Imagicus Hypnotherapy

Neuro-linguistic programming (usually shortened to NLP) is an interpersonal communication model and an alternative approach to psychotherapy
based on the subjective study of language, communication and personal change. NLP was co-created by Richard Bandler and linguist John
Grinder in the 1970s. The initial focus was pragmatic, modelling three successful psychotherapists, Fritz Perls (Gestalt Therapy), Virgina Satir
(Family Systems Therapy), and eventually Milton Erickson (Clinical Hypnosis), with the aim of discovering what made these individuals more
successful than their peers.

NLP aims to increase behavioural choice by the manipulation of personal state, belief and internal representation either by the NLP practitioner,
or by self-application. Some of the main ideas, many imported from existing counselling or psychotherapy practice, include problems, desires,
feelings, beliefs and outcomes that are represented in visual, auditory and kinaesthetic (and sometimes gustatory, olfactory) systems. When
communicating with someone, rather than just listening to and responding to what a person said, NLP aims to also respond to the structure of
verbal communication and non-verbal cues. The NLP meta model questioning is intended to clarify what has been left out or distorted in
communication. The NLP Milton model uses non-specific and metaphoric language allowing the listener to fill in the gaps, making their own
meaning from what is being said, finding their own solutions and inner resources, challenging and irrational beliefs. The actual state someone is
in when setting a goal or choosing a course of action is also considered important. A number of techniques in NLP aim to enhance states by
anchoring resourceful states associated with personal experience or model states by imitating others.

In the early development of NLP between 1972 and 1976, Richard Bandler, a psychology student at University of California, Santa Cruz, and John
Grinder, a linguist specializing in syntax, guided somewhat by the anthropologist and systems theorist Gregory Bateson, participated in
collaborative studies with three successful psychotherapists, Fritz Perls, Virginia Satir, and Milton Erickson. Of the three, Erickson was the most
well known. They reviewed many of hours of audio and video of the three therapists and spent months imitating how they worked with clients, the
aim was to model the communication patterns which made these individuals more successful than their peers.

"The system was developed in answer to [why] particular psychotherapists were so effective with their patients. Rather than explore this question
in terms of psychotherapeutic theory and practice, Bandler and Grinder sought to analyze what the therapists were doing at an observational
level, categorize it, and apply the categories as a general model of interpersonal influence. NLP seeks to instruct people to observe, make
inferences, and respond to others, as did the three original, very effective therapists." (Druckman, 1988, Enhancing Human Performance: Issues,
Theories, and Techniques).

The first model was Fritz Perls, a German-born psychiatrist and psychotherapist who was associated with the founding of 'gestalt therapy', an
approach to therapy which at its core is the promotion of awareness and the contact between the self and its environment. In 1964, Fritz Perls
had began a long-term residency at Esalen Institute in California, United States and became a major and lasting influence. Esalen was dedicated
to humanistic alternative education and to exploring work in the humanities and sciences that furthers the full realization of what Aldous Huxley
called the "human potential". The second model was Virginia Satir, also an early leader at Esalen, and known especially for her approach to
family therapy that treats groups and to some extent individuals, as systems that exhibit homeostasis. Her therapeutic interventions would
usually focus on relationship patterns rather than on analyzing impulses of the unconscious mind or early childhood trauma of individuals as a
Freudian psychoanalyst would do.

In 1975 the meta model was published in Structure of Magic Volumes I & II, it featured a set of specifying question that both Fritz Perls and
Virginia Satir used intuitively to respond to distortion, generalization and deletion in the speaker's language. Second, the Milton model featured
verbal (ambiguity, metaphor, suggestion, embedded suggestion) and non-verbal patterns (matching and mirroring, spacial marking) that Milton H.
Erickson used to effect change with clients.

The NLP meta model can be seen as a heuristic that responds to the words and phrases that reveal unconscious limitations and faulty thinking -
the distortions, generalisations and deletions in language. Bandler and Grinder observed similar patterns in the communication of Fritz Perls and
Virginia Satir (and gleaned from a set of transformational grammar language categories). The meta model seeks to recover unspoken information,
challenge generalisation and other distorted messages that involve restrictive thinking and beliefs. The intent is to help someone develop new
choice in thinking and behaviour. By listening to and carefully responding to the distortions (generalisations and deletions) in a client's sentences,
the practitioner seeks to respond to the form of the sentence rather than the content itself.

In contrast to the Meta Model of NLP which specifies information, the Milton Erickson inspired Milton model described by Bandler and Grinder as
"artfully vague", allowing the communicator to make statements that seem specific but allow the listener to fill in their own meaning for what is
being said. It makes use of pacing and leading, ambiguity, metaphor, embedded suggestion, and multiple-meaning sentence structures. It has
been described as "a way of using language to induce and maintain trance in order to contact the hidden resources of our personality". The
Milton model has three primary aspects: First, to assist in building and maintaining rapport with the client. Second, to overload and distract the
conscious mind so that unconscious communication can be cultivated. Third, to allow for interpretation in the words offered to the client.

After spending months closely studying Erickson's language (verbal and non-verbal) and imitating the way that Erickson worked with clients,
Bandler and Grinder published the Milton model in 1976/1977 under the title The Patterns of Milton H. Erickson Volumes I & II. In the preface,
Erickson said, "Although this book is far from being a complete description of my methodologies, as they so clearly state it is a much better
explanation of how I work than I, myself, can give. I know what I do, but to explain how I do it is much too difficult for me." Erickson was known for
his use of unconventional approaches, including the use of stories, and for deeply entering the world of his clients. The Milton model is a way of
communicating based on the hypnotic language patterns of Milton Erickson.

A basic assumption of NLP is that internal mental processes such as problem solving, memory, and language consist of visual, auditory,
kinaesthetic (and possibly olfactory and gustatory) representations are engaged when people think about problems, tasks or activities, or engage
in them. Internal sensory representations are constantly being formed and activated. Whether making conversation, talking about a problem,
reading a book, kicking a ball or riding a horse, internal representations impact on performance. NLP techniques generally aim to change
behaviour through modifying the internal representations, examining the way a person represents a problem and by building desirable
representations of alternative outcomes or goals. In addition, Bandler and Grinder claimed that the representational system use could be tracked
using eye movements, gestures, breathing, sensory predicates and other cues in order to improve rapport and social influence - and it is these
internal mental processes that both give rise to revealing, and also modifying, behaviour.