How to solve test anxiety using NLP?
Test anxiety is an extremely common problem. I wrote a blog post about this and I wanted to make a video with a little technique that you could use. This works on children as well as adults, and you don’t need to be an NLP practitioner in order to do this. Anyone can do this.
How to solve test anxiety using NLP
Usually what happens is that we’re getting anxious over something that hasn’t even happened yet. We know that the test is coming and we start to get nervous and we let that nervousness build and we start making images in our minds of us failing the test and stuff like that.
The important thing is that before you go into the test, you step into a very good emotional state. Now this is one way of doing that. It’s a decision, “I am doing to feel differently.” When you feel that initial -let’s say nervousness- coming up, this is what you could do.
NLP Circle of Excellence
I want you to imagine a circle right in front of you, and in this circle is where excellence is going to live. Now what would be part of an excellent state? Let’s say for test anxiety that would be calmness. So in your mind, and you can close your eyes if you want to, you can go back to a time in your life where you felt really calm, let’s say at the beach, and you imagine what you heard, you imagine what you saw and what you felt at that moment in time so you can go back to feeling that really calm state. The moment that you feel that calmness inside of you, I want you to step inside of that circle, and I want you to allow that calmness to become part of the circle.
Now you step out. What else could you need in this circle? Let’s say you would want to have focus. You do the exact same thing. You go back to a time in your life where you felt really, really focused. What did you see, hear, and feel at that moment in time? So you start to get that feeling of focus coming back. And when you have that at a peak focus state, you step into the circle and allow that to become part of calmness.
Then you step out and you keep doing that with different resources that you’d like to have inside of that circle so you can truly build that emotional state of excellence. And when it becomes really powerful, you can decide to take that circle anywhere you want.
That’s one way, a very simple way, to use visualization in stepping into a calmer emotional state. There are many more techniques taught to deal with anxiety, especially at the NLP Master Practitioner level.
Write-up
I want you to imagine a circle right in front of you, and in this circle is where excellence is going to live. Now what would be part of an excellent state? Let’s say for test anxiety that would be calmness. So in your mind, and you can close your eyes if you want to, you can go back to a time in your life where you felt really calm, let’s say at the beach, and you imagine what you heard, you imagine what you saw and what you felt at that moment in time so you can go back to feeling that really calm state. The moment that you feel that calmness inside of you, I want you to step inside of that circle, and I want you to allow that calmness to become part of the circle.
Now you step out. What else could you need in this circle? Let’s say you would want to have focus. You do the exact same thing. You go back to a time in your life where you felt really, really focused. What did you see, hear, and feel at that moment in time? So you start to get that feeling of focus coming back. And when you have that at a peak focus state, you step into the circle and allow that to become part of calmness.
Then you step out and you keep doing that with different resources that you’d like to have inside of that circle so you can truly build that emotional state of excellence. And when it becomes really powerful, you can decide to take that circle anywhere you want.
That’s one way, a very simple way, to use visualization in stepping into a calmer emotional state. There are many more techniques taught to deal with anxiety, especially at the NLP Master Practitioner level.
