NLP GLOSSARY OF TERMS

Accessing cues - Actions which affect our internal processing so that we can access one representational system more strongly than another in that moment. E.g. to direct access to your kinaesthetic system you may slow your breathing rate and your voice tempo; to access editorially you might choose to tilt your head as if you are using a telephone.etc.

Anchoring - is the process by which any internal or external representation gets connected to and triggers a subsequent string of representations and responses. They can be naturally occurring or set up deliberately. A perfume, a song, the sound of your name being spoken by a certain person can all be naturally occurring anchors. Intuitively set anchors might include a clenched fist or a triumphant yell to help us anchor that feeling of success.

An Anchored State - can be deliberately set up by applying a touch, a sound, a gesture or a combination of these as a state comes to maximum level. Then the state can be reactivated or remembered through re-using that same touch, sound, gesture or combination to the same intensity and in the same way. To be successful "anchors must be as precise as possible and can be set either by yourself or others.

Attention - In NLP we speak about First Attention and Second Attention. First Attention is more limited being where you focus your conscious mind. Since the conscious mind is limited in its ability to take in and remember information, of greater value to the NLP student is Second Attention - the facilitation, process and use of the unconscious mind.

Auditory - One of the main representation systems of the neural network of the human body, indicating the ability to take in information through listening. Auditory process is the taking in of heard information - whether words or music, whether external or internal.

Behaviour - is human activity. It includes large movements like a gesture or throwing a ball; small movements such as eye movements or breathing changes; micro movements such as the micro muscle movements experienced when modelling some activit; and internal activity such as the experience of emotions.

Beliefs - are our subjective ideas and systems or networks of ideas about what is true and real or not, for us, for others, for the world and society. These ideas and systems are developed throughout our lives as the product of our experience and modified by our perceptual filters, deletions, distortions and generalisations.

Calibration - The ability to notice and measure change with respect to a standard. To calibrate skilfully one requires a refined sensory acuity. When you can tell accurately that a person is happy or excited because of the changes in the way they usually are, you are calibrating. Good salespeople can calibrate when a buyer is ready to buy.

Chunking - an extremely useful skill to understand the difference between logical levels of information. It is the grouping of information into types and sub types and assists in the development of meaning facilitating memory. Chunk size can vary, e.g. when you first learn to drive each separate process is one chunk - adjust the mirror, look behind you, start the engine, put the car in gear etc. Once you have driven for a while, driving becomes one chunk.

Complex Equivalence - This is the meaning attached, by an individual, to a particular word, label, expression or phrase, based on his/her sensory experience and model of the world. Misunderstanding usually occurs when two or more people each assign meaning to an abstract form of words (different due to their different life experience) and act as if they are using a common agreed meaning.

Communication - The process of conveying information by language, signs, symbols, and actions. Moving towards an outcome, it can be directionalised toward the outcome as is usually the case in sales, negotiation and therapy.

Congruity/Incongruity - Congruency is the alignment of all output channels in a communication. E.g. the words, the tone of voice, the gestures are all communicating the same or similar message. Incongruency is the result of conflicting messages, eg saying "Yes, I'm sure" in a soft questioning voice ending with an upward inflection.

Conscious Mind - is limited in its ability to take in and remember information upto 7+ 2 chunks. The focus of the conscious attention is usually on only one experience at a time shifting from experience to experience.

Content/Content Reframe - The substance or matter of an experience / Reframed = thinking of the substance of the experience in a different way so that you gain a different perspective on the experience. eg the glass is half empty / the glass is half full.

Context/Context Reframe - the background, situation or circumstance of an experience / Reframed = thinking of that experience, and mentally changing the scenario. Eg working late at night when you are tired takes on a different perception when you think about lying on your yacht explaining what it took to get there.

Criteria - the defined standards and values of an individual when measuring what is important to them.

Cybernetics - the study of systems of communication. Traditionally applied to machines such as computers and robots, cybernetics can also be applied to humans, both in terms of individual systems - the communication system integral to a single individual and in terms of social systems and communities.

Deep Trance Identification - the achievement of an intensely altered state in which an individual is able to identify the patterns of excellence which he/she wishes to model.

Deletion - is what has been left out of your internal representation of the original experience. One of the cognitive processes that allows us to manage incoming sensory data without being overwhelmed, however there are things we delete which would be useful for us to have retained.

Digital - is either on or off, an abrupt state change.

Dissociation - the process of mentally stepping outside of ones self.

Distortion - The process of including changes into ones internal representation so that things get, "blown out of proportion", "the truth gets stretched", things get "twisted" or "bent", allowing us to shift our sensory data.

Down Time - is the result of putting one's awareness internally. Focussing the attention on internal processes.

Ecology - is the study of consequences. To be ecological is to act at all times within the knowledge of the consequences of ones actions.

Elicitation - Information gathering by direct observation of a persons accessing cues, gestures, etc and through the asking of well formed questions to determine the structure of their internal experience.

Epistemology - The study of how we know what we know, how individuals, groups, families, societies and cultures think and decide. It reveals the premises underlying outer behaviour and inner thinking based on the history of the individual or the social group. Systems such as extended families, cultures or societies may have a dominant epistemology into which the sub-system of the individual or family or community fits their own epistemology, and the greater system of interconnected life has a number of epistemologies.

Ericksonian Hypnosis - Communication models developed by the innovative psychiatrist Milton H Erickson for working on an individuals subjective experience. This is a form of hypnosis which respects the uniqueness of each person and develops trance states specifically for each person. As a result Ericksonian Hypnosis involves the elegant and graceful use of the following - calibration, use of context, rapport, visual and auditory analogue markers, elicitation and feedback.

Eye Scanning Patterns - are a set of Accessing Cues that pay attention to the way the eyes move and the sequence of eye positions. Knowing which internal process correlates to each position is the precursor to understanding and eliciting strategies.

Feedback - The criteria which enable you to determine if you are moving toward your desired outcome.

First Order Change - Change which occurs at the same logical level as the problem state. Eg "eat you vegies and you can have your desert"

First Position - being associated with ones self, the process of using ones own sensory acuity to process the world.

Flexibility - To gain flexibility is to extend and expand ones range of behavioural patterns, to expand the way one processes the world, to extend one's model of the world, to extend ones range of perceptual filters. This allows one to achieve ones outcomes in any situation

Frames - impart meaning to a given set of circumstances, events or behaviour. Once the frame has been established, the meaning can be defined.

• As if frame - The process of acting "AS IF" you are what you want to be. Eg acting happy when you feel sad.

• Discovery frame - The action of suspending expectation, judgement and desire in order to create a mental framework in which to discover and learn.

Future pace - the internal process of noticing into ones future and placing resources there to be used at a future time.

Generalisation - The cognitive process by which parts of a person's internal experience separates from the original experience becoming a separate generalised pattern. This can be useful as when a child touches a stove top and gets burnt, the child generalises to "burners are hot", or "don't touch stoves when they are on". It can be limiting in other cases, eg a child is yelled at by a woman in a red dress, and generalises to "people in red dresses should be avoided".

Generative Change - a change that creates the possibility of further change. Teaching people new behaviours in such a way the they feel empowered often leads to generative change. Change that can redefine their life and the lives of those they interact with.

Gustatory - about taste. Gustatory process is the taking in of tasted information - testing food, poisons, soils, chemical balance is rudimentarily achieved through taste.

Identity - includes the way we see, hear and feel about ourselves, the values and beliefs which determine the patterns of our behaviours and thinking.

Imprinting - in humans usually takes place in formative situations in which beliefs and values are installed. Unlike animals, imprinting in humans can be reversed.

Integration - is carried out by our vestibular system allowing us to incorporate our learnings so that these become part of us for use in both the external and internal worlds.

Intention - Intention is not always apparent from behaviour, is regarded as highly important for the person doing the behaviour, and is the reason or purpose behind the behaviour.

Internal negotiation - From the work of Virginia Satir, leading family therapist. The act of separating out different parts within a person, when those parts appear to have different agendas, in order to negotiate or come to an agreement to create a better situation for the person. Eg, when you want to buy an expensive evening jacket and "your internal accountant - you're saving for a new car", "your internal fashion stylist - this doesn't go with anything else in your wardrobe", and "your internal party girl - It would make Mame green with envy - I'd look great" all have different opinions.

Internal representation - Known as mental maps, our internal representations are the result of our pictures, sounds, thoughts and feelings. These govern our behaviour in the external world.

In Time - a state in which people experience time as continuously present. Neither the past nor the future has a great deal of meaning in this context. Can be culturally based or simply the result of someone being totally absorbed in the moment.

Kinaesthetic - pertaining to feeling, touching, proprioception, sensation. Kinesthetic process is the taking in of information through the feelings, emotions, sensations, movement and sense of touch. This often involves the act of breathing and all forms of moving.

Lead System - The first sensory system to take in information.

Logical Levels - when two or more logical types are in a hierarchy the logical type that includes the others would be considered to be at a higher logical level.

Logical Types - classifications or sets of nominalizations.

Map / Map of Reality - a description of subjective representation of reality. The NLP presupposition, "The map is not the territory" suggests that a description of reality is a representation - once or twice removed from the original experience and is known as a map.

Matching/Mismatching - matching is adopting parts of another persons behaviour i.e. particular gestures, facial expressions, forms of speech, tone of voice etc. If subtly done it helps create a feeling of being similar or alike between people. Mismatching can be either conscious or unconscious behaviour. It has the effect of reducing rapport between people because a mismatcher does things differently from others, breathing at a different rate, speaking at a different tempo and so on. Mismatching can be a normal prt of focuses on difference.

Meta-Cognition - thinking about one's thought processes from a Meta position, literally taking an outside perspective to think about how one thinks.

Meta Model - in the field of NLP the Meta Model is a language tool that provides questions to help uncover, specify and clarify information, which in everyday verbal or written language may have been lost through habitual patterns of distortion, deletion and generalisation. Developed by Richard Bandler and John Grinder.

Metaphor - used to provide learning directly to the Unconscious mind, or to offer suggestions and solutions conversationally, Metaphor uses the description of a process, or series of events, designed to reproduce the patterns found in a real situation, with alternative content. Includes allegory and simile.

Meta Position - a dissociated position, stepping outside of your own habitual internal process, internal state and external behaviour, to acquire a neutral and impartial observer type of position. A meta-position is useful for gathering information without filtering it through your usual patterns and filters.

Meta Programs - the mental patterns that underlie and describe human activity and personality traits, Meta Programs are the habitual thinking processes that determine the where one places one's attention, or what provides motivation. For example whether one puts one's attention primarily on the past, present or future - whether one more often places attention on one's self or on others; whether one moves away from that which is undesirable, or moves towards that which is.

Milton Model - developed by John Grinder, Richard Bandler and Judith Delozier after they modelled Dr Milton Erickson, a psychiatrist and hypnotherapist of incredible skill. The Milton Model's function is the opposite to the function of the Meta model, in that it is designed to deliberately delete, distort and generalise information even further, in order to allow each individual listener to draw on their own personal relevant experiences within the structure offered by the presenter, in order to have them infer a personal meaning from a very unspecified communication.

Mirroring - when one reflects all or some aspects of someone's physiology, as if seen in a mirror image, eg right hand for left, as opposed to matching exactly, eg right hand for right hand. Mirroring is used to build Rapport by reducing the difference between self and another at unconscious levels.

Models/Modelling (replicating talent) - when modelling one elicits and describes, either consciously or unconsciously, the patterns at work in an expert demonstrating their expertise. Eliciting the specific and efficient description, replication and transfer of skills from one being to another within a specific context and for an intended outcome. Modelling for elegance involves removing non-essential features and distinctions of the modelled pattern, we are able to produce a streamlined behaviour, which with a minimal number of distinctions provides effective replication of the talent. Modelling is also a naturally occurring form of learning, where a person exposed to the behaviours and qualities of a significant other will re-present, internalise and express those behaviours and qualities themselves eg children modelling their parents, students modelling a mentor or teacher.

Modal Operator - a linguistic term, used as part of the meta-model to bust generalisations, distortions and deletions. A modal operator denotes whether something is an option (a modal operator of possibility- words like could, might, may, can) or whether it is a requirement (modal operator of necessity- words like must, ought, should, have to).

Model of the World - each individual human has their own combination of values, belief, perceptual filters, experiences, learnings, desires and expectations. These aspects in combination produce a unique way of being in the world, and a unique way of perceiving the events that we encounter, and in turn a unique way of responding to information, experiences and people. Our internal representations of reality, and the processes by which we organise those representations, shape our actions. These internal maps are referred to as being our model of the world.

Multiple Descriptions - we experience the world through our particular map, or model of the world, rather than experiencing reality directly. If we only ever experience one model of the world then our experiences are pretty limited. A way to get more information - information that may have otherwise been deleted, distorted or generalised out of existence - is to take on multiple descriptions of an event, or an experience. Different descriptions may be useful in different contexts, as can multiple descriptions of the same context. At least three descriptions of any given circumstance, skill, activity or concept allow the individual to cross reference and find the common elements, thus extracting what is essential, as well as gaining understanding and flexibility about the different ways of approaching the same scenario.

Neuro-Linguistic Programming - is the study and methodical application of how people take in information from the world through their senses, how they re-present that information to themselves to think about it, how they filter, interpret, generalise, distort and delete that information with their values and beliefs, and how they form their states, behaviours and actions as a result. Essentially we take the understanding that an individual, their model of the world and objective reality are separate, and NLP studies the interaction and relationships between them.

Neurological Levels - a content model developed by Robert Dilts. Places the contexts of environment, behaviour, capabilities, belief, values, identity and mission on an increasing hierarchy of significance, on the basis that the higher up the context is the more engaged a person's neurological and physiological system, and the more intensely they will respond.

New Code - a development in the field of NLP which emphasises unconscious learning and understanding and which uses instead a systemic approach to teach and demonstrate patterns by arranging events, situations or contexts in which the learnings and patterns manifest spontaneously.

Nominalisation - a verb (doing word) that has been 'frozen' into a concept, or abstract noun (thing word), by attempting to describe an action as if it were an object- eg the action of loving becomes the nominalisation of love, budgeting becomes budget, managing becomes management.

Olfactory - smelling and of the sense of smell.

Outcomes - a specific desired result, for a specific context, that is clearly represented in all of the sensory representational systems. In order to make an outcome well-formed it must also be measurable, time coded, stated in the positive, have defined resources that are available to the client, be within the individuals control, appropriately contextualised, and checked for ecology.

Pacing - the period of matching the client's physiological cues, emotional state or model of the world in order to create a string enough rapport to be able to lead them by example to a different physiology, emotion, or model of the world.

Paradigm - the collected identity, beliefs and values from which a group, corporation or entire culture operates.

Parts - a useful metaphor in which contextualised aspects of a personality are 'separated' out and treated as distinct from the whole, or from other parts, in order for an NLP practitioner to work with the aspect in question to resolve incongruency, build resources or achieve some other outcome. Within this metaphor 'parts' are essentially treated like any other NLP client, with their own strategies, values, beliefs, resources and need for pacing and rapport.

Patterns - any repeating sequence.

Perceptual Filters or biases - the filters that an individual has that influence how they generalise, delete and distort information and their experience of reality in order to come up with their particular model of the world.

Perceptual positions - when you operate from your own model of the world you are in the first position, or the position of self. When you take on the model of the world of another person you are in second position, or the position of other, when you take a dissociated Meta position you are in the third position. Using these different positions to perceive a single context enables the client to gather additional information. It is important to have clean perceptual positions, and to vital to use them appropriately in order to avoid perceptual contamination.

Phonological Ambiguity - when the meaning of a sentence is made ambiguous due to use of words that have the same sound but different meanings.

Physiology - referring to the body. In NLP the term is used to describe or indicate such indicators as posture, breathing, heart rate, muscle tension and psychological or emotional state.

Preferred System - The modality or sense in which a person is most comfortable, the one they use first or as a default use most often, both to gather information and to re-present information to themselves.

Present state - the current situation, including internal state, internal process and external behaviour - the place from which one is starting.

Presuppositions - the items, ideas or concepts that are, for the sake of consistency and utility, treated as though they were true, upon which many working theories can then be based. The pre-suppositions of NLP provide the philosophy that underscores and supports the practice of NLP, and provide useful framework, reminders and starting points for interventions.

Rapport - a synchronisation of behaviours, either unconsciously occurring, or deliberately generated, which reduces the difference between self and another at unconscious levels. Most often achieved through matching, mirroring and cross-matching. This is the pace element of Pace and Lead. The test for rapport is that when one of the people in rapport leads the other follows, this can be physical duplication of movement or movement through state change.

Reality Check - the act of conducting a 'check' or a comparison between one's internal processing, and the external experience or reality.

Reframing - changing a person's ideas about the meaning, significance or relevance of a situation by changing the frames which define the situation.

Reimprinting - changing and re-structuring of an core imprint experience that has resulted in a person building a pattern of limiting beliefs or unwanted behaviours and which continues to provide a template upon which future behaviour is based.

Requisite variety - a principle stating that: in any system, the part of that system which has the greatest range of behavioural flexibility is the controlling part.

Representation - an internally generated picture, sound or feeling used to re-present to the self a concept, past experience or imagined event.

Representational systems - the internalised representations of the sensory systems used for the purposes of thinking in pictures, sounds and feelings.

Resource - an element that makes up or contributes to a state that is extremely useful and resourceful for an individual in a specific context. A resource may consist of a positive kinaesthetic, or an internal sound byte, or image, it might be a memory, or an abstraction - a collection of useful 'bits and pieces'.

Resourceful State - a state made up of all the elements and aspects that an individual needs to be resourceful in a chosen context, or to be used as a general cross-context state to allow an individual to have effective and resourceful internal processes.

Second Order Change - a change that occurs at a different logical level from the problem state.

Sensory Acuity - precise and accurate ability to make fine distinctions and internal representations with each of the senses. There are exercises that help to practice and strengthen these.

Sensory Based Description - a specific description limited to only what one can experience directly with the senses - see, hear, feel, smell, taste - without interpreting or ascribing meaning to that description.

Sensory Based Experience - an event experienced in as many of the senses as possible, and without conscious understanding or analysing, in order to get a clean map of the experience in each of the representational systems.

State - a "package" to describe an overall condition - it includes the physiology, internal kinaesthetic, auditory and visual, and thought processes and strategies. More than just 'feeling' a certain way eg feeling confident, as opposed to a state of confidence- which includes all the other aspects and internal processes beyond the kinaesthetic. A state may be something to move away from (an unresourceful state) or something to move towards (a resourceful state).

State Control - Deliberating choosing to experience, reduce or enhance specific states using a variety of techniques including Changing the Physiology, Sub Modalities and anchoring.

State Elicitation - Deliberately inducing a state with a subject through pacing and leading, metaphor, physiology, anchors, act as if and remember a time.

Strategy - the specific elements and precise order of the steps that make up a thought process or behaviour. Can include any and all of the following in limitless combinations: all representational systems, internal and external information, internal state, internal process, external behaviour, and utilises the phases Trigger, Operate, Test and Exit (known as the TOTE). A strategy is what let's you know when to start, what to do first, what to do next, and how you know when you are finished. Individuals have many different strategies for different contexts. Some strategies are very effective and useful, others are less so, but it is possible to change a strategy if a more efficient or effective one is desired.

Sub-modalities - the subcategories that describe distinctions in each of the Modalities. Eg Sub-modalities of the Visual Modality would include all the possible variations available in a visual format, including but not limited to, Brightness, Size, Focus, Colour, and Distance etc.

Synaesthesia - when two rep systems interact in such a way as to seem simultaneous, though in actuality one very closely precedes the other. Eg an auditory/visual synesthesia would mean that hearing sounds (like music) would create an image, so rapidly as to seem instantaneous.

Syntax - the structure of a language that determines the way nouns, adjectives and verbs etc should be positioned to correctly convey meaning. Syntax can change across languages, and changing the syntax can change the meaning of a sentence drastically.

Through Time - a time sort in which one is extremely aware of the passage of time. In this state it is easy to accurately judge the passage of different periods of time (five minutes, or an hour) and to estimate how long activities will take. People sorting by through time strongly prefer to be punctual, and tend to be early, plan ahead and have systems for doing things efficiently.

Time Line - a metaphor to describe the ways in which people represent time. A personal Timeline may be elicited (or installed) simply by asking the subject to indicate the location or direction in which a certain point of time (say last Christmas) might be positioned.

Triple Description - experiencing a situation from three perspectives; self, another and the Meta position. Takes the concept of "see it from the other fellows point of view" or "walk a mile in another man's shoes" to a greater level of association and clean separation.

Unconscious Mind - If we consider the conscious mind to be everything that we are aware of in any given moment (like *NOW!), and we accept that the conscious mind can only maintain concentration on 7+-2 chunks of attention at a time, then it would be appropriate to call your Unconscious mind EVERYTHING of which you are not currently consciously aware. The unconscious is like a recording device, constantly taking in and processing MASSIVE amounts of information and never discarding it.

Universal Quantifiers - a Meta Model Violation in which an extremely broad generalisation is made. Typically expressed in terms like: all, nothing, always, never, every, none etc. The way to 'bust' this violation is to challenge the generalisation by bring the chunk size down to specifics- often by citing a specific example, or outright questioning of the statement "What, ALL of them? Are you sure? Isn't there even ONE exception?"

Unspecified predicated - predicates that are non-sensory specific, not relating to any of the five senses.

Up-Time States - a state that has the subject alert and paying attention to external world rather than their internal processes.

Values - usually expressed in a single word nominalisation (Honesty, Achievement, Morality) these are actually clusters of usually very strongly held beliefs, often so deeply unconscious that it can be difficult to extract the specific beliefs in the cluster. People get very touchy about their core values and working with them requires patience and rapport.

Vestibular System - the body's balance system and what gets upset when you spin around in circles- one of the great things to calibrate when doing a standing or moving intervention as the unconscious mind can cause a wobble, tilt or lean to be a visible signal.

Visual - related to the sense sight and the experiences of seeing.

Well-formedness Conditions - conditions (such as achievability, measurability, self initiated and maintained) that an outcome must meet in order to be a well-formed outcome, or an outcome that is essentially fool proof and has no built in flaws.