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The Power of NLP Submodalities
One of the major tools of Neuro
Linguistic Programming is a process or technique known as
Submodalities.
Think about a T.V. Set: you have the
picture (the modality) but you can adjust various aspects of the
picture brightness, the contrast, the color, (on the old sets), the
vertical and the horizontal. The fine tunings. Those are the
"Visual" submodalities.
Now think about a stereo system. You can
adjust the volume, the bass, the treble, and on some systems you can
mess around with a whole bunch of little sliders in the graphic
equalizer. We call this "Auditory" in NLP.
Now think about touch,
what we in NLP call "Kinesthetic." You can think about touch or
feelings in a lot of different ways, hot to cold, rough to smooth,
large to small, feelings even have color and vibration etc.
Now think
about a food that you really, really, really like....Now tell me,
how do you know you are thinking about that food?
Do
you have a picture? Imagine an
internal screen and think of that food. Notice where on the screen
that food is located. Is it near or far? to the right or left? up or
down? center? Is it in black and white or color? Is it a movie or a
still? Are you seeing it through your own eyes or do you see
yourself in the picture looking at the food?
What about sounds?
Do you say something to yourself about
this food? What about feelings? Do
you have a feeling somewhere in your body?
Most people have never thought of stuff
like this until exposed to NLP.
Okay? So big deal right? Well it
is a big deal because if you know the submodalities of a food you
have trouble saying "no" to...or something that you no longer want
to want...like ice cream or cake or doughnuts or cheese puffs... you
can change them to be the same as the submodalities of a food you
can easily say "no" to. Changing the fine tuning of an internal
representation or picture can totally change your experience of that
thing. We use submodalities in NLP
to help clear unwanted habits, and to install new habits.
For example, I was addicted to Starbucks
Java Chip Ice cream. I had to have it in the house at all times. If
I ran out, I would make a special trip to the store to get some. If
the store I went to didn't have it, I would keep going from store to
store until I found it.
At home, every time I walked by the
fridge I would grab a spoonful (and I work at home, DANGER!). Then one day I
did this technique and I haven't craved it since and it's been 3
years now.
When I thought of Ice cream, I had a
picture right in front of me. Life Size. Center.
When I thought of Frozen Yogurt, I had a
picture to my right and a bit lower.
Just imagining moving that particular kind
of ice cream over to the right where yogurt is in my internal
representation, was enough to change ice cream from something I had
to have every day to something I have only occasionally. And I
honestly have only had Starbucks java chip like 2 times since doing
this. I still eat ice cream occasionally but I can now take it or
leave it. Now if I had moved the
picture down to the far lower right corner of my internal screen
(where I find green olives when I think about them. YUCK!) I most likely
would not be able to eat ice cream at all.
This is of course just the tip of the
iceberg but this is way too long already so I'll stop here for
today... So this coming week, just
think about something you like and notice if you have a picture. Is
it near or far away? Is it in the center? To the right? To the left?
Up? Down? Is it in color or B & W? Is it framed or panoramic?
Through your own eyes or seeing yourself in the picture?
Now play with the location a bit.
If you
change it how does that change how you feel about the thing you
like? If it's something you want to like, go ahead and see what you
can do to intensify it and make it even better.
If it's something you don't
want to like anymore...well go ahead and change the picture so it's
less appealing.
I'm working on a complete video
lesson about this which will be up at some point soon.
-Mark Shepard, NLPT, Modern Jedi
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