By: Shlomo Vaknin, C.Ht

Making a change is as easy as 1,2,3… 10…

The first and most important lesson I learned in the Hypnotherapy College is this: “Accept and use whatever happens and make it work for your outcome.” Here’s an example of what this means. Let’s say that you’re with a client, and someone interrupts your session. Act as if it was all planned in advance. When you’re a therapist, a coach, a consultant, a motivational speaker, or any other “agent of change,” your outcome is to get the client the outcome he’s paying you to help him achieve. Therefore, anything that happens during the process you two are going through is OK!I have learned this lesson in the Hypnotherapy context, but it applies for NLP change-work as well.

You have to understand, that it is not YOU who is making new understandings for your client, it is your client’s brain that is making them. You are not changing your client’s behavior. Your job is to direct the client’s mind through a certain process and let “it” do the work.

To make NLP work for your client, you must assume that your client’s mind is already in the process of changing that discouraging thought pattern or disabling set of behaviors. Once you assume that, all you have to do is to choose the right pattern, work with your client through that pattern, accept and use whatever happens and make it work for your outcome (sounds familiar?), compare the feedback to the given outcome, and proceed accordingly.

If the feedback and the outcome are aligned, which means the client has achieved what they asked for, then your job is done. If not, you re-evaluate the session, choose a better (or stronger) pattern, perhaps also induce hypnosis in the client to reduce subconscious secondary gain based objections, and you aim for the same outcome again.

But you have to remember to keep a high level of sensory acuity while you’re with the client. Be “out there,” observe, absorb, constantly evaluate the direct and indirect messages coming from the client, and work with whatever it is to facilitate the change your client is paying you for.

Another lesson I learned quite early in my training is that you should never make your client a friend. Yes, of course, you can have social relationships with your clients, but AFTER you’ve done the change-work. It is much better not to accept relatives, close family members or friends as clients, because of many reasons. The main reason is that no matter how well your intentions are, your relationship with them is in the way of their therapy and progress.

On the other hand, it is also not for the client’s benefit if you become friendly with them early on in the sessions. Stay formal. Be the authority they might need to be “commended” and lead, in order to change themselves. Avoid humor in the first session at least, and never ever tell jokes or lose control over the session. You are paid to help the person produce new or renewed results, not to be a comedian or just another friend. Even subconsciously, if the client suspects that your lack of skill is covered by humor and needy behavior, your prospects of success with them will be dim.

Stay focused on one outcome at a time. Don’t spread yourself too thin or work on 10 different issues in one session. Give their mind some time for processing, for re-organizing, for venting, for recovering, for grieving (usual with ex-addicts) and so on. Give them the time to see results from one or two outcomes first, so that when they return to you their motivation and confidence in your skills are high and strong.