Neuro-linguistic Programming is a highly sophisticated model used for therapy and coaching. It dates back to the 1970s, when Richard Bandler and John Grinder studied the techniques of successful therapists, including Milton Erickson (the father of modern hypnotherapy), Virginia Satir (a family therapist) and Fritz Perls (the founder of Gestalt therapy). Its leading exponent and innovator is Robert Dilts, who was one of the first students of Bandler and Grinder at Santa Cruz, California, where NLP began.
NLP continues to develop in theory and application, and now has an extraordinary influence not only in the therapeutic world but also in business contexts. It is both philosophy and method for personal and professional development.
As a movement deriving from disparate sources, NLP is difficult to define and is in continual development. The name itself refers to the ability of words to transform experience: through language neurology is influenced. That doesn't say much and the name itself (with subtones of mind control) does not endear itself to natives this side of the Atlantic.
NLP provides the therapist or coach with strategies and techniques to reprogramme ways of thinking, using close observation of the individual's unconscious responses and knowledge of how the mind encodes experience. The word 'programme' has negative connotations for some; the phrase neuro-linguistic programming also overemphasizes the role of language and can imply that NLP is some kind on intellectual pursuit. It's not. Or, rather, it shouldn't be. But perhaps this connotation has made NLP more acceptable (than 'therapy') to certain strata. Thinking is conscious mind activity. Problems are not the province of thought alone. If they were, you would have changed them, since thought is mostly in the control of the conscious mind.
NLP demonstrates that you are not at the mercy of your ways of thinking and responses. There is a structure to experience, and you can intervene and modify elements of that structure.
Here is a brief account of several of the main elements of NLP, as I see it. Clearly, the brevity of exposition means there is considerable oversimplification of the subject and that some important areas are entirely omitted.
1 The meta-model
This was where NLP started, and is its bedrock. The meta-model refers to the questions that address the problem (or issue) itself, or help formulate a well-defined outcome or goal. It is a way of questioning.
Since no problem is well formed - that is to say, any problem has inherent contradictions and does not stand up to scrutiny - meta-model questions define and delineate the problem; by being exposed in this way, the problem begins to break up. A well-defined problem is already a problem in crisis with itself. A well-defined problem also signposts the causes and remedies.
Examples of meta-model questions are:
Applied to problems, meta-model questions expose some of the unhelpful deletions and distortions you create in your 'map' or interpretation of the world (see below, The map is not the territory, under The presuppositions of NLP). Your map can then be enriched and made more useful.
These deletions and distortions are manifested on a grammatical level (explication of which is beyond the scope of this brief introduction); they are also manifested on a physiological or somatic level (in posture, gesture, movement, symmetry, voice, gaze). The meta-model can therefore be applied both to cognitive structures (language and thought) and to physiological expression.
2 Representational systems and submodalities
We see, hear, feel, smell, taste the world - providing our faculties are working - but most of us have a preferred sense modality or representational system. That is, one sense will typically take precedence in our experience. (Note: this important aspect of NLP is often simplified and distorted in NLP texts and trainings. It is important to note that a favoured representational system is a tendency not a law. Of course, all of our senses are utilized in all of our experience, and in different experiences we will prioritize different modalities.)
Some of us will make judgements, for example, on how something appears to us; we will be most influenced by how we see the situation. This may be reflected in a person's turn of phrase, saying, for example, That looks good; I get the picture. These people are primarily visual. Others make judgements according to how something sounds to them. They may say I hear what you're saying; I like the sound of that. They are primarily auditory. Others still are inclined to make judgements according to how something feels to them. They may say That feels right; I was moved. They are primarily kinaesthetic.
(In fact, even visual and auditory people, for example, base their judgements on how they feel about what they have seen or heard. It's just that for them the emphasis is on the visual or auditory - and the feeling may be unconscious; whereas for the kinaesthetic person the emphasis is on the feeling itself.)
Our experience is a product of our representations of experience. An NLPer can use knowledge of representation systems and submodalities (see below) to modify and transform experiences.
Indeed, we can identify a person's problem thinking strategies and help change those strategies. As we talk, our eyes move up and down, left and right; these movements are actually a barometer of how someone is thinking at a given moment (although they are much else besides). When a person looks up, they are visualizing; when they look laterally to the side, they are thinking of sounds. When most right-handed people look to their left, they are recalling; when they look to the right, they are constructing or inventing. Looking down to the left indicates a person is talking to himself or herself. Looking down to the right indicates a person is accessing an emotional state. A person's problem thinking strategy might be, for example, to see something, hear a critical parent's voice, and have a bad feeling. (A process that is usually entirely unconscious.) This strategy, once made conscious, can easily be unpicked and transformed.
Representations of experience can be divided into what are called submodalities. Every representation of experience comprises things we see, hear and feel, taste and smell, and each representation has its own subset of specificities termed submodalities. For example, think of a great experience you had with a friend. Have you thought of one? Now consider just its visual properties. How bright is that memory; is it moving or still; in black and white or colour; framed or panoramic; close or distant; small or large; and where situated in your visual field? Compare the features of that memory with the visual aspects of a difficult experience you had while alone.
Do you notice the differences? These distinctions are called submodalities. They are useful because the way you see something (for example) dictates the way you feel about it. If we alter the submodalities of a thing we are altering our perception, and therefore our feelings about it. (However, it is more true to say that the way we feel about something dictates how we see it. Very often the visual submodalities cannot be changed permanently until the feelings have been changed.)
3 The unconscious and conscious can communicate directly
In therapy/coaching, I can ask your unconscious body questions and it will answer either by giving you a specific feeling or impression, or (in hypnosis) by giving a signal such as specific fingers lifting for yes and for no (you don't need to be hypnotized in order for the unconscious to be able to communicate directly).
We can also ask the unconscious to do tasks, even while fully awake (without any hypnosis). The list of possible requests is endless. One thing (my wife) Elizabeth and I consistently do is ask our unconscious to find something for us that we mislaid (keys, diary, or whatever)! The 'answer' we get may come in the form of an impression, an action, or a feeling that leads us – often indirectly – to the mislaid item. To borrow a phrase: the unconscious works in mysterious ways - it certainly doesn't give us a verbal message, which is the conscious thinking process.
In therapy, we can actually ask the unconscious to try out new behaviours; or we can ask if the body is ready to give up a certain behaviour.
4 Time-lines
Most people mentally code their past and future experiences by giving each experience a spatial location in their visual field specific to the time of its occurrence. Of course, like most mental strategies, this takes place without any conscious awareness of what we are doing.
To remember something that happened two weeks ago, for example, I will have a mental (visual) image of it which is located five feet away from me, at eye-level, at an angle of 45 degrees to my left. A good proportion of Europeans and North Americans, like me, will order their past by having it stretch out in front of them at approximately a 45-degree angle to their left, with the immediate past appearing close to them and previous experiences appearing progressively beyond; and will order their future at a 45-degree angle to their right, with their immediate future foremost. Some people, however, have very complex and elaborate time-lines.
This special kind of spatial sorting allows you to sequence your experience chronologically, so that you can remember the order of experiences; and it helps you to plan your actions in the future.
Some people who are very inept at planning haven't got a time-line for the future at all; or can't see beyond today! Imagine how that impacts on their life. Some people have a future time-line only extending to the next year or two, possibly indicating significant difficulties with regard to their very survival.
At one time Elizabeth, having far too much to do, had made an unconscious readjustment to her time-line, making each day of the coming week stretched out and separate from the others. This was great for planning a very full schedule: by giving each day so much room, it helped the week not to look so condensed and imposing; she had room to breathe! But later she realized the downside: she literally couldn't see her future any more, beyond the next week or so. Anything further was too far away for her to see!
We can create time-lines for people who haven't got one, and we can adjust a person's time-line for various purposes, altering the perception of the present, past and future.
We can also, for example, put an event into a person's future time-line to make it more likely to happen. And we can go into the past, along the time-line, and make adjustments to our perception of experiences.
5 Logical levels (also called neurological levels)
These were postulated by Gregory Bateson (a forerunner of NLP, an anthropology professor at Santa Cruz), and developed by Robert Dilts. Five levels are identified (in order of influence), with an optional sixth level, the Spiritual:
The higher the level, the more significant and meaningful. The higher levels influence and control the lower levels. Your beliefs, for example, control and direct your behaviour and are controlled and directed by your identity (and not vice-versa).
Problems arise when people confuse the logical levels - for example, 'You're stupid [level of identity] because you forgot to do your homework [level of behaviour].'
Borrowing Einstein's principle that you can't solve a problem at the same level of thinking that created the problem, an NLP (master) practitioner will find a solution at a higher level than the problem.
6 Meta-programmes
These are the filters which we apply to experience (perception through our senses). All of these filters are useful, and it is important to be able to use all of them. Each individual will use certain of these filters or meta-programmes predominantly as an expression of personality. The question is, are we using the meta-programmes appropriate for the task? Problems arise when we don't.
For example, external reference (reliance on what others think) may be useful if you need to fix the electrics, but an inappropriate filter in deciding choice of marriage partner (but who knows?) Emotion might be useful for making a wedding speech, but inappropriate in determining criminal sentencing. The NLP therapist/coach can help people adopt appropriate meta-programmes.
Hundreds of mea-programmes have been postulated. But it is perhaps more useful to work with a smaller number. The main meta-programme patterns are these (adapted from Robert Dilts):
Approach
Toward the desired/ Away from unpleasant circumstances
Match (find similarities)/ Mismatch (disagree, find differences)
Proactive (get on with things)/ Reactive (react to circumstances)
Internal reference (use own experience)/ External reference (rely on others' opinions)
Analysis
Big chunk (see the big picture)/ Small chunk (work with detail)
Time frame
Short term/ Long term
Past/ Present/ Future
Problem solving
Focus on: Task/ Relationship
If task: Option/ Procedures orientated
If relationship: Self/ Other/ Context based
Thinking style
Vision/ Action/ Logic/ Emotion
The immensely successful Disney Strategy (Robert Dilts points out) differentiated three stages in the development of a new project: Dreamer, Realist and Critic. It's clearly inappropriate to be too critical (small chunk) when thinking up a new project - that's the time to dream (Vision). On the other hand, there's no point thinking in a visionary way when working out how the project will be carried through in practice.
As an exercise, you may want to consider which meta-programmes would be applicable to each of the strategies of Dreamer, Realist and Critic. You might then try applying the Disney Strategy to your own projects.
7 Modelling
NLP is founded on modelling: finding out how other people do something successfully and emulating them. This is how the meta-model was developed: Bandler and Grinder, for example, observed exactly what kinds of questions really made a difference and formulated the meta-model. The principle is, if someone else can do something, copy them and you can do it too!
In therapy and coaching we use models of excellence to enable us to learn to do things differently. If you can't do this as well as you'd like to, who do you know who can? Step into their shoes and find out how they do it.
Incidentally, such modelling is regarded in hypnosis as a trance phenomenon called deep-trance identification. In NLP we do the same thing, using the unconscious as facilitator, but without necessarily using hypnosis.
8 The presuppositions of NLP: living principles
It can be argued that the whole of NLP is an elaboration of the following fundamental presuppositions. These are not simply an aid to therapy and coaching: they are a guide to living. In this way, NLP is more than just a model for coaching and therapy: it is a philosophy or ideology. What would it mean to live your life according to these founding principles? What if society adopted them?
(1) The map is not the territory
This means that our perception of reality is not the same as reality itself, just as a map is not the same as the territory it represents. In other words, our conception of reality is not what reality is; it is just an interpretation. We can't know what reality is; or, if you like, there is only interpretation. (Not welcome news for fundamentalists!) Consequently, if we're not happy, it's not reality that is at fault, it's our perception of it. Our map perhaps needs updating; our perception of how things are is not serving us well.
There are many implications to this type of thinking. For one thing, it is not a question of who is wrong and who is right. The notion of right and wrong doesn't make sense in this context. The appropriate questions are, is your way of thinking useful; are your beliefs making you happy; is your conception of the situation empowering you?
(2) Every symptom or problem has a positive intention or was once a solution
There is a positive intention motivating every behaviour, or a context in which every behaviour once had value. Another aspect of this presupposition is that we all make the best choice we can given the possibilities we perceive that we have at the time.
Think about alcohol or tobacco - to take a standard example. At one point, these were solutions. Subsequently, they may have become problems.
On a coaching and therapy level, this is of fundamental significance. It is one of the most importance principles of therapy. It explains the presence of a problem or symptom: it is trying to do something positive for you (or was at one time). Therefore, battling against a problem is fruitless; you are fighting a part of yourself that has a positive intention. Of course, it often doesn't feel like this, especially if this part of you is making you feel bad or making you do destructive things. Nevertheless, there is a positive intention there.
A positive intention has to be stated in the positive. If a person says the intention of their destructive behaviour was to hurt others, this is a negative formulation, and we still haven't found the positive intention. The positive intention of the behaviour may have been to get attention, for example. The positive intention of a problem may well not pertain to the present: it may be the positive intention of the six-year-old within, who learnt that doing this apparently destructive behaviour was an excellent way of getting attention (their best perceived choice at that time).
We can also apply this presupposition to other people: friends, colleagues, adversaries. We can ask ourselves, what is the positive intention that motivates their behaviour? This is a very liberating and empowering way of thinking - though of course not always easy. On a personal level, it gives us a way of not taking slights against our character personally. On a general or political level, it would make war unthinkable. This principle alone would transform personal relationships.
(3) The meaning of a communication is the response we get
This means generally we have to take responsibility for how others interpret our words and behaviour.
(4) An individual already has the resources they need to make the changes they want
The coach or therapist doesn't need to bring in any new elements, or impose their map on the client. The aim is to help the client to find and apply the resources they already possess.
(5) We are systemic beings
It is impossible to isolate one part of the system from the rest. Our minds, bodies, cultures, our species, planet, even the universe - are all interconnected. Treatment must therefore be holistic.
(6) The law of requisite variety
We need flexibility in proportion to the variability of the system in which we operate. As society becomes more complex, we need to be more flexible to operate effectively. The most flexible person is often the most resourceful in any given situation.
(7) There is no such thing as failure, only feedback
All experiences are valuable as things we can learn from. Life is going to give us challenges as well as opportunities. Without challenges, without 'failures' there would be little opportunity to learn. When things go wrong, we can simply ask ourselves, what can I learn from this? How can I use this for the good? This is a transformational way of thinking, because every experience becomes positive. The problem is, of course, when we don't learn from our experience and keep making the same mistakes. This relates to another NLP principle: if what you're doing isn't working, try something else!