NLP Practitioner
Written
Integration
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NLP Practitioner Written Integration
NLP Foundations and Presuppositions
1.
List the Presuppositions of NLP
1. The map is not the territory – we react to our experiences, not reality
2. Having choice is better than having no choice
3. People make the best choice they can at the time (give them a better
choice or a better map, and they will take it)
4. People work perfectly: they execute their strategy brilliantly, but the
strategy may be broken
5. All actions have a purpose
6. All behaviour has a positive intention
7. The unconscious mind balances the conscious mind – it is not malicious
8. The meaning of your communication is the response it invokes
9. We already have (or can create) all the resources we need to succeed
10. Our mind and body is one symbiotic system
11. We process all information through the 5 senses
12. Modeling successful performance leads to excellence
13. If you want to understand, act (the learning is in the doing)
2.
What is the Law of Requisite Variety?
The person with the most flexibility will control the situation (in relation to
achieving a desired outcome)
3.
What are the 3 Legs of NLP? What are some of its variations?
 Be focused on your Outcome
 Be Flexible
 Take Action
 …. Within the spirit of rapport (by employing sensory acuity)
 Other definitions seek to put Rapport as one of the three legs, in the spirit
of Taking Action …. Still the same 4 components. I personally prefer to see
Rapport as the broader context, as this sets an all-encompassing tone for
all coaching interventions, not just NLP
4.
What does “The map is not the Territory” mean?
 We make sense of the world through our own filters (DDG plus language,
values/beliefs, metaprogrammes, decisions, memories). Because our own
DNA / experience / beliefs are different from the next person, we will each
be interpreting the world differently. The world is the same world – our
maps could be considerably different
5.
What is the difference between the distinctions of “process”, “pattern” and
“content”? Why are these distinctions important to know?
 Content = WHAT you say
 Process = HOW you say it
 Pattern = the language filters that we apply to what we say
(deletions, distortions and generalizations)
 NLP seeks to alter the process, rather than the content, in order to have a
more lasting and more readily transferable impact on HOW the individual
thinks / feels / behaves. Content-free coaching has a lasting, sustainable
and more immediate impact. It also enables the client to tackle issues that
they may not have the words to articulate in a content-centred approach.
6.
What is meant by the conscious and unconscious? Why is the difference
important to know?
 Conscious is the ‘waking mind’, which can process limited amounts of
information (7 things +/- 2). What we say and do in the conscious is
influenced by our unconscious
 Unconscious is the deep structure
 Our surface behaviour and thoughts are shaped by the deep structure, the
subconscious – we need to access the subconscious to understand the
drivers for what we see and to effect real change (through offering up
alternative maps)
7.
What are some of the existing definitions of NLP?
 NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) is the study of excellence and how to
produce the specific results you desire in your life on a consistent basis.
 Handbook for the brain – helps us to make sense of how we operate and
how we can change how we operate for better results
 Ability to be at your best more of the time – understanding what we do /
what we think / the underlying beliefs at work when we are being
successful, enables us to model this behaviour to achieve that success in
other areas of our lives and to make adjustments that enable us to move
beyond issues / obstacles / negative thoughts and feelings more quickly.
8.
What is your definition of NLP? Explain thoroughly.
 I like the outcome focused definition of “the ability to be your best more of
the time”. It ascribes to NLP the properties of being a process rather than
a noun / a tool for leveraging desired outcomes rather than a goal in itself.
Therefore it remains something that is dynamic and fluid – potentially
meaning something different to each person who approaches it.
9.
What is the magic number 7 +/- 2 and why is it useful to know?
 The number of pieces of information we are able to hold / process in our
conscious minds at any one time
 This is an almost insignificant amount of information compared with what
our subconscious processes. Therefore, to make sense of our world, the
subconscious mind applies a range of filters that simplify / narrow what
we experience into manageable thoughts. Understanding those filters
give us insight into the individual’s perspective and helps us offer
alternative ones where they may be useful
10.
List the well formedness conditions for outcomes
 Outcome is expressed as a specific, desired sensory based goal
 It is positive
 It can be evidenced
 Controlled and maintained by the person determining the goal
 It is ecologically sound
 It is congruent with the identity of the person forming it
Frames
11.
Describe the following frames and when to use them:
Frames set the reference points by which we make decisions / sense of the
world. We make and use frames constantly in communication – as
practitioners we need to be careful not to use frames inadvertently in the
structure of our questions.

Backtrack
Backtracking is the process of restating another person’s key points, using
their choice of words. Matching their tone and body language can help to
pace them, too.
Useful backtracking questions include:
“Can I check that I understand …?”
“Can I summarise so far?”
“So you are saying …”
Useful for checking shared understanding (eg goals); to pick up at the start of
a new session – check understanding of where we got to last time; to establish
rapport by demonstrating that you have identified and understand key points

Relevancy
Checking how a specific statement or behaviour is helping a person to
achieve their desired / agreed outcome
Useful for confronting a behaviour that is not helping or for reinforcing a
resourceful behaviour.

As If
Asks the client to tap into their problem-solving / creative capability by asking
them to behave / think as if they already have the outcome they desire. Useful
for creative problem solving / anticipating issues and challenges as a result of
a particular course of action / reinforce a goal by ‘experiencing’ success.
Useful questions include:
“What would it be like if…?”
“Can you guess what would happen if …?”
“How would your behaviour / body language be different if you already had
this?”

Discovery
A state of suspending own perceptions or pre-suppositions in order to learn
about what happens to those thoughts and ideas as a result of taking part in
an exercise.
Useful where an individual feels stuck.

Outcome
This evaluates events based on whether they bring you closer to your desired
outcome. This can be used at the micro level, to assess individual behaviours
/ events / thought processes; or at the macro level for life planning decisions.
Good questions for the Outcome frame include:
“What am I trying to achieve right now?”
“What will this give me that is valuable?”
“What do I want?”
It could also be used to help understand another person’s motivations (eg
when in 2nd position) – possible questions include:
“What is this behaviour giving me?”

Contrast
The contrast frame evaluates by difference. For example, we might use
questions here that open the client up to noticing differences between unresourceful and resourceful states:
“How is this different?”
“What is it that makes this stand out?”
“What are the important differences between these things?”

Agreement
This frame seeks to find common ground in order to pace another person and
acknowledge their view of the world, without necessarily agreeing with their
outcome.
By seeking to agree with some part of the other person’s world, we avoid
setting up a direct conflict between possible outcomes. At the same time, we
are not trying to state that we understand the other person – this may also
result in conflict (How can you understand me, when you don’t agree with
what I’m suggesting … given that people carry out their strategy brilliantly!)
For example:
Person A:
“We have so much work to do, we will have to work late”
Response:
“I agree we have a lot of work to do. If we take a break and
come back fresh I believe we will finish it much more quickly”
Useful statements include:
“I agree …. and….”
“I appreciate ……..and ……”
“I respect …….and ……”
Meta Model
12.
What is the meta model? When is it used?
 The Meta Model is a series of language patterns that enable the NLP
practitioner to uncover what is happening in the deep structure though
identifying, understanding and challenging the deletions, distortions and
generalizations (collectively known as transformations) used by the client.
i.e. enables us tp gather information on the rules an individual applies to
themselves and their map of the territory.
 Enabling the client to reconnect with the deep structure increases selfawareness and provides a the client with increased choice
13.
What are the three universal processes of modelling on which
the meta model is based? What are the definitions of each?
 Distortion = changing the experience, making it different somehow from
what was real. We may give more weight to one aspect than
another in a given experience
There are 5 key distortions:
 Lost Performance – value judgments where the person doing the
judging is missed out
e.g. It’s really important I get it right
According to whom?

Cause-Effect - Using words to imply a cause and effect
relationship.
e.g. “She makes me really angry”
How do you allow her to make you feel that way?

Mind reading – guessing someone’s internal experience
e.g. “You think I’m nuts”
How do you know what I’m thinking?

Presuppositions – part of the sentence is assumed to be true, in
order for the whole sentence to be true
e.g. “She’s behaving herself at the moment”
In what ways does she not behave herself?

Complex equivalences – two things interpreted as being the same,
even when there is no evidence to support it
e.g. “He always talks over me, he doesn’t take me seriously”
Could his talking over you mean anything else?
 Deletion = Missing out a portion of the experience. There are 3 types of
deletion
 Comparative deletions – where the comparator is missing from the
statement:
e.g. “It’s not as bad as it was”
BAD compared with what? In whose estimation?

Simple deletions – where a key object / person / result / action is
missing from the statement:
e.g. “I’m terrible”
At what? How? According to whom?

Nominalisations: where verbs are turned into nouns:
e.g. “I never have enough time”
“What is it that you are doing that isn’t moving you forward?”
 Generalisation = where one specific experience comes to represent a
whole group of experiences (even if that initial outcome was an
unrepresentative event). We may even come up with a very good rule
based on an accurate generalization, but fail to build in any latitude for
exception
2 types of generalization:
 Modal operators of necessity – Must, should, ought, can’t
e.g. I ought to be more organised
What stops you? What would happen if you were? What will
happen if you’re not?
 Universal quantifiers (massive generalizations) – No-one, always,
never, every
e.g. I’ll never get this done?
Never? When could you be finished by?
14.
What is a nominalisation? What is its appropriate meta model response?
 Nominalisation is where an individual attributed fixed form to something
that does not inherently have form. This gives it a fixed meaning in their
mind. For example: love / success / relationship
 The correct meta model response is to seek clarification – what does that
mean for them
15.
What is a deep structure?
 Everything we know about an experience in the world – often unconscious
 The term comes from transformational grammar, to describe the complete
linguistic form of the statement, from which the surface structure is
derived
 The more general structure which gives rise to a particular visible form
16.
What is a surface structure?
 What’s actually said
 The idea, subject to deletions, distortions and generalizations that come
from the deep structure
17.
What is a derivation? Transformation?
 Derivation = obtaining information from the deep structure
 Transformation = a series of derivations that connect the deep structure to
the surface structure
18.


What are the following meta model distinctions and their appropriate
responses?
Simple deletion
Where a key object / person / result / action is missing from the statement:
e.g. “I’m terrible”
CHALLENGE the missing information: In what way? How exactly?


unspecified verbs
Verbs that don’t fully describe what is going on – e.g. “You hurt me” / “Their
children are rude” / “She frustrates me”
CHALLENGE clarification of the missing information – “How specifically did ….”


“ly” adverbs
Adverbs (describing the manner in which the verb is carried out) with ‘ly’ on
the end. These often hide value judgments – e.g. obviously / clearly /
regrettably / quickly ….
CHALLENGE the underlying value judgment:
“What was obvious about it?” “Would this be obvious for everyone involved?”
“What was clear about it?” “Why was it regrettable?” “What made the pace
important?”


comparative deletion
Where the comparator is missing from the statement: e.g. “It’s not as bad as it
was”
CHALLENGE the comparator: BAD compared with what? Compared with
whom / what?


nominalizations
Transferring something that should be a process into a fixed idea or noun (eg
relationship)
CHALLENGE by returning the idea to a verb: “What are you doing that makes
it feel that way?”


complex equivalence
two things interpreted as being the same, even when there is no evidence to
support it (e.g.“He always talks over me, he doesn’t take me seriously”)
CHALLENGE the link: Could his action mean anything else? Could the
outcome be attributed to anything else?


cause-effect
Using words to imply a cause and effect relationship (e.g. “She makes me
really angry”)
CHALLENGE the link: How do you allow her to make you feel that way?
What are you doing to make it this way?


mind reading
Assuming you know what another person is thinking / feeling / experiencing
CHALLENGE the assumption: How do you know what I’m thinking?


unspecified or lack of referential index
Use a general subject, not referring to anyone in particular – people / someone
/ they. e.g. “bosses don’t care about the workers” / “The industry is suffering
from a lack of skills”
CHALLENGE the missing WHO:
“Which bosses don’t care”
“The whole industry?” “Says who?”


universal quantifier
Phrases that leave no room for exception: All / Every / Never / No-one
CHALLENGE if this is always / never the case:
“Has there ever been a time when your boss recognised your work?”
OR – we can exaggerate the quantifier – “Never??” “Always??”


modal operator of necessity
Must / Should / Have to (plus the opposite of each)
CHALLENGE the consequences – “what would happen if you did / didn’t?” etc


modal operator of possibility
Could / can / may (plus the opposites)
CHALLENGE the limitation
“What is stopping you from …?”


lost performative
Where value judgments are made but the performer of that act is omitted from
the statement e.g. “It’s wrong to cheat”
CHALLENGE the missing performer / take back the power to decide
“According to whom?” “How do you know it’s wrong?”
19.


What is the difference between the Precision Model and the Meta Model?
The Meta Model is a set of 13 language patterns designed to specify the
transformations of a person’s language
The Precision Model is a cut-down version of the meta model – focusing on 5
language patterns (these 5 patterns have been identified as particularly useful
in a business context)

Those 5 patterns are:
 Simple deletions (unspoken nouns)
 Simple deletion (unspoken action)
 Universal quantifier
 Complex deletion
 Modal Operators
Milton Model
20.
21.


What is the Milton Model? When is it used?
The Milton model seeks to leverage the transformations of an individual to
create “artfully vague” language which does not overlay the practitioners own
map of the territory onto what is being said. It provides freedom for questions
to mean whatever they mean for the individual, without any practitioner bias –
i.e. Milton language is clean.
What is transderivational search (TDS)? How do you activate it?
The process of searching back through one's stored memories and mental
representations to find the personal reference experiences from which a
current understanding or mental map has been derived.
It can often be observed via eye accessing cues – the eyes will search through
the visual / auditory / kinesthetic planes for useful information, whilst moving
left to right in an attempt to link remembered experiences with a current
question / situation.
22.


23.


24.

25.

What is an embedded command? How do you do it?
Where an instruction is included within a longer sentence (e.g. “you’ll like this
exercise about …..”
It may be underlined by using analogue marking.
What is analogue marking?
Using your tone, body language or gestures to mark key words / phrases in a
communication. In the example above, the word ‘like’ could be analogue
marked with an enthusiastic tone, a really positive (even mildly excited) facial
expression and/or a hand gesture
Analogue markers may be used subconsciously by the client when hitting
upon key issues
What are Inverse Meta Model Patterns?
The Milton Model is the inverse of the meta model. Whereas the meta model
seeks to specify distortion, deletions and generalization in a speaker's
language, the Milton model intentionally utilises those patterns. It is general,
ambiguous and metaphoric – leaving meaning open to the interpretation of the
subject.
What are Conversational Postulates? Give an example.
Questions that if taken literally, would require a yes/no answer; but in actuality
presuppose and produce a behavior.
Example:
You are sitting at home and there is a knock on the door (or the phone is
ringing) and your partner asks, "Can you get that?" You won’t answer yes /
no; instead you’ll answer the door.
A stranger approaches you on the street and asks, "Do you have the time?"
Instead of saying yes / no, you would look at your watch and tell them the
time.
26.
What is a Selectional Restriction Violation? Please give an example.

A Milton Model hypnosis pattern, where we give things and beings human
qualities they can't in actuality possess.
For example:
“Trees are crying leaves into the river” (song lyric)
“The tortoise keeps going: he knows he’ll reach the finish line in the end”
The unconscious mind needs to find some way to make sense out of these
statements: it knows that they can’t really be true of the object / being in the
phrase, so may begin to apply them to him/herself. The unconscious knows
that you’re not really discussing trees / tortoises.
27.
What is a referential index shift? Give an example.

The Referential Index Shift in NLP is finding someone else who has a way of
thinking or a resource you wish to model (their Reference System), entering
their model of the world and noting from their perspective (and in all
modalities) the process and results of their thinking and/or action.

Also making a change in the referential index (subject) of a sentence to create
overload at the conscious level.
Example:
Perceptual Positions exercise. Whilst in 2nd Position (named
other), asking the client specific questions to elicit
understanding:
- Describe how they are feeling
- What’s important to them
- What’s this really about for you
- What is there for you to learn?
Useful for addressing conflict / anger issues with another person as well as for
the more positive situation of simply wishing to learn from how they do things
28.
What is a pattern interrupt? When is it used? What are its effects?
 An abrupt change of state – e.g. by mismatching the client
 It can be used when testing an anchor / when breaking a stuck state of
relationship (where something in the sentence is bigger than the rest of the
sentence) or synaesthesia
 Changing the immediate state, opens the client to moving forward in a
different way
29.
When would you use the Meta Model vs. the Milton Model and vice versa?
Explain the differences between the two in structure, intent and application.
Meta Model:
 When challenging transformations between deep and surface structure, to
gain clarity / additional information
Milton Model:
 When creating artfully vague language to allow the individual to use their
own transformations to make sense of the information – freeing them to
interpret for themselves whilst reducing the opportunity for creating
conflict / mis-communication (i.e. non-content driven coaching)
State Management
30.

What is meant by a “state”?
The sum of conscious and unconscious thoughts / feelings experienced at a
specific time by a person


What is meant by a “stuck state”?
An unresourceful state
A set of negative thoughts / feelings that the individual is experiencing and
unable to move on from
31.
32.
What is meant by “going meta”?
 Taking the helicopter view
 Looking objectively at the situation, from a dissociated position (therefore
able to look at the situation without the accompanying emotion)
33.
What is the relationship between internal representations, physiology, state
and the quality of your behaviours and results (the “face map”)? Why are
these distinctions important and how can you use them?
 Internal representation = the individual’s map
 Physiology = the physical manifestation of the individual’s response to
that map – how they physically express their state
 State = the sum total of the thoughts and feelings a person has
 Relationship = the Mercedes Model. The map impacts the state which is
apparent through physiology. Changing any one of these has an impact
on the others:
 Eg looking up / walking around changes the physiology, which
creates a more resourceful state, which can provide longer
term change to the map
34.
What is a physiology of excellence and why is it important?
 ?????
35. What is the difference between association and dissociation? When is each
useful and not useful?
Association = seeing a situation through own eyes
Useful when …
Not Useful when …

Anchoring resourceful states

Experiencing a phobic response

When using perceptual positions


When experiencing enjoyable
states / experiences / memories
Recalling unpleasant
experiences

Trying to achieve meta position

Practicing a skill


Paying attention
When trying to create distance
between self and past experience

Creating rapport
Dissociation = watching self in the situation, as if in a movie
Useful when …
Not Useful when …


Anchoring resourceful states

When using perceptual positions

When experiencing enjoyable
emotions

When setting or using bail-out /
safety anchors

Creating distance between
individual and negative states
(e.g. when experiencing a phobic
response)
Recalling unpleasant
experiences

Trying to achieve meta position

When trying to create distance
between self and past experience

Reviewing / reflecting

Keeping track of time
36. How do you facilitate association and dissociation?
Association:
 By asking the person to see the situation through their own eyes
 By incorporating Kinesthetic submodalities to enrich the visualization
Dissociation:
 By guiding the individual to see themselves in their visualization (as if
watching themselves in a movie)
 By increasing the intensity of the visualization without the use of
kinesthetic submodalities (i.e. discouraging any emotional
connection)
37.
How do you facilitate a V-K dissociation? Double dissociation?
By taking the person through 2 stages of dissociation:
1. by guiding the person to see themselves watching the movie (eg
watching themselves in a movie)
2. by guiding them to remove themselves another step – so they are
now watching themselves sat in the movie theatre, watching
themselves in the movie
Strategies
38.
What is a strategy? How is it both different from and related to a state?
 A repeatable sequence of thoughts leading to actions that consistently
produce a particular outcome. It’s how we do what we do. Often an
unconscious process and is rooted in our representational systems – we
use our representational system to think and to plan our strategy.

A state is a particular way of being at any one time: the sum of all our
emotions, thinking and physiology. Our state changes throughout each
day and impacts our ability to think – the calmer our state, the easier it is to
think rationally. The more angry / upset we are, the harder it is to think
rationally and objectively. However, given these states are transient and
the relationship between physiology / thinking / feeling (the Mercedes
model), it is within our power to choose our state.
A strategy is a process, whereas a state is an outcome. The two are linked in
a three way relationship, whereby a strategy can bring about a state as an
outcome; an internal state can impact how we process and may affect the
overall formation of a strategy.
Internal
represen
-tations
Internal
state
For example: compare the
impact on our strategy for
coping with exams:
Scenario 1: We have cleared
our diary and have committed
to a high intensity period of
study to blitz an exam – we
have one day per key topic –
plenty of time! We get the
results and we’ve done well.
Cramming is a great strategy.
Scenario 2: We have cleared
our diary and have committed
to a high intensity period of
study to blitz an exam – we only
have one day per key topic –
we are very worried and find our mind returning to concerns about time
slipping away. By the time we have reorganized our thoughts, we find we’ve
only got half a day per key topic of useful time. It’s very stressful trying to cram
it all in. We are worried about the exam and each question seems to cover
more ground than we had time for. When we get the results, we’ve not done
as well as we could have. Cramming is not a good strategy.
Behaviour
39.


40.


How do you elicit a strategy? What questions would you use?
Eliciting a strategy is about figuring out what steps a person is taking and how
they are processing them to bring about their strategy. It is achieved through a
process of asking really good questions and using sensory acuity to notice
what is going on. It’s useful for either modeling a great strategy or for
understanding where a strategy may be broken, in order to improve it
Process:
1. Use present tense language to associate the person into their strategy
(by getting them to use it now, or remember a time when they used it,
translating into present tense). Associating them into the strategy
means that the eye accessing cues you see are for the strategy, not
for the recall process.
2. Ask them to take you through the strategy step by step – notice
everything!! Eye accessing cues, language, tone, non-verbal cues
3. Map the steps – noting the difference between ‘then’ and ‘and’
statements to distinguish sequential steps / parallel processing
4. Focus on strategy not content
5. Use TOTE questions to fill in the detail of strategy:
 Outcome: What are you trying to achieve by doing this?
 Cue: What is the first step in the process?
 Next Steps: What do you do next?
 Transition: And what do you pay attention to as you go through
these steps?
 Exit: How do you know you’ve reached your outcome? (usually
triggered by a submodality hitting threshold – picture becomes
really bright / clear, feeling becomes really strong)
6. Backtracking: Run through steps, asking “and then…?”
7. Review: check if the strategy makes sense to you – does it seem to be
whole?
8. Ecology check: does the process ring true with the person for how
they do the task?
What is a synesthesia?
Simultaneous representations across more than one representational system.
Usually our lead and preferred systems link up to create a strong emotional
response or state.
Often people are unaware of the multiple representations, focusing on the
strongest (often the kinesthetic response), but with a strong overall response
to it.
41.
How do you change or streamline a strategy?
42.
How do you install a strategy?
5 main ways of installing a strategy, but the best results come from combining
all 5 ways.
1. Anchoring: Set anchors to trigger the move from one step to another –
physical or spatial anchors will work. Then ‘walk’ the client
through them faster and faster (or fire them off faster and
faster)
2. Accessing
Cues:
You can ask the client to link eye accessing cues to the step
you are asking them to do. E.g. if you are asking them to
‘check internally if the step is congruent’, have them look down
and left as they step into the anchor
3. Repetition: repeat the process until you are sure the strategy will run
automatically
4. Future Pace
/rehearsal: Ask the client to apply the strategy to a future point in time to
practice (in advance) the new strategy
5. Metaphor: Provide the client with a metaphor that takles them through the
steps of the strategy – making sure the outcome is positive and
compelling. Use submodalities to enrich it for them
43.
What are the well formedness conditions for strategies?
1. Well defined outcome
2. All three major representational systems are used (VAK)
3. All loops have an exit - something that determines when the right
conditions have been achieved
4. Strategy has an external check – a way of testing it with the world (and
avoiding it existing entirely in the client’s mind, subject to their own
interpretation)
5. The strategy is efficient (uses the least number of steps possible to
achieve outcome)
6. Strategy uses a logical sequence that can be identified and taught to
others
44.
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What is TOTE?
The basic NLP strategy pattern: Test – Operation – Test – Exit
Test: compare current outcome with desired outcome – what’s the difference?
Operation: what can we do to reduce the difference?
Test: How much has the gap closed?
Exit: the trigger point for completion showing there is no difference between
actual and desired state
Sensory Acuity and Calibration
45.
What is sensory based language?
Language that utilises the 5 senses to describe the world and the individual’s
interpretation of that world (VAKOG). For example:
 It feels to me …
 I see this as …
 I hear what you are saying
 You can almost taste the success
 The smell of success
46.
What is calibration? How do you do it? Why do you do it?
 Calibration is the process of using sensory acuity to understand the state
of another person. It is spotting the patterns that signify particular
thoughts / behaviours / mental states for that person. It is about being
able to detect when the individual is aligned with the information they are
giving you, and when there is a mismatch that may require questioning.
 You do it by noticing the physiological changes / patterns that relate to
that person when they are having known responses (like / dislike / happy /
relaxed etc), so that you can spot subtle changes in those patterns when
their state alters
 We do it to:
 understand when we are in / out of rapport and make changes
to improve that rapport
 identify when the individual has an underlying issue that may
need further exploration
 test whether the words match the intention
47.
Calibration is based on which presuppositions of NLP?
 Mind and body are a complete system
 We process information through our senses
48.
List at least 7 things you can calibrate.
 Complexion
 Eye accessing cues
 Eye contact (amount of) / pupil size
 Facial expression
 Tonality and use of language
 Laughter
 Hand / foot gestures
 Posture (e.g. arm folding)
 Movement (pace / smoothness of)
49.
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List 3 ways you can develop each of the following:
visual external acuity
Practice focusing on the details of a person’s physiology when communicating
with them
Watch TV with the sound off and practice interpreting meaning from
expression and gesture
Practice spotting eye accessing cues
visual internal awareness and flexibility
Practice visualization, manipulating the picture in your mind: making it bigger,
smaller, brighter, sharper, bigger, smaller etc.
Slow the internal picture down – notice the detail of it and try to describe those
details
Try to consider the feelings attached to that picture or the sounds that might
accompany it.
auditory external acuity
Practice listening for clues in the tonality of a person’s voice, rather than the
words they say. Consider tonality, pace, language used.
Practice spotting auditory language in others
Close your eyes and slap your hand on the chair / table – recreate the sound
in your mind
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auditory internal awareness and flexibility
When visualizing, see if you can attribute any sound to the pictures
Practice building rapport with an auditory person – how is their voice different
from yours? – Practice matching tonality, pace.
Practice selecting auditory language
Close your eyes and hit your hand onto your chair / table top etc – recreate the
noise in your mind – practice making it louder, softer, longer, clearer, lift/drop
the tone
kinaesthetic external acuity
Look out for people who are expressing themselves in kinesthetic words notice the pace at which they speak / answer
Notice kinesthetic eye accessing cues
Practice asking kinesthetic submodality questions
kinaesthetic awareness and construct
Practice using kinesthetic language
Practice matching the pace of a kinesthetic person (slow down if you are
highly visual) – and see what impact this has on rapport
Pause and take time to notice your own body – which parts are tense /
relaxed; how balanced are you / notice your clothes touching your skin /
notice you touching the chair
Describe all of the above internally interms of kinesthetic language
olfactory acuity
Take time to focus on and notice smells
Recall memories associated with particular smells and consider the impact
the smell had on your feelings and thoughts
When visualizing, check to see if there are any associated smells
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gustatory acuity
Take time to notice particular and individual tastes in the food that you eat
Consider the language that might be associated with those tastes
Try to recall times where specific tastes were impactful – notice how they
made you feel / think / behave
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auditory digital
Start to notice whenever you / people around you begin to have “a talk with
your/themselves”
Practice categorizing your experience – what would your own filing system
look like?
Practice giving a running commentary as you review data / a situation
Practice summarising effectively
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50.
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What is meant by taking inventory on yourself?
Achieving a systematic internal awareness – noticing without judgment or
trying to change anything
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51.
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52.
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Process:
o Start by noticing your own body – the feelings you have / where
feelings are located / connection of different parts of your body
o Notice your thoughts – what pictures do they create (describe through
the full range of submodalities)
o Notice your current state
o Come back to the present moment with increased awareness
What is meant by multi-tracking? How are some ways to do it?
Multi-tracking is the simultaneous management of states / emotions / thought
processes / physiology
For example, when leading a client through an exercise, you may be:
 Managing your own state
 Remaining in rapport with your client
 Looking out for congruence / incongruence clues
 Managing the exercise
 Managing your client’s appointment time
 Choosing language from a particular submodality
What is simultaneous incongruity? How do you calibrate it? How do you
handle it?
Simultaneous incongruity is conflict in messaging (verbal / non-verbal / tonal)
that happens at the same time (eg. Shaking head whilst agreeing to
something).
NB: Incongruity can also happen sequentially – in this case it can be
harder to address and ‘bring the parts together’, as they may be
mutually exclusive: ie when one set of thoughts / behaviours is
present, the other is always absent (e.g. drug / alcohol user)
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This incongruence may be occurring at any one of the neurological levels:
o Environment: you may need more information to commit
o Behaviour: you may have the information, but not know how to act
o Capability: you may know what to do, but not have skills to achieve it
o Beliefs and Values: you may not see this as a priority, or it may conflict
with your own beliefs and values
o Identity: You may believe in it, but it might not fit with your picture of
who you are
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When noticing it, the practitioner should rapportfully investigate / challenge by
asking questions to understand the conflict. Parts integration may be helpful
to bring together the two opposing states
53. What is the single most important component of physiology to work with and
why?
 Breathing – because it is unconscious and clearly noticeable (by looking at
shoulders, chest, stomach)
Anchoring
54.
55.
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What are the keys to anchoring?
Selecting experiences with powerful emotional
What are the steps to anchoring someone?
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
56.
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57.
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Remember an experience where you felt a particular positive feeling
Enrich the picture using VAK language
Ask them to relive it as if it was happening now
Double the feeling as they breathe in / out
Create a physical anchor (pressing a suitable part of the body) as the feeling
reaches its height
What does it mean to collapse an anchor?
Replace a trigger for a negative state with one of a positive state
What are the steps to collapsing an anchor and when would you do it?
Collapsing an anchor would be useful where an individual is detrimentally
affected by a state (set of feelings) over a longer period of time
58.
How do you do a visual squash? When would you use it? How is it related but
different to collapsing an anchor?
59.
What is chaining anchors, how do you do it and when?
60.
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61.
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62.
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63.
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What is a stacked anchor? How and when do you do it?
A layering of positive anchors, to create an altogether more powerful
resourceful state
Useful when tackling complex / powerful negative states
What is a search anchor? How and when do you do it?
Search anchor is the process of trans-derivational searching for a specific
state / set of circumstances
Used to create a ‘map’ through time of instances when the state occurred, in
order to tackle it (through application of a resource anchor)
What is a resource anchor? How and when do you do it?
Resource anchor is a positive, resourceful state created using powerful
positive examples of feelings / behaviours from own experiences
These feelings are ‘anchored’ for the person by creating a VK trigger that is
associated to that positive state (eg a physical point on the hand / knee /
shoulder / elbow; a visual anchor, eg a visualized circle)
How do you do a Change Personal History? When do you do it?
Steps:
a. Decide on a PROBLEM to be worked on
b. Create a RESOURCES anchor
c. Calibrate and anchor “the SEARCH” for problem behaviour / feeling
d. Imagine a timeline on the floor and associate into NOW
e. From now, SEARCH backwards for 3-4 key examples (ask age / year
for each)
f. Move off-line to META position to ID further resources
g. Create STACKED anchor with extra resources
h. Associate into the earliest key example and allow adult resources to
have their IMPACT on the situation – COLLAPSING –ve anchor with
+ve resources anchor
64. What is the single most powerful representational system to anchor in? Why?
 Breathing
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65.
Give an example of an anchor that spans all rep systems.
 Your name
66.
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67.
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What is a future pace and how do you do it?
Asking the person to apply the insight they’ve gained to a situation that will
happen in the future, so as to embed the learning
How do you do a circle of excellence? When is it used?
This is used when a client wants to feel resourceful in any set of
circumstances (once established, the circle can be used in any situation that
calls for those resources – very useful in terms of not being situation specific).
Steps are:
1. Establish rapport
2. Establish benefits of having the new resource
3. Help client to identify the specific feelings that will contribute to that
resourceful state (about 3 …. A recent client of mine needed 4 feel
they had ‘enough in the kitbag’ to be really resourceful)
4. Explain you will be asking for clear examples of when the client felt
each of those feelings
5. Explain the circle of excellence
6. Help client to visualise the circle on the floor
7. Remind client of resourceful feelings they listed
8. Take each feeling in turn (using the client’s language / labels) and
elicit a clear memory – associate the client into the feeling (look out
of your own eyes; notice what you see / hear / feel)
9. Calibrate the client and instruct them to ‘grow that feeling’ as they
step into the circle – allow them time to experience the resourceful
state inside the circle (2-3 seconds)
10. Instruct the client to step out of the circle.
11. Repeat 8-10 for each feeling
12. Break state
13. Future pace – point where this resourceful state would be useful
14. Ask client to step back into the circle – get the client’s feedback on
what is different now
15. Remind client to take the circle with them (eg some people put it in
their pocket as a lasso, others put it on a watch face, or a
photographer’s light catcher …. When I did this exercise, I wore the
circle on my hand, like a tattoo).
Rapport
68.
What is an NLP definition for rapport?
 The state of being in sync with another person, so that they feel listened
to and understood
69.
70.
What is meant by pacing and leading?
List at least 7 things you can match in establishing rapport.
 Breathing rate
 Hand / leg gestures
 Modal language (VAK)
 Tonality
 Pace
 Facial expression
 Laughter
71.
What is the difference between matching and mirroring?
 Matching is when you use the same side of your body to copy the gesture
(e.g. crossing the right leg)
 Mirroring is when you create a mirror image of the gesture (e.g. sat
opposite each other, crossing the left leg to create a mirror image of the
other person’s crossed right leg)
72.
What is crossover mirroring?
 Matching a person’s body language with a different part of the body – e.g.
moving a foot in time with someone’s breathing
73.
What is the test for rapport?
 If you lead, does the other person follow?
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Representational Systems
74.
Draw a diagram of the eye patterns for a “normally wired right
hand person”.
Up Right =
Visual, Constructed
Right =
Auditory, Constructed
Down Right =
Kinesthetic
75.
Up Left =
Visual, Remembering
Left =
Auditory, Remembering
Down Right =
Auditory Digital
What is meant by a primary representational system and how do you detect
it.
 The preferred method for interpreting and communicating with the world,
from the following options:
 Visual
 Auditory
 Kinesthetic
 Olfactory
 Gustatory
76.
What is a lead representational system? How do you detect it if it is different
from a person’s primary representational system?
 A lead representational system is where a person ‘goes to’ first to make
sense of the world, despite spending most of their time processing in
another system
 It can be spotted by watching for an extra set of eye accessing cues. For
example, a person might access the visual plane to make sense of what’s
being asked, or to access a particular picture, before moving to the
kinesthetic plane to understand it / connect with it more deeply. Another
example may be a person accessing their auditory system to ‘catch’ your
question, before moving to visual / kinesthetic.
77.
What is overlapping? How do you do it? When would you use it?
 Overlapping is where you choose to bring another representational
system into the discussion, whilst maintaining a bias towards the
individual’s preference.
 You do it by starting off in the representational language of the client, then
moving to other modalities
 It is used to provide the client with more flexibility, or to show them
something they are currently missing
78.
What is another term often used for the technique of overlapping?
 Translation (ie preserving the meaning of a phrase whilst translating to
another modality)
79.
What is the difference between the rep systems of auditory tonal and
auditory digital?
 Both refer to our representational systems, with a preference for taking
information in through hearing
 Auditory tonal refers to the sounds we hear, whilst auditory digital refers
to the actual words as discrete representational symbols – ie devoid of
emotion. Whilst the auditory tonal person will need to be heard, learn
though listening and asking questions; the auditory digital will have
conversations in their mind, learn by figuring things out, memorise by
steps, procedures and sequences.
Submodalities
80.
What are submodalities? What do they allow us to do?
 Subjective subdivisions within a given representational system – they add
dimension to what the individual is describing. For example:
 Visual:
Colour / black and white; Bright / dim; Near / far away;
Sharp / fuzzy, Moving / still; Associated / dissociated
 Auditory: Quite / loud; Clear / muffled; Point source / spread out;
Fast / slow; Energetic / flat
 Kinesthetic: Hot / cold; Texture; Point source / spread out;
Physiological site of a feeling (eg tummy / head)
81.
What is the difference between analogue and digital submodalities?
 Analogue submodalities are either / or (black and white or colour /
moving or still; sound or no sound)
 Digital submodalities can be expressed as a range between
extremes; they are relative terms (e.g. contrast, brightness, volume,
temperature)
82.
What are critical submodalities?
 The submodalities that must be included for this particular individual. For
example, for one of my clients colour is a critical submodality.
Visualisations increase ten-fold in power by incorporating and increasing
the intensity of colour.
83.
What are driver submodalities?
 Submodalities that seem to have impact for most people. Some key
examples of these include:
 Size (big vs small)
 Distance (close vs far away)
 Panoramic (vs bounded)
 3 dimensional
 Rich in colour
 Associated (vs dissociated)
84.
Describe the standard swish pattern. When would you use it?
1. Identify the problem
2. identify the picture that triggers the problem
3. identify the submodalities that give the picture impact (critical and driver)
4. Break state
5. Create the positive image to replace what was there before (using
submodalities to give it impact)
6. Wheel in the old pictuire and diminish its impact (through submodalities)
7. Bring in the new image (over the top) and intensify it (using
submodalities)
8. SWISH it
9. Repeat the SWISH part 2 more times
 Useful to create alternative behaviour to a pattern that is no longer
helpful (e.g. curing habits, such as procrastination, nail-biting, bingeeating)
85.
Describe how you would design and conduct a designer SWISH
 A designer SWISH uses the individual’s critical submodalities to
XXXXXXX
86.
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87.
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What is a phobia?
A fear that has a detrimental effect on the life of a person
A present day response to an intensely traumatic experience in the past
Describe how to remove a phobia.
Fast phobia cure
Steps:
1. Calibrate the phobic response
2. Do an ecology check (current status 1-10; desired status 1-10)
3. Create a stacked kinesthetic BAIL-OUT anchor
4. Find first / earliest memory of the phobic response
5. Show the ‘movie’ (dissociated) backwards and forwards until the person
is comfortable with it (increasing pace, adding music and colour)
6. REASSOCIATE with visualization, including colour and music
7. Check score now 1-10
8. Future pace
88.
Describe how to create a compelling future.
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89.
How do you elicit a timeline?
 Ask the client to physically determine their representations of past, current
and future, paying attention to direction of travel of time and, in particular,
to where present is in relation to the individual. Use the following
questions:
 If you had a timeline, where would it be?
 If you had to point to the past, where would you point?
 Where is the future?
 Now connect the two places (this is the client’s timeline)
 Where is now in relation to you? (through the person, vs
outside of them)
90.
What is the difference between in time and through time?
 An “In time” line passes through the body. The person is associated in the
now, with the timeline passing from behind them (past), through them and
in front of them (future)
 Through time is where the individual is outside of the timeline with time
passing from left to right (more usual in western cultures) or right to left.
Reframing
91.
What is the premise upon which reframing is based?
 That we can affect the filters we use to make sense of the world, and
therefore can change our understanding of that world and generate more
possibilities.
92.
When do you use a reframe?
 To challenge a limiting belief
93.
What are the two basic categories of reframes? When do you use one
or the other?
 Context – where we want to get the person to use their experience to
reflect on their different experience of the same behaviour (eg confidence
in speaking to one person as comparator for speaking to audience)
 Content (Meaning) – where we want the person to think what else the
behaviour could mean (eg not tackling a goal could be revealing an
underlying limiting belief)
94.
What are the steps to negotiating between parts? When do you use it?
 Negotiating between parts (or parts integration) is used where individuals
display conflicting behaviours / thoughts / feelings and can be used to
provide an alternative, new possible outcome for them. It can be used
during Options stage of coaching, or during Goal setting (where individual
has a decision or choice of path).
1. Check subconscious mind is happy to work on this
2. Get the person to describe the issue in a nutshell
3. Identify the two parts and invite one of them out onto the hand (client
chooses which one) – establish IDENTITY and use VAK language to
enrich and thank them for coming out
4. Chunk up (highest positive intention of each)
5. Spot the boundary condition and chunk up 2 more times for each
6. Have each identity appreciate each others’ gifts
7. Reintegrate into the whole
8. Link to action and future pace
Ecology
95.
What is ecology? Why is it important?
 Is the matching / congruence of an outcome with the greater environment
(eg the impact on family / immediate surroundings / appropriateness in
terms of the law of the land)
 If a solution is incongruent with a person’s ecology, they are unlikely to
act upon it. Therefore we need to check the ecology of any solutions we
work on
Modelling
96.
What are the elements to basic modelling? What presuppositions of
NLP is modelling based on?
 Modeling successful performance leads to excellence
 If you want to understand, act
 People make the best choice they can at the time (if modeling
provides a better strategy, the individual will take it up)
Perceptual Sorting
97.
What is meant by a perceptual position?
 The eyes that you use to view the world (your own perspective, that of
another)
98.
What is the value of establishing multiple points of reference?
 Our own view of the world can include limiting beliefs. Looking from
anothers’ perspective can help us to see greater potential in ourselves /
more possibilities / greater value in what we do
99.
What is a triple description and why is it important to do? Please give a
thorough explanation of 1st, 2nd and 3rd position.
 Seeing an event from 1st, 2nd and 3rd position
1st position = our own perspective / map of the world from inside that world
(ie associated – through your own eyes)
2nd position = making a mental leap to see the world from the perspective of
a specifically named other. 2nd position is the basis for rapport
and empathy.
There are two types of second position: emotional and
intellectual: the first is about understanding the other’s emotion
/ pain and reaching a point where you do not wish to hurt them;
the second is about understanding how the other person
thinks, the opinions they have, values and beliefs that may
underpin their thinking
3rd position = the perspective of a detached observer, providing an objective
platform from where you can view the relationship and the
impact of each person on the other. This is also the position
adopted for performing an ecology check for any planned
change – ie how the change would affect each individual and
their relationship
3rd position can be broken down further into:
 Pure third = outside of first two, but with a history of having
been “in both shoes”
 Meta = Outside of first two, but with experience of being 1st
person, whilst suspending beliefs about 2nd
 Observer = detached observer – noticing things about 1st
and 2nd position and their interactions, without reference to
or the need to have experienced either 1st or 2nd position
4th position = a synthesis of all of the previous positions with the accumulated
knowledge of each
100.
What are the 4 perceptual positions based on time? Why are they
important to do?
 Now
 Past
 Future
 Helicopter view – the whole landscape
Miscellaneous
101.
What is chunking and why is it useful to be flexible with it? Give examples of
chunking up, down, and laterally.
 Chunking enables us to access other logical levels (uncovering values
and beliefs and identifying their priority order; accessing detail to uncover
potential blockers)
 Chunking up: How does that contribute to your overall aim?
 Chunking down: Can you give me some more detail on that?
 Chunking sideways: What examples have you got where you did this
successfully?
102.
List at least 5 things you can do with your internal dialogue.
1. Identify whose voice it is (own or that of another)
2. Install a positive voice
3. Use Overlapping to provide the auditory digital person with more
options to express themselves
4.
103.
What is meant by epistemology? Why is it important to study it?
 Why we believe what we believe
 Understanding and accessing an individual’s belief system can help in
understanding the impact this has on their conscious mind (thoughts and
feelings) and actions (behaviour)
 Understanding beliefs gives us a blueprint of the person’s territory, so that
we can try to see the world from their perspective in order to help them
get more of what they want and to challenge those patterns that might not
be helpful in achieving their goals
104.
How will you celebrate having finished all these questions?
 A rather cheeky red!