In a continuing pursuit of my goal to become an NLP coach and trainer, I have just recently graduated my second Master Practitioner course of NLP training. Next year I begin as an Assistant Trainer at the NLP Center of New York. However this year our group has been focused on learning more about the art of storytelling and how that can help to give clients new resources for problemsolving. The specific type of storytelling to which I am referring is called a therapeutic metaphor. A therapeutic metaphor is a story that is constructed based on solving a specific problem for its listener.
Dr. Milton Erickson, the world famous hypnotherapist is best known for his use of this type of storytelling. Dr. Erickson was one of three therapists who were studied by the two original creators of NLP, Bandler and Grinder. Fritz Perls, Virginia Satir and Milton Erickson were modeled by Bandler and Grinder in order to learn how they were so successful with their patients. By studying each of the therapists, Bandler and Grinder developed special “patterns” for general communication, rapport-building and self-improvement. Erickson’s unique ability to communicate with his clients came from his method of telling them stories. He told his patients stories in order to guide their subconscious mind to solving their own problems, change limiting beliefs and break unuseful habits and patterns.
Storytelling has existed for centuries as a way of teaching, sharing and passing down experience, customs, traditions and values. As well as having a definite entertainment value, a good story is extremely valuable to the listener because it inspires them to think about something in new ways without ever telling them what to do. The story sets the storyteller apart from the listener. The storyteller is just the messenger. The listener’s subconscious mind is the changemaker, not the storyteller. That is because each person makes their own meaning out of everything they experience by listening to a story.
When you listen to a therapeutic metaphor, it parallels with your experience, and entices you to follow along for the ride. Despite the subject of the story being unfamiliar, it intrigues your conscious mind, by bypassing your logical mind and crossing over to touch your heart and your emotions, its message lives inside of your subconscious, percolating and simmering, waiting for just the right moment to knit together its meaning for you and come up with the answer to the question that you’ve been unconsciously seeking. There’s a more scientific explanation to how this works but that is for another post.
For now, I just want to let you know that I’ll be telling many more stories in my coaching, teleclasses and on my Free Weekly Juicy Call. Expect to be enchanted with tales from far off lands, fairies, animals and objects, kings and queens and a touch of the simple everyday stories from my own life and experiences.
That is because I’ve learned that by adapting my coaching style to include more teaching through the use of therapeutic metaphor, I am able to hand you back the controls so that you become your own teacher. By helping you to think about your challenge in new ways, your subconscious mind takes over and triggers a change in your brain, helping you to make the leap from what you don’t want to what you do want. You see it’s one thing for me to tell you about how important beliefs are, but it’s quite another thing to demonstrate the same concept with a good story that will remain with you and seed new wonderful changes in your life.
As your coach and guide, I promise to make these stories come alive for you and to share more ways of having fun as you transform your old ratty and fatty beliefs and take on new empowering and juicy ones filled with self love and body acceptance.
I’m very excited to share many wonderful teaching stories with you and eager to see what changes you will make from sharing those experiences. As a student of NLP for over 4 years, I have enjoyed hearing many therapeutic metaphors and recognize that through hearing each of those stories, I have taken leaps of change in many old limiting beliefs, recognized new possibilities for ways of doing things and enjoyed seeing things from a bigger picture perspective.
Although I will soon begin to share some of my stories and metaphors with you on the Juicy Calls, I will officially begin using them in my new 15 week pilot program series starting April 18 called Self Image Makeover: 90 Days to a Slim, Savvy, Naturally Slender You. If you are a woman who suffers with a fat or ugly self image, then you may want to know how easy it is to change your thoughts so that you can effortlessly shape your body. In the course, you’ll also learn how to tap into the law of attaction and make it work for you to help you to lose weight without dieting.
For more information, you can get my free article called, “Tap Into the Law of Attraction to Lose Weight Without Dieting.” Email me at [email protected].
So tell me what you think about these upcoming changes. Do you believe that you can change your body size by changing your thoughts? Ever been moved to change by listening to a story? I’d love to hear your experiences. Click below and share your feedback and comments with me.