NLP REFRAMING & ANCHORING

NLP REFRAMING OF STORED ANGER

NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) Reframing is easy to do to shift anything from a negative or blocked state into a clear or positive state. The basic technique is the same, no matter what the issue.

First of all find what part of the body is holding on to the negative emotion. For instance, the liver commonly holds on to stored anger. Imagine what this trapped anger feels like with all your senses. What shape is it? What size is it? What colour is the anger? Is the anger hard or soft, rough or smooth? Is there a sound associated with it? All these questions are designed to get a clear perception of the anger so that it can be reframed. If you don’t know the answer to one of the questions, if you did know, what would the answer be?

Commonly the colours experienced will be red or dark, and the block will usually be perceived as hard. Gradually imagine reframing each of the aspects one by one, maybe in several steps each, to something light and soft and completely different to the original feeling of anger. For instance a large, hard, red, oval, rough block of anger with an abusive sound could be reframed in the following sequence: - Reframe (imagine) changing the colour to bright yellow
- Reframe the yellow to white
- Reframe the shape to a ball shape
- Reframe it to soft cotton wool
- Reframe the abusive sound to gentle relaxation music
- Shrink it down to be really tiny until it disappears and the block is gone.

This technique is surprisingly powerful and is great for using with kids for rapid results. It can be used for just about anything you can imagine in our body, even pain. As the volunteer for a class demonstration of this technique during my hypnotherapy training, I was totally amazed that the pain I had been experiencing in severely overstrained muscles I had got the day before disappeared completely after several reframes.

NLP ANCHORING OF JOYFUL FEELINGS

NLP commonly uses “anchors” to lock desired feelings into the subconscious mind so they can be retrieved at will, or even automatically, by re-activating the anchor. This works really well for things like retrieving feelings of confidence before public speaking, calmness before entering anxiety-provoking situations and so on. The anchor I commonly use is to press the thumb and the forefinger of the left hand together when the desired feelings are being vividly experienced. This is processed by the right hemisphere of the brain, the creative part, and is locked into the subconscious mind. To retrieve the good feelings, just press the thumb and the forefinger together again and the good feelings come flooding back. The key is to be experiencing the feelings clearly when the anchor is initially formed.

Exercise: Imagine a time when you were having fun, filled with the joy of being alive, feeling your heart wide open and joyful. Often this will be a happy memory from childhood. Make this memory real, bold, vivid, clear and get those joyful feelings as strong as you can. When those joyful feelings are at their peak, press the thumb and the forefinger of the left hand together to create your anchor. Hold for a minute then release. Get those good feelings strong again and then reinforce the anchor again. Release. Now any time you want to reclaim these joyful feelings, just press the thumb and the forefinger of the left hand together again to re-trigger the anchor.

If you are convinced you do not have any happy, fun-filled memories to relate to, just imagine how you would have felt if you had felt joyful at any time and use these feelings as the basis for your anchor.