer’s mind? It is actually very simple. When you are presented with question about the price at the beginning of conversation, ask your client: “Sure, and to answer that, may I ask you what got you interested in our product / service?” You can also tell them that it is free if it is not right for them and start asking questions.

Tell them about price towards the end of your conversation, once you know you built value of your product or service enough. If you did that well, price is never a question. Your customer only needs to know what they are paying for. Shortly after this point, it is a good idea to ask for objections, answer them if there are any, and ask for order.

5. Sell with integrity

This is probably the most important tip for increased sales – sell with integrity! If you have win win outcome in your mind and genuinely care about your client, you will find it very easy to build relationship with your client and sell them your product or service.

Once I was asked by a professional sales man whether we run an advanced course for building rapport. When I explained that rapport building skills are covered on each of our training courses, he said that he wants something more advanced than that. I told him: “No, we do not run any specialised courses for building rapport, however I can give you one advice right here and now that will surely advance your building rapport skills, would you like that?” And I told him to care about his customers. I told him to want the best for them. I told him to have a win win outcome in his mind. In other words, I told him to sell with integrity.

He had a ‘light bulb’ moment and I had a good feeling. I knew that from then on he will start building relationships instead of selling. Because to me, that what sales are about – meaningful relationships. With that in mind, sales excellence becomes so much more realistic.

Lenka Majstrikova is an expert author, Trainer and Master Practitioner of NLP, Time Line Therapy™ & Hypnosis, personal change facilitator and an absolute believer in the magnificence of every human being. She is a Founder and Managing Director of Ultimate Mind (http://www.ultimatemind.co.uk/), dynamic training company delivering accredited training courses in NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) for personal and professional development.

Join Lenka on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/ultimatemind to find more of inspirational articles and tips for living happy, healthy and prosperous life.

We can all use a boost or two of self-confidence. Unfortunately, these boosts don’t come in tablets or in pills. If you want to step out of your shell, you need to summon it from within. That’s where NLP techniques for confidence come in.

These techniques help you draw whatever ounce of confidence you have stored inside you and help you nurture that quality to its maximum potential.

So if you’re ready to learn these NLP techniques for confidence, read on!

NLP Technique for Confidence # 1: Groove to the Music.

Music has always been a vital part of life. Whether you’re into country music, rock, pop ballads or nature instrumentals, music more or less has an influence over the way you feel.

One of the NLP methods for boosting self-esteem involves associating a particular song with the feeling of confidence. There must be some song that makes you feel like you’re on top of the world!

Coincidentally, one of my no-fail feel good songs is “Eye of the Tiger.” Whenever I feel uneasy, I simply hum this tune or sing the lyrics in my mind and I feel like I can do anything. Go through your playlist right now and see which song makes you feel like a superstar!

NLP Technique for Confidence # 2: Pull the Trigger.

Here’s a powerful visualization exercise you might want to try when you’re alone. Find yourself a quiet spot and a comfortable position. Next, close your eyes and practice your breathing exercises. Inhale. Exhale. Do this until you’ve reached a peaceful state of mind.

Then, open your eyes and visualize a mirror in front of you. In the mirror is another version of yourself – a successful and self-confident you. Branch out a little bit more and explore how this new version acts. How does he or she walk? How does he or she communicate with others?

Put yourself in his or her shoes and feel just as confident as the person in the mirror. When you feel their strength flowing through you, press your thumb and your index finger together assign it a codename. It can be something as simple as self-confidence or inner strength. From then on, that will be your trigger. Repeat this exercise several times to make your trigger more powerful.

NLP Technique for Confidence # 3: Make Daily Affirmations.

Everyday is an opportunity for you to be more self-confident. So start your day by making daily affirmations. Find time to meditate in the morning and remind yourself of all your good points.

Tell yourself repeatedly that you are a self-confident person and that you hold in your hand the power to do whatever you want. As you’re saying the affirmation, think and feel as you would if you’re already the confident person you aspire to be. As you affirm it day after day, you’ll soon find your self-esteem soaring to the roof!

NLP techniques for confidence are here to help you bring out the best in you. So take advantage of this knowledge and use it to achieve greatness.

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If you have ever worked in an organization before, you know as well as I do that working in teams can be a real pain in the butt. Disagreements, lack of communication and sometimes lack of ownership causes people to slack when the projects are due. This often leaves people disappointed and dejected. Sometimes, it even creates animosity and arguments that stay for longer than the darned project itself.

To create an effective team, there are several key elements that are required. I’ll cover them in turn and explain how NLP can be used in that context.

Team Building Tip #1 – Have strong leadership.

Most teams fail because there is a lack of buy in of team members to a single leader who sets the direction and vision of the organization, no matter whether it is a big or small one. It’s very common in my leadership training to see actual leaders abdicate responsibility to other members, causing them to fail miserably in the games we play there. Why? Well it’s a question of competence. A strong team leader is able to inspire, motivate and set a direction. Without these elements a team is doomed for failure from the start. As a leader, you can use NLP by guiding them to hear what you have to say more clearly. Communication models in NLP enable a leader to communicate at multiple levels to different people at the same time, thereby increasing your ability to influence more effectively.

Team Building Tip #2 – Establish A Common Language

In the team development process, you will also find out that the beginning stages tend to be a little trying because you are in the process of establishing set protocols and communication. At this point of time, the team will need to be in rapport. Create experiences. Build common knowledge through those experiences and that will encourage members to hang on and contribute because they are now no longer individuals but members of a team with a larger goal at hand. It’s about communicating and understanding each others’ individual differences early, rather than waiting until the critical moments in a project. In NLP, common language comes also from understanding their communication types. Do they prefer visual, auditory or kinesthetic communication processes? You can go even further in NLP to explore other communication strategies such as meta programs and TOTE strategies to create more power in your leadership approach.

Team Building Tip #3 – Connect With The Vision

I think everyone needs a higher cause to make them feel great about contributing. There’s no sense in contributing to something that you deem to be a waste of time. If this happens, its important to revisit the goals and vision because that’s what brought the team together in the first place. This is about being able to pain “high chunk” or abstract elements in the minds of your team members that connect with what is important to them – their values. In NLP, values form a significant pillar for communication. That’s because values sets are what drives and motivates people!

As you continue on your path to being an effective leader, always remember that NLP is a powerful application and should be learned by any leader who wishes to continue to climb to higher positions and better results in their organization.

Stuart Tan, MBA (Western Michigan) has been training NLP for over 14 years and developed multiple programs all across Asia focused on developing motivation, focus and identity shifts. His ability to create profound change in individuals is also reflected in his business coaching work where he targets scaling the business from the inside out. He believes that every individual who wants to grow a business must have three components – a clear purpose, maximized capacity, and pillars of prominence.

He currently works on http://www.WorldOfNLP.com where he aims to help individuals develop a better sense of leadership capability through NLP practices.

Stuart is the national best selling author of three books, “Master Your Mind Design Your Destiny”, “Secrets Of Internet Millionaires” and “Secrets of eBay Millionaires”. He hails from the small city-state of Singapore, and has spoken to over 120,000 people across Asia. Contact him at Twitter.com/stuarttan

Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) has been developed on some extensive research, begun in the early 1970′s, investigating how people naturally overcome their problems. This research has brought a deep understanding of how people unconsciously contribute to both the creation and the solution of their problems.

NLP is also the study of exceptional talent. It studies the combined conscious and unconscious processes that enable people do what they do. For instance, NLP doesn’t pay much attention to what people say that they do, as this is not usually related to what they actually do, just because the key to success is often unknown at the conscious level.

NLP shows how our own successes can be understood and modeled, so they can be reproduced. It is a way of discovering and unfolding somebody’s personal genius, a way of bringing out the best in somebody’s personality and skill.

The key is to understand that how we feel about doing anything depends entirely on which emotion we have unconsciously learned to associate with that situation, just because most unwanted behaviors and beliefs have been learned and stored at an unconscious level. For example, as a child you may have ‘learnt’ to become afraid of insects, this may have been because the first time you saw a bee or another insect the adults ‘taught you how to behave’ by running away from it. This is then stored at an unconscious level and every time you now see an insect you react with an automatic unconscious response which you are unable to change consciously. This is the same for phobias and fears and they can only be changed at the unconscious level.

A special attention is paid to what is also known as limiting beliefs. You may be letting a belief that you formed at an early stage of your life hold you back today, like ‘I am not worthy’. It’s important to understand and accept that this is only a belief, it is not true and therefore can be changed at an unconscious level to a belief that will empower you life.

Traumas, difficult life experiences or other conditioning can lead us to form erroneous beliefs about ourselves and the world. These ideas become frozen in time within our nervous system causing blocked energy and are often set off by triggers in the present. By re-programming the brain through certain simple exercises, we can be able to replace these conditioned responses with more life affirming or desired behaviors.

NLP basically works by utilizing our ability to change the process in which we experience reality (this is the real ‘power’ of our own mind) to rapidly change the way we think and act for the better, providing a way of helping to become more competent at what we do, more in control of our thoughts, feelings and actions, more positive in our approach to life and better able to achieve results. In other words, NLP can help eradicate old out dated “programs” (mental, emotional and physical) that run on “automatic pilot”.

Once a limiting belief or a limiting belief system is identified, there are various techniques that can be used to remove it and replace it with beliefs that support our goals. Patterns of failure, self sabotage, over eating, addiction, money problems can all be tracked back to limiting beliefs, often developed in childhood.

By examining our values, beliefs and capabilities around unwanted behaviors, we can set up a ‘how to’ methodology to identify patterns and looks at the reason or intention behind the behaviors, which in turn gives us more choices about how to think and run our life.

The magic of NLP is that it teaches how to eliminate those negative associations for good, by the mean of techniques often involving fun exercises that use your imagination: guided visualization, anchoring new associations, Time Line Therapy, hypnosis, metaphors, creative imagination, re-imprinting etc. to name a few, are actually helping millions to enhance mental, emotional, physical and spiritual well-being.

Using NLP we can model, or copy, human excellence, e.g. the best of performance, feelings, behaviors. You can identify what makes someone exceptionally skilled, and get the skill for yourself or teach it to others. The application of these skills is infinite. NLP can enable a therapist to change the impact of the past on a patient, or improve from poor performance into good performance, and/or teach how to gain rapport in a non-verbal way and improve communication skills.

Andrea is a software developer and writes articles online about computers, software but also health, sports, food and other interesting topics. Come to visit his new website that helps people find the best cappuccino machine and reviews the most interesting automatic cappuccino machine available in the market

NLP is an acronym for Neuro Linguist Programming. In the simplest form, NLP is a type of brain software that programs a person’s way of thinking. An NLP practitioner studies the ways a human thinks and attempt to clear all the phobias, dogmas and unwarranted beliefs that the person had hitherto been living with. The technique controls a person’s neurological thought process.

NLP is a rich technique. From improving family relationships to enhancing career, NLP can help a great deal! The programming style also helps people to recover from traumas, phobias and terminal illnesses. Ask people who have benefited from NLP techniques and they will explain better as to how effective the technique is.

The credit of NLP goes to two wondrous minds- Richard Bandler and John Grinder. The two great men came up with this interesting and powerful technique way back in 1970s. Since then there has been a great change in the way this explicit tool has been used to program behavioral patterns, communication, motivation and memory. The technique has evolved into a much comprehendable and beneficial one. NLP hypnosis still remains to be a mysterious science for many. As a matter of fact, hypnosis came much before the actual NLP techniques. NLP hypnosis or hypnotherapy has been successful in maintaining an even popularity ever since its inception. The synthesis of NLP and NLP hypnosis makes for an interesting study. A person can become an expert in hypnosis with the help of neuro linguistic programming.

Mr. Richard and Mr. John developed a ground-breaking tool that includes 3 core areas- Neurology, linguists and computer science. The duo also worked on a book “The Structure of Magic” which was published in 1975. Very soon they began NLP courses to teach common people on how to benefit from NLP. On the whole, NLP training seeks to provide a deep insight into the way a human operates. It helps to understand as to what effect does communication (both verbal and non verbal) has on the human mind. Basically, the technique is an in-depth linguistic programming of a person’s thought processes. It helps to extricate and replicate the behavioral patterns of an individual. The technique not only helps to model another person’s thinking but also aids a person to win over self-limiting patterns. Better known as “modeling excellence”, neuro linguist programming (NLP) is a diagnostic technique. It cannot be understood theoretically. It can be understood experimentally only.

NLP is a booming business today. The industry is teeming with NLP training practitioners, NLP coaching trainers, NLP courses and NLP master mentors. The high-end advantages of the technique help to draw people towards this wondrous mind technique. Some institutes also offer free NLP online coaching. An interested person may hunt for such free NLP training programs to boost one’s confidence and interaction skills. There are many Los Angeles NLP online training programs that offer free NLP tutorials. Free NLP downloads and eBooks help a person to master the science of NLP without spending a fortune on otherwise expensive NLP courses.

John James Santangelo is an expert in NLP and successfully running a Los Angeles based NLP training center. If you’ve ever been curious about NLP or you’re interested in attending an NLP certification course then visit our site http://www.lanlp.com, sign up for a FREE MP3 of live NLP training and find out how you can develop YOUR personal power! Our NLP program has helped thousands of people just like you to achieve their goals, create outstanding relationships AND develop financial wealth and freedom, Find out today, give us a call (818) 879-2000

Have you ever been scared of boarding a plane? If so, you’re not alone. The fear of flying, called Aerophobia, is among the most common fears that people experience. This phobia is often a devastating, overwhelming feeling. It may even keep you from using air travel; traveling to new places, or visiting loved ones. Beating such a phobia used to take years of therapy, but now there are hypnosis and NLP techniques to eliminate phobias for easier, life-improving results.

Are you wondering what a phobia is? All phobias are categorized as a form of anxiety disorder, and many who have them will experience panic attacks and other unpleasant feelings such as shakiness, physical illness, or a rapid heart beat. Many sufferers complain of feeling unwell or losing their self-control, and organize their lives around their phobia to try to evade their fears.

For sufferers with Aerophobia, even the mere thought of getting on a plane might cause symptoms of an anxiety attack. Other sufferers might feel only slightly nervous while the plane is grounded, but grow hysterical once the aircraft takes off.

Picture a case in which a woman suffering from Aerophobia is sitting on a plane before takeoff. She begins to feel anxious and her heart starts to race. She knows it is safe to fly, but she is scared nonetheless. Once the plane is in the air, she is powerless to do anything but sob uncontrollably, and continues to cry throughout the trip until she can finally disembark from the plane. As extreme as this sounds, this type of behavior is common to a very high amount of people.

All phobias are distinguished by extreme, irrational fear. People with Aerophobia are scared of air travel even when they realize that flying is actually a very safe form of transportation. They often feel embarrassed when they respond with sobbing, trembling, or having a panic attack, but feel helpless to restrain their behavior. For many sufferers, this fear of embarrassment is as daunting as the phobia itself.

In reality, people with phobias cannot control their behavior because their fears are rooted in the unconscious, which no amount of willpower or conscious effort can help. This is where hypnosis is effective. Ericksonian hypnotherapy and Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) techniques go to work in the unconscious mind to effectively beat phobias.

A well-designed hypnotherapy program for extinguishing a phobia contains several comprehensive steps. Step one is hypnosis therapy for relaxation, dispelling stress and tension. Once you feel relaxed and stress-free, hypnotherapy forms new thoughts in the unconscious to eliminate the phobia. NLP itself eliminates fears by specifically targeting the single thought process that causes a phobia.

Unlike traditional hypnosis, which uses direct post-hypnotic suggestions, Ericksonian hypnosis uses indirect suggestions in conversation to convince the unconscious to follow a new, more logical way of thinking. It works better than conventional hypnosis therapy because people have a tendency to reject simple post-hypnotic suggestions, but find it harder to reject indirect suggestions that are incorporated in interesting metaphors and stories.

The specialized phrasing of post-hypnotic inductions in traditional hypnotherapy means that several conventional hypnosis programs will only work for a particular given phobia. A distinct feature of the Ericksonian hypnotherapy and NLP program is that it isn’t specific to a single phobia and will eliminate any phobia, in any individual. It works for most people because the system is composed of multiple unique hypnosis techniques assembled for highest effectiveness.

The most useful fear eliminating NLP technique that I have studied is called the Visual – Kinesthetic Disassociation. The V/K is often called the “one session phobia cure,” because of its remarkable effectiveness!

The combined Ericksonian hypnosis and NLP program is ideal for an independent thinker who wishes to beat an irrational phobia once and for all. People can complete the step-by-step program at their own personal pace, but are typically delighted at the ease with which they finish the program and fight their fears. The results people see with hypnosis often seem simply phenomenal.

Hypnosis therapy and NLP are phenomenal tools for many people suffering from fear. Ericksonian hypnotic therapy and NLP have helped countless people fight their fears. The techniques are perfect for helping individuals who are scared of air travel to experience air travel and all of its benefits. For a long time, hypnotherapy has been used to improve lives globally, and eliminating fears is just one of the ways in which it changes lives.

Alan B. Densky, CH has been treating phobias using Hypnotherapy since 1978. He offers phobia treatment hypnotherapy CDs plus a broad range of NLP CDs for stress & depression related symptoms. Visit his website for free hypnotism downloads.

As a business consultant as well as Certified Trainer of NLP, I am often asked ‘How can NLP be useful in business?’ I think that there are three main areas where we can apply NLP to business. They are self-management, communications and modelling excellence. The area that interests most people is communications. Whatever position you hold, in whatever type of organisation, it is likely that part of your job involves communication with others. It’s also likely that that part of the job could be a source of some stress and frustration, as information is easily distorted or sent to the wrong people or arrives too late to be useful.

The two biggest complaints I hear from employees in the companies I work with are ‘Nobody told us’ and ‘Nobody asked us’. Communication is vitally important for business success and people need to feel that they are informed, involved, consulted and listened to. The larger the organisation, the more difficult this is, and the more likely that individuals get the impression that their voice isn’t being heard.

I believe that one of the reasons for this is that frequently when we are having what passes for a conversation with someone else, we are either not fully listening or we make so many assumptions about what is being said that we do not learn anything new from what we are hearing. We simply use it as further support for our (already established) point of view.

Let’s go back to basics. We have five sensory systems which process information from the out side world and turn it into perceptions. The amount of information available to us is way in excess of what we can usefully handle; therefore it has to go through a filtering process to sift out the information which is relevant, useful or interesting. There are many types of filters, some are simple functions of the nervous system, and others such as our beliefs and values are created as a result of experience.

Our beliefs filter our experience very effectively: Imagine two people meeting at a party. The first person, John, regards himself as objective, level-headed, down-to-earth and sensible. The conversation gets around to UFOs and aliens. John laughs at this discussion. He is convinced that there is no intelligent life on other planets. Another person in the group, Peter, says to John ‘Well, as a matter of fact, I was abducted by aliens’.

What do you imagine John’s first reaction is going to be? To laugh some more? Accuse Peter of having had too much to drink? Call Peter a liar? You probably wouldn’t expect him to say ‘Really? Wow! I didn’t think that was possible. You must tell me all about it.’ Why not? Because John is going to make sense of Peter’s statement through the light of his own filters. And this is precisely what we all do, most of the time, even with much more trivial topics. We filter our experiences to support what we already believe to be true. The more deeply held a belief is, the harder it is to challenge it. The old saying ‘I’ll believe it when I see it’, would be much more accurately expressed as ‘I’ll see it when I believe it’.

So most of the time when we are engaged in conversation, we end up with an impression of what was said that is incomplete, inaccurate or both. Not all of this is a result of the listening – what we say is also filtered to make our conversation concise and easy to follow. NLP has a lot to offer in improving this situation. The tool I find most useful for understanding someone else’s point of view and recovering what has been lost in the filtering process, is known as the Meta model.

It is essentially a set of questions that can be used to challenge incomplete or inaccurate statements and recover the meaning that has been lost to the filters. The result of using it is that you can help people to be more precise and specific in what they say, and sometimes help them to view their experience more constructively.

The Meta model is usually divided into three parts that correspond with the three actions of the filters: Deletion, Distortion and Generalisation.

Deletion

There are several different kinds of deletion. One of the most common forms of deletion is heard in business as comments like ‘ Communication is terrible at present’ or ‘There’s a complete lack of teamwork’ or ‘performance is up this month’. What these statements have in common is that they have deleted information about what is actually being done and covered it up with an abstract noun. For example, the word communication replaces details about is who is communicating what to whom (or not!). To recover these details, simply ask ‘Who is not communicating about what?’ or ‘What work should the team be doing together?’ or ‘Who is performing well at what?’ Simply ask. But since this is not the kind of question that people get asked regularly, you should take care in how you ask. It must be done with rapport, you must demonstrate that you are genuinely interested in the details, otherwise you risk sounding like the Spanish Inquisition!

Another common form of deletion is where the information about who is doing something is lost. For example ‘They don’t listen to me’ or ‘She didn’t invite me to the meeting’ or ‘They turned up late’. You may think you know who is being referred to, but sometimes it’s a good idea to check. The ubiquitous ‘they’ is usually worth challenging, to find out whether or not the speaker actually knows whom they are referring to! In this case all you have to ask is: ‘Who specifically?’

Sometimes this kind of deletion is paired up with a further type, known as an unspecified verb. This is when the details of how something was done are filtered off, as in ‘He rejected my idea’ or ‘They upset us’ or ‘She ruined that project’. Again we may think we know what is meant by each of these statements – and we may be wrong again! Find out more by asking ‘How specifically?’ In the former case you may find that what ‘he’ said about the speaker’s idea was he needed more time to consider it.

Of course, if you are going to ask these questions, there has to be a purpose. You will quickly lose a lot of goodwill from friends and colleagues if you start challenging every deletion you hear. It is probably most useful to use this kind of approach in interviews, coaching sessions, counselling and investigation of training and organisational development needs.

Distortion

The second area of the Meta-model deals with distortion. I should emphasise that this is unconscious distortion as a result of unconscious filters, not any wilful distortion of facts. One of the most common forms of distortion is ‘mind-reading’, where a person claims to know someone else’s feelings or thoughts, as in ‘You don’t like me’ or ‘He’s angry with me’ or ‘They won’t agree’. Sometimes these judgements are made on valid information, but if you suspect that they are simply invented you can ask ‘How do you know?’ Again, done with rapport and genuine interest, this can be a powerful question that could bring someone to a useful realisation that they actually have no reason to assume hostility from another person (or assume anything else!)

Another form of distortion is when opinions and value judgements are expressed without being attributed to anyone. These may be heard as comments such as ‘You should work hard all the time’ or ‘It’s not a good idea to throw away those files’ or ‘It’s best to keep an open mind’. None of these comments are presented as a subjective judgement, but rather as objective fact. All proverbs also come into this category. A statement like this may be preventing someone from thinking for himself. To challenge it, a good question to ask is ‘Who says?’ or you could use ‘According to whom?’ There is, as with all Meta-model questions a risk of this sounding aggressive, so ensure that you are in rapport before asking.

A third kind of distortion comes when something is taken to have a meaning that may not be accurate. For example ‘I didn’t get the promotion. The boss doesn’t like me.’ Or ‘Sales are down. The product range is awful this season.’ In neither case does the one statement necessarily imply the other, but the speaker is taking the two to be connected in this way. There are two ways that this can be challenged. First you can challenge the logic. For example, ‘How does your not getting promoted mean that the boss doesn’t like you?’ or ‘How does a drop in sales mean that there’s something wrong with the product range?’ The other way to challenge this would be to focus on the counter example. For example ‘Are there other people whom the boss likes that didn’t get promoted either?’ or ‘Have sales ever fallen when the product range was good?’ Either way, to challenge this type of distortion will focus attention on faulty deductions and get back to what is actually known as fact. This can be really useful in problem solving and counselling situations where there seems to be no way forward and no choices. Challenging the distortions will usually open up some possibilities.

Generalisation

The third area of the Meta-model deals with generalisations. Generalisations are useful; they give us the ability to spot patterns and to apply experience in one situation to another similar one. However, they also form the basis of prejudice and narrow-mindedness, so it can also be useful to challenge them on occasion. The most common form of generalisations involve words like never, always, everyone, no-one, all. For example ‘It always rains in Manchester?’ or ‘Nobody ever listens to me?’ or ‘All salespeople are extraverts’. Clearly these statements are untrue, but many people act as if their generalisations were true and miss opportunities and possibilities because of it. The ‘rule of thumb’ here is that all generalisations are untrue – including this one! The way to challenge generalisations is simple: you echo back, ‘Always?’ or ‘Nobody? Ever?’ or ‘All of them?’ (with a suitable amount of incredulity). Alternatively you could look for the counter example, as in ‘Is it ever fine in Manchester?’ or ‘Has anybody ever listened to you?’ or ‘Are there any salespeople who are introverts?’

I would urge particular care when challenging generalisations. Often when a person says something like ‘Nobody ever listens to me’ (especially if it’s said with some feeling) it’s an indicator that somebody in particular is not listening to something important right now. The person may be feeling undervalued or rejected and a smart response like ‘What nobody? Ever?’ may not be the most tactful thing you can say! In that case, treat it like a deletion and ask ‘Who in particular is not listening to you?’

There are other kinds of deletions, distortions and generalisations. The ones I have discussed here are some of the most common I have encountered in business. The overall effect of the questions I have suggested is to challenge the validity of the statement and encourage the speaker to be more precise, more specific in what they are telling you. With practice you will be able to avoid some of the common frustrations of communications at work – such as preparing a report and being told afterwards ‘That wasn’t what I wanted’ or tailoring a presentation to suit what you had been told about the audience, only to discover that the information was incorrect. Using Meta-model questions won’t entirely remove the subjectivity from a point of view, but it may bring you closer to understanding what is really being said – and what is really meant!

Dianne Lowther – Master Trainer of NLP

Dianne Lowther is an award-winning Master Trainer of NLP and Principal of Brilliant Minds. She specialises in applications of NLP for leadership and business results and has 18 years of experience of working at senior level in organisations. She also runs public courses in NLP including her ground-breaking ‘Business Class NLP’ intensive programme for business leaders. To find out more about NLP, visit http://www.executivenlp.co.uk and get ‘The Introduction to NLP for Business Leaders’ free. To find out more about Dianne Lowther and Brilliant Minds visit http://www.brilliantminds.co.uk or find her on LinkedIn