the Central London nlp group

Living NLP The newsletter of the Central London NLP Group Issue 6

What price freedom?
“If every NLP training organisation donated the fees from one participant from the past year, what a difference that would make” – Cricket Kemp Many NLP training companies in the UK have not contributed to The NLP Fund, created to help pay the costs of freeing NLP from trademark registration. These costs are now believed to be nearing £100,000. A recent phone call to check on the state of the Fund, administered by Cricket Kemp, ascertained that under £7,000 has been raised – about a third of that from one person – but very little donated by the largest UK-based NLP training companies. In 1998 Richard Bandler obtained ownership in the UK of the registered trademark ‘NLP’. Had this been allowed to stand, Bandler could have prevented anyone in the UK from using the term ‘NLP’ when offering their services, and could have sued if anyone offered ‘NLP’ without his permission. Those who obtained his permission could have been required to pay Bandler high yearly licence fees. Tony Clarkson challenged Bandler’s ownership of the NLP trademark in the High Court and the registration was subsequently withdrawn. Last year the Court ruled that Dr Bandler pay certain of the legal costs. He has not paid those costs, and a Petition for his bankruptcy has now been entered in the High Court. Some of the long-standing NLP training companies have trained many hundreds, if not thousands, of people, in-house and in the public arena, and a typical fee for NLP Practitioner training is £1,700. These trainees then go on to practise NLP as coaches, trainers, therapists and in business. Those who use the term ‘NLP’ in their trading in the UK, and the UK training companies who train in NLP, owe much of their freedom to do so today to Tony’s action. At least two corporate members of the Association for NLP have offered Tony a free training, which could cost them much less than a cash donation. And some companies which we believe to be high earners in UK NLP training have yet to contribute at all. Use the coupon on the back page to make a contribution, and see our suggestions in the Editorial
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Grinder, Faulkner, Dilts
PPD Personal Development are bringing some of the top American NLP trainers to London this year. John Grinder returns with Carmen Bostic St Clair on 7/9 July for a seminar titled Tapestry: Weaving Your Life. Charles Faulkner offers an Advanced Meta-Programmes (sic) course from 28 to 31 July. Robert Dilts will be here in February (28/29) with what will probably be the longest seminar title of the year: Road Map and Travel Guide to Survive in a Changing World. PPD Personal Development Tel: 020 8201 3333 E-mail: ppdpd@ppdpd.co.uk
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Where is Richard Bandler?
We’ve tried to contact Richard Bandler several times: our e-mails were returned undelivered and our letter remains unanswered. We’ve written a lot about him in recent issues and are aware that not all of it has been good news. We’d very much like to give him the opportunity to say a few things for himself. If you can help us arrange a meeting with Richard, or to correspond with him, do please contact Isha on: 020 8985 4047 or e-mail us at: livingnlp@nlpgroup.freeserve.co.uk
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NLP Millennium Project
If you have $3,500 burning a hole in your pocket you might like to visit the University of California in sunny Santa Cruz this summer. Robert Dilts and Judith DeLozier say: “a fundamental goal of the NLP Millennium Project is to focus the multi-national ‘group mind’ of the NLP community on the ways in which we can creatively work together to evolve the future of our field.” The event is open to “people with lots of experience using NLP”. Telephone 001 831 336 3457, fax 001 831 336 5854, e-mail teresanlp@aol.com, or see the NLP University website at www.nlpu.com for further details.
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Programme subs
If you want to continue receiving the Group programme by mail, it’s time to renew your subscription. Send £3 for one year payable to The Central London NLP Group to Alan Slater, 7 Royal Parade, Dawes Road, London SW6 7RE.
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Editorial
If you look around at the NLP world at the moment you’ll find a fair amount of contention. Richard Bandler has been suing various people for whatever reasons and, as a further outcome of the trademark court case, could be declared bankrupt in the UK at some point in the future. The NLP newsgroup on the Internet is replete with posts from people selling trainings on how to use NLP to seduce women or from people verbally abusing those who are selling such trainings. And there are a lot more posts in which people who claim NLP certification above Practitioner level spend a lot of their time basically slagging each other off. Surely people who are good at NLP would only use it for Good Things, wouldn’t they? Well, let’s rephrase that: Surely people who have the ability to model others with accuracy would only use it for Good Things, wouldn’t they? Or how about: Surely people who are able to adjust their behaviour and language patterns until they get what they want would only use that ability for Good Things, wouldn’t they? Is it starting to sound a little less like the absolute truth? The truth is that NLP is like a knife. It can be used to harm or to heal. It can be used for ‘good’ purposes or ‘bad’. NLP per se is neither good nor bad. And how someone lives their life isn’t necessarily an indication of how good they are at NLP. You can’t tell how good someone is at NLP by what they do ‘in real life’ because there is no requirement to use your NLP skills ‘in real life’ - it’s entirely up to you. And it’s entirely up to you to decide when and how you use your NLP skills. We think that one of the best uses for NLP is in making a difference to the community. Tony Clarkson made a huge difference to the UK NLP community by keeping NLP trademark-free. You can make a difference too. You can phone the company you trained with, or the company you’re thinking of training with, and ask whether they’ve contributed to The NLP Fund. If they say ‘no’, urge them to do so; if ‘yes’, ask them when and how much. And, of course, you can contribute to the Fund yourself. Please contribute generously, to help pay the costs of revoking the NLP trademark and keeping NLP in the public domain. Send your donation to The NLP Fund, Bongate Mill Farmhouse, Mill Hill, Appleby, Westmorland, Cumbria CA16 6UR. - Isha and Garry
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Denis Bridoux
On February 22 Denis Bridoux presents a session on MindLines, a refined version of L Michael Hall’s model from the book of that name. Denis is, amongst other things, an NLP Trainer for Post-Graduate Professional Education and has trained extensively with Richard Bandler.
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New year, new look
The NLP Group website has a new look for the new year. We wanted a cleaner, more professional look with more content and an easier navigation system. We’ve included photos of the Group so that potential members can decide whether we look like a friendly bunch. A new page details all the NLP practice groups we know of and another lists NLP training companies both in the UK and abroad. A new section reviews a choice of NLP books while another contains NLP-related articles. Finally, the London Diary lists NLP events for the coming months.
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NLP website watch
NLP Comprehensive www.nlpco.com Connirae & Steve Andreas	NLP University www.nlpu.com Robert Dilts & Judith DeLozier	Modelling projects www.experiential-dynamics.org David Gordon & Graham Dawes
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Shelle Rose Charvet at the Central London NLP Group
By Simon Hargrave Shelle came to Regent’s College on the 21st October to give us a taster for the three-day seminar on the Language and Behaviour (LAB) profile she was about to give in London. She showed just how professional, knowledgeable and entertaining a speaker she is, giving an audience of 60 or more the benefit of the latest research and experience she has gained since writing her book, Words That Change Minds. However, since only 3% of people are convinced just by what they read, it’s a challenge to find what else you need to get a feel for what Shelle offers! Shelle demonstrated how to find out a person’s motivation and working traits – and she made the point that our language and behaviour patterns are context-specific (and that context can be very narrow). So when you use the LAB profile your questions have to be specific – and you have to spot when the context is changing. The LAB profile is about what you do and the decisions you make, not what you are. When she wrote her book, she had to rely on the statistics generated by Roger Bailey (the person who derived LAB from the work of Leslie Cameron Bandler); she’s now getting live research data to improve the usefulness of the profiles. Shelle showed how the profiles are being used for recruitment and for team-building by working out what skills and attributes are needed to make a team a success. On a personal level, using the profiles can flag what someone may need to achieve their desired state, e.g. an options person may need some of the attributes of a procedures person in order to get anything finished. If you want to know more about LAB profiles, and reading the book isn’t enough, Frank Daniels (01773 532195) is compiling a list of people who’d like to see Shelle in person in the UK.
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Training Report (1)
Jill English tells us about learning how to train with John Seymour Associates After 20-odd years working in personnel management and a bit of time in and around NLP, there opened up a chink in my ‘I can’t train people’ belief. That chink let through a message along the lines of ‘It isn’t that you can’t, more that you don’t know how. Yet.’ Which is how I came to find myself on John Seymour’s Training Techniques course. Having done a couple of serious NLP courses and knowing not a great deal about training (except I didn’t think I could do it), I decided to start at the beginning with Introduction to NLP and Training in September which I followed up with the Advanced Training Techniques course in November. This was the first major training I had done with John and this proved to be a good place and a good person with whom to start my journey towards being (even in some small sense) a ‘trainer’. I’m glad I didn’t miss the ‘Introduction to NLP’ element of the first course as I found the revision useful and was interested to see how material which was relevant was identified and introduced. I really enjoyed watching the skills being used to teach the skills! Within the first hour (on both courses), we’d done our first piece to video and by the end of the training there was lots more filmed evidence of improvement in performance. We designed exercises in less time than it takes to poach an egg (delivered in the time it takes to boil one), refined and honed our design and delivery skills as well as our feedback skills (and boy, did the feedback skills get a workout!). With three video cameras, purposeful exercise design and an excellent training/assisting team, there were no wasted minutes to sit back in. I worked hard and enjoyed every moment! Other participants (as always) were great. I was particularly impressed that the varied group on the Advanced Training Techniques course included a couple of very experienced trainers who were there to see what else they could learn. I’d really like to model the learning strategy and the modesty which enables someone with over 30 years’ experience to be open to learn and develop! What made it so valuable to me? There were chances to ask anything I wanted to and expect an honest answer, to watch the proceedings from any point in the room, exercises to design and deliver to camera, very discerning feedback, high quality visual aids (with the invitation to photograph these) and a totally professional training experience. John really cares about maximising learning and was prepared to explain anything he did (or didn’t) do. I might never be the world’s best trainer, but from being someone who thought they couldn’t train I have travelled a long way. I now know there is stuff I can do well, (and how to transfer skills to the workplace) and stuff I need to work on which will take practice. So I shall make chances within the ‘day job’ to run courses or bits of courses with the clear intention that both I and my trainees have a good time and learn lots. John Seymour Associates 0117 955 7827
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Training Report (2)
Douglas Cartwright reports on his Practitioner training with McKenna Breen and Richard Bandler Showbiz and entertainment were the buzzwords of the 1998 McKenna Breen NLP Practitioner course with Richard Bandler. Energetic, feel-good music accompanied the entrance and exit of Richard Bandler, the co-creator of NLP, and you could be forgiven for thinking the Messiah had actually come gauging by the cheering from the audience. Each morning, Bandler quickly wove the 400-strong audience into a trance – at times I physically felt myself slipping down in my chair – and dosed us with a potent mix of irreverent stories and metaphors with a liberal sprinkling of swearing, double entendres and overt criticism of religion. The assistants told us this was to ‘shake up our belief systems’ because Richard wanted people to have the freedom to think for themselves. However, a number of people were visibly offended and obviously wanted to keep their belief systems! To prove the potency of NLP, his demonstrations included hypnotising people to believe they could paint, age-regressing skin, and an on-stage phobia cure with a king python. Bandler is a consummate entertainer, and has a professional sense of timing and immaculate voice control. He seems to believe in direct intervention to make people ‘work’, and I felt extremely nervous at times, especially when he’d jump on members of the audience and do fast inductions with them! The afternoons were led by Michael Breen and Paul McKenna, the hypnotist. They taught language patterns with quite a large number of hypnosis techniques for us to practise. To Bandler’s credit, his attitude installation ensured that everyone was soon intoning “Down – Nowwwww” with style and verve! McKenna also touched upon time-lines, albeit too briefly, and offered an integration at the end of each afternoon. In my opinion the McKenna Breen training is less about technique and more about developing a ferocious propulsion system to ‘just do it’. I would recommend that people attend a 20-day training for technique and a Richard Bandler training for the attitude to use it. I have seen too many NLPers who don’t integrate what they have learnt into their everyday lives. Doug leads a North Harrow practice group and is keen to lead more sessions, especially in exchange for generative feedback! McKenna Breen Ltd 020 8340 8089
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Modelling writing skills
Perhaps you’ve wondered how NLP writer and trainer Joseph O’Connor is such a prolific and successful writer, or how comedy writer, author and trainer Robin Prior does it? Wonder no more, for now you can attend their writing skills seminars. Isha greatly enjoyed and benefited from their ANLP evening event last year, which was such a success that Joseph and Robin have started their Writing Consultancy. They are offering The Art of Writing Creatively on 12/13 Feb and Getting Published on 11/12 March, both at Regent’s College, £175 each, or attend both weekends for £290. Tel: 020 8 558 7199 E-mail: convergence.pauline@virginnet.co.uk
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Practice group for trainers and coaches
If you’re an NLP Practitioner or equivalent and are a trainer or coach you might like to attend the Exploring Learning group. It meets at King’s College in the Strand on the 3rd Monday of every month at 6:30 pm for a 7 pm start, finishing at 9 pm. Sessions are £3 for members, £10 non-members, and membership is £36 per year. King’s College tell us that the meeting rooms are accessible to wheelchair users. The group is dedicated to hands-on practice with exercises and is run by Amanda Vickers, Bridget Strong and Will Jackson. In January Central London NLP Group founders Penny Tompkins and James Lawley ran a session on directing attention. Upcoming sessions are: February 21 Exploring risk in training design and delivery with Mark Underwood & Bridget Strong, March 20 Hypnotic drawing and storytelling in training with Graham Shaw and Judith Lowe is coming in May. If you want to attend, please contact Amanda Vickers: Telephone 01727 830693 e-mail exploring.learning@apexmail.com website www.welcome.to/exploring.learning
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NLP tasters
Andy Smith and Nick Driscoll of Transformation Training (who also run the ever-successful Richmond NLP Group) are presenting a series of ‘taster’ evenings in Central London. Topics include Developing Emotional Intelligence (Feb 10), Stress Management with NLP (Feb 24), Self-Hypnosis Made Easy (Mar 9) and Building Self-Esteem with NLP (Mar 23). The venue is the Friend’s Meeting House, 8 Hop Gardens, off St Martin’s Lane (beside Café Flo) and costs £10 payable on the door. Doors open at 6:30 pm for a 7:00 pm start and the evening continues until 9:30. Discounts are available for advance or multiple booking. For details phone Gaia Visions on 07930 452037 or e-mail rospb@yahoo.com.
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Submitting articles
We’d be delighted if you’d like to contribute to Living NLP or wish to reply to any of our articles. You can send articles and letters to Garry at the address at the bottom of this page, either printed, on a disk, or as e-mail attachments, in plain text format, MS Word (2, 6, 95 or 97) format or Windows WordPad format. Alternatively, you can e-mail them in plain text or HTML format to: editor@nlpgroup.freeserve.co.uk Inclusion of articles or letters (or any part thereof) is at the discretion of the editorial team.
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