IF THERE’S A THEORY, THERE’S A PRACTICE

In writing about the Theory of NLP (#10) I am aware that where there’s a theory, there’s a practice. And it is The Practice of NLP that has mostly been promoted during the past 40 years (1975- 2015). Given, that — What is the practice of NLP? How many practices of NLP are there? Are there legitimate and illegitimate practices of NLP? What are the criteria for the practice of NLP?

Now as a preamble for what follows, it is not trivial for me to note that theory and practice are not always aligned. In fact, given human fallibility, it is very common for one’s theory and one’s practice to be incongruent. In fact, I can go further and assert that theory and practice are always incongruent. That’s because everyone is fallible, no one is infallible (perfect), and so there are always failures in practice to fully actualize the theory.

Now with that out of the way— when we begin exploring the practice of NLP, we have, as it is in every field, a great range of practices. There are people who are very conscientious about being true to the theory and there are people who could care less. There are people who trace what they do very carefully and explicitly from the theory or the model. There are other people who use the theory/ model of NLP to legitimize, justify, and validate their own pet-hobbies and projects. The credential “Master Practitioner” sounds very close to Master’s Degree and so they jump on the shortest and cheapest NLP course they can to get their so-called credibility. This is as ludicrous as it is unethical and unprofessional! But it happens. And this has seriously damaged the credibility of NLP around the world.

Now historically, the practice of NLP was the very context in which the theory of NLP was discovered and articulated. During the “wild days of NLP” (1972-1975, McClendon), NLP used Perls’ Gestalt Therapy, Satir’s Family Systems, and Chomsky’s Transformational Grammar to begin constructing the model which implicitly assumed the theory. Then using Miller’s TOTE model and Korzybski’s General Semantic theory, NLP created various practices that distinguished at first: Questioning people about their map or model of the world to generate a fuller expression. Tracking representational systems as people speak to generate a model of the person’s subjective experience (modeling). Inviting people to change their representational systems, including the language system, to generate healing, health, renewal, well-ness, etc. (therapy, self-development). Formatting certain subjective processes to deal with regular experiences that were undesirable such as phobia to generate a set of “patterns” (the NLP patterns). Using these processes and patterns in specific domains— therapy, health, business,

leadership, management, parenting, hypnotherapy, sales, etc. (the NLP Applications).

All of this, and more, is involved in The Practice of NLP. Further, as various people practiced NLP, most did so honorably, some did not. Some used it for manipulating people to buy what they didn’t need or want and so in many places, NLP got the reputation of being manipulative. Actually, NLP is not manipulative, but a person could certainly use it to manipulate. Anything powerful enough to create positive change and transformation can be mis-used by those who are not conscientious or ethical. And that has happened and it continues to happen.

“So,” you ask, “why hasn’t the governing body of NLP sanctioned those who use it unethically? Board of examiners in psychology and other fields do that. How could NLP has not done that?” For one reason, there is no governing body. There is no international association of NLP that has control over the field. There are lots and lots of associations ... and that’s the problem. Many associations but no control to identify the “bad apples” and stop them from practicing. And if you ask why that is so— it goes back to the beginning and how the founders and early developers failed to set that up.

Today the practice of NLP is all over the place. There are highly ethical people who are very conscientious and caring and who you can depend on to do the right thing. There are also a good number who are not like that. I’m involved with a new movement in NLP to begin to address this. You can check out www.nlpleadershipsummit.org to see what 100 of us are attempting to do.

In every field we warn: Buyer Beware. This is especially true when you are shopping for an ethical and caring and professional NLP Trainer. So, what is a buyer to do? My recommendation, Ask questions! Lots of them.

What is covered in the training? Specifically. Can I see the curriculum? How much time is given to the five models of NLP? (2015 Neurons #7) What skills will I learn from the training? How will you assess or benchmark these skills so that I know I have developed them to a certain level? What association of NLP are you associated with? Are you in good standing with them? How can I contact that association? If I have a complaint about the training, who do I contact to readdress something?

In terms of quality NLP, beware of any training for Practitioner less than 7 days and Master Practitioner less than 12 days. Anything less than that, you are not getting the basics of the field. Check out Users’ Manual of the Brain, Volumes I and II for the content of NLP Practitioner and Master Practitioner (Crown House Publications, www.crownhouse.co.uk).

Neuro-Semantics began in 1996 in reaction to the Bandler lawsuit “against the field of NLP in the USA.” We felt that we could do much, much better in terms of the practice of NLP and so we set out a vision of collaboration, respect, high quality, giving credit to sources, being professional, apply to self, etc. Today Neuro-Semantics is a world-wide Association (the ISNS) in 50 countries, 19 national Institutes, and a leadership team who holds trainers accountable to professional standards. This is how we are attempting to correct things and be a positive influence in this field.