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Most
of ‘information’ we have in our brain about our
survival and development are what we learnt/picked
up/absorbed after birth, from our neighbours.
The
information are not
neutral bits and pieces of data. They
are not ‘objective’ data in any sense.
They are greatly tilted to one direction or
the other, favouring one’s own perception of the
world, and one’s own way of living in it, as
against others – thus, giving the data a distinct
flavour of one’s culture.
Nor
can one easily reach and use them as and when we
need them. Often, they are stored far from one’s
conscious ability to know they are there…
Filtered
Information and Tilted Styles
There
are many reasons for this lack of neutrality.
- First,
we are not neutral in educating our children. We
eagerly influence them to our peculiar way of life: our culture gives a bias to our
education.
- Any
culture implicitly claims to be higher than,
or superior to others.
- And
it has a tendency to reject members who cross
its boundaries.
- And
children ‘absorb’ the world, uncritically.
And they swallow not only information, but all
the bias (air of superiority, etc) attached to
it.
- A
child’s brain is designed to take in or
absorb whatever it sees others do. They
imitate, mimic, play or act out the world
around till it becomes a part of them.
Take
for instance the dress code. There are many kinds of
dress that people wear. But, what a child will
desire to wear will much depend on where it is born
and brought up.
Typically,
NLP has no
interest to make a distinction of right and wrong
between any data, information or learning . It
does not play the judge. But, it has the tools to
facilitate a change, where one opts to make one.
If
you got accustomed to doing things a particular way,
and for any reason you wanted to change, your past
customs could block you. Here NLP can help you
decipher how you created (and continue to create)
obstacles to change. And, it can also helps you to
achieve desired change.
Probably,
NLP has the best of tools that could help us
understand how specifically culture programs our
minds and how we could reprogram them.
[Particularly,
the ‘Sub-modalities’ of NLP will be of great
use. We will learn and apply these and other tools
shortly. And, for now, kindly wait till we could
properly set the stage for NLP to play on.]
It
is worth mentioning that much of early learning we
had as babies and toddlers are not accessible to us
now, as hey have gone deep into our unconscious
minds; but they greatly influence our behaviour from
deep within.
Albert
Einstein observed that to root out a problem we
should go the level of consciousness that created
it.
Today,
let us get familiar with one NLP tool that helps to
calibrate the depth dimension of human behaviour. NLP believes that human behaviour has a ‘structure’. This
structure is revealed in so many ways. And human
language is one great source of understanding the
structure of human behaviour! Learning the depth
also helps to understand structure of behaviour.
We
are interested in the depth dimensions precisely
because we want to build development from a strong
foundation. Also, the obstacles to development arise
from these deep levels of learnt behaviour: from our
style of life that we picked up from the culture
around. And, to manage one’s life better, and to
become constant achievers, it is important to
program our brains like winners, using NLP!
Interestingly,
even manage your business better, you may want to
learn NLP! Business, too, is faced with similar
challenges. Mr.
Narayana Murthy
articulated in a speech the specific element of
culture or values that an organization has to change
in order to succeed.
Logical
Levels of Behaviour…
When
you move in a dark room, probably, you stretch your
hands forward, trying to feel any obstacle that
might come your way. And, those who don’t have the
visual faculty use a stick to tap the floor to make
sense of what lies ahead.
Similarly,
the logical levels of human behaviour that Robert
Dilts introduced to NLP can prove to be a great help
to navigate the dark world of our mind!
A
behavioural level may be understood as a plane on
which a behaviour originates / stands. At different
times, we act as if we stood on different
platforms/levels.
For
instance, a woman tying a colourfully decorated
piece of thread around the arm of a man, when done from
a deep level of belief that it binds the two as
brother and sister, makes the act sacred. The
belief-platform or foundation of the act gives it
its meaning.
In
NLP we could make useful distinctions of some eight
such levels or sources of acts.
- The
environment: The
world outside of us (environment) could generate
a human activity: You see a piece of paper on
the floor, and you act: pick it up and place it
on the table. Prompting to act was from
environment.
As
a corollary, an environment may reveal the existence
of a human activity: If you
hear a piece of music,
you know someone is playing it (directly or from a
recorded
devise). A human activity behind the music
can be found from the music in the
environment.
- Action:
Activity it self
can trigger activity. A job is advertised for
and a walk in interview is held. Hundreds
of youth attend.
An activity called ‘interview’ lead
others to
act: attend interview.
Beyond
Level 1 and 2 above, others are not visible:
- Capacity:
You
interview someone for a driver’s job. S/he
comes with a valid licence, certificate of past
experience etc. But, you would better check if
the person is really capable, by a test drive:
make capacity visible by action.
- Attitude:
Being capable does
not ensure action. To keep the environment clean
does not require great capabilities. It’s a question of attitude; lacking which, one may
not act responsibly, even when capable!
- Values:
Beyond
attitudes, there is value. One is capable of
riding a bike. One has a good attitude to follow
rules. But, one values one’s comfort more than
safety: Avoids wearing a helmet, when it is hot!
- Beliefs:
At
this level, the brain’s ability to reason
almost stops! We behave as if we are literally
‘blind’ - blindly driven by faith?. Often,
what starts as vague assumptions ends up as
hardened beliefs, making one irrational. And
much of our life is an expression of our
beliefs.
If
you believed you can’t pick up a foreign language,
you will not even try to learn it!
But your child may learn it before you, once
you reach that country! It’s a question of getting to know
how children do it, and doing it like them! And
that requires that you first
give up your belief that you cannot learn!
- Identity: Identity is what we think ourselves to
be. It
is the self image: the way we look at or
perceive ourselves. This identity is acquired
from others. If others loved and trusted you,
you learnt to grow with trust in yourself. If
the identity is not strong, one tends to be
diffident and act clumsily.
- Spirituality:
It
is the area where we seek ‘meaning’, with
questions like ‘for what?’ or ‘for
whom?’ etc. You are a successful person. Yet,
if you don’t find any meaning, you could
suffer depression: a desire not to live.
Build
from deep within
The
deepest level is the level of meaning. If you
don’t find meaning in developing, then you won’t
move and develop! And once you want to develop, that
is, if you have the spirit,
then, you need to check other levels: beliefs,
values, attitudes, ability, activity, and
environment. |
