As stated already, this is not a book for the NLP expert. Its prime purpose is to help anyone interested in improving the levels of their sports performance. However, it is necessary to cover briefly some key aspects of NLP so that the reader can put these into context.
Richard Bandler and John Grinder, assisted by a number of people, (in particular Robert Dilts and Judith DeLozier) originated NLP in the United States in the early 1970s. It was based on modelling people who were highly effective in their fields and establishing how they did what they did (even if the person in question did not seem to know what it was they were actually doing, i.e. they were doing it naturally or unconsciously).
The original definition of NLP was 'the study of the structure of subjective experience', which is a wonderful description but can create mayhem in the minds of newcomers. It is not based upon some complex theory that needs to be analysed to be understood. In their book Neuro-Linguistic Programming: Volume I The Study Of The Structure Of Subjective Experience the originators make the point that
... it makes no commitment to theory, but rather has the status of a model - a set of procedures whose usefulness not truthfulness is the measure of its worth. NLP presents specific tools, which can be applied effectively in any human interaction. It offers specific techniques by which a practitioner may usefully organise and reorganise his or her subjective experience or the experience of a client in order to define and subsequently secure any behavioural outcome. (My emphasis)
This can seem confusing to someone new to the field. Put simply, it means that we each have a model of the world based upon our values, beliefs, behaviour, experience, etc. However, everybody's model of the world is different. No two people are exactly the same in all respects. The reason is that the experiences we have are different, and our responses to experiences are different. Even people who have shared the same experience, e.g. a holiday, will view and remember it differently. A piece of music or a picture can create entirely different feelings, moods, emotions or reactions in different people. This is due to our individual responses to them.
Some people find this confusing, or even distressing, as they would prefer a world where everyone is the same and everything is predictable. Fortunately, NLP has shown us what most of us know already: that our capacity to be individual and unique is never-ending. NLP has given us a structure and a language to explain this.
This brings us back to part of the quote from the original Bandler, Grinder, Dilts and DeLozier book, the issue of what is true. We all believe we know the truth when we experience it. And, of course, we are right. It is just that it is our version of the truth!
Sport is a wonderful example of this. As anyone who watches sports events knows, opposing fans will see the game completely differently. Each person is seeing the same thing yet living a different experience. This is not just an issue of opposing fans having different opinions. Fans of the same team will debate and argue endlessly the merits of individual players' performance, re-run incidents that occurred. Newspaper columnists may then describe what appears to be a different game. Someone who saw the game on TV may describe something totally different.
This becomes even more pointed if you hear the players and managers discussing key incidents afterwards. In football a penalty incident is seen and described completely differently. In cricket an umpiring decision is debated from a large range of angles. How is it that everyone knows the truth? Often the more uncertain the options are, the more certain people are of their version, based upon their own model of the world. Rather than create an esoteric debate on the nature of truth, Bandler and Grinder took the view that it was the usefulness of something, not the perfect definition of truth, that was important. Instead of getting lost in the philosophical labyrinth, they concentrated on the question: does it work?
Building on this, they focused on the ecological aspects of what works. It is not sufficient to ruthlessly pursue a narrow, selfish ambition at the expense of other people, or even at the expense of our own peace of mind. Ecology in NLP is about making sure that what we do does not harm us or the people around us.
An individual who works on a mental aspect of performance that allows him/her to inflict unnecessary physical damage on an opponent would not be acting in an ethical or ecological way. This is an important issue, as it encourages us to improve our own performance without being 'untrue' to ourselves. NLP is not about a selfish search for success at the expense of personal happiness or causing damage to others. It is about achieving higher levels of performance and satisfaction whilst still being entirely true to oneself and, where appropriate, others as well.
The early work of Bandler, Grinder and the other originators provoked immense reaction at the time. As they had tended to model experts in communication, e.g. therapy, hypnosis and counselling, it was people from these fields who responded first. Many were sceptical, as they felt that the quick and permanent results that NLP achieved were a 'quick fix'. They believed that, because they had had to study for many years to achieve academic success and recognition in their field, their whole ethos was being threatened.
Others jumped onto the bandwagon and became NLP 'junkies', avidly attending training courses, and hungry for the next new technique they could try. Even now, some NLP courses have a quota of these people attending them. One other factor regarding the early history of NLP was that it originated in California and therefore the reaction of non-Americans meant that a certain scepticism prevailed.
Gradually through the seventies and eighties NLP developed greater use in wider fields. Part of the reason for this was that people who tried it found that it worked. This, along with the expansion of its use, particularly into business and sport, meant that more and more people heard about it, tried it, found that it worked and told others about it. Courses in NLP were created to reflect various levels of experience in the subject. Normally certification was awarded at the end of the course. Levels of certification were created that people could be trained to run. At the highest level this meant being qualified to train and certificate others, so that the message could be spread even further.
Part of its attraction, to many people, was that NLP did not ally itself to any one discipline. NLP took what worked from all sorts of fields - including psychology, philosophy, counselling, therapy, brain research, hypnotism and psychotherapy - and welded them together. Thus attendance at any NLP training normally involves mingling with a huge range of people from a wide variety of backgrounds.
Across the world various control bodies were established to monitor standards and promote NLP on as wide a front as possible. Increasingly, as the years have gone by, more and more books have been written on NLP. Particularly as the field has widened, some people have focused on specific aspects and turned them into specialist areas of their own. At this point NLP as an entity is known more widely than ever before, and the number of people who are exposed to it grows exponentially each year. In a very short time there will be virtually nobody who has not heard of NLP!
In business and sport many people are already using NLP techniques, without ever having heard of NLP itself. They have found something useful that they can use easily with very quick results, with no need to understand the concepts and jargon of NLP.
Over recent years specific developments in NLP have included its relationship with the Meyers Briggs Type Indicator, problem solving, interpersonal skills training, leadership, establishing how some genius did what they did, probing how people use time in their lives, self-development, learning strategies and influencing skills.
The prospect of attending a 22-day practitioner certification, probably over a series of weekends, may not appeal to many people, but short, sharp sessions or easy to follow books will increasingly bring awareness of NLP to more and more people.
For those seeking qualification, one particular trend is to follow a distance-learning process using tapes and manuals. At present this represents a very small part of NLP training but a part which seems likely to grow steadily. The advent of accelerated learning techniques is also likely to impact on how people are trained in NLP. However, because NLP is such a practical subject, the actual 'doing of it' will always remain the key element in any certified training.
Outside the formal aspects of achieving a certified qualification, there is an increasing number of short, focused courses on specific aspects of NLP. These normally take up to three days and are highly intensive, great fun and can be put to use immediately. Normally it is not necessary to have any qualifications in NLP in order to attend these short courses.
The number of books now available is also growing at a dramatic rate. Most bookshops carry a range of NLP books, normally under the psychology section but increasingly in a section designated specifically to NLP. Increasingly most of the books are easy to understand, and it is normally best to buy one that has been recommended, try it, and then buy other books by the same author, or dip into the bibliography to follow a topic that seems interesting. The publishers of this book specialise in NLP and carry a wide range of titles.
For those new to NLP, some techniques will already be familiar, though you may not be aware that they originate from NLP.
Many of the techniques covered in this book overlap each other. This is quite deliberate. One of the fun ways for sportspeople to practise is to find a technique that works for them, then add in other ones that are allied, or appear to be relevant and worth a try. It is also fun to try something completely different, which may appear to make no sense and see what happens. Having fun is part of the spirit of NLP.
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