Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP)

Neuro:
Refers to the nervous system and how it process information and codes it as memory inside our body.

Linguistic:
Indicates that the neural processes of the mind come coded, ordered, and are given meaning through language.

Programming:
Refers to our ability to organise these parts into programmes to achieve a desired outcome.

The History

Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) represents a relatively new discipline dating back only to the mid 1970s. It was founded by Richard Bandler and John Grinder who were working at Santa Cruz university California as a mathematician and a linguistic professor respectively.

They came together to study language patterns and began by studying three of the most acclaimed therapists in different fields. These therapists essentially used language as their vehicle. Virginia Satir a great Family Therapist, Fitz Pearls a Gestalt Therapist and Milton Erickson in Hypnosis.

Bandler and Grinder were searching for a pattern or methodology in these therapists use of language which was producing such profound changes. They discovered there were indeed recipes for their success and they distilled many of these into processes and drilled down to see why they worked.

They built a model of communication that provided a theoretical understanding of how we get “programmed” by language. In essence they worked out how to use language to get results and packaged this in a way that is easily understood and repeatable by anyone. As the model grew it expanded into explaining how to make the most of our brain and how to use it to get what we want in a systematic fashion.

Today NLP has institutes world wide and numerous authors have applied NLP to medicine and health, therapy and psychological well being, business, education, athletics, law and many more areas.

NLP Today

NLP has many different applications in different contexts. At its simplest NLP deals with understanding how people can have exactly the same experience yet interpret it differently, react to it differently and remember it differently.

NLP deals with the strategies individuals use to make sense of the world around us and indeed the people around us. If the strategies we are using to interpret our world are not working in our favour then NLP allows us to alter some or all of the strategy in order to serve us better. This is of course tremendously helpful in assisting people with phobias or unhelpful repeated reactions to specific situations or communications.

Applied to education we can teach children new strategies in an area of weakness such as spelling. We can employ different strategies in different situations such as interviews or presentations helping us achieve our full potential.

NLP improves our ability to communicate by providing a communication model and perhaps most importantly it describes skills to be used in order to build and maintain rapport. This places what some people do naturally within everyone’s reach. It assists us in getting the best out of ourselves.

NLP explains how memory works and gives methods of working with our own memory and where appropriate with the memory of others. NLP cannot eliminate our personal histories but it can help us to attach a more productive or amenable meaning to events that have occurred to or around us. This has obvious therapeutic benefit to people distressed by painful memories conscious or unconscious.

NLP can also strengthen useful strategies and positive interpretation, building confidence and self esteem. This allows us to take what we do well and be even better. You can even improve your golf swing!

Taking control of ones own mind describes the heart of NLP.

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