5 Highly Effective Neuro-Linguistic Programming Techniques For Personal Development
Neuro-linguistic programming (NLP) refers to the ways our thoughts affect what we do and how we interpret brain signals. It studies how we can control our emotions and thoughts rather than them controlling us. NLP can be used to treat things such as phobias, mental health conditions, as well as general personal development and rewiring one’s thought processes to improve day to-day living. This article outlines the techniques used in NLP training. Read on to discover the top five highly effective NLP techniques for personal development.
Modality Training
This is based on visualisation and is often recommended for people who are new to NLP because it’s easier to pick up. To begin, create a detailed scene in your head of yourself performing an action successfully. This could be anything, from having your say in a work meeting to nailing a workout. What is your body language like? It should be confident and comfortable. By focusing on feeling the energy you exude in your head, this technique should help you to manifest this in your real-life activities.
Modelling
This is another simple but effective NLP technique. It involves surrounding yourself with people that inspire you and have achieved the things that you are aiming for. If you focus on modelling their behaviours, you will start to move towards them yourself. You could find a mentor or trainer, take inspiration from your boss or join a group of like-minded people. If this isn’t possible, follow people who inspire you and have a positive influence on your mindset on your social media profiles.
Mirroring
This may sound similar to modelling but it is actually very different and is to do with body language and communication. This NLP technique requires you to mirror the body language of the person you’re talking to. Try to match their energy level and possibly their vocabulary. This will allow you to build connections and rapport instantly – they will find you more trustworthy because you are like them.
Swish
Swish is a more advanced version of imagery training. It’s another example where you need to utilise your brain to picture something vividly in your mind. Begin with something you don’t want and make it bright and overwhelming. Next, create an image of what you do want but smaller. Then, reverse them, bringing what you do want into the spotlight with bright colours and positive features. Make the other image the small one and repeat the process three to five times. Your brain will learn how to amplify positives and reduce negatives.
Incantations
Incantations are phrases you repeat to yourself while embodying what you are saying with intensity and meaning, using physiology as well as your voice to affirm your beliefs, goals and positive thoughts. This empowers your self-esteem and rewires your brain to focus on confidence and self-belief at all times.
The Coaching Centre utilises the most effective NLP techniques to develop you into your full potential. Get in touch with us today by calling 0439 194 323 to find out how we can help you.
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Shawn Dwyer is a highly experienced NLP trainer and Associate Certified Meta-Coach who is the International Meta-Coach Foundation President and leading NLP Neuro-Semantic Trainer in the Australasian region. Shawn is also a long-standing member of the International Society of Neuro Semantics and Neuro-Linguistic Association of Australia. Shawn provides multiple industry leadership skills that sets The Coaching Centre training apart from all other training in human development.
Fully Alive Fully Human
That phrase, fully alive/fully human is perhaps the very best description of what “self-actualization” means. And it fits our core theme at The Coaching Centre. Fully alive speaks about your body and neurology-alive, energetic, vitality, passion, etc. Fully human speaks about your mind, heart, and spirit-a human being “fully functioning.” That was Carl Rogers’ term for self-actualization. Fully functioning mentally, emotionally, linguistically, behaviorally, and relationally. And that’s a function of meaning-your semantics. That’s why one of our central models for guiding, the self-actualizing life is using our meaning and performances axes.
Over twenty years of ongoing research, Maslow, his students, and his colleagues identified 19 being-needs/values. They identified those qualities and experiences that make us fully human, that expresses our best humanity. And at the heart of these qualities is the being experience which refers to them being end values and not means values. Being fully alive and fully human speaks about living beyond the instrumental values that’s required to cope, survive, maintain safety and security, love and affection, bonding and attaching, and feeling social value.
what is beyond those instrumental values?
Maslow identified it as our higher nature. It is where we strive to fully express our best humanity. In The Coaching Centre programs, this is our meta-life (to use Bateson’s term), it is the meta-place where we construct meaning which, in turn, determines the quality and effectiveness of our lives. So, what does the self-actualization trainings entail?
1) Vitality.
When it comes to having the energy to live life fully, you have to gratify the four classes of lower needs: survival, safety, belonging, and social. If you do not truly and adequately gratify them, you will experience deficiency and because deficiency takes up a lot of energy, leads to being desperate. When falsely gratified, creates neurotic needs (compulsions). Gratify them truly and adequately, and you will release lots of energy-energy or vitality to focusing on your passions and values, living the “good” life of the being–values.
2) Potentials.
Vitality also involves the meta-life of the being values and so unleashing your potentials up and down the hierarchy enables you to tap into your inner self, your true self, the self you can become. Therefore, this makes for a highly meaningful life, an ever-increasing of your capacities, a deep authenticity, and it makes all of life an adventure. In Unleashing Potentials the processes for how to be released from what’s holding you back and how to be liberated for what lies before you gives you a key to personal empowerment and freedom. Modules I and II offer six-days of personal self-actualizing where you create yourself and lead yourself.
3) Creativity.
Having created yourself, the best version of you, you are now ready for creating solutions to the real problems outside of your skin.
Therefore by discovering your inner construct in your meta place for inventing meaning, you are ready as a meaning-maker to tackle the challenging problems for making the world a better place. Furthermore, having modeled creativity as involving four stages: outcome, problem, solution, and innovation, this module gives one the practical tools (using the Precision Funnel) for creating solutions and innovating them with precision.
Self-actualizing people with these abilities are now in a wonderful position to lead groups, families, businesses, corporations, even countries to become self-actualizing groups. It’s not easy. But given their problem-solving capacities, their meaning-making abilities, their bias for implementing and embodying what they do, self-actualizing people can lead the way. They lead the way as change-agents.
And all of that occurs in 12 intense days of training. But, of course, that’s also based on previous trainings in NLP. In all, along with the required reading and self-application, the Self-Actualization Psychology Diploma is equivalent to two-years of study at a University. The difference is that this is rigorously personal and practical. The focus is on experience, experiential learning, and self-application. The focus is on the actual skills for actualizing vitality, potentials, creative solutions, and leadership. The design is that people graduate with the ability to actually do things.
Nor is that all. Following up on that are four additional trainings: Unleashing Authenticity; Unleashing Productivity; Unleashing Resilience, and Unleashing Collaborative Leadership- another 12 days. And why? The reason
is simple: The Coaching Centre is about actualizing your highest meanings and values into your very best performances.
Are you ready to unleash your highest and best potentials? Find out more about the next course below
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Are you looking for a better way to view the world? Perhaps consider a Self-Actualizing attitude!
Then to detail that self-actualizing attitude, the following are listed for your consideration.
1) An open attitude.
Open to the possibilities and potentials that clamor within, open to the changes that may bring, open to giving up inauthentic roles and becoming real, open to being more vulnerable as a human being.
2) A willingness to ‘become.’
This is part of the open attitude. Becoming occurs best from being and refers to developing and orchestrating your inner gifts as you make informed decisions about your destiny. It is the adventure of becoming your real self and your best version of you.
3) A self-authoring attitude.
To be and to become requires that you primarily own your own “authority” and not defer to others, to authority figures, to external rules, etc. As a meta-program of self-referencing this means that you become the author of your story, your experiences, and your values. Doing that gives you a “circle (locus) of control” over your innate capacities.
4) A transcending passion.
This passion for life starts with being the best you and then transcends to seeking to making a difference in the world by contributing your uniqueness. As you get this attitude, you experience a never-ending motivation, a compelling reason to get out of bed each day.
You fall in love with an ambition that drives you.
5) Playful curiosity.
In all of this, instead of getting really “serious” about things, you continually see what is humorous in being human-what is silly, ridiculous, incongruent, etc. and this keeps you playful. This is important. After all, passion without playfulness invites the demonic-the hellish rigidity, dogmatism, and perfectionism that plagues so many high achievers.
6) A restless attitude.
Self-actualizing people are forever restless because they live in the realm of “the more, the more.” That’s the being dimension. Unlike the deficiency dimension of the lower needs which operates by “the more, the less,” this works by the reverse principle. The more you satisfy the being-needs and values, the more your capacity and passion grows. The new discontent that then arises typically means that another higher level being-need has opened up.
7) A beginner’s mind.
Because self-actualizing people have a passionate learning state of curiosity and playfulness, school is never out for them.
They are constantly learning and developing. Out of that comes a never-ending flow of freshness and creativity.
8) A self-challenging attitude.
Knowing the dulling effect of boredom, familiarity, and the comfort zone, self-actualizing people have a hunger that makes them long for a challenge. To be “put to the test” is a thrill for them.
9) A mental agility.
With a beginner’s mind, they are naturally flexible and so they easily adapt to changing conditions. No wonder then that they can shift perspective, learn so quickly, and become the pioneers of tomorrow.
10) An embracing of change.
If we ask, “Who are the change embracers who are not put off or threatened by change?” the answer is, “those who are self-actualizing. “They are the ones Gary Hamel described, “the future belongs to the agile.”
11) A resilient spirit.
Self-actualizing people are forever unleashing more and more of their potentials because whenever they experience a set-back, they immediately (or quickly) bounce back. That’s because they have bounce inside of themselves. This attitude prevents obstacles from sapping their energy.
12) A discipline of follow-through.
This persisting attitude gives them stamina and tenacity to maintain their course. Ego-strength empowers them to create and follow a discipline practice and it is in that persistence that they succeed.
And because so many people wait for “something to happen” and only react to the events of life, they suffer from the torments of indecisiveness. Not self-actualizing people. They decide and then persist and if things go south, they bounce back, learn, and readjust.
14) An audacious dreaming.
They dare to dream-and to dream big. A self-actualising attitude allows you to tap into the powers of the imagination in order to create, first in their mind, a bright future that draws out all of their powers.
With all of the previous attitudes, they live in the here-and-now and are fully present to whatever they are engaged in.They do it whole-heartedly.
16) A risk willingness.
So not expecting absolute safety or secure, they secure themselves in their a ability to learn, to be resilient, to be connected, etc. Consequently the risks they take are intellect and well calibrated.
Lastly, while specific actions enable you to do what needs to be done, it is attitude that makes your actions energised with the particular qualities that the action needs. Just “doing what you need to do” is not enough. You have to embed your actions within a larger frame of mind-a meta-state.And because all attitudes are comprised of various combinations of meta-states, knowing how that works gives you the tools for supercharging your attitudes just right.
Are you ready to learn how to live a self-acualizing life?
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NLP Attitude – Getting the NLP Attitude
~by Dr.L.Michael Hall and Mr Shawn Dwyer ~
Richard Bandler once defined NLP as an attitude. “NLP is an attitude, backed up by a methodology that leaves behind it a trail of techniques” Now if that is true, and I think it is, then what is the NLP attitude? And do you have it? Many, if not a great many, people trained in NLP do not have the NLP attitude. What explains that? There is in my opinion an understandable reason why that is the case.
NLP Attitude Presuppositions
So let’s start with the presuppositions of NLP and consider what they imply in terms of attitude. If X is a basic premise of NLP, what can we infer would be the central attitudes which correspond to that premise?
There is no failure, only information that informs us of how to improve-curiosity, persistence.
The map is not the territory, only symbolic of it -fascination, exploration, skepticism.
The meaning of your communication is the response you get- openness, wanting feedback.
Mind and body are part of the same system -synergism, systems thinking.
Every person operates from his model of the world-respect, seek understanding, compassion.
Person and behavior are different phenomenon- respect of persons, more than behaviors.
Behind every behavior is a positive intention- honor persons, optimism, look for the positive.
“Lose your mind and come to your senses” (Perls) – sensory awareness, appreciation.
If what you’re doing isn’t working, do something different – flexibility, freedom of choice.
“It’s never too late to have a happy childhood” (Bandler) – creativity, ecological thinking.
Furthermore in learning NLP in the 1980s Michael trained with one of the founders (Bandler), but as Michael got to know Bandler, one thing he knew was that whatever the secret of NLP is-it did not lie in the persons who put it together. Bandler’s life was a mess! (See NLP Secrets: Untold Stories, 2019). So Michael looked deeper. And he looked inside the model for its working premises. Guess what he found? Therein lies the spirit that lead to the discoveries and creation of NLP.
So what is the NLP spirit that brought it about and that continues today to make it work?
1) Learning. It’s an attitude that there is always so much more to learn. There’s an attitude of know-nothing in order to avoid our own biases and stereotypes.
2) Openness. It is an openness to what I don’t know, to the feedback I get even that I may not want or understand, and more openness to change in a process world.
3) Curiosity. An attitude of curiously exploring everything. An attitude of asking, “What else is there? Am I missing something? What allows this to be as a possibility? What else can I use this for?
4) Questioning. It’s an attitude of boldly questioning everything, and then asking meta-questions of those answers. It is questioning with the Meta-Model to get precision and specificity.
5) Flexibility. It’s an attitude of being willing to change whatever is no longer working and adopt something new and different.
6) Persisting. It’s an attitude of never giving up, always looking for a way to make things happen, a “can do” attitude of determination and a bit of stubbornness.
7) Passion. It’s an attitude of passion to live life fully, to be fully present in the here-and-now. It’s a passionate attitude about connecting to others, making a difference, and adding quality to whatever you’re doing.
A passion and an attitude of adding more ecstasy to life, to relating, and to being the best version of yourself.
8) Playful. It’s an attitude of being playful, experiencing more fun in whatever you are engaged in, especially learning and skill development.
It’s the attitude that getting there is where there is the most fun. So the lighten up attitude, stop taking yourself or words so seriously.
9) Skepticism. It’s an attitude of suspecting that what you see is not all there is, that there is more and you have to hunt for it. “What else lies out there to discover?” “What else lies in this experience that I can use?”
It’s an attitude of skepticism about words knowing that “the map is not the territory.”
10) Creativity. It’s an attitude of creating higher quality products, services, and information. An attitude of inventiveness, “How can I make this better?”
Why do so many people trained in NLP do not have the spirit of NLP?
So here are some suggestions:
They are trained exclusively in the techniques, the content and miss the attitude.
The techniques are offered as final products rather than specific historical discoveries and so are open to updating, correcting, and even being made redundant.
There are techniques treated as “real” rather than one way to map a resolution.
Those training the techniques do not themselves have the spirit of NLP. So the attitude is not demonstrated.
However problem however is deeper and more pervasive than just that many NLP people do not have the right attitude. And what’s deeper is that so many of the techniques as processes will not work without the right attitude. Using them as if a formula out of a cookbook will seldom get the results that someone with the right attitude, even those less skilled, will get.
Are you looking for NLP training? Contact us at The Coaching Centre
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To have understanding about when you set a goal, a vision for your life or for this year – remember that you will be making mistakes. After all, you and I are fallible human beings. This is a good thing, a really good thing. Being fallible and embracing your fallibility, in fact, this is what makes you human, it also makes you real and loveable. Yet many people fear it, dread it, run from it, pretend that it is not so, and use all sorts of defense mechanisms in an attempt to escape it. If we ask, Where do all of these responses come from? The answer is obvious, from misunderstandings about fallibility. That then leads us to another question, what do we misunderstand about fallibility?
First, there is the misunderstanding that being fallible means being deficient as a human being.
Now it is certainly true that we all experience the feelings of deficiency about all sorts of things. After all, we are not sufficient to do everything or to be everything. If we are measuring ourselves by others, especially by those who are especially skilled or competent in a given area, then of course we will feel deficient. But deficiency in a given area is not the same thing as being deficient as a human being. All humans are deficient in numerous things and is inevitable and okay. What’s not okay is to assume perfection or think that it is possible.
Second, misunderstanding that confuses fallibility with negative emotions
Actually, to be fully alive and fully human is to experience not only the full range of positive emotions, but also the full range of negative emotions. And negative emotions are good. Without them, we would not have a strong kinesthetic aversion to things that can be dangerous. Understanding the so-called “negative” emotions essentially provide us the move-away-from energy within our mind-body system so that when we find that something does not fit our mental model, we are equipped to make a change.
Fallibility, which literally means “liable to error,” is an essential condition of being human.
It is essential in that it is a built in condition for being free, for thinking, for problem-solving, for learning, for growing, etc. If we were not “liable to error” we would be completely determined and have no choice, not even the choice to make a mistake.
Without that determination we have room or space within our minds and actions to make other choices. And to have that freedom means to be free to make mistakes. This is our glory.
Are you wondering, How can making mistakes be a glorious thing?
The glory is that we can learn. We can test something, see what works and what doesn’t and constantly learn better for understanding. This is the foundation of science. It is the basis for the ongoing development of the human race.
Yet how much parenting and schooling conditions us to fear mistakes? It seems endemic – in nearly every family and in every culture. The problem is that with that fear is that not all mistakes are the same. There are all sorts of mistakes – they range on a continuum from minor inconsequential mistakes to fatal mistakes. There are also mistakes in all domains – mistakes of the mind, of the mouth, of actions, of relationships, etc.
With mistakes, we can also ask about the intentional state of mind of the person who made the mistake.
Understanding was it an accident or was it intentional? Was the person just clumsy and awkward in handling something? Were there other factors involved (weather, health, relationships, pressure, etc.)? Was the mistake a result of a plan to harm someone or destroy something?
These distinctions give you critically important questions to ask when you or someone else makes a mistake.
What is the mistake? How is that considered a mistake?
How big or small is the mistake? What are the potential consequences of the mistake?
In what domain is the mistake?
Who made the mistake? How knowledgeable and/or skill is that person in that domain?
Was the mistake an accident or intentional or some mixture of the two?
What is needed to correct the mistake? How long will that take?
How much effort will be required to correct the mistake?
When we engage in “trial and error learning,” we are using mistakes to learn.
And sometimes this is the best way to learn – try something, see what happens, reflect on what to do, or what else one can do, and try it again.
A big mistake that has lots of negative consequences need to be recognized as soon as possible and the person needs to make things right as quickly as possible. And that’s about responsibility and ownership.
Mistakes – an inescapable fact of life and therefore one that we need a good relationship to.
That’s especially true if you are a parent – as you enable your children to learn from mistakes and not fear them. If you are a manager and enable your people to own mistakes quickly and responsibly.
Perfectionism is the myth, the fallacy, the lie, and the goal that will defeat you in the long run.
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What Is Neuro Linguistic Programming And How Does It Work?
Neuro-linguistic programming (NLP) facilitates a change in the way an individual responds to thoughts or feelings by tapping into the function of the mind.
Ever since its beginnings in the 1970s, NLP’s simple, practical methods have proved both fascinating and popular for therapists and clients alike. To unpack what NLP is, how it works, and how it can benefit you, we’ve put together this handy guide.
What Is NLP?
Neuro-linguistic programming is a psychological therapeutic method stressing that a person can use techniques adopted by successful people to achieve their own individual goals.
Using successes and failures as a background, it encourages a person to consider which thoughts, feelings, or actions are geared towards positive experiences, and which prove a hindrance.
Within NLP, there are no negative actions, as failure is simply regarded as a step in the process of learning and success.
NLP is founded on the theory that the senses – and the emphasis placed on sensory input – help an individual to create their own map of the world.
The system used to make sense of experiences is called a primary representational system (PRS), and the therapist must understand an individual’s PRS in order to interpret and alter thoughts, feelings and actions.
NLP practitioners take into account a person’s way of speaking, their actions, thoughts and feelings in order to form a view of how the person understands reality and the world around them. Practitioners then use NLP techniques to help the person replicate successful processes or techniques used by others.
What Happens During an NLP Session?
During a session, the therapist works to understand a person’s way of thinking, behaviours, emotions, and goals, before trying to identify their view of the world and primary representational system.
Using this information as a basis, the therapist will implement techniques to alter the way the person thinks, acts, or feels in a particular environment or situation.
With its strong foundation in Gestalt therapy, which was developed by Friz and Laura Perls and which focuses on an individual identifying change and implementing solutions in the here and now, NLP has a firm emphasis on the present and requires the individual to make steps towards change within the therapy session.
Become the best person you can be with The Coaching Centre. Our range of personal and professional development programs and courses are designed with you in mind and are guaranteed to result in a better quality of life.
With our accredited, highly-trained coaches and proven methodologies, we offer solutions tailored to your experiences and preferences and geared towards helping you achieve success in every area of your life.
Therapy is an intervention that starts off to distinguish the difference between coaching and therapy, so that then as a coach, you can be crystal clear about what you are doing and what you are not doing. Central to that distinction is the presence of ego-strength. As a coach, you challenge people. Yes, you do so out of compassion and care and even love, but you challenge people.
You disturb their peace, you shake them up so that they awaken to their possibilities and potentials, and you stretch them so that they do not stay in their comfortable and familiar comfort zones.
Therapy
Do that with a person who needs therapy and you can make things a lot worse.
Do that and you can activate the person’s fragile ego-system and then all sorts of abreactions can occur. The person may become overwhelmed with anxiety, have a panic attack, fall into a comma, positive or negatively hallucinate, fall into a deep depression, start feeling suicidal, etc.
Insufficient ego-strength refers to one not having sufficient inner strength or capability to “face” some aspect of their “reality” without falling apart or collapsing. Then in fight/flight they react in extreme ways trying to protect themselves.
How much do you, as a coach, need to know about therapy?
How much do you need to know to stay clear about when to coach and when not to, when to refer to a professional psychotherapist, and when you could facilitate the needed healing?
Use the questions about coachability. Is the person okay in his person or is there a deep not-okayness? Is the person living in the past, and reacting to the past as if it is present? How defensive does the person seem to be? Does she present herself as open to feedback and finding out how to work on self and improve oneself?
Does the person talk about peace or growth?
While the coaching client is focused on solving problems, growing, stretching, unleashing potentials, exploring new possibilities, and generally, taking on more, not so with the therapy client. The one who needs therapy (healing) wants peace, tranquility, the cessation of striving, pushing, achieving, the release from stretching, etc. These are two very different orientations and they indicate that the therapy client is tired of the struggle, tired of things not working, tired of the internal conflicts, and just wants a reprieve from them.
To be effective as either a coach or a therapist requires both knowledge and skills
Your studies in NLP can lead you through a lot of the knowledge that you need. It has prepared you for understanding communication and how the coaching dialogue can work. Learn about the filters people use to process information when you learn about Meta-Programs. You can learn about the construct of meaning and the layering of meaning when you learn Meta-States. Learn about the processes of change when you learn The Axes of Change. Thereafter you can learn about unleashing potentials when you learn The Self-Actualization Quadrants. After that the more rigorous and difficult challenge of learning the coaching skills so that you can actually do it.
To be effective as a psychotherapist also requires both knowledge and skills
Here knowledge has to include Abnormal Psychology, how things can go wrong and how to identify what has gone wrong, how, and to what extent.
Included in abnormal psychology is the structure of neurosis, the presence and structure of personality disordering, how and what gets traumatized within a person, and much more. You need to know about projection, transference, abreactions, etc.
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As you know, the actual process of meta-stating is very simple which is why everyone does it and almost everyone does it unconsciously. All you have to do is to start with a state, say learning, and then think about that state, you like it or you don’t, you find it exciting or boring, you want to do more of it or less. Whatever your second thought is, it comes with some feelings (emotions) and what you have done is to set a frame about that experience.
When you do that, you do something very complex, something unique to human consciousness. You are thinking about something simultaneously at multiple levels. At the primary level you are seeing, hearing, and experiencing some event or action or activity (“learning”) and yet at a higher level of consciousness, you are having thoughts-and-feelings about it. In doing that you have begun to create your own unique mind-scape, a mental system composed of thoughts and feelings that frame your understandings and beliefs about the subjective experience called “learning.”
Nor do you stop at one level. We can invite you to go upward in the levels of your mind by simply asking, “What do you think about the joy of learning?” And to your answer we can ask it again, “What do you think about that?” Animals cannot process information like this. But you can. It is uniquely human. The technical language for this is self-reflexive consciousness. This is your power to think recursively and to create multiple layers of levels (logical levels). And when you do this, you enter into the Semantic Realm of your own unique Meaning Making.
Once you do this, it is no longer adequate to ask a person, “So what do you think of this project?” Or house, plan, proposal, strategy, etc.? For the human experience, nothing is that simple. And why not? Because whatever a person answers, that is just the first level of thought. Above and beyond that first thought is a second one, a third one, a fourth one, etc. And it is just not a “thought” in the intellectual sense. No! It is a dynamic thought full of emotion, experience, and somatic commitments—a state.
The Big Misunderstanding
A big misunderstanding of Meta-States is that it is just academic or intellectual. Wrong! It’s wrong because every state is dynamic—it is alive, moving, fluid and it is comprise of emotions and somatic commitments. To understand this, let’s start with something simple like the learning state. When you are in a learning state, what is occurring? Thoughts like “I wonder what I will discover…?” Emotions like “it’s exciting to discover, I feel curious and can’t wait…” Somatic commitments such as eyes open, mind alert, body moderately tense, body oriented to the teacher or subject, etc. A state involves a whole constellation of forces and activities. It is not just one facet of consciousness, but all facets. And a state involves an energy field comprised most essentially of your metabolism, as well as other neurological and mental and emotional forces.
And because of that, you can anchor a state with a touch, sound, sight, or word and in that way “fire” it off so that a person re-accesses the state. A song can trigger you to go into a particular state, as can a word, or an image. States are dynamic and fluid constellations of energies that come together to form a particular experience.
Meta-Scape
So imagine the power, the energy, the collisions, the explosions, etc. that occur when you apply one state to another state! Bring joy to learning and joy becomes the frame of learning, the category in which learning is classified, and the energies that start modifying the quality of learning. That’s what happens when you are meta-stating. Bring intense curiosity to your openness. Bring playful silliness to your experimenting. Whatever state you bring to another state, you are building up a meta-scape— a layered system of understandings, beliefs, references, memories, imaginations, decisions, etc. And it is inside that system that you live!
After that, if I want to understand you, I need to understand the meta-scape you live in. NLP calls this your “model of the world.” Korzybski described it as your “map” of the territory. At The Coaching Centre we call it your “matrix” of frames in the Matrix Model. It is your inside world that you live from and so you inevitably will be expressing it.
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As a Coach, and especially as a Meta-Coach— you need to go deep with your clients. This is not just something nice to do, it is essential. It is essential for the client if the coaching is to be authentic, real, personal, intimate, intense, and fierce. Otherwise, the coaching will be shallow and superficial. The coaching will merely coast along on the surface of things and never get sufficiently deep to be life-changing or transformative. Obviously when that happens, people will wonder what they are paying for and if the commitment of time, effort, and money invested in coaching is really worth it.
Today there is far too much “coaching” that is superficial and shallow. Therefore the sessions are more like chats and everyday conversations than anything else. And anyone could facilitate those kind of sessions; it requires no special skills or understanding. “What’s the problem with that?” someone may ask. The problem is that it degrades the quality and significance of coaching and leads some to consider the whole thing more of a hoax than a legitimate profession.
Now that we have raise the question, what’s the answer. How do you, as a Meta-Coach facilitate the coaching conversation so that you can go deep with your clients? And “deep,” what are we taking about? What is “deep” when it comes to having an authentic coaching conversation?
You Need To Go Deep With Your Clients
Deep means that we get beyond the outer game of actions, behaviors, performances, environmental factors and to inside to the inner game. This is where coaching makes the most difference.
Lots and lots and lots of people know good and well what to do, even how to do it, but they still stop themselves from carrying out what they know. It’s the Knowing—Doing Gap.
They procrastinate, they make excuses, they sabotage themselves with limiting beliefs, decisions, understandings, etc. Deep means that the coaching goes meta to the meaning frames that construct the person’s model of the world.
Now for the how question. How do you facilitate the person going inside, going to his or her meta-matrix of frames, and “getting to the heart of the matter?”
START WITH THE OPENING STATEMENT AS YOU DISCOVER THE HIDDEN PROBLEM AND/OR DESIRED OUTCOME.
Wherever the client starts, use that the beginning point. Whether the client starts with a goal or a problem, embrace it and begin mapping out the external landscape: PS—> Gap —> DS. What do you want? So what do you really, really want? Where are you now? What’s going on now? And how bad is it? How far away in time and space is your objective? What do you have to do to get what you want? Shallow conversations stay on the surface and focus on the external variables. Deeper coaching conversations take a person inside to the person’s code of representations and meaning frames.
GO INSIDE TO THE PERSON’S MATRIX OF MEANING FRAMES.
Once you have the basic external landscape, go inside. Then, what do you understand or believe that is creating what’s going on right now? And what else? Is it ecological? Can you pinpoint what beliefs, identities, permissions, decisions, intentions, etc. are formulating your goals? And what do you understand about reaching those goals? on another note, what beliefs are limiting you? Let’s say that’s true, what does that mean to you? Shallow conversations focus on external solutions — as if all solutions and resources are external. Deeper coaching conversations know that the true source of experiences and emotional states are products of each person’s internal code. We seek to identify and understand that code because when the code changes, so does the person’s experience.
DETAIL THE PERSON’S STRATEGY FOR HIS OR HER VARIOUS EXPERIENCES.
The fundamental NLP principle from Korzybski and George Miller is that every experience has a structure —a process and it can be identified. So using a know-nothing frame, elicit from your client the processes whereby he creates his experience. Get the strategy process from how she invents her reality. For this you will need to use the basic NLP distinctions of representational systems, strategy analysis, and then the Meta- States structure of reflexive consciousness.
Shallow conversations superficially assume that experiences are mysterious and just happen, and that people can be held responsible for what they feel and sometimes even for what they do. Deeper coaching conversations hold people responsible for their mental maps—challenging and confronting them about the ecology of the maps that they are using. This makes the conversation intimate and sometimes fierce like a crucible.
DETAIL THE PERSON’S DEFINITIONS, UNDERSTANDINGS, AND ASSUMPTIONS.
To go deep with the person, inquire about the person’s definitions of terms, how she understands what she’s talking about, and what he is assuming without questioning. Surface conversations skim over a person’s words assuming that the other person uses his words in exactly the same way you do. Deeper conversations don’t make that assumption, but recognizes that each person operates from her linguistic definitions.
LOOK FOR AND TALK ABOUT THE DEEPER THINGS.
So if you are not getting the person to go inside and identify his belief frames, note that and give that back to the person as feedback. “Are you aware that all of your talk is about external things?” “What do you now realize when you notice that?” Many people have a difficult time going in and/or talking about internal things. It may be that they have not learned how to be self-aware. It may be that they don’t have permission. The coachee could assume that going inside is framed as negative and therefore something to avoid. And sometimes it may be that all of the cultural frames go against it. It may be that the person is too insecure inside and protects oneself against it.
Speak about the deeper things by framing the distinction between the outer game and the inner game. Frame your coaching as going beyond the surface activities to the inner game where the real game occurs. The coaching conversation is like none-other precisely because it is deep, intimate, and personal. Here’s to your inner journey to becoming a Deep Meta-Coach!
Learn the art of going deep at The Coaching Centre today!
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What is Meta-Model Coaching
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