NLP Was defined by the presenter. as ‘the “Science of Excellence” which I found a bit curious… personally I think that ‘mind control’ sounds much cooler. Over the course of the next hour though ‘Mystic’ explained that NLP was less voodoo and more common sense then I could have imagined.

He started with a brief history of NLP and the two pioneering books called “The structure of Magic” 1 and 2 – these books were the results of studies done on successful psycho-therapy and attempted to identify trends and common practices by different ‘professionals’ in the field.

The Milton model next and switched tracks from suggestive hypnosis to ‘indirect’ hypnosis. A hypnotist employing this technique would be vague and ambiguous thus allowing the subjects mind to choose the direction.

Some other new ideas came out around this time;

“The mind and body are not separate”

“Everything you experiences has a structure, a sequence”

“We all have the same (or similar) hardware. If we can think alike – we can perform alike”

The presenter delved into NLP as psycho-therapy and brought up some interesting points. When you ask your sub-conscious a question (and we all do) it answers… no matter what you ask it, it WILL answer. One of the problems many depressed people have is that they ask the wrong questions. When asking the question, “Why do I feel so shitty?” the mind can easily come up with a number of answers – you don’t have enough money, the weather is crap, you’re girlfriend is cheating on you, you hate your parents… instead of asking destructive questions like these we can ask, “what can I do to feel better?”. The subconscious will of course answer this as well.

With out a doubt, the coolest part of the presentation was the ‘taking control’ portion. It touched on pacing and leading. The idea, again, is simple but the effects are undeniable. Pacing occurs first. It is the process of ‘syncing’ with the subject and making them like you. People typically like other people who are like them. A number of verbal and physical methods were identified like matching tone of voice, speed of speech, body language and speech patterns and representational systems (physical, auditory, visual). After building a physical rapport comes the leading portion. Carefully crafted suggestive questions are used to ‘nudge’ the subject to a desired conclusion. For example, “would you be more comfortable sitting down or standing?” implies that choosing one of the two options will result in comfort… see where this is going?

Much of the presentation seemed like common sense but many of us live our lives without employing that common sense. It was a refreshing reminder.