The Coaching Language Magic Mini Ebook
The Coaching Language Magic Mini Ebook
The Coaching Language Magic Mini Ebook
By Jamie Smart
Table of Contents
The bata scoir is the name of a stick which used to sit in the corner of
Irish classrooms in the early days of British rule. Its purpose was this:
whenever a child spoke in Irish (rather than English), they would be
beaten with the bata scoir. Within a few generations, the number of Irish
speakers fell from 100% (circa 1800) to 5% (circa 1900).
The British knew something very powerful: that a great deal of a people’s
culture and heritage are ‘contained’ within their language. Install a new
language, and its associated culture will soon follow (just as the old one
will diminish as the old language is destroyed).
In the world of computer programming, there are things you can do using
one programming language that you cannot do using another. The
programming language (combined with the imagination and skill of the
programmer) defines the domain of what actions are possible.
Ever since I was a little child, I’ve loved language. And while I didn’t
imagine that language would become such a large part of my life as it
does today, I always had an affinity for words. I love the way they look,
the way they sound, and the amazing things you can do with them.
What I didn’t realize until much more recently is that words shape our
reality; to a great extent, the language we use programs the reality we
experience (see Quantum Psychology by Robert Anton Wilson for a
fascinating, in-depth and reality-stretching exploration of this topic).
You can use language to change your (or someone else’s) reality.
This fact makes language one of the most powerful tools for coaching
yourself and others. The full NLP linguistic set is often undertaught, and
yet is one of the most powerful toolsets there is for making change
possible (I’ve heard Richard Bandler say that the NLP linguistic tool ‘The
Meta Model’ is the starting point for everything he’s discovered in the field
of NLP).
1) Think of something you want (Eg. I want a new car / a new job / to
learn French etc). Say it out loud, and notice how you feel. Then
say it in the following ways, paying attention to your internal
experience each time:
How was your experience different as you said it in these different ways?
Did any one way make it seem more likely to happen, or seem more
possible?
2) This time, express the same desires, but starting the sentences in
the following ways. Again, pay attention to your internal experience each
time:
How was your experience different as you said it in these ways? Did you
find one way of saying it that felt better than the others? Many people find
that the words from the second list (which relate to possibility) are more
motivational than the words from the first list (which relate to necessity).
If you found one way of saying it which made you feel more likely to do
the things that will move you towards what you want, I’d like to ask you a
question. What happens when you imagine using this way of saying it for
everything you desire in your life? It’s just a thought :-)
This week we’re just scratching the surface of the power of language as a
coaching tool.
What is less well known is the extent to which the language we use
shapes our perceptions of the world. You can use language to quite
literally change the way a person perceives reality.
- “The fact that you’ve arrived means you’ll be able to make whatever
changes you want in your life.”
The logicians among you will recognise that these statements wouldn’t
pass a logic test, but the unconscious mind isn’t too stringent about logic.
If the person accepts the statement as true (and they usually do), then
the unconscious will act accordingly. The structure of these frame-setting
statements is this:
X means Y
A causes B
“You learned to walk and talk, and you don’t even know how you did it.
That means that the things you’ll be learning today are going to be really
straightforward for you.”
I use these all the time, and the ONLY time I get rumbled is by
experienced NLP Practitioners (and even then, it’s usually only the ones
I’ve trained to pay close attention to language). One of the things you
start to find after you spend some time on a training course with me or
listen to some Salad CDs is that it becomes a lot more fun to listen.
Sometimes my assistants and more experienced students have trouble
keeping a straight face on trainings when I’m embedding commands etc in
seemingly ‘innocent’ stories and sentences.
“Imagine that you are fishing. You feel a tug on the line, and out of the
water comes a golden fish, which says ‘I can grant you three wishes. Tell
me your heart’s desire?’”
This approach worked really well to elicit the ‘What do you want’
information, and I was thinking about the reasons why:
c) When a person is given three wishes, it can remove the need for what
they want to be ‘realistic’ (or even possible). This can help get to what
you really want, at the deepest level.
Finding out what someone wants sets a direction for the coaching session.
Other ways of finding this out include the following:
My fave is still “What do you want?”, but the others all have value in
different situations.
Once you know what someone wants, you can further clarify their goal
using other queries (see NLP Tips 1 & 2, below).
http://www.saladltd.co.uk/salad%20pages/Nlp%20tips/nlp_tip_1.htm
http://www.saladltd.co.uk/salad%20pages/Nlp%20tips/nlp_tip_2.htm
The key is to help a person get a clear idea of how they would like things
to be. Once you have this, you have a direction for the process.
“Information gathering?!?” I hear you ask. “How dull”. But wait. According
to NLP co-developer Richard Bandler, 95% of NLP is information-
gathering.
I often get emails from people asking things like “What technique do you
use to help a one-eyed mother of four overcome her inexplicable fear of
dwarves which emerges when she’s doing the dishes?” The technique I
use is…watch and listen.
I believe that when you’re working with someone and you have the
attention of their unconscious mind (rapport), the unconscious will do
everything within its power to tell you exactly what you need to know in
order to help the person make he necessary changes. The coach’s role
involves having the sensory acuity to intercept those messages from the
unconscious. So how are those messages sent?
- Body language
- Gestures
- Eye movements
- Throw-away comments
- Sensory language
- Ambiguities
- Organ language
- etc
I’d like you to consider the possibility that your clients are offering you a
wealth of clues to help them find solutions to their problems and the paths
to their desires.
And the most useful set of questions out there is…The Meta Model.
The Meta Model (created by Bandler and Grinder) is the most powerful set
of questions there is for helping people enrich their maps of the world.
Bandler credits it as being the tool which helped them create all the other
NLP models.
While teaching the Meta Model is beyond the scope of this NLP Tip, it is
one of the things we learn on the NLP Practitioner training. By the time
you finish that training, the Meta Model questions have been wired in as a
natural part of your responses, so you know automatically which
questions to ask.
Astonishingly (to me) the Meta Model is not taught in depth on most
Practitioner trainings these days. This is because it’s traditional seen as
being “difficult”, but it’s not! On our practitioner training you learn the
Meta Model quickly and easily using games which make it fun. The great
thing is, by the time you realise how easily you can do it, the learnings
have already gone in.
More Information
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• Feel confident that you can discover the information that really matters
in any situation. People pay good money for this!
• Ask questions that amaze your clients, you colleagues, your friends
and even yourself with the quality of answers you'll get.
• Relax, knowing that you will never be stuck for what to say or ask again.
• Overcome barriers and obstacles that have been holding people back.
• Feel good, knowing that you really make a difference in people's lives.
“This is a fun and friendly way to learn and master the skills of
coaching mastery.”
Michael Neill, author of “You Can Have What You Want”
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Free Stuff
Jamie is author of The NLP Tip, an e-zine which goes to thousands of people
around the world each week (available from www.saladltd.co.uk), as well as the
creator of Ericksonian Hypnosis CardsTM and many other products.
He lives in Leicestershire (UK). When he isn’t helping other people get what they
want, he likes going for long walks in the woods, listening to music and reading.
Acknowledgements
I’ve been fortunate to learn from a number of great NLP Trainers and other
innovative thinkers and teachers. Thanks to anyone whose efforts have made
their way into this work.