NLP techniaues

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July, 2002 3 - Anchor Point

A N C H O R P O I N T

NLP in Actionby Dr. Richard Bolstad with Annette Currie

Stasis And Action

To understand what this article isabout, I invite you to begin by per-forming a simple experiment. In amoment, I invite you to step back into

a memory of a time when you expe-rienced a standard NLP process,done with yourself as the client. Sitor stand in the position you were inat that time, as the NLP process wasdone. Make again any movements ofyour body that you made as thatchange process occurred. Noticewhat this feels like kinaesthetically.Actually do that and then return tothe page.

Now step back into the reallifesituation that you were changing byusing that NLP process. Stand or sitas you are in that real life situation,and perform any movements that youperform in that situation. Noticewhat this feels like kinaesthetically. Dothat and return to this page.

As a generalisation, most (but notall) NLP processes are far more static

than real life. While such processesenable us to delve into the innerworld where we create our own re-ality, they do not necessarily matchthat reality in this one key respect.That is curious because NLP tech-niques were initially modelled from

some very active people. In this ar-ticle I want to suggest that we revisitthose more active roots of our meth-odology.

Action In The

History Of NLP

In his book modelling Virginia Satir,NLP trainer Steve Andreas discussesthe fact that Satir did not merely talkwith her clients. She engaged themin action. He identifies two key aimsof this action. Firstly it helped associ-ate clients into experiences:

Another powerful element

of Virginias effectiveness washer insistence on action. Sheunderstood that people changeonly if they fully experience theevents or perceptions thatwords can only point to. Sec-ondly, it helped futurepace newstrategies. After helping one ormore family members makechanges, she would ask themto re-engage in live interaction,so that she could evaluate and

test what she had done. Vir-ginia used action to translatehopes and yearnings intobehaviours that satisfiedthem

(Andreas, 1991, pp. 12-14)

Family sculpture, Andreas noteswas one of Virginias wellknownways of transforming words into ac-tion. She would position familymembers in a still tableau or sculp-ture that displayed their typical ways

of interactingtheir supporting,clinging, blaming, placating, including,excluding, their distance and close-ness, power and contact relationships,etc. (Andreas, 1991, p.15). Thismethod is taken further in the workof Bert Hellinger, modelled by NLPtrainer Lucas Derks. Derkss ownwork explores how people create aninternal social panorama mentallypositioning people they know aroundthem and using location as a key

submodality to represent psycho-logical significance. He saysHellinger developed a dramaticway of making panoramas visible.It is a far better show than mostNLP demonstrations, where some-times 50 people sit around andwatch how someone has closedhis eyes and thinks The clientis asked to choose people that mayhave some resemblance to the

original family member Hellingerexplains to a client: Now you takethe chosen persons one by onewith both hands, and put them ontheir spot in relation to the others,just like you experience them rightnow. (Derks, 1998, pp.139-140).


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4 - Anchor Point July, 2002


Both Satir and Hellinger wouldrecognise the inspiration for their workin the psychodrama model (discussedbelow). John Grinder and RichardBandler recommend in one of theirearliest books (Grinder and Bandler,1976, p. 67) the use of psychodramaticsorting for internal parts conflicts. Theysay Here the therapist has the clientselect two members of the group toplay his polarities The therapist willdirect the client to play first one andthen the other of the polarities. In thisway, the polarities are initially enactedby the client themselves and can thenbe modelled and played back by theselected group members.

The use of action has reemergedthrough the history of NLP in numer-ous places. Robert Dilts uses spatialanchors (marking out set spaces inthe room as anchors for particularstates) and explains why he uses ac-tion to do both Reimprinting on thetime line and sort the different sen-sory components of a belief: I likemaking a physical time line because it

helps to organise the elements of thesystem in the same way as putting thesenses into their accessing cues helpsorganise them and keep them sepa-rate. (Dilts, 1990, p.116) Michael HallsMindToMuscle pattern involves us-ing active expression so that a highlyvalued principle delivers real learningsand the learnings become incorpo-rated into the very fabric of themuscles themselves. (Hall, 2001, p. 42)

While action has a history in NLP,there is no agreement about the sig-nificance of action and only limited at-tempts to create a model for the useof action within an NLP framework. Inthe field of psychotherapy, there areat least three distinct models in use,

as discussed by David Kipper (Kip-per, 1986, pp. 10-22). These are psy-chodrama, fixed role theory andbehaviour rehearsal.

PsychodramaFirstly, there is the psychodrama

model of Jacob Moreno (18921974).In the early twentieth century, Morenoevolved a model of psychotherapywhich took its metaphor from thetheatre. Noting that children devel-oped new behaviours after roleplay-ing them in games, he assisted firsttroubled children and then adults toexplore in roleplay their internal and

interpersonal dilemmas. Moreno de-scribed Psychodrama as a therapeu-tic controlled acting out taking placewithin the treatment setting.(Moreno, 1977, p. X) He believed thatthis process of exploring experiencesin action would increase clients spon-taneity. This word has a specific mean-ing in Psychodrama. An action, inMorenos terms, is spontaneous if itenables the person to respond

with some degree of adequacy to anew situation or with some degreeof novelty to an old situation.(Moreno, 1977, p. XII)

To create an adequate response toa situation requires developing a rolefor that situation. By role, Morenorefers to the functioning form theindividual assumes in the specific mo-ment he reacts to the specific situa-tion in which other persons or ob-

jects are involved. (Moreno, 1977, p.IV) Moreno points out that the roleevolves directly from the individualsinteraction with the world, even be-fore the person has a unifying senseof self. Role playing is prior to theemergence of the self. Roles do not

emerge from the self, but the self mayemerge from roles. (Moreno, 1977,p. 153) In some ways, the concept ofrole and role relationships corre-sponds to the concept of strategy inNLP. In other ways, a role is similar toa part in NLP terminology. One keydifference is that roles are, by Morenosabove definition, interactional. Psycho-drama presents a systemic model oftherapy in which a persons strategiesor parts cannot be understood in iso-lation, but are related to other per-sons or objects. As a result, psycho-drama is generally done in a groupsetting, where the roles of others canbe played by other group members

(who thus become auxiliary actors).

The term role is taken, of course,from the theatre. While Morenoemphasised that he used the term ina different way to the way it was usedin drama, the metaphor of the the-atre is also used to describe the pro-cess of therapy in psychodrama andMorenos related action methods.

There are three basic phases in apsychodrama enactment, called byAdam Blatner (Blatner, 1988, pp. 42-101):

Warmup (The director ortherapist warms up to theirown role, then the group warmsup to each other and to the task,then a protagonist/client is se-lected and warms up to theirrole and contract with the di-rector)

Action (the problem is pre-sented, auxiliary actors are en-gaged, resistances are dealt with,action explores the protagonistsissues, often leading to cathar-sis, and finally, surplus realityenables the exploration of


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other possibilities in the drama) Sharing/Integration (the pro-

tagonist explores how theywant to act in real life, they andthe group share their responsesto the psychodrama, and thesession is closed by dealing withreentry to real life, checkingwhat support is needed andwhat unfinished business is left,and saying good-bye)

Change in psychodrama is consid-ered to occur through the develop-ment of spontaneity and role expan-sion. By role expansion, the develop-ment of more adequate new roles is

described. Both these goals of psy-chodrama imply action, rather thanjust visualisation.

Fixed Role Therapy

While Fixed Role therapy hasnever caught on in the way thatpsychodrama did, it provided thefirst nonpsychodramatic model forunderstanding the use of action and

role enactment in therapy. In devel-oping Fixed Role Therapy, GeorgeA. Kelly (1905-1967) was influencedboth by Alfred Korzybski and byJacob Moreno. Kelly had observedthat the real life behaviour of actorsin the theatre was often changed bytheir playing a role in a particularproduction.

In fixed role therapy, the therapistbegins by analysing the current

behaviour of the client, and the con-structs which determine thisbehaviour. Constructs are what we inNLP would call frames or beliefswhich shape expectations. Kelly saysA persons processes are psychologi-cally channelized by the ways in which

he anticipates events. (Kelly, 1955, p.46) The Fixed Role therapist writesfor the client a script which requiresher/him to assume an alternative iden-tity and act in ways which are bothmore useful and sharply in contrastto the previous script which theperson has lived by.

Once this new script has beenwritten, the client visits the thera-pist every second day for a periodof two weeks. During this time, heor she assumes the new identitydesigned by the therapist and actsaccording to it, even taking on thename assigned with it. The thera-

peutic sessions explore the effectsof this new role on the areas ofwork, relationships with people ofthe same sex and the opposite sex,

relationships with parents and gen-eral life orientation. Unlike a psycho-drama, the action in fixed role therapytakes place in the real daytoday lifeof the client. This is a rather extremeform of tasking as applied by MiltonErickson.

Behaviour Rehearsal

While Moreno and Kelly thoughtof action and roleplay as central totheir methodology, the developers ofBehaviour Rehearsal considered it asmerely one of the many techniquesfor behaviour change. Joseph Wolpe(19151997) was a pioneer of many

behavioural change techniques, in-cluding behaviour rehearsal, originallycalled behaviouristic psychodrama(Wolpe, 1969).

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Wolpe gives an example of its usewith a client who has an anxiety re-sponse to another person. He says(Wolpe, 1969, p. 68):

The therapist takes the roleof a person towards whom thepatient has a neurotic anxi-ety reaction and instructs himto express his ordinarily inhib-ited feelings towards that per-son. Particular attention isgiven to the emotion infusedinto the words. The voice mustbe firm, and suitably modu-lated. The patient is made torepeat each statement again

and again, being constantlycorrected until the utteranceis in every way satisfactory. Theaim of the rehearsal is, ofcourse, to make it possible forhim to express himself withhis real adversary so that theanxiety the latter evokes maybe reciprocally inhibited, andthe motor assertive habit es-tablished.

Later texts described the use ofgroup settings to create an entirecommunity in which the clientcould interact in this way. Behaviouraltherapists were also eager to developa role theory which did not draw onMorenos model. They used Sarbinand Allens (1968) model of roles associally defined behaviours associatedwith given positions (e.g., husband,daughter). This classification (social

roles) is only one of three types ofrole identified by Moreno (the oth-ers being psychosomatic roles (e.g.,eater, walker) and psychodramaticroles (the roles that emerge in aculture from collective experience,such as the hero or the dragon).

W hy Use Action?

Most NLP, as Lucas Derks notesabove, is done with the client sittingdown, closing their eyes, almost im-mobile. Such methods have advan-tages. For example, static NLP meth-ods are often faster, because the cli-ent does not need to explain theirinner world or move things andpeople around to begin a change pro-cess. Static methods are also oftenmore private, reducing the need forothers to know the content of thepersons experience. When we achievesuch success with these static tech-niques, what reasons are there to jus-

tify us changing to the use of more ac-tive methods in some situations? Thereare four that stand out for me, and twoof them are the rationales that SteveAndreas gives for Satirs work.

Firstly, action gives us an expandedrange of choices for helping peopleaccess the experiences they want to.Consider the situation where I havesomeone run the NLP trauma cure.

I ask them to see an image of them-selves sitting down in front of them,watching an image on a moviescreen further away. This complexdouble dissociation scenario can,of course, be explained verbally anddone with visual imagination. How-ever, when someone is already anx-ious about their problem, it helpsto take that visualisation task awayfrom their conscious mind and sim-ply set out the scene using two

chairs and a blank wall. The feelingof being dissociated is often easierto access with these external visualand kinaesthetic cues.

Secondly, most of our changetechniques are designed so that theclient will be able to behave differ-ently in an active situation at somefuture time. It seems clear to me thatthe very best way of testing andfuturepacing this change is to use asituation which as closely as possiblematches the ones the client wantsto be different. Hence, when Rich-ard Bandler is testing his work witha person who had anticipatory anxi-ety about people failing to turn upon time, he says to her You can gotry it in the real world. Ill tell youwhat. Why dont you go outside bythe coffee machine and Ill meet you

there in ten minutes. (Bandler, 1984,p. 26). When he has worked with aclient who had an agoraphobic fearof driving outside the city limits, hesays, Ive got a couple of other thingsI want to do, and then well go for aride in the country. (Bandler, 1984,p. 57). Such reallife tests are clearlymore effective than the imaginaryones which preceded them in eachcase. Using action enables us to cre-

ate more powerful testing and moreconvincing futurepacing.

Thirdly, active methods may ex-tend our success with NLP to newpersonality types. In my NLP MasterPractitioner trainings in New Zealand,the Kiersey Bates questionnaire re-veals that 8090% of our NLP par-ticipants are introverts. They rechargetheir batteries by themselves, andconsequently find interactive situa-

tions more tiring than refreshing. Myimpression at Psychodrama gather-ings is that the opposite is true. Mostof the people there are extraverts;they enjoy the expression of their ex-periences in action in front of oth-ers. It seems likely to me that there


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are other personality distinctions thatmark out more immobile forms ofNLP from active change techniquessuch as psychodrama. For example,NLP may focus more on visual andauditory digital sensory input than onkinaesthetic and auditory tonal ex-perience.

Fourthly, action, to use a psycho-dramatic expression, can warm theclient up to psychosomatic rolesfaster than talk. The body deliversinformation and memories, storeddeeper in the brain, long before theconscious mind has access to them.This is understood in Ericksonian

therapy and is the basis for the useof ideomotor signals. Ernest Rossiand David Cheek (1988, pp. 2021and 26) explain Careful observa-tion of many oldfashioned efforts

at total age regression indicated thatthe significant memories could beaccessed rapidly within a momentor two at this initial emotional andphysiological level. We speculatedthat this affective response accessedthe limbichypothalamic and reticu-lar activating systems. It took longerfor such memories to be expressedby action potentials moving skeletalmuscles at the ideodynamic fingersignalling level. Finally, at the highestintegrative, cortical level, thememory could be expressed withincognitive frames of reference as averbal communication Talking de-pends on associative pathways

within the cortex of the brain. Thisability to report verbally on visual,auditory, olfactory, tactual and posi-tional stimuli depends on the high-est levels of cortical activity.

Towards An NLPMetaphor ForAction

Neuro Linguistic Programming, byits name, originally uses a metaphorfrom the world of computers. Apersons responses are described asemerging from strategies andsubmodalities which are analogous tocomputer programs. The static natureof computer hardware makes it hardto add action to this metaphor, andthe selfcontained functioning of acomputer limits the metaphor inunderstanding interaction between

people. Indeed, the person in NLPbased changework often behavesmore like a computer, passively tak-ing in a new program, rather than likean actor in the drama of their life.

metamorphus press


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Psychodrama, Fixed Role theoryand Behaviour Rehearsal have all tosome extent made use of the meta-phor of the theatre to explain whatis happening when we use actiontherapeutically. This metaphor hasthe advantage (for therapeuticwork) of allowing the description ofinteractional scenes, of action,and of multiple actors (such as thethree versions of the client requiredin the NLP trauma process referredto above; the observer, the personin the movie theatre seat, and theperson on the screen). In Psycho-drama, a role is said to have five com-ponents: context, behaviour, belief,

feeling, and consequences (Williams,1989, p. 58). These equate to someextent with the NLP TOTE modelfor strategies (Bolstad, 2002, pp. 3134) so that Context (especially in

the sense of the theatrical cue) =the Trigger, Behaviour = the Opera-tion, Belief (on which basis decisionsare made) = the Test, and Feeling andConsequences (being both resultsof the situation) = the Exit. Strate-gies, in this sense, provide a bridgebetween the two metaphors ofcomputer and stage.

In the brain, we know that differ-ent actors (we would sometimescall them parts in NLP) are mostlikely embodied in separate neuralnetworks (see Bolstad, 2002, p. 38)One of the risks of the role meta-phor, I believe, is that it does not so

easily suggest the integration ofseparate neural networks (separateroles) into one network, somethingthat clearly happens in NLP pro-cesses such as parts integration. This

integration is seen as central bymany psychodramatists however.For example, Paul Holmes, MarciaKarp, and Michael Watson (1994) sayof role reversal (a technique de-scribed later on in this article) thatit is a technique typical to psy-chodrama, and is one which is con-sidered by many practitioners as thesingle most effective instrument intherapeutic roleplay. According toJL and ZT Moreno (Moreno et alia,1955) such a procedure is impor-tant not only for interpersonalsocialisation with others but alsofor personal self integration. (em-phasis mine). In NLP, parts work

is always based on an attempt to atleast harmonise and more usuallyintegrate the parts involved (seeBolstad, 2002, pp. 72-76).

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Virtual reality provides us with ametaphorical situation which I believeis more isomorphic with NLP thanthe theatre.

In virtual reality, a computerprojects the illusion of a real world,in which you as the experiencer areimmersed. The sensory qualities ofthis virtual world (such as the loud-ness of sounds, or the colour of ob-jects) can be altered from within thecomputer. Although the experienceyou are having has some correlationto a real world around you, its ex-perienced significance is a functionof your computers embellishments.

Nonetheless, when you movearound and interact in this embel-lished virtual world, things happen.

Michael Hall uses a similar analogywhen he describes personality asan energised holographic force field(Hall, Bodenhamer, Bolstad andHamblett, 2001, pp. 6790). He saysthat we embody our internal world,projecting it outward into space likea hologram. An example is oursense of time as having direction inrelation to our body (creating whatHall calls time lining). A person talk-ing about the future may gesture to-wards the front as if that future ex-isted there. Indeed, in their virtualworld, it does. Similarly, we projectother metaprograms into space. Aperson who likes to get the big pic-

ture on life, Hall notes, may stepback so they can see the wholething. People code their beliefs, their

values and even their sense of whothey are with the submodalities oflocation.

In psychodrama, experienceswhich have not occurred in real lifebut can be created and enacted areoften referred to as surplus real-ity. Moreno says There are certaininvisible dimensions in the reality ofliving, not fully experienced or ex-pressed and for those who failedto experience them, life is incom-plete that is why we have to usesurplus operations and surplus in-struments to bring them out in ourtherapeutic settings. (Moreno, 1966,

p. 151) In fact, we know from re-cent research that allexperience isactually surplus reality!

Advanced Neuro

Training


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Even our sense of our own body isa virtual illusion, as demonstrated bythe phantom limb phenomenon,where someone with an amputatedlimb reports that they still feel it to bethere. A fascinating experiment furtheremphasises this virtual nature of allexperience. V. Ramachandran and Wil-liam Hurstein explain (1999) The sub-ject sits in a chair blindfolded, with anaccomplice sitting at his right side, orin front of him, facing the same direc-tion. The experimenter then standsnear the subject, and with his left handtakes hold of the subjects left indexfinger and uses it to repeatedly andrandomly tap and stroke the nose of

the accomplice, while at the same time,using his right hand, he taps and strokesthe subjects nose in precisely the samemanner, and in perfect synchrony. Af-ter a few seconds of this procedure,

the subject develops the uncanny illu-sion that his nose has either been dis-located, or has been stretched out sev-eral feet forwards or off to the side,demonstrating the striking plasticity ormalleability of our body image. Themore random and unpredictable thetapping sequence, the more striking theillusion. Ramachandran and Hursteinwere able to create this illusion in 12out of 18 subjects (research referredto me by Steve Andreas). This studyemphasises that our bodyimage isjust that: an image or a constructwhich we manufacture internally andproject out into space around us.

Lucas Derks, as mentionedabove, has used the term socialpanorama to refer to the pro-jected social world in which we liveour lives, peopled by virtual humans,

by nature, by dead and spiritual be-ings and by our own self-image.Emphasising the virtual nature of allexperience, Derks begins his bookwith the statement Even when youmake love, it is your own visual, audi-tory, kinaesthetic, olfactory and gus-tatory image of the other person youembrace. (Derks, 1998, p. 5) Oncewe understand that we live in thisvirtual world, we understand that tomove around in our dreams, as ac-tion methods of therapy suggest, isto move around in our own virtualspace. To sit immobile while doingNLP is almost tantamount to deny-ing the world our brain has con-

structed. If we want to change ourinner world, it makes sense to inter-act with it on its own terms, andthose terms involve locationalchanges and movement.

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NLP Applications

Many applications of action are al-ready discussed and demonstrated intranscripts in the NLP literature, par-

ticularly in the work of Robert Dilts.For example:

Setting out a Time Line on thefloor and walking along it to settemporal locations to revisitdisturbing emotional experi-ences or resourceful times. (e.g.Dilts, 1990, pp. 84-114; Andreasand Andreas, 1994, pp. 129140)

Integrating conflicting partsstanding at a metaposition on the

other corner of an equilateraltriangle opposite the two parts(e.g., Dilts, 1990, pp. 156-173)

Learning from standing in first

Neuro-Energetics

(self), second (other) and third(observer) positions, about arelationship which has been achallenge (e.g., Dilts, 1990, pp.190199)

Aligning neurological levels bystepping through them on thefloor (e.g., Dilts and McDonald,1997, pp. 24-36)

Setting out a physical space as amovie theatre with a projectionbooth to run the movie in, forthe NLP dissociation traumacure (e.g., Bolstad and Hamblett,1997, pp. 118120)

Using models such as the Circleof Excellence which anchor re-

sourceful states to set places onthe floor and utilise steppinginto those resources in orderto access them (e.g., Andreas

and Faulkner, 1994, pp. 4447) Having a client leave their re-

sistances and conscious mind inone chair while they walk overto another chair and sit downand go into trance (e.g.,Erickson and Rossi, 1981, p. 9)

Rehearsing clients through newstrategies in action and install-ing them for future use (e.g.Bandler, Grinder and Satir, 1976,pp. 8586).

The range of these applicationsleaves no doubt that, should wechoose to, we can usefully incorpo-rate action into all forms of NLP in-

tervention, from submodality workto anchoring, from parts integrationto strategy change, from tranceworkto interpersonal communication.


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Structuring ASession W ith Action

Preframing:As with all NLP tech-niques, some preframing is necessary

to successfully pace and lead the cli-ent into action. Inadequate framingand pacing will lead to inadequateaction. This stage involves project-ing the virtual world into existenceand associating the client into it.

For example, before his time linereimprinting work with Carla, Rob-ert Dilts (1990, pp. 84-85) says,

Carla, I would like you to

imagine that in front of you,here on the floor, there is a line.This line is your line of time. Tothe left is the past, to the right

is the future, that is, where youwould like to be able to go, andto the left is what has hap-pened. Here you are in thepresent and you have this thing,something that is sucking partof your identity out. I am goingto ask you in a moment to stepon this imaginary line, facingyour future Then I want youto start walking backwardsalong this line, back in timeAnd when you step on that line,I want you to be fully inside yourlife experiences.

Action:Most NLP techniques involve

some form of accessing personal re-sources, and then some way of ap-plying those resources to a challeng-ing situation. That means that there

are at least two virtual locations tobe used, and at least two programsto be run through.

Postframing, Ecology checks, andFuturepacing:Having the personturn off their virtual environment af-ter action is as important as turningit on before. We do not want theperson to continue to think of theleft hand back of the room as thepast or of a particular spot on thefloor that everyone walks across asmy resources. We do not wantthem to confuse another trainingparticipant with my father or thepart of me that wants to smoke ciga-

rettes simply because that partici-pant occupied that location in theprojected virtual experience. Further-more, it is important to have the per-son confirm that they have changed,and check the ecology of what theyhave done. This is all very similar tothe process of reorienting a personafter a hypnotherapeutic session (andnot surprisingly because action in vir-tual reality presupposes an altered or

trance state). This can be done verysimply.

For example, after parental time linereimprinting with Dave, ConniraeAndreas (1994, p. 140) says,

Great. So that is the pro-cess(very softly spoken) andif you would like to let yourunconscious do any more ab-sorbing, or generalising, or let-

ting that light flow and deepenin any other ways, that is fine.The integration can continuein whatever ways are appro-priate and right and fitting,and natural and automatic,even after we finish, because

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this kind of shift and integra-tion often does continue and itis a nice thing to acknowledgethat happening. So wheneveryou are ready you can just letyourself consciously return tous in this room, as the integra-tion continues unconsciously.Thank you. (Dave hugsConnirae).

Modelling MoreTechniques

Dale Buchanan is director of thePsychodrama Section at Saint Eliza-

beth Hospital, Washington, and authorof numerous articles in the Journal ofGroup Psychotherapy, Psychodrama andSociometry. He has written an articlewith Donna Little studying the simi-larities between NLP and Psycho-drama. They note Bandler andGrinder have refined the therapeuticprocess. Needless to say they havemiraculously packaged a process ofimmense value to all therapists. (1983,

36, p.114).I believe we could also say that Psy-

chodrama has packaged a process ofimmense value to NLP Practitioners.Once we recognise the action implicitin the virtual reality model of NLPwork, we can realise that the fields ofPsychodrama, Fixed role theory, andBehaviour rehearsal will contain a richsource of new NLP techniques.

For example, the simple psycho-dramatic process of reversing rolesgives us a very effective way to in-stall a genuine second position forNLP clients. Here is the detailed ini-tial explanation of reversing rolesgiven to a client (called the protago-nist in psychodrama) who has been

acting in a projected virtual reality dia-logue with another person (called anauxiliary in psychodrama) as the stand-in for their boss: Reverse roles! I wantyou (the protagonist) to sit (stand)here, where the auxiliary was and bethe person portrayed by the auxiliary.Behave and talk exactly like him (her).And you (the auxiliary) move herewhere the protagonist was and try andbe him (her) exactly. Now (to the aux-iliary who plays the protagonist) willyou, please, repeat the last sentencethat the protagonist has just said?(Kipper, 1986, p. 163)

Linguistic Cues ForAction

We also have, with NLPs modelof sensory representational systems,

a key to the development of our ownaction methodology. A clients activekinaesthetic verbs, and their linguisticmarkers for submodalities of locationgive us directions to the projection oftheir virtual reality.

Most of us know that when a clientsays Im trying to get away from thathorrific memory. They are telling usverbally about the need for a fuller dis-sociation such as the NLP trauma cureprovides. Similarly, when a client tellsus Im trying to reach a state of happi-ness, but it seems too big a leap for-ward from where I am. we get directdescriptions of the virtual world that

they are living in. We can have themproject that world into the room, andthis immediately gives us and themmore clues about what needs tochange and how to change it.

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Examples of kinaesthetic verbs are:Balance, Block, Bounce, Break, Cast,Catch, Chew, Crush, Drive, Grab,Grind, Grope, Hang, Hike, Hit, Hold,Kick, Leap, Letloose, Move, Pen-etrate, Press, Pull, Reach, Roll, Run,Scrape, Scratch, Shape, Slip, Stick, Stir,Stretch, Stick, Support, Swallow, Sway,Tap, Throw, Tie, Touch, Turn, Vibrate,Walk

Examples of markers for locationare: Above, Away, Back, Behind, Be-low, Beyond, Bottom, Close, Distant,Far, Forward, From, Front, In, Inside,Left, On, Outside, Reachable, Right,Top, Towards, Under, Unreachable,

WithinSummary

Most NLP change processes havebeen developed as static, internal

experiences. While there are advan-tages to this, we can also benefitfrom the power of action to assistaccessing states, to futurepace andrealitytest changes, and to matchmore active and extraverted clients.In psychotherapy in general, there areat least three models for the use ofaction: Psychodrama, Fixed Roletheory, and Behaviour Rehearsal. Psy-chodrama, with its basis in roletheory, influenced NLP developmentparticularly through the work of Vir-ginia Satir.

Our inner world is like a virtualreality, and action methods enable us

to externalise or project this virtualreality into the room where we areworking. Many NLP techniques, par-ticularly those developed by RobertDilts, already do this; for example

setting out time lines on the floor,creating spatial anchors, movingthrough first second and third posi-tions as set out on the floor, and re-hearsing new strategies. In each case,the virtual reality projection needsto be preframed before starting, andthe person drawn back to externalreality afterwards. Psychodrama of-fers many other active techniqueswhich could be modelled and usedin developing NLP processes. Also,each time a client uses kinaestheticverbs of movement, or linguistic in-dicators of location, they provide uswith cues to create action from.

This article is not intended to bean instruction manual for the use ofaction in NLP. It is intended to drawattention to this element of what wedo and to encourage the further ex-ploration of an important tool whichhas yet to be given its full recogni-tion in NLP.

Dr. Richard Bolstad with Annette Currie

REFERENCES:

Andreas, C. and Andreas, T.Core Transfor-

mation, Real People Press, Moab, 1994.

Andreas, S. and Faulkner, C. eds. NLP:

The New Technology Of Achievement, Will-

iam Morrow and Company, New York,

1994

Andreas, S. Virginia Satir: The Patterns of her

Magic, Science and Behaviour, Palo Alto,

California, 1991

Bandler, R. Magic In Action, Meta Publica-

tions, Cupertino, 1984.

Bandler, R., Grinder, J., and Satir, V.Chang-ing With Families, Science and Behaviour,

Palo Alto California, 1976

Blatner, A.Acting In: Practical Applications Of

Psychodramatic Methods, Springer, New

York, 1988

Bolstad, R. and Hamblet t, M.Transform-

ing Communication, AddisonWesley-

Longman, Auckland, 1997

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Bolstad, R.RESOLVE: A New Model Of Therapy, Crown House,

Bancyfelin, Wales, 2002

Derks, L. The Social Panorama Model, Son Repro Service,

Eindhoven, Nederlands, 1998

Dilts, R. and McDonald, R.Tools Of The Spir it, Meta, Capitola,

California, 1997

Dilts, R.Changing Belief Systems With NLP, Meta, Capitola, Cali-fornia, 1990

Erickson, M.H . and Rossi, E.L. Experiencing Hypnosis,

Irvington, New York, 1981

Grinder, J. and Bandler, R. The Structure of Magic II, Science

and Behaviour, Palo Alto, California, 1976

Hall, L.M.MetaStates Certification Handbook2001

Holmes, P., Karp, M. , and W atson, M., ed. Psychodrama

Since Moreno:Innovations in Theory and Practice, Rutledge, Lon-

don, 1994

Kelly, G.The Psychology of Personal Constructs, Norton, New

York, 1955

Kipper, D.A. Psychotherapy Through Clinical Role Playing,Brunner/

Mazel, New York, 1986

Moreno, J.L. Psychiatry of the twentieth century: Functionof the universalia: Time, space, reality and cosmos pp. 146-

158 in Group Psychotherapy, No. 19, 1966

Moreno, J.L. et alia. Psychodrama pp. 289340 in McCary,

J.L. ed.Six Approaches to Psychotherapy, Dryden, New York,

1955

Moreno, J.L. Psychodrama: First Volume, Beacon House, New

York, 1977

Ramachandran, V.S. and H irstein, W.Three Laws of Qualia:

What Neurology Tells Us About the Biological Functions

of Consciousness, in Gallagher, S. and OShear, J. eds. Mod-

els Of The Self, pp. 106-107 Imprint Academic, 1999

Rossi, E.L. and Cheek, D.B.MindBody Therapy,W.W.Norton

& Co., London, 1988Sarbin, T. and Allen, V. Role Theory in Lindzey, G. and

Aronson, E. eds.The Handbook Of Social Psychology,Addison

Wesley, Reading, Massachusetts, 1968

W illiams, A.The Passionate Technique,Tavistock/Routledge, Lon-

don, 1989

Wolpe, J. The Practice Of Behaviour Therapy, Pergamon, New

York, 1969

Dr. Richard Bolstad is an NLP trainer and a member of

the New Zealand Association of Psychotherapists. He can be

contacted at 26 Southampton Street, Christchurch 8002,

New Zealand, Phone/Fax +64-3-337-1852,email: [email protected], internet

www.transformations.net.nz

Annette Currie, who gave advice on this article from a

Psychodramatic perspective, is an NLP Practitioner and a

Psychodramatist. She is a member of the New Zealand

Association of Psychotherapists and can be contacted at Phone/

Fax +64-3-326-5086

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