WHAT IS NLP?
Whether you think you can or whether you think you can't, you're right.
HENRY FORD
NLP is a relatively new concept and was developed in the mid 1970's by linguist John Grinder and Gestalt Therapist Richard Bandler and inspired by some of the greatest therapists and thinkers of their time including Fritz Perls (Gestalt Therapy), Virginia Satir (Family Therapy), Milton Erickson (Hyphotherapy), Carl Rogers (Person Centred Therapy), Albert Ellis (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy),and Eric Berne (Transactional Analysis). Bandler and Grinder studied the successful elements from the different approaches to language, communication and psychotherapy around at the time brought them all together in NLP.
Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) explores the relationships between how we think (neuro), language and how we communicate (linguistic) and our patterns of behaviour and emotions, and how we achieve our goals (programs). It is based on the belief that we are 'programmed' by our past experiences, sometimes in ways that support us and sometimes in ways that limit us.
The name makes it sound complicated, but in fact NLP is simply a way of studying our thoughts, languages, emotions and behaviour patterns, identifying which are effective, and changing those that are counter-productive by working through carefully designed NLP techniques with an NLP practitioner. NLP techniques can be used in a variety of contexts; generally it is used to help people overcome negative emotions, past traumatic events, fears and phobias. NLP techniques are extremely popular in Business Coaching and Life Coaching to improve performance and motivation.
This is a very short, simplified explanation of NLP. There is a wealth of definitions, information and books available on the subject; the best explanation I've found is:
NLP is whatever works! (Robert Dilts)
