A former student of ours wrote this article when he was an NLP beginner himself.
The methodology of NLP along with all of the techniques and patterns lead to an immense amount of information and skills that are available to the NLP beginner. Here are a few tips and tricks from my personal experience to not only make this learning task manageable, but enjoyable!
10 Tips for the NLP beginner
1. Chunk down – Even just one piece of NLP such as the meta-model can be overwhelming if you attempt to master the whole skill-set at once. The first task in any large learning process is to break it down into manageable chunks. Here is the test: if the piece that you are considering learning overwhelms you, break it down into its component pieces and start with one of those first! You can’t eat an entire elephant in one bite, can you?
2. Prioritize – If the chunks are appropriately sized and you still feel overwhelmed, it is most likely an issue of prioritization and sequencing. Once your learning tasks are a manageable chunk size, ask yourself questions such as: “What piece, if I learn it now, will make learning the other pieces easier?”, “What is the most important piece, that if I focus on it first, will have the most impact on my life?”, or “Which piece will I have the most fun with today!”
3. Action, Action, Action – Reading is nice, but there is a big difference between effective understanding and effective action. Get out in the world and use it! Practice makes perfect. Do you want to be a master reader or a master Practitioner?
4. Apply to self – Upon finishing NLP training, it is my experience that students tend to become most effective at the techniques that have had the most impact on their own lives. Experiencing it yourself gives you a much richer understanding of the tools and their effects than using them on others. Not to mention that by not to using such a powerful tool set on yourself you are missing out on the personal change that can take your skills to the next level!
5. Make a daily routine – Make it a habit to practice daily, even if only briefly. Upon acquiring new skills, you will begin to notice new opportunities to practice. Use them!
6. There is no such thing as failure, only Feedback!! Use feedback wisely to know what your next step for improvement is, and always remember to celebrate your achievements!
7. You already have all of the resources you need – When you appreciate and accept where you are in the learning process, learning comes more easily and the journey that you are on becomes much more pleasant. Success is not a destination, it is a journey.
8. Be open to notice that which we call NLP in its naturally occurring environment. Excellence exists sometimes in the strangest of places and you can always learn from seeing excellence in its natural context. Where do you think NLP came from in the first place!
9. Practice, practice, and practice some more.
10. Have fun!! People learn more, quicker, and maintain learning over a longer period of time when they are having fun. They also have more fun in the process! Seems like a win-win to me!
Whether you are a beginner, master, or somewhere in between, I hope that you find these tips and tricks valuable and bring them with you into your life; may your journey to mastery be fruitful and fun!
This article was written by Jason Schneider, who since then started an NLP company of his own.
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