Pegasus NLP Blog

‘I’ve done NLP – I can tell if you’re lying’

The old myth of the NLP Lie Detector Technique came up again in today’s course – just as it does in just about every NLP Core Skills Course we do. And it again struck me how sad it is that such a valuable body of knowledge as powerful and life enhancing as NLP is can be trivialised in this way.

Not only trivialised but misrepresented in facile and misleading NLP articles, websites, and training courses – to the extent that these trivialised versions of NLP become almost ‘accepted facts’ about NLP…

The NLP ‘Frogs into Princes’ book

The myth is based on an early observation made just a few years after NLP began to be developed in the early 70’s and mentioned in the great little book ‘Frogs into Princes’. Read the rest of this entry »

Instead of rushing about in the dark

Thomas Henry Huxley was a London biologist during the second half of the 1800’s. He coined the term ‘agnostic’ and championed the work of Charles Darwin’s work, among other things. There is a story of his being late for an appointment, rushing out of his house, hailing a hansom cab, and shouting to the cabbie ‘Top speed – I’m late!’

After a few moments the thought dawned on him… He stuck his head out the window and shouted to the cabbie ‘Hey, do you know where I want to go?’

‘No, sir, I don’t,’ shouted the cabbie, ‘But I’m going as fast as I can!’ Read the rest of this entry »

Making it ‘your own’ Values Hierarchy

Values are very personal. No-one can or should advise us about which values are right for us. Of course lots of people are only too happy to do so, whether as well-meaning friends or well-intentioned (if unskilled) coaches or therapists.

It is, after all, much easier to advise someone else on how they can or should live a fulfilling life than to do so for oneself.

Fortunately anyone can use the NLP-based process described in this series of articles to check and double-check their values hierarchy before investing time and energy in pursuing it.  (Incidentally, if you’ve just discovered this blog you might want to note that this is No. 6 in a series – scroll down to get articles 1-5 in the NLP & Goals series. And it might be a good idea to read them in this order.) Read the rest of this entry »

I was feeling pretty good as I made my first coffee of the day at 7.10 am this morning (for the record that’s Saturday 16 January 2010). The snow had not affected plans for the 3^rd module of our NLP Master Practitioner Programme – and I was looking forward to going in to facilitate today’s session and was happily anticipating some of the good things we were going to be doing and exploring together.

Then I turned on Radio 4’s flagship Today news programme to find out what was happening in the big world out there.

Big mistake. I was just in time to hear presenter Jim Noughtie putting on his ‘sad-and-moving-story’ voice and beginning to read from one of the Rupert Murdoch tabloids…. “…the bloated and rotting corpses in the intense heat…” was all I heard.

Fortunately I was able to switch him off in time. It was about the terrible earthquake in Haiti, of course, and Jim had managed to evoke some images. Not what I, or anyone else, needs at any time let along 7.10 am as you begin your day. Read the rest of this entry »

If you have taken action with the first four articles on how to use NLP to identify your values and goals you will now have a list of your Top 7 values, arranged in order of importance to you.

You now have your provisional Values Hierarchy.

Next step is to check this hierarchy to ensure it takes you in a right direction for you – and without creating inner conflict. And that’s the subject of this article and the next one. Read the rest of this entry »

This month’s Pegasus NLP Newsletter is about how Grand New Starts, such as new year resolutions, begin with lots of enthusiasm and then quickly fizzle out.

Why does this happen? Frequently because big changes can are so disruptive of our own lives and the lives of those around us that the drive for normality soon undermines our new resolutions. Read the rest of this entry »

In the first three articles we looked at how to make your goals meaningful by finding out which feelings or values you want to feel more of in your life from now on – and which you would like to feel less of.

We now need to do two things:

1. whittle your list down to size and discover which feelings are more important to you and which are less so – so that you don’t waste time chasing minor ones and forget about important ones.
2. look at why so-called negative feelings are included in your final list – because, after all, isn’t NLP supposed to be about being positive…? Read the rest of this entry »

This is the third in a series on how you can use NLP to create personal or professional goals, including New Your Resolutions!

Article No. 1 is about how to use NLP to create life goals which give us a sense of fulfilment and purpose – a feeling that we really are going somewhere with our lives.

Article No. 2 is about how our goals become meaningful and fulfilling when we use NLP to link our goals with our values i.e. when, instead of being sort of plucked out of the air,  our goals are carefully designed to ensure we experience, on a daily basis, more of the feelings which we would like to feel – and less of the feelings which we would like to avoid feeling! And the rest of this series is about how to carefully design such goals.

Time for some day dreaming!

A great way of identifying how you want to feel (and how you don’t want to feel!) is to do a bit of day dreaming – or fantasising – about your Ideal Day. Read the rest of this entry »

Well, if the Ouch Factor from the previous article and, especially, from Kaufman’s Victory Poem has worked you’re now probably thinking about your goals for 2010. And, if you have done some NLP and come across the NLP Well Formed Outcomes process or, as we have defined it in Pegasus NLP, the  NLP PECSAW process you may have now begun designing goals for the next year.

Great! Or is it…?

Goals, walls, and ladders

Stephen Covey, in his pithy style, distinguishes between management and leadership: ‘Management is efficiency in climbing the ladder of success; leadership determines whether the ladder is leaning against the right wall.’

The same concept can be applied to our personal and professional goals, Read the rest of this entry »

Well, how about that! Another year almost through…

And, yes, it’s once again that time… when many of us take stock. And look backwards over the past year or so, and look forwards towards the coming year and, perhaps, reassess how we are living our lives and how ‘on track’ we are for fulfilling our personal values.

As I was driving home a little while ago I was half-heartedly pondering such thoughts and Herbert Kaufman’s great little poem popped into my mind:.

Victory

You are the man who used to boast

That you’d achieve the uttermost,

some day… Read the rest of this entry »