I’m a firm believer that changing your mindset and perceptions can help you fast-track your goals and live a MUCH more empowering life. It’s incredible what reframing your thoughts can do to give you clarity and even improve how you’re feeling. The NLP technique fits perfectly into this process because it helps you become consciously aware of your thoughts and feelings.
Master NLP practitioner Aubrie Pohl joined me on Self Love and Sweat THE PODCAST (Episode 78) to talk about how she coaches her students on NLP techniques to change their mindsets and reach their goals. Here’s a brief recap of our conversation:
What is NLP?
NLP stands for neuro-linguistic programming. Aubrie breaks it down beautifully:
“Neuro (brain) refers to how your brain structures reality, while linguistics focuses on language and communication patterns. Programming is simply how you process all of that in your subjective experience. All of those filters you’ve experienced your entire life affect how you show up for yourself today.”
What’s interesting about NLP is that we’re all always doing it. Even if you didn’t know what NLP was before today, you’ve done NLP. It’s essentially how you’ve experienced life.
“You always have some type of NLP in your mind. For instance, you might have a limiting belief like ‘Oh, I can’t go in there, I’m not a social person,’ or ‘I can’t work out by myself at the gym, I’ll look silly.’ That type of programming is in your brain and you’re listening to it constantly. Sometimes that programming can serve you well. And sometimes, there might be things about that programming you want to change, especially if it’s preventing you from reaching your goals.”
That’s where an NLP technique can help. Sometimes we don’t realize our brains are programmed a certain way. An NLP technique can help us to become more aware of how certain things affect us and change that programming to better serve us.
How to Change Your Perceptions Using NLP Techniques
Aubrie shares we can look at life through three perceptions: first-person, second-person, and third-person.
“First person is seeing through your own eyes. You’re focused on your internal experience. Second person is taking a walk in someone else’s shoes. Think about how someone else would respond to a situation. The third position is what I call the ‘fly on the wall’. You have an outside perspective from a non-biased perspective and disconnect from emotions.”
While all three perceptions can be both empowering and limiting in different ways, Aubrie believes that we can use each of them at various times to help us through our situations.
“For example, if you’re an introvert being put in a social situation, think of how an extrovert would speak and behave in that same setting and try to embody it. People who see pretty gnarly things in life, like surgeons and police officers, know how to use that third-person perception to disassociate themselves from it.”
By learning how to make these transitions via the NLP technique and become more aware of our own perceptions, we can change our mindsets to keep moving forward.
You won’t want to miss the full conversation — hear it now on the Self Love and Sweat Podcast.
And, if you want to get certified as an NLP Practitioner and Life Coach with Aubrie – click here (online AND in-person options available)!