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When NLP is under attack

by Sue Knight

This is a portion of a National Public Radio (NPR) interview between a female broadcaster and US Marine Corps General Reinwald who was about to sponsor a Boy Scout Troop visiting his military installation. 

FEMALE INTERVIEWER: So, General Reinwald, what things are you going to teach these young boys when they visit your base? 
GENERAL REINWALD: We're going to teach them climbing, canoeing, archery, and shooting. 
FEMALE INTERVIEWER: Shooting! That's a bit irresponsible, isn't it? 
GENERAL REINWALD: I don't see why, they'll be properly supervised on the rifle range. 
FEMALE INTERVIEWER: Don't you admit that this is a terribly dangerous activity to be teaching children? 
GENERAL REINWALD: I don't see how. We will be teaching them proper rifle discipline before they even touch a firearm. 
FEMALE INTERVIEWER: But you're equipping them to become violent killers. 
GENERAL REINWALD: Well, you're equipped to be a prostitute, but you're not one, are you?

The radio went silent and the interview ended. 

You may not be surprised that I received this from Frank Farrelly master of Provocative Therapy. My experience is that it takes a lot of skill and a lot of love to get away with the kind of provocation that Frank is so skilled at using.

However there is a part of me that would have liked to have given this kind of response to one of the questions that I was asked through the ASK Sue Knight section of my web site. I was also asked about a year ago to respond to someone who had written an article in one of the Training magazines entitled NLP No Longer Plausible. And just recently I read the response from someone replying to an accusation that NLP was just Mickey Mouse tactics. Note however that at the end of this interview 'the radio went silent and the interview ended'. It might be personally satisfying to give a brilliant comeback but it might not achieve the overall outcome of building relationships and influencing perceptions. Last month I listed some of the horror stories (in my view) of how NLP Is sometimes represented and the subsequent response that elicits. If you are facing a less than desirable reaction to someone's perception of what NLP is about then do remember:

   The meaning of the communication is the response that it elicits! 

We and by we I mean those who consider ourselves to be a part of the NLP community, are all responsible for the way that NLP is perceived. If someone experiences NLP as No Longer Plausible it is because that is the way that practitioners of NLP are putting it across. If someone thinks that NLP is Mickey Mouse then the same is true. You may not personally have given this impression but we do all have an influence and I do believe that we are all connected we are a system.

I believe that there is no better opportunity to demonstrate the sensitivity and flexibility that we can learn with NLP than when we are on the receiving end of a less than favourable reaction. The challenge is how to resist the temptation to make a point / attack / go on the defence. A strategy that I find works and that demonstrates what NLP can be about is this:
  1. Recognise that a perceived attack is just that perceived and that you can if you wish frame it as an opportunity.
  2. Decide what outcome you want to achieve e.g to portray the flexibility that comes from making choices in our thinking and behaviour. It might be that you want to connect favourably with the person to whom you are responding.
  3. Ask yourself 'what response would you ideally like from the other person?' For example would you like them to understand your point of view / accept your experience / agree with you?
  4. Presuppose that what we give is what we get and decide how you can be an example of those responses that you would like in return. So if you really want the other person to understand your point of view are you willing to understand theirs (and I do mean really understand theirs)?
  5. Be the example of what you want in the way that you respond. Resist the temptation to get revenge / rationalise / dispute
  6. Put yourself in the other person's shoes to check out that the effect of what you are saying or doing is likely to get the reaction that you want.
  7. Do it
  8. Get whatever feedback that you can to find out what effect you did have.
  9. Decide how you can learn from that.
It seems pretty straightforward when I see it on paper like this but I do know that this is for many people (me included) a real challenge to our thinking skills. 

It might be worth considering that what 'pushes our buttons' is often a projection of something about ourselves that we have not integrated. Or as my Mum would say 'It takes one to know one'. We can only recognise structures in others that we have within ourselves. And it is those structures in which we have an imbalance in some way that are often the ones that 'get' to us. This does mean to say that we would behave in the same way as the person who has the potential to rub us up the wrong way but something about them is a projected part of ourselves. 

A way to get an understanding of this is to ask 'what is it about the other person's behaviour that bothers / angers / frustrates .me? I rarely like the answer that I get when I ask this question. So for example when I found myself getting frustrated at a colleague's questioning of a delegate recently and I asked myself this question. The answer was that it was 'their insensitivity' that was frustrating me. And here is the crunch in what ways am I insensitive? Not necessarily in the way that I was perceiving my colleague to be, but for sure I am insensitive and to be honest I can also think of times when I have used this same kind of persistent questioning. The value of this self analysis is that it helps me to recognise how we are connected and how we are one system. The consequence of this realisation is that whatever response I then choose to give comes from a state of connectedness rather than one of dissociation. When I do this I find that the temptation to retaliate 'Well you are the same' or 'it was your fault' just dissipate and I take ownership of what I am experiencing. 

The buck really does stop here. 

But as Frank Farrelly acknowledged for quick thinking brilliance the Marine Corp General's comeback was pretty sharp!

 

©2002 Sue Knight
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