NLP stands for Neuro-Linguistic Programming. It is a grass roots personal and professional development movement that began in the early 1970′s when a small group of college students in Santa Cruz, CA set out to discover the structure of subjective experience.
This group of brilliant and curious souls, led by Richard Bandler and John Grinder, soon discovered a unique way of approaching how the mind works. The NLP models that resulted from exploring subjectivity constitute a singular contribution to the field of psychology and personal development.
The NLP approach to human potential is a departure from convention.
To learn to solve problems, NLP students didn’t study those who had the problems to learn about what went wrong. They studied those who used to have the problems and had since resolved them. With a unique process called modeling NLPers systematically deconstructed the mental and behavioral strategies that lead to success and taught those strategies to those in need. A new paradigm was born!
What is NLP? Modeling.
Modeling is at the heart of any NLP student’s understanding of the world and has been turned into a popular concept by the gurus of the day. To learn how to get the best results, study people who have already gotten those results and do what they did.
NLP makes the most of the concept of modeling. Bandler and Grinder, for example, wrote a two-volume series on the language patterns of Milton Erickson, MD, arguably the most gifted hypnotherapist the world has ever known. Essentially, every successful strategy or method in any field can be deconstructed, understood and put to use by anyone who wants to learn.
While some dispute the veracity of this claim, no one can deny that the NLP process of modeling has given the world some of the finest communication methods and personal growth techniques the world has ever known. There is nothing like NLP and there never will be.
How NLP Can Change Your Life
Learning NLP well will change your life. I won’t create a long list of bullet points to show off the benefits of knowing NLP, however. I’ll just ask you a few of questions.
What if you were a world-class master of interpersonal communication?
What if you could decipher the strategies that make the most successful people in your circles successful, even when they themselves don’t know how they do it?
What if you could genuinely help anyone with any problem within a few minutes of knowing them and without giving common advice?
What if you had a bottomless black bag of personal development tools and exercises that you could use at any time with anyone, including yourself?
What if you consistently applied the most sophisticated set of personal development skills in the world to your toughest personal challenges?
What is NLP? It’s the vehicle toward answers to all of the above and more, believe it or not.
