Beginners Mind - Part 2
Reflections at the end of the second session of the NLP Practitioner Certification Training
By Berry Moore
I’ve been dreaming a lot recently.
That in itself is not unusual.What’s different about my dreams in recent weeks is that I’ve been writing them down, observing patterns, and finding that many of the dreams are metaphors for issues in my life.
I am surrounded by metaphors. They’re in the movies, they’re in every book I read to my children, they’re in the little daily events my friends relate over coffee, they’re in my kitchen. I guess they’ve always been there, somewhere.
The second weekend of the NLP Practitioner Course has left me feeling that I am walking always on shifting sand. My perspective on life seems higher, broader, more expansive. The boundaries have changed, everything is connected after all, and now I’m not sure where you end and where I begin. It’s as if someone joined the dots and the picture turned out to be… a maze!
Knowledge and awareness bring responsibility. I am not always comfortable with this new way of recognising people and situations. I feel somewhat confronted by life at times, and at other times I feel the new knowledge has opened up endless possibilities for adventure and delight. There have been some intensely special “Oh Wow” moments as I notice perspectives shifting, and new pictures emerging. Yes, I feel closer to me. I feel closer to my clients. And to my children.
My job is to make people feel better. I call it Energy Therapy, and I use massage, Reiki and Aromatherapy techniques to achieve this. I’ve been using NLP too, and in order to do that effectively I believe I have to “live the experience” myself.
The most profound moment of the second weekend for me was walking through the eight Logical Levels and watching how changing a belief at one level brought everything else into alignment. It was confrontational, difficult, and inspirational. Now I watch the shifts as I use this experience to the benefit of my clients.
I’m taking baby steps, adapting my minimal knowledge and experience to a level where both my client and I can feel comfortable. And it works!
I met a man I admired greatly, a policeman who has made it his mission to give what he calls motivational workshops to police at grassroots level. He doesn’t know it, but he is a master of some of the most powerful NLP techniques we’ve been studying. I watched him manouvre effortlessly through a day composed of the full range of the heirarchy of ideas. Milton himself would have been so impressed as the man gazed into the distance and told senior police personnel in slow, hypnotically picturesque language about a farmer and some birds and a field of wheat. Gregory Bateson and Robert Dilts may have smiled to watch him chunk down to focussed, specific administrative questions as he checked the work of a junior clerk.
I learned a lot, probably more than I consciously realise. I was in a conflict situation, and I don’t handle conflict well. I dreamed the woman concerned confronted me in my own kitchen, and stuck her toe in my ear. Her red sock had a hole in it, and I said so. She still wanted to fight, so we pulled silly faces at each other until we were both nearly crying with laughter.
So, when would I use a metaphor? Oh, anytime. Berry Moore is a holistic massage therapist and metaphysical healer. She is also an AHT trained Master Practitioner of NLP.
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