What is NLP and Time Line Therapy™?
How Can it Empower Me?

Success in any area of life is founded on:

• effective communication,
• healthy relationships,
• self-awareness.

It is also about being willing to change when things are not working and keeping what works. Most of all, it is about taking responsibility for yourself and accepting that where you are today is the sum total of all the decisions you have ever made before, be they conscious or unconscious decisions.

With that basic and extremely important premise, you put yourself in the driver’s seat and can mastermind your own results in any area of life – health, relationships, business, career, family, etc.

Imagine looking back on your life when you are at a ripe old age of 85 – do you want to have results to show or reasons (excuses) for not being, having or doing what you desire?

Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) is a model of communication and excellence.

Briefly, it is how to use the language of the mind to consistently achieve our specific and desired outcomes. NLP is also a study about how humans perceive the world around them, out of which have emerged technologies for accelerated behavioural change. You can take charge of your mind and create the results you want in your personal and business life.

Researchers in the field of NLP have modeled excellence to find out what high performers do that makes them extremely effective and they have developed techniques that can be taught to others to achieve the same results.

The NLP-based Mastermind Your Life series of courses provide practical, step-by-step techniques to achieve higher sensory awareness and to recognize how people process information. When you know how other people absorb information, you can tailor your communication to them so that they are best able to process it. You will learn how to establish rapport within minutes and therefore open up the channel of communication with anyone you meet. In a study of communication at the University of Pennsylvania in 1970 (Kinesics and Communication, R. Birdwhistle), the researchers determined that in communication, 7% of what we communicate is the result of the words that we say, or the content of our communication. 38% of our communication to others is a result of our verbal behaviour, which includes tone of voice, timbre, tempo, and volume. 55% of our communication to others is a result of our nonverbal communication, our body posture, breathing, skin colour and our movement. By learning how to read and utilise tonal and non-verbal communication, we become highly effective communicators in any context. Establishing rapport is the first step towards building a relationship based on trust and integrity.

As relationship building is part of any personal or business situation, including managing people, selling, presentation, persuasion and negotiation, you will learn about the various information processing filters that contribute to personality differences. Practical techniques to identify and utilize these filters are included in the courses. You learn how to influence with integrity with the aim of consistently achieving win-win outcomes.

Just knowing the tools to effective communication is not enough if there are emotional or mental barriers to peak performance. Our past experiences and the memories that go with them affect how we approach present day situations. If they prevent us from expressing ourselves in an appropriate way, they stop us from achieving the results we want.

For example, fear of public speaking or the belief that “I am a poor presenter” would prevent someone from presenting effectively, or may be even not present at all. Active imagination techniques are highly effective in removing emotional or mental obstacles, and course participants will learn how to overcome their personal limitations.

Time Line Therapy™ (TLT) is actually an extension of NLP.

The NLP models generally deal with how we, as humans, operate now and they do not take into account the past, present or future. Tad James and Wyatt Woodsmall extended the models in NLP to take time into account as published in their book, Time Line Therapy and the Basis of Personality, and it really is very interesting how we organise time, how much that affects our personality or how we behave.

They discovered was that while some changes you make, using NLP are generally very effective and fast, they do not stick because the changes are not consistent with our past (memories, beliefs, etc).

Time Line Therapy™ techniques make up another NLP model. It is a concept and not the absolute truth. It helps us understand how a process works, and is a useful tool to help us make changes in ourselves so that we can get to where we want to go.

What are the benefits that we can gain from knowing about Time Line Therapy™, how we store time and what we can do with it for making behavioural changes?

There are three main benefits from learning and utilising the Time Line Therapy™ model.

• The first technique is how to release unresolved negative emotions from the past.
• The second is how you can undo limiting decisions that you have made in the past which affect how you behave today.
• The third is looking forward to the future, how you create the type of future you want to have.

TLT utilises what your unconscious mind already does naturally, the difference being you can do it at will, instead of waiting for an unexpected flash of enlightenment, the “light bulb” moment, at some unknown time in the future.

Time Line Therapy™ is a process of active imagination, where the client imagines floating above his “Time Line” and letting go of his negative emotions and/or limiting beliefs. The client then imagines creating events in his future that support his desired goals or outcomes.

Everyone has a mind, consisting of conscious and unconscious (sub-conscious) parts. The conscious mind is the part which we are aware of, and it is in charge of our rational and logical thought processes. The unconscious mind operates outside of our awareness and is responsible for our emotions, feelings, beliefs, values, memories and keeping us alive (breathing, sweating, walking, etc).

We represent the external world in our minds by means of pictures, sounds, feelings, taste, smell and self-talk. Our external behaviours, and hence results, are directly related to the internal thoughts and feelings we hold in our minds.

I am calling it the unconscious mind, not because the mind is unconscious or asleep, but just that we are unconscious or unaware of its workings. So for short I shall call it the unconscious mind. Now the unconscious mind is really responsible for all learning, behaviour and change.

Everything we learn, what we do and changes that we make happen at the unconscious level. We may, or we normally do, make decisions at the conscious level. However, for the learning or the behaviour or the change to take effect, it has be processed and implemented at the unconscious level by your unconscious mind.

Your conscious mind is your goal setter. Your unconscious mind is your goal getter. Therefore, you must be able to direct your unconscious mind to where you want to go.

For example...

...You consciously decide you are going to make yourself a cup of coffee. You can see the steaming coffee, hear the sound of the stirring teaspoon, feel the hot cup in your hand, smell the aroma and taste it. Without thinking about it any further, you get up, walk over to the kitchen, make the coffee and sit down to enjoy it. Your unconscious mind takes over (moves your muscles, keeps you breathing, etc) once you give it a clear directive. The same goes for your bigger life goals.

Once we have identified what exactly is our goal, we must take action and maintain focus. That is easier to do when you have a supportive, success-oriented network around you, e.g. family, friends, experts and a coach. If you feel any doubts or negativity about your goal, you have to let go of the limitations that are stopping you in order to move forward. Our values are the criteria by which you allocate your time and effort, as well as judge your actions and those of others.

Are your values in conflict, or aligned with your goals?

You can overcome your limitations or conflicts by attending personal development training, therapy or coaching.

The Mastermind Your Life courses are designed to give participants a good understanding of how we communicate with ourselves and with others, as well as practical hands-on exercises to facilitate learning.

The participants are expected to apply their learnings in the real world and there are feedback and discussion sessions after the training.

As an added bonus, I may offer each participant individual coaching by phone in the weeks following the training.