Neuro-Linguistic Programming

The Science of Achievement

State Management and Anchoring

Have you ever had a day where everything you do seems to go the exact way you wanted it to; a day where you almost felt in a ‘zone’? If you had the ability to enter any state of mind at any time, do you believe you would be able to achieve more?

Generally speaking, most humans like to be in a positive frame of mind with confident and happy feelings. Of course we all have days where we need to feel relaxed, or sometimes even depressed or sad, so many of us however have no idea of how to manage what state we are in to get the most out of our personal resources.
One of the most fantastic concepts in NLP is that it teaches state management. These techniques are designed to allow you to manage the way you are feeling at any given time. Think of all the areas of your life that this could be beneficial. Imagine when looking for a new job or partner if you had the ability to smile at rejection.
A key component to state management is you physiology. Have you ever tried to feel sad or depressed whilst holding your head high and smiling and fast breathing… impossible right? Our physiology greatly affects our state and thoughts. State management could be described in the anagram: STATE:

Stance
Thoughts and
Attitude can
Transform any
Environment

If you are in a position where you need to be highly focused, determined and confident it is essential that you hold your head high, pull your shoulders back, smile and breathe confidently. The best way to learn this style of state management is to practice and take note of your physiology whilst you are in certain states.
Most of us have witnessed the experience of positive thinking, as a result it is well understood that we are all in charge of how we act in certain situations. Your internal dialogue will also negate how you respond to various situations. Have you ever ‘told’ yourself that you feel exhausted? A command to yourself such as this will defiantly send messages to your brain telling your body how to respond. The same case applies to if you feel angry. You can however change how strongly you feel towards a situation by representing your internal dialogue differently. Of course, exhausted and angry are strong words; words that are very likely to command your body into negative beliefs. By changing words such as angry and exhausted to gentler or more amusing words such as peeved and mildly energy drained you can affect how your body will react to those commands. Give it a try yourself. Most of us have words that we use often; words that we know are affecting the way our body functions for us. Try making a list of all the words that you use often that you believe could be affecting your life in a way other than that which you wish. Then make a list of new words that empower or amuse you in some way. Initially you will not use these words all of the time, although the more often you do utilise them, the more they will become part of your innate structure of language. Also take note of how the people around you respond to the various words that you imply; when you make a command, you make it to others as well as yourself. As a result the people that are close to you should begin to react differently to certain situation too.

One of the most effective techniques when it comes to state management is Anchoring.
Anchors are usually triggered through external stimuli. An ‘anchor’ is a stimulus which is linked to and triggers a particular emotional state. Although tending to be external an anchor can be anything. For example, hearing a particular like a piece of music at a wedding can lead to feelings of happiness, whereas the funeral march tends to have sadder semantics. Once anchored you could be anchored for life. Hearing the same music, even years afterwards the original incident will trigger off the same psychological and physical responses.

Anchoring is used on a daily bases for sales and marketing. Everyday thousands of pounds are spent on advertising campaigns that show people having loads of fun and enjoying themselves whilst using a particular product. In the 1980’s Pepsi Cola did an advertising campaign with top entertainer at the time Michael Jackson. Jackson was well known for putting people into a state of happiness by using his music. The campaign anchored people to the product by flashing images of the drink whilst the viewer was ‘in state’. Despite the fact that Jackson made it well known that he despised Pepsi cola sales of the product shot up, due to the future association of whenever the viewer now saw a can of Pepsi the music of Jackson anchored them to feelings of happiness.

Anchors are used everyday in marketing. By understanding more about the way they are used to influence you the more you will learn through observation of external anchors.

Anchors can either be created instantaneously or be created through repetition over time. Even though you may go for many years without experiencing anchoring effects form a stimuli. For example, you may hear your alarm go off every morning, indicating that it is time to get out of bed and go to work. An anchor (pleasant) may be created over time if you enjoy your work that you like getting up when your alarm sounds. You may however have just a single day where you feel ill and tired. From that point on you could begin to anchor the sound of your alarm clock to feelings of tiredness and as a result begin to resent getting out of bed in the morning.

Anchoring can be easy to do. The following is an explanation to help you anchor yourself in positive ways:

Step by step guide to anchoring:
• Select the emotional; state that you wish to have available to you in a chosen situation.
• Once clear, think back to a time when you felt that way
• Ask yourself, what did I see, what did I hear, taste and smell etc. build up a strong a picture as possible.
• Select a kinaesthetic anchor; ideally it should be distinctive and discreet. For example touching your thumb and index finger.
• Select an Auditory anchor, make it specific.
• Select a visual anchor.
• . Once selecting an anchor for each representational system, relive the state you wish to anchor.
• Once you reach peak state make your gesture, see your image and say your words. Timing is everything. Be sure to avoid anchoring in the warm up or cool down period of state

Test and repeat to strengthen.

It is also important to understand the technique ‘dropping the anchor’ if you already have negative anchors which you wish to get rid of.

Collapsing the anchor: the process.
• Identify the problem state, and select an empowering state you would rather experience.
• Create that positive state and determine the physiology needed, then break that state.
• Now summon up the desired state again and anchor it to a particular sound or touch. Again, break that state.
• Test the positive anchor.
• Identify the negative state, and repeat the above, anchoring it with a different sound etc. Break state. You will now have both positive and negative anchors.
• Now, without breaking state go through each state using the anchors.
• Finally, fire off both anchors at the same time. This will cause confusion and should remove the negative anchor before the positive one.

For this procedure to work the positive anchor must be stronger than the negative one. If not, repeat the process again, this time ‘stacking’ the positive anchor. You may also want to contact a specialist to aid you in this technique.

To further aid you in improving you skills in anchoring and state management try completing the following tasks over the next week.

The first task it designed to improve your skills of state management, as well as making you more efficient at recognising the body language of others. The more you become confident you become with recognising the body positions of those around you the better your communication skills will get.

It is inevitable that through out the week you will fell de-motivated, tired or stressed. You first task is to try changing you internal dialogue and body language to change how you feel in particular situations. Take particular note of how you feel and also how those around you respond. The body language of those around you will change to match yours if enough rapport has been gained- this will be a key moment in observing the true potential of NLP.

The second task that you will find beneficial in improving the way you communicate is one that would be to understand that full potential of anchoring. Keep this task personal initially; think of an anchor that is having a negative impact upon your life (such as feeling annoyed when your alarm clock goes off). Keeping to the instructions above attempt to drop the negative anchor and create a new positive anchor in its position. This can be difficult and failure can be expected at first. However, the better your skills in this area the easier you will find it to imply the skills of NLP to your everyday life.

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