NLP techniques are useful only when applied, having unraveled the structure of the experience we want to change. By themselves these are useless.
I consider the NLP process of change to be a reversed engineering process and the techniques a part of the larger strategy.
What is the NLP strategy?
We start with a “problem” as described by the client.
The problem is the tip of the iceberg, the piece of information in the equation with many unknowns.
Having satisfied ourselves that the problem is really a problem, and that changing it is ecological (good for me, good for the client, and good for the world at large), we work it backwards to unravel the structure.
How is it a problem? How is it not a problem, what makes it a problem and how motivated the client is to change it and why? How much better their life is without that old problem? Here we had brought them into the “dreamer strategy”. We had also elicited the criteria for the problem.
Next, How do they do it? What are the Submodalities of it. Maybe synesthesia is present at which point we install the missing modality or remove one, for change.
Next when do they do it and how do they know when to have it? Anchors. The when gives us clues to contextual triggers.
If possible, do they remember the first time it happened? If not, no problem.
At this point we have the model of their experience. We know their strategy, we know their belief systems (Cause Effects and Complex Equivalence Implication structures), we know their strategy for doing it and we know the triggers. and contexts.
Now the job is easy and takes the least amount of time as we know what changes to make and where to apply the techniques, keeping in mind that while asking questions we had already been doing work with the client, reframing the problem “they used to have”.
For superficial eradication, we deal with the criteria, we reframe. For strategy we use submodality work, For eradication of the trigger point significance, we use various anchoring methods, all the while we use everything simultaneously; reframing from the get go, all the way, the Meta Model for Specificity and Reframing through questions, Milton Model all across the board, submodalities and anchoring, all the while calibrating and being cognizant if the preferred modalities of the client and observing analog behaviour cues. Timeline is useful for belief change process and great reframing tool.
Before we apply techniques we must be aware why we are applying these, what we want to achieve, what the client wants to achieve, the ecology and the process of verifying we had accomplished that we wanted to accomplish. Through that we maintain three perceptual positions simultaneously and satisfy ourselves the three were satisfied. That’s when we know we did our job as Practitioners.