What is Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP)?

Neuro Linguistic Programming is a very effective form of personal growth, counseling and success coaching that can facilitate profound life change. It originated with Richard Bandler and John Grinder in the late 1970’s. It differs from other forms of counseling in that it focuses more on the structure of the problem or issue rather than on the content. It studies how the experience is formed.

Most of what you hear about NLP are the techniques that have been developed beyond the original work. Those techniques keep expanding and evolving with each new innovative person who contributes to the field. NLP is an attitude of curiosity. It is the study how we form our experience and how that can be changed. It looks for the structure of how the person creates their experience of their world and how they created their presenting problem. Its root philosophy is that we are at cause in our lives; we created the life we are living and, therefore, we can change it.

It can rapidly change major patterns, habits or problems in our lives. It allows us to reinterpret a memory, completely changing the nature of an experience. We can literally open the boundaries of how we are experiencing our lives.

Because NLP can often give immediate results, some techniques or processes focus on relieving the immediate symptoms, without getting to the roots of the problem. When used in that way, the problem can often reappear in some other form. The NLP TimeLine process is one of NLP’s most effective processes for getting to, and clearing, the root core of the problem rather than just symptoms.

In short, Neuro Linguistic Programming techniques make clear that we are at cause in our lives rather than our general concept of being at effect of our past, current life events, other people in our lives, or our own habits and emotions. It is not just for solving or healing problems; it is for enhancing the whole way you live your life. It increases your resources and effectiveness.

Hypnosis & Hypnotherapy

The Importance of the Unconscious Mind

Change must occur in the unconscious mind for it to be effective. For instance, you can consciously know that getting into relationships with men who are not emotionally available always turns out badly, or you might know that eating fatty, high calorie food is not good for you.  But that doesn’t necessarily mean you won’t get involved with that kind of man or eat too much of that kind of food.  People are often hard on themselves because they keep doing things that they know are not good for them, feeling as though this means they lack self-discipline or good character.  But it doesn’t mean that at all.

The unconscious mind is in charge of what we believe is true on a gut level.  It’s the reality on which we base our lives and the decisions we make.  It is how we interpret just about everything in life.  We can certainly use our conscious mind to override our unconscious mind in many instances; but when something has deep roots in the unconscious mind, going against what the unconscious believes to be true can feel like pushing a boulder up a hill.

The power of hypnosis is that it enables you to get the cooperation of you unconscious mind.

What is Hypnosis?

Hypnosis is a natural state that all of us go in and out of throughout the day.  It is a relaxed, focused state of consciousness, in which you release yourself into a particular focus.  You are in various stages of hypnosis when you are driving a car, reading a book, learning something, meditating, watching TV and so on.  The depth of hypnosis depends on how deeply you focus in on, or release yourself into, what you are concentrating on.

What is Hypnotherapy?

In hypnotherapy a practitioner induces hypnosis in the client for the purpose of personal growth or change.  Many people have misconceptions about hypnotherapy, believing that it is giving someone else control over them, or that they may do or believe something that isn’t really true for them as a result of it.  But the power of hypnosis is it gives you access to what is really true for you.  It allows you to come into your own deepest experience, and access memories that you may have consciously forgotten.  Hypnosis in the context of counseling is generally a very light hypnosis.  You are aware of your surroundings and what is happening, and remember what you experienced when you come out of the hypnosis.  It is nothing like stage hypnosis, or hypnosis done for the sake of entertainment.

NLP TimeLine Counseling & Hypnotherapy

NLP TimeLine Counseling is a form of hypnotherapy.  The first part of the session is an intuitive process with Dr. Jane probing to identify what the most effective limiting decision to release would be.  She is looking for the limiting decision that (when released) would have the most impact in releasing the negative pattern the client brought in with him or her.  This process, of probing and asking questions, activates in the unconscious mind the memories holding the pattern in place.  The second part of the session is the actual NLP TimeLine Process.  It begins with a hypnotic induction that brings you into a mild state of hypnosis.  The NLP TimeLine Process, itself, is inherently hypnotic, and is particularly effective because it uses hypnosis in tandem with the NLP technology of how the brain works.

When many (if not most) Hypnotherapists help their clients release a dysfunctional belief, he or she replaces it with what they consider to be a more positive or healthy one instead.  Dr. Jane does not consider this to be beneficial to the client in that the new belief is limited by the practitioner’s understanding or consciousness.  In the NLP TimeLine Process, Dr. Jane facilitates clearing the limiting decision, but does not replace it with another decision.  What she is doing when she releases it, is to allow the unconscious mind to reconfigure itself without the distortion of the dysfunctional belief, so that the client can access the truth of undistorted present-moment experience.  This is based on the principle that life is inherently designed to work.  In other words, it is based on understanding that what causes problems are distortions of experience, not the nature of how life is when it is undistorted.  For this reason the “Life is Designed to Work” thought system provides a solid foundation for facilitating profound life change in these sessions.