Trying To Lose Weight, Make Other Changes? There Is A Secret Equation That Guarantees Success

For many people, the street to personal transformation and self-improvement is a long and winding boulevard filled with complex barriers. Drug companies in particular have capitalized on and created colossal fortunes because of the elusive search for the "Magic Pill" that will answer all of your prayers. As it turns out, there is a secret formula for success, and it begins in the subconscious mind.

One of the presuppositions of NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) is that "there is a positive intention behind all behaviors." And based on that rule, when it comes to eliminating negative behaviors, there is an equation that we should keep in mind. I'll let you in on the secret equation in a minute. But I have a riddle for you to solve first.

Riddle: A holy man made his son drink lye, which burned out his vocal chords. What was the positive intention behind this behavior?

If you are like most of the clients who have come into my office since 1978, you'll indignantly say something like: "There isn't any." But you would be 100% incorrect. To answer this riddle, you must separate the behavior from the positive intent of the behavior.

The minister's son was cursing. And the minister believes that if his child curses, his soul will be condemned to Hell. So the answer is that the minister was burning out his son's voice box so that he couldn't curse. By doing so, he was saving his son's soul from being fated to suffer in Hell.

The secret equation for successful change uses NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) and works as follows:

We should always respect the positive intention that motivates each behavior. If we have an impulse to engage in a behavior that we do not appreciate, we can easily get rid of the compulsion to use that behavior. What we need to do is to find a different behavior and substitute it in its place. To be successful, the new conduct must be as available and efficient at accomplishing the same secondary gain, but be more consciously tolerable to you. We call this a REFRAME.

When clients come into my office, one of the first things that I do is to take a methodical case history. Let's imagine that they come to me and ask me to help them overcome their appetite. Conventional wisdom tells us that the two main reasons that anyone eats too much are: (1) to reduce stress; (2) because eating can be a conditioned response. For instance, if a person eats while they are watching TV, they will develop a conditioned response, and thereafter, every time they sit down to watch TV, they'll get cravings and an urge to eat.

However, the above answer only takes into consideration the possible secondary gain received from the eating behavior. What if they also have another behavior that is involved in the equation? For example: What if being fat is also a behavior for this person? I can hear your mind working away right now as you think, "Being chubby isn't a behavior, what are you talking about?"

Sorry but you could be totally off the mark. Here is a classic textbook example that will clearly demonstrate the fact that being chubby can be a behavior. It can be a behavior because it can accomplish positive outcomes.

Example: A woman falls deeply in love. Her partner leaves her, and breaks her heart. Her subconscious wants to protect her emotionally and keep her from ever having her heart broken again. So it motivates her to get chubby to keep her out of relationships. By doing that she won't get her heart broken again.

Everyone is totally different. And sometimes there are subliminal elements at work causing neurotic behaviors. These are elements that are different for each person.

Here is another case: A woman comes into my office complaining of an uncontrollable compulsion to eat way too much at dinnertime. During the case history, upon questioning, the woman explains how she was never able to satisfy her father.

We did an age regression, and one of her early memories was of eating dinner with her family. And her dad was insisting in an authoritive voice that she eat what was left on her plate, even though she was bursting. So she cleaned her plate because of fear, and dad commended her for finishing all of the food. It was one of the only times in her life that she could recall her dad telling her that he was happy with her.

Jump forward to present day. Dad has been dead for years, but the unconscious program he created is still functioning. She still has a compulsion to eat all of the food on her plate, even if she is feeling stuffed to the gills, because by cleaning the plate, in her subconscious she is getting dad's approval, and eliminating her fear!

So if you are finding it difficult to make personal changes, keep in mind that there is a positive intention causing all behaviors. And the formula for successful change is to alternate another behavior that will realize the same secondary gain, but in a mode that is more consciously satisfactory to you, as an individual. The most efficient way to get your subconscious to accept the responsibility for making this kind of change for you is through an NLP 6-Step Reframing Technique.

Article Source: http://www.fitnesshealtharticles.com.

About the Author:
Alan B. Densky, CH is an NLP Practitioner. He began his practice of NLP & hypnosis in 1978. He offers an interactive NLP Six-Step Reframing CD on his Neuro-VISION Hypnosis website. Also available are his Free NLP article library, NLP & hypnosis newsletters and MP3 downloads.