Just before he blows the coming of the new day on his trumpet, I meet Atmo on top of the hill above the camp. I enter the Geodesic Dome which colorful coverings make it stands out from miles, to hear him play the army’s reveille. It started as a joke and that’s why I liked it as an idea, he says, while I can’t help but laughing when listening the tune has been concrete connected with the daily commencement of military life’s tolls, inside a dome dressed in a kind of psychedelic camouflage, in a meditation center. No one’s rushing to get washed, no stress exploding in the atmosphere, no commotion disturbing the peaceful dawn due to a trumpet. Yes, some people have changed the side on which they’re sleeping.
What I like in moments like this, is that I can watch how the elements that create the “map” of a world are mapping across with those of another world. Like one of an army camp with these of a meditation one. I find that in moments like this a door to deeper yet fresher understanding of like can occur. And because I can examine the thing that are made for the purpose of inducing very certain behaviors, in an automatic way, bypassing the critical mind. Like the trumpet’s reveille. In NLP we call these things anchors. A sign, a cue that is wired in a certain way in our brain to elicit a specific behavior. If I use the name Pavlov to give you an example, in essence I apply an anchor that will make you recall the required information from your brain in order to make sense of what I’m saying. A lot of these action are based in our “primitive” parts of the brain. Evolution has programed us to fire off the instinct of fight or flight in front of certain shapes or colors or combinations of those. It hasn’t programed this in the areas of the critical mind but in those where decisions are taken in such a fat, automatically way so as survival is ensured. It has frequently occurred to me, in my excursions in nature, that I suddenly enter an emergency state in the view of a tubular shape with stripes. Immediately after I feel stupid that I jumped back like this in front of some branch or leaves that created an illusion but I don’t feel bad about it. In the case that this was a real snake –which has happened to me- my reaction could pretty well save my life.
Our everyday lives are full of anchors. Valuable in order to navigate our world and at the same time a burden, when it comes to the things we consider as unwanted outcomes of our actions and behaviors. To better understand what I’m saying, next time you come to realize that the way you communicate with the world brings unwanted for you results, just take a moment to watch what is happening. Are you entering in an automatic behavior (reacting instead or responding)? Bring your awareness in this moment, watching without judging. What was this that triggered the reaction that led to the unwanted outcome? For example, what was it that made you lose temper which resulted the breaking of communication with the beloved person or made you shrink while trying to claim something from your boss, which resulted not getting it? A certain tone of voice maybe? An image in your head that seems to overwhelm you or one that brings your temperature up and stresses your nerves? Or is it that you “read” in an automatic way the expressions in the face of the one you’re talking with, according to certain patterns that correspond to your own perception of the world?
The last one is just one of numerus examples of anchoring that we do. We are constantly trying to mind read the psychological disposition of others from their face expressions and voice tone, among others. It is one of the characteristics of what makes us so successful in navigating the world. That is, when what we guess fits or comes close to what the other person is actually experiencing. But when the reaction activated by your guessing brings an unwanted outcome, then it is time to abandon the crystal ball and start shedding some light to the anchor, the automatic pilot that fires off the unwanted reaction. So to make the necessary arrangements or better to train your unconscious mind to make all these arrangements with its deep wisdom. It is something that we can train ourselves to do, so that we start to understand the way in which we operate. The first and maybe the most important step towards self-improvement, the way to live better lives. To taste the fruits of being present in the moment, living our ideals, unfolding our true potential.
A lot of people thinks NLP has to do with the mind. But then again a lot of people think that meditation is about having a stupid smile in your face all the time. In meditation, I find the practical human science, one that bypasses the analytical mind. And NLP, for me, to make my mind a tool of awareness and to have choices rather than automatic operations or dilemmas. So that I can bring the wanted situations and changes in my life. To live and interact with life instead of reacting in an automatic way. In this way, it is not by chance that I came in contact with NLP in a meditation center. Neither is by chance that I talk about it on the occasion of a trumpeter in a colorful Dome.
During winter time, while I’m running up and down to catch up with the job and projects, in some moments where I feel the burdens are just about to bring me down, often I recall Osho Afroz in my mind. By doing this, an image is constructed in mind, where I see myself there. I see myself in the picture, which by being big, bright and colorful it creates a feeling of longing to make it a reality. This is one of the way I encourage myself to keep going. Having the belief that by having a few months in this place is the best thing I can do for myself, I produce a strong motivation to make these connections in my mind. The point here is that for the anchors to work effectively, they need to be connected with the positive intention and belief that lead to the wanted behavior. This is where the motivation and the essence that makes the anchor work comes from. In this way I create in my mind the suitable stimulus –images, voices, sensations- that help me make my wishes to manifest in the world. For sure you do the same or similar thing regardless if you are aware of it or not. The question is if there are areas in your life in which you prefer to have a conscious choice on how things work.
We have a limited conscious mind, paired with an unlimited unconscious one. At the same time, our experience for the world out there is created in our brains. We don’t really know if there is something out there or if it is all a creation of our minds. But we know –and this is one of the basic principles of NLP- that what happens in our brain doesn’t necessarily stick to what other people understand as reality. When certain stimulus appear that in some way we have connected so that they fire off certain behaviors, ones that apparently had a usefulness when they were installed but we currently characterize them as unwanted, that’s where we need to take action in order to change these connections.
Some of the most exciting examples of anchors are found in the common expressions that we use in everyday communication. Here in Greece, when we want to encourage, excite the people around us for the realizing of a new plan, we often use the expression “pull the anchors!” For someone that hasn’t see the sea in his life, this doesn’t make any sense. But in the context of a civilization that comes from a nation of seamen, expressions like this one connect and activate the “cultural genome”, directly inducing feelings of joy, excitement, anticipation for the wonderful adventure that lies up ahead. From all these examples I believe it’s clear that working with anchors isn’t about learning something new. It is rather about learning to use the tools that we already unconsciously use, in a conscious way.
Rituals are anchors. The army, religion, are full of them. Uniforms are very strong anchors, in inducing certain states and behaviors to those who wear them, as well as to those who come in contact with them. Very often we see athletes, every time before starting to compete, to repeat a certain move or the like. We say it is their good luck thing but essentially it is a ritual that anchors the athlete to the desired psychological state from which comes the optimum performance. It is not about luck or about compensating for not having to do hard work. It is about connecting to the state of maximum performance that comes from the athlete working real hard in his training. The thing is that we see these things so often in front or our eyes that we tend to dismiss their outmost importance.
So how can we use these things to our advantage? There are numerous ways. Here’s an example that we have seeing in the cinema many times. Our hero is on the threshold of a life changing ordeal. We see him alone in a room, talking to himself in front of a mirror. As he addresses to his reflection, the scene is building up the feeling to a climax that will bring him out there to his accomplishment. No matter how inconvenient it might seem to you in the beginning, speaking to yourself in front of the mirror or during the course of your day activities. It is actually a proven method of self-coaching, of setting your cognitive abilities in focus, in clearing your mind from useless thoughts and making it serve you in the best way. Just remember, like our hero in the film, the essence here lies on the feeling, the psychological state of being in which you want to enter. The anchors themselves, looking at yourself in the mirror, listening to your own voice coaching you or whichever else, are not the purpose but the means that will brings you in the desired psychological state which is the best for achieving whatever it is that you are on to. Logical thinking on its own cannot bring the desired states and changes in you that you wish, unless it comes in communication and agreement with the unconscious mind. And this has to do with incorporating feelings and the whole body.
Just the other day, I heard a voice from a television commercial saying “when you hear the name (the company’s name) you are thinking (the quality that the advertiser wants us to think). So, this person just tried to implant an anchor in me, which will fire off when I come in front of the certain product, making me feel a non-logical impulse to buy it? I believe that the deeper understanding of our mind we get, the more we bring to our conscious the choices of a dignified and full of integrity human being. Do we wish to be the waif of each advertiser or politician or anyone that thinks can treat us as a Pavlov’s dog or do we prefer to have the option to use our brain’s abilities to our benefit and by our own choices? When you come to realize that you can enter a certain psychological state when you wish to, as long as you have cared to install an anchor that will take you there, isn’t this something in which you want to have conscious choice on? Let’s say I want to have the quality of self-confidence in something that I am about to venture in the future. I can coach myself in being able to induce myself in this state of confidence. I can do this by bringing in my mind the memory of an experience in which I was fully in this state of confidence. I’m bringing in my mind the images, sounds, sensations that are connected with that experience and induce this feeling in me. Then, as I’m feeling the confidence building up in my body, reaching a climax, I create a cue, a sensory stimulation with which I am going to connect the feeling of confidence from now on. For example, I can press my index and middle fingers of the right hand at the middle of my left arm. I’m taking care to press while I’m feeling the wanted state climaxing. In this way I’m imprinting it with the most effective way. Additionally I can use a word or phrase or imagine a certain color in my mind that I connect to the feeling. Or, instead of pressing with my fingers, I can create a small ritual or connect the feeling with a piece of music that I love and connects me to it. Whatever feels to me that can benefit me in the best way in this situation.
In an article like this I can’t go in to lot of details and thoroughly analyze techniques. My goal here is to give you an understanding of the basic elements on how anchors work, as well as some ideas on how to incorporate them in your life. Before closing the article, here are my idea about two of the most powerful and universal anchors. The first is…hugging. It is scientifically proven that a 20 second hug can provoke the excretion of dopamine and other, so called, happiness hormones. I believe that this is anchored to the time when we were feeling safe in the arms of our mother. But anyway it comes from, we can all benefit from this to connect ourselves with happiness and bliss. I know it feels awkward because that is how I felt the first time I did an extended hug –without doing or saying anything, just being present- but I can assure you that it is absolutely amazing and life changing! My second idea is that the most universal and powerful anchor ever is…our own breath. Breathing has a direct way, when we use it in a conscious way, to connect us to the present time and space. There are numerous techniques out there on things we can do with our breaths, to be present, to heal ourselves, to come to a level of emotional intelligence where we use our feelings instead of them using us. But the thing with breathing is that we don’t necessarily have to learn a technique, even though it really helps. Because breathing is always here. It just takes a choice of consciousness in using, then breathing knows what to do to benefit us.
I hope you found this article interesting and useful. If so, feel free to share it and to subscribe to my blog in order to receive notifications. The most important of all, use what you learn to bring light and love to yourself and the world!
References:
For the Geodesic Dome: Facebook- Dome Kabisia
https://youtu.be/J66jxZj5oFE
Atmo: http://www.atmomusic.com/
Osho Afroz: oshoafroz.com
No comments:
Post a Comment