Improve Your Life With Language Work – Neuro-Linguistic Programming™

How can we empower ourselves with language work? Neuro-Linguistic Programming™, or NLP™, is becoming more well-known as an entry point to self-empowerment with language, but its applications are often misunderstood. Learn how I applied it in my business life.

What is NLP™ or Neuro-linguistic Programming™, and what is language work?

During my mid-thirties, I was introduced to the work of Richard Bandler, one of the co-creators of NLP™ (stands for Neuro-Linguistic Programming).

Neuro-Linguistic Programming™, or NLP™, for short, is tough to explain in a few sentences, but it’s worth it!

Working with the skillset of NLP can help introduce us to the world of language work.

Often, we are unconscious about the influence of other people’s language on our mind, body, and spirit.

Our nervous systems can be immediately affected by language and by the specific use of words.

Not knowing this or how to break out of programming and hypnotic effects can put us at a disadvantage.

If someone is communicating powerfully with you and has good intentions towards you, then being aware of the power of language may not be a necessary skill.

However, if someone is being manipulative or has bad intentions, wouldn’t you like to become aware of what they are doing to your nervous system with their language choices?

This can be especially true if you are being subjected to the constant word salad spouted by a narcissist or any type of manipulator or predatory person.

How can we begin language work?

To begin working on language use, it’s important to know how entwined language is with our reactions to everything around us.

The language we use, listen to, or hear in our minds can influence: –

• the structure of our thoughts.
• Our subconscious and conscious thinking processes.
• Influence our different states of mind.
• Inform us about how we can begin to use language to shift internal experience more deliberately.
• Teach us how to access internal resources more easily, feel better and be more productive in daily life.
• Enable us to deconstruct certain beliefs that do not serve us.
• Employ creative visualization to improve our lives.
• Work with hypnosis to support health and wellness.
• Demonstrate eye-accessing cues to teach us how the brain recalls information – for example, when we are constructing information (see picture above).

and…

• any other positive application we can think of!

Isn’t NLP™ that thing about hypnosis?

Hypnosis often gets a bad rap because most of us only see hypnosis in the context of an entertainment piece.

For example, if you go to a comedy show or club, you might see stage hypnosis.

People are put into a trance and act out roles and suggestions they are given. Sometimes, the acts are funny or outrageous, and we laugh at them.

Maybe you’ve heard about therapeutic hypnosis or even tried it yourself.

But how can either of these options help us with our language work?

Which type of trance do you want to be in?

When you drive your car, you are in a very specific state of mind – which is, in fact, simply a different type of trance – or self-hypnosis.

When you are at home by yourself, you may act differently than when you are at work.

All of us shift between different brain states and states of mind daily.

That was Richard Bandler’s point when demonstrating NLP™. As one of the originators of NLP™, he wasn’t interested in mind tricks, hypnosis for entertainment, or bending spoons.

What interested him the most about this work was how it could help people have successful lives.

He would model experts in particular fields, observe them at their best, and employ these modeled approaches in language models so that other people could replicate excellent behavior.

That is (one of) the essences of NLP™.

How I first experienced NLP™

My business partner at the time and I were on Richard Bandler’s course to learn about the use of language.

When we got there, we were a little confused. 

There seemed to be a lot of people attending in the medical field.  We were business development trainers, not medical staff!

After about half a day, we both began to get it.

Piece by piece, Richard showed us how certain aspects of our language and behavior are constructed. 

He also helped us learn how our focus of attention can affect our energy and results.

Using these techniques, we could then learn how to script our courses for maximum retention. 

We realized that there needed to be a large dollop of fun in our processes.  This helps people relax and learn easily.

Helping people to type with NLP™ and Accelerated Learning

Six months later, my business partner and I ran courses teaching people to touch type in one day.

These were clients who had little or no keyboard experience. 

Maybe they could peck and poke at the keyboard with one or two fingers, but not much more. 

At the time, there was a wave of people who needed to learn computers as part of their office work experience (well, it was in the late 90s!).

We used a carefully scripted course.  The script contained specific language and creative visualization techniques inspired by what we had learned with Richard Bandler.

We also used some accelerated learning techniques.  This included tools like visualization of the placement of the keys as well us the most helpful movements.

We were also not shy to use everything we could to shift the learning mind state! 

This included music and several different learning approaches, including movement around the room tapping on oversized hand-shaped posters.

People worked on their learning both individually and in groups, often a rare occurrence in computer training for business.

The course worked extremely well and kept us both quite busy for several years.

The UK version of the course, called Key Symphony, only stopped running in central London in 2021.

Neuro-linguistic programming and spiritual openings?

I also noticed when I was on Richard Bandler’s course that many people attending were involved in spiritual work.

I had recently begun my spiritual journey, so I was interested to note that many people were openly learning NLP™ for that purpose.

It didn’t really occur to me to make the connection in a bigger way at the time. It was such an early part of my spiritual journey.

Now that I’m on the spiritual path, I’m beginning to understand more deeply why people were on that course for that purpose. 

Those people were practicing energetic clearing by reprogramming their inner worlds to release trauma and restriction.

How were they doing this with Neuro-Linguistic Programming™ or language work? 

For many, it was about improving how they spoke to others outwardly, plus changing how they spoke to themselves inwardly through their inner dialogue.

This focus promotes enormous clarity and a much more peaceful inner world.

Think about it – when the ‘monkey mind’ chatter is cleared, we can meditate and even think much more effectively.

When we have improved our internal languaging through clearing energetic blocks, creativity can reign. We experience much less restriction and much more flow.

“It’s all a matter of intention”

Richard Bandler

Richard Bandler always made it clear that learning about language patterns and being able to influence how people feel was not manipulative!  Of course, it can be if that is your intention.

You may know somebody who will act like that, or maybe you can identify many people in your life or in our society who act that way.

People with bad intentions can create karma

If a person’s intention is purely self-motivated and for their benefit without any thought given to the consequences for others, then bad things can happen.

Our level of vibrational awareness can affect how we behave in the world and how we choose to interact with others.

For example, a lot of dating coaches employed Richard Bandler’s work but not with good intentions! Courses were sold about how to ‘hypnotize’ women in bars, for example. Sad, but true.

Ultimately, an individual may have an outcome that they discover they do not like and start to awaken from creating negative karmic patterns. 

Noticing repeating patterns like this may be their first experience of personal growth.  Karma, anyone?

An alternative approach can be that, when we intend a positive outcome for both us and for others, this focus sets a more positive tone towards the outcome of our desires.

Positive intentions – the starting point

When working with clients and using Neuro-Linguistic Programming™ to support their growth, I focus on setting the highest intention for the client.

This sets a positive, energetic frame of reference both verbally and energetically. 

Encouraging positive language work and setting a positive intention also helps us to create fabulous questions for intuitive readings, which in turn give us fantastic answers!

Being clear about the frame of reference for the readings I give makes a huge difference for clients. 

I realize now that having studied NLP™ has made an enormous change to my approach in intuitive work.

Sarah Lawrence is an Intuitive Coach with both business and personal teaching and training experience.  Learn more about her here.  To schedule a chat about the intuitive work she offers or to book a reading, connect with Sarah at the client portal.