NLP: Your Pathway to Personal Success

As a certified NLP trainer, I am often asked, "What is NLP?"

The term NLP stands for neuro-linguistic programming and was coined in the early seventies by John Grinder, an assistant professor of linguistics at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and Richard Bandler, a student of psychology at the university. They began their work by studying Fritz Perls, a psychotherapist and originator of the Gestalt school of therapy, Virginia Satir, a well-known family therapist and Milton Erickson, a world-famous hypnotherapist. Their intention was to model outstanding therapists and identify patterns in order that other practitioners could use these patterns to generate similar results. It may be said that NLP is about identifying excellence through an exploration of patterns, and then devising means for others to use those patterns to achieve similar results.

NLP also draws on earlier work, such as Ivan Pavlov's conditioned reflexes (1904). In NLP this is called anchoring. NLP takes theoretical results developed by others and makes them available to you and me so we can improve our lives and well-being.

NLP is more than just techniques. It is a curiosity about how people who are high achievers accomplish what they actually set out to do. It is also a methodology that assists you in discovering those thinking and communication patterns that prevent you from being successful and shows you how to achieve the results of successful people. That is, NLP is a process of discovering the patterns of excellence of experts, and it makes these effective ways of thinking and communicating available for others to use for their own benefit or to assist others.

NLP had its origins in therapy and is now applied in all areas of human endeavor - education, health, sports, business and, perhaps most importantly, interpersonal relations.

Let us break down and analyze the terms neuro-linguistic programming.

Neuro refers to your neurology - sense organs. It is about how you absorb information. For example, you use your eyes to see things in your world. You also experience or perceive events through your other senses: aural (hearing), kinesthetic (tactile touch or emotional feeling), gustatory (taste) and olfactory (smell).

Linguistic refers to the language - pictures, sounds, feelings (kinesthetic), tastes, smells and words - that you use to remember and make sense of a particular experience (or to forecast a future experience). For example, can you recall your breakfast this morning? When you remember having breakfast, can you see a picture in your mind, or can you hear sounds (perhaps a radio was on or you were engaged in a discussion with your family)? What about tastes and smells? And how were you feeling - happy, tired, excited?

Think about a significant event in your near future. Do you envision yourself being successful? Or failing? The pictures, sounds, feelings, tastes, smells and words that you use to describe future experiences have a bearing on what actually happens. You do create your own reality!

Programming refers to your habits, patterns, programs and strategies. If it is a workday, do you follow a particular routine as you get ready for work? Perhaps you like to lie in bed an extra five minutes after the alarm goes off. Do you shower or bathe right away or have breakfast first? If you take time to look at what you do, I am certain you will see a pattern that you follow in getting ready for work. If for some reason you do not follow that pattern, do you find yourself feeling that something is missing?

You have patterns, habits, strategies and programs for everything you do. Some of these patterns serve you, but others do not - resulting in unwanted outcomes. You may be fully aware of some of your patterns. You may become aware of others only when someone else brings them to your attention. And you may choose to quickly forget about these patterns because you want to avoid addressing that part of your life. And there are still other patterns that you are not aware of at all, yet they continue to influence how you look after yourself, communicate with others and perform your daily tasks. If the patterns serve you - that is, generate positive results in your life - great! However, if you find that some patterns do not serve you, would it not be useful to identify those patterns and to change them so they work to your advantage?

Question: Who put your patterns, habits, strategies and programs in place? Of course, you did. So who can change them? Only you. But first, you must become aware that you run these patterns. This is one of the biggest benefits of NLP - becoming aware of the patterns, habits, strategies and programs that you have been running unconsciously and then using NLP techniques to change them in order to achieve the outcomes you desire.

Copyright ? 2005 Renewal Technologies Inc.

About the Author: Roger Ellerton is a certified NLP trainer, certified management consultant and the founder and managing partner of Renewal Technologies Inc. (www.renewal.ca). He can be reached at info@renewal.ca. This article is an extract from his book Live Your Dreams - Let Reality Catch Up: NLP and Common Sense for Coaches, Managers and You (www.live-your-dreams.biz).

Roger Ellerton, PhD, CMC is a certified trainer in neuro-linguistic programming (NLP) and was listed in the International Whos Who in Education. For over fifteen years, he has been and continues to be a student of personal development methodologies. He is the author of Live Your Dreams Let Reality Catch Up: NLP and Common Sense for Coaches, Managers and You (http://www.live-your-dreams.biz/) and is the co-designer and presenter on the twelve-audiotape series Change at the Speed of Thought! 

View all articles by Roger Ellerton

View the original article here

Read More

Developing Personal Depth

Everyone seeks personal depth to one degree or another. Personal depth stands as *the* way to add richness and beauty to our lives.

Nobody wants to be considered a shallow person. Still, the concept of becoming a ?deep? person turns many people off. We have this image of a deep person as someone who spends a little too much time stroking his beard and smoking his pipe, lost in thought way beyond us mere mortals.

They ponder too much. They?re smarter than us. They go to the opera -and actually know what the fat lady is singing about! They?re just not normal.

Fortunately, personal depth exists as something else altogether.

Achieving greater personal depth (and not coincidently, greater success at anything you pursue) involves taking specific actions. You can achieve greater personal depth starting today by working with the seven characteristics listed below.

1. Develop and use the generating energies of trust and value.

Trust: Even though you don?t have all the answers, you know you?ll get by. You?re ?enough? and you know it. You can count on yourself. You can rely on your power, strength and talent. Whatever happens you know you can face it: you know you?ll make it. Even though it may not be perfect, you?ll handle the situation at hand ?good enough?. That?s trust.

Value: You might not be highly visible in the world, but the role you play in life *is* highly valuable. You know you are valuable in your way - to yourself and to those who love you. Also, you recognize, respond and act upon your value.

2. Develop and use the sustaining energies of life such as discipline and ownership.

The discipline that?s self-imposed: You decide on something and then you *follow through*. You follow your own plan, your own rules - that?s discipline.

Ownership: Own your thoughts and feelings. Own your emotions. Own your failures - so you can change them. Own that you?re responsible. And own your successes - so you can keep them. Ownership gives you the ?right? to change.

3. Continuously create new meaning, new destiny, new personality, and new self-image.

People with personal depth never settle for the way they are. They may be satisfied, but they always seek to become more. More meaning in their life. Higher destiny. Greater complexity of personality. And new self-image.

4. Develop and strengthen character.

Character: By knowing your ideals and your principles, and living by them?. by having ideas and opinions and standing by them?. That?s how you build character and thus increase your personal depth.

5. Continuous expansion of your power, strength, responsibility and creativity.

You look for ways to be more powerful; to act, to get involved in the world around you. You look for ways to take more responsibility from the most minute to the most magnificent. You know your strengths and look for ways to use them. You work on expanding your creativity. (Creativity is anything you do that inspires you or inspires others.) Just taking a walk can be creative!

6. Sustained actualization.

You?re in touch with your thoughts and feelings, and you?re not afraid to put them into action. You always think and feel. You?re aware of that thinking and feeling. And you act upon those thoughts and feelings.

7. Generating spirituality.

You don?t have to separate yourself from the mundane of life to experience your spirituality. Rather, you seek the spiritual *within* the material. Your spirituality eventually becomes your number one priority.

You come to realize everything you experience is a manifestation of your spirituality. There is no separation between the spiritual and the living of life - that?s the goal of the person seeking or having personal depth.

***

As you can see, personal depth is not something you check off on a to-do list. Let?s see? walk the dog, take out the trash, and oh yeah - achieve personal depth. No.

It?s an ongoing, never-ending, always-expanding endeavor. Basically it all comes down to becoming more of yourself.

There are no limits, and that?s the good news. You can always experience greater personal depth.

Mark Ivar Myhre, The Emotional Healing Wizard, offers unique cutting-edge emotional healing tips, techniques and secrets that teach you how to deal with depression, stress, anxiety, and much more. ==> http://www.join-the-fun.com

View the original article here

Read More

The Day I Gained My Personal Freedom

Right now in the United States we are celebrating the day that we gained our personal freedom as a county. It is our independence day July 4th. Throughout the many years our country has fought to preserve and protect that freedom and today is when we acknowledge it. Just thinking about this idea takes me back to when I experienced my moment of freedom from myself.

Many of us can trace our moment of freedom back to something specific, a moment when something significant had happened and we "woke up". A moment when we had our hearts open fully and felt totally alive. These types of moments could include the time that your baby was born, the time we had a loved one pass away, the time we talked to someone inspiring, or even an inspirational moment that came from no where.

My moment of personal freedom came when I had my heart broken for the first time. There I was not just past 21 years of age when I had my life set (or so I thought). I was going to get married, we both had good secure jobs, 2 brand new cars, plenty of money, and getting ready to buy a house. On the outside it looked good but what also came along with that was worth mentioning too. I was closed off from my family, I was money driven, disconnected to myself, and very arrogant.

At that time in my life I had it all figured out and no matter what, I would not listen to anyone. It was my way or the highway. My life was a house built on sand. All it took was one piece to break and the rest of it would fall apart. And that piece broke when my fiance informed me that she did not want to get married any longer. My heart was broken and my world began to spin. In a matter of days I had no direction, no clue on what I was doing and was scared. I was hurt badly and was ashamed, but I did not know this would be the moment of freedom in my life.

But after all the tears had been cried out I began to see things differently. I began to even feel lighter. It was as if I had been holding my breath and carrying such a heavy weight around... but now it was gone and I could finally breathe fully.

I had gained my personal freedom.

I was free to live in a way that was congruent to life, free to listen to those that were trying to help me, free to begin self development, free to question, and free to change.

My life has never been the same since and I have been experiencing a wonderfully free life full of twists and turns and highs and lows. But I would not ever wish to change that moment in which I gained my personal freedom.

So that was my moment when I became fully alive. When was your moment? Please take the time to that moment when you discovered and gained your personal freedom and share it here with us so we can all celebrate together.

Happy 4th everyone, and happy independence day.

If you are interested in reading more great articles and seeing my weekly "Monday Motivator" Videos... visit my Blog RedZen by CLICKING HERE NOW where you can find "Peace in Life One Inch At a Time"

View the original article here

Read More

Not for Personal Gain

In the spiritual community there seems to be a belief that selling and marketing is somehow "not spiritual" Many of my clients say they have heard that there is a rule "not for personal gain" when using their spiritual skills and talents.

This has been mistakenly interpreted to mean that we shouldn't charge for using our gifts and skills to help others. Some people get round this by saying "I only charge for my time not my gift". But that's kidding themselves.

I believe that the axiom "not for personal gain" has been completely misunderstood.

The true meaning of this is to not use your powers to gain influence over others for personal gain. For example it's possible to send "thought forms" to influence others, or use your energy to control others. It is entirely possible to do this, and you could really take advantage of others. This is known as "black magic".

Of course, according to one of the laws of Karma those who do this will only attract the same into their life. If you were to abuse your power and you can expect others to abuse you with theirs. What goes around comes around. The universe will balances itself, and that's why the warning is given.

When it comes to charging an honest fee, for offering an honest service, this is NOT personal gain.

We use money because it's easier to fold than chickens

We use money as an exchange now, but throughout history the healer or shaman of the tribe would not have been expected to hunt as much, or gather as much. They would be rewarded for their healing services and spiritual guidance with food or goods. Now we use money as an exchange. It's simply easier to fold than chickens.

It takes time, commitment and investment to be a good healer and therapist. If your skills help others, then that has value and that value should be rewarded with something else of value.

There is also the client perspective. When you work with clients for them to really make the changes they want they will have to make some changes for themselves. They are much more likely to follow through and do any "homework" if they see it as an investment.

It's well known that people don't value what is free

How else will they value you, what you do, and take on board the changes you will help them make?

In his book "How To Be Financially Successful - A Spiritual Perspective" Joshua Stone calls this "poverty consciousness in the name of spirituality". He says there are spiritual workers who go around telling others that they should not charge for their spiritual services.

Now the reason they are doing this is because they want YOUR services but don't have any money. They are run by the negative ego, and the negative ego is angry about this so it strikes with judgment to blame others for charging money for spiritual services.

Often the reason they want your services for free is because they don't have any money. The negative ego wants what you have, doesn't want to be left behind, so it gets into a position of a self proclaimed moral high ground or self righteousness by pretending it is better than others, by not charging. This is the negative ego attacking others because it can't make money.

However it is an attitude total PROSPERITY consciousness to believe that it's good for spiritual practitioners to charge for their service, no matter what kind of services these are.

All services are made possible by a heavenly/earthly balance

The universe likes, no LOVES balance. If you deliver a service that has value to your client then you should be rewarded for your service.

Often people don't feel comfortable charging what their service is really worth also because of negative ego in the form of lack of self worth. If you don't believe you're worth it, then you won't be comfortable charging it. But in truth who are you to withhold your service, not to offer it to those who need it and can benefit from it. NOT to sell yourself - now that's selfish!

Being a successful spiritual practitioner requires you to be successful in all areas of your life. Being a wonderful channel for spirit is not enough, you need to be successful in business, relationships, health, money and all life areas.

Now how much you charge is entirely up to you. but my personal belief is that you should place a high value on what you do as you have in your power the ability to completely transform someone else's life. I think that is worth a lot.

According to the law of karma if you offer an honest service for an honest fee that reflects its true value, then the great news is you can expect others to do the same to you! Now that's the beauty and magic of the universe.

Bonus tip!

Communication with your unconscious mind can skyrocket your intuition and help you make better decisions more quickly. And now I would like to offer you free instant access to an online test to find out how intuitive you are. How Intuitive are you?

View the original article here

Read More

The Day I Gained My Personal Freedom

Right now in the United States we are celebrating the day that we gained our personal freedom as a county. It is our independence day July 4th. Throughout the many years our country has fought to preserve and protect that freedom and today is when we acknowledge it. Just thinking about this idea takes me back to when I experienced my moment of freedom from myself.

Many of us can trace our moment of freedom back to something specific, a moment when something significant had happened and we "woke up". A moment when we had our hearts open fully and felt totally alive. These types of moments could include the time that your baby was born, the time we had a loved one pass away, the time we talked to someone inspiring, or even an inspirational moment that came from no where.

My moment of personal freedom came when I had my heart broken for the first time. There I was not just past 21 years of age when I had my life set (or so I thought). I was going to get married, we both had good secure jobs, 2 brand new cars, plenty of money, and getting ready to buy a house. On the outside it looked good but what also came along with that was worth mentioning too. I was closed off from my family, I was money driven, disconnected to myself, and very arrogant.

At that time in my life I had it all figured out and no matter what, I would not listen to anyone. It was my way or the highway. My life was a house built on sand. All it took was one piece to break and the rest of it would fall apart. And that piece broke when my fiance informed me that she did not want to get married any longer. My heart was broken and my world began to spin. In a matter of days I had no direction, no clue on what I was doing and was scared. I was hurt badly and was ashamed, but I did not know this would be the moment of freedom in my life.

But after all the tears had been cried out I began to see things differently. I began to even feel lighter. It was as if I had been holding my breath and carrying such a heavy weight around... but now it was gone and I could finally breathe fully.

I had gained my personal freedom.

I was free to live in a way that was congruent to life, free to listen to those that were trying to help me, free to begin self development, free to question, and free to change.

My life has never been the same since and I have been experiencing a wonderfully free life full of twists and turns and highs and lows. But I would not ever wish to change that moment in which I gained my personal freedom.

So that was my moment when I became fully alive. When was your moment? Please take the time to that moment when you discovered and gained your personal freedom and share it here with us so we can all celebrate together.

Happy 4th everyone, and happy independence day.

If you are interested in reading more great articles and seeing my weekly "Monday Motivator" Videos... visit my Blog RedZen by CLICKING HERE NOW where you can find "Peace in Life One Inch At a Time"

View the original article here

Read More

Success coaching and personal development tips

There are many personal development tips that you will need to use in order to become a successful person. You will find that when you use techniques like success coaching you will be forced to face some of these issues and work on the type of person who you wish to become.

The first tip that you will have to use is learning how to be on top of things. You need to work on your timing. You will find that there are going to be appointments in which you will be expected to be on time for. You need to learn how to be on time for these appointments so that you can stay on schedule. Also, keep in mind that there are many benefits to being on time. Keep in mind that the early bird gets the worm, and the early worker gets noticed and promotions.

The second top is that you are going to have to learn to stop what you are doing in order to find success. You will need to keep in mind that there are times when you need to let go of it all, so that you can work on yourself and be successful, yet happy. You will want to make sure that you think about having some fun.

The third thing is that you will want to consider all the things that you will have to do in order to become a successful person. You will want to consider that the climb up is harder than the climb down. Also, keep in mind that you need to watch who you step on in the process because you never know when you will need the same people to help you later.

With that said, you will also need to learn from your personal mistakes and also learn from the mistakes of others. Some people will ignore the advice that they are given and they will expect others to help support them while they make mistakes. The key is to make a choice not to make a mistake. If you know that there is a possibility that you could end up getting hurt in any way then you will need to stop and re-think what you are about to do.

You will also want to channel yourself into a positive aura. You will need to be able to make lemonade out of lemons. You will want to make sure that you stop thinking about the negatives and start thinking about the positives. You may want to re-focus your energy so that you can keep yourself in line and with a positive sense of mind.

You will need to think about your strengths and your weaknesses. You will need to work on your weaknesses and you will also need to keep up with the strengths so that you can be the best that you can be.

A lot of people hold themselves back. You have to keep in mind that there are a lot of things that you can do, but you will need to get the motivation started to keep yourself going. You will not want to limit yourself. You need to keep in mind that there are times where you will be pushed to your limits, but when you take a step back you will be able to go the distance with the proper motivation.

Keep in mind that you are able to make a difference, but you will need to consider what it is that you would like to change before you take any action.

Read More