Have you ever had a conversation with somebody about a problem or situation you were going through and they say something that completely changes your frame of mind?
Suddenly you feel different about what you were experiencing. Maybe in your mind you told yourself, “I never thought of it that way!”
That’s the power of reframing and in this blog post you are going to discover three different neurolinguistic programing reframe methods that will completely change your life.
What is Reframing?
(No, Reframing isn’t replacing a broken window)
Richard Bandler and John Grinder are the fathers of neurolinguistic programming. They studied three of the world's best therapists, Milton H. Erickson, Virginia Satir, and Fritz Perls, to understand how they achieved the results they were getting.
In their studies, they discovered something called reframing - which is looking at things from a completely different perspective. When you change the perspective you change the meaning. And ultimately, when you change the meaning, you change the emotional response as well.
Curious to learn more? Keep reading!
You probably know somebody in your life who complains about practically everything. Nothing ever goes right and they are stuck in the mode of being the victim. This might be a friend, family member, or heck, maybe this seems a little too familiar and you realize you do this.
Fear not, because there is hope!
The truth is, people who are stuck in a victim mindset are completely unaware that a solution exists. They keep looking for the solution inside of the bubble of their problem, when in reality, the answer they’ve been looking for couldn’t possibly be inside of the bubble. If the solution was inside the bubble, they would have found it already and there wouldn’t be a problem.
Take for example, the story of a woman who was a housewife and had an obsessive compulsion to make sure her house was immaculate, especially the carpets! If she noticed that the carpets had even the slightest showing of being walked on or dirty, she would become so anxious that her anxiety wouldn’t subside until she swept and vacuumed every inch of them. This took up hours of her time and could occur multiple times in a day. She told her therapist about the situation and how it was ruining her life.
The therapist asked the woman to close her eyes and imagine she saw the carpet, completely untouched, puffy and clean. While imagining this, the obsessive housewife started to smile, relax, and looked rather pleased with what she was imagining. Then, the therapist said, “Because of how spotless and untouched the carpet is, you realize that you feel completely alone and the people you love the most are nowhere to be found.” The housewife’s face changed and she felt awful.
Then the therapist said, “Now imagine the carpet has footprints all over it so that you know the people you care about the most, are nearby.” The woman let out a huge sigh of relief and her compulsions over the carpet vanished.
The real problem most people who struggle have, is to see things differently. It isn’t that they don’t want to, it’s that they were never taught how to.
Lucky for you, we’ve got the goods right here, so keep reading to discover 3 incredible reframing techniques that will immediately improve your life.
Reframe #1 - The As If Reframe
Have you ever heard of the phrase, “Fake it till you make it?” What if we told you that there is some truth to that statement?
The ‘As If’ reframe is a unique NLP technique, which allows you to take on a new perspective (reframing) by associating into a resourceful state of someone real or imagined. The reason why the ‘As If’ reframe works is because we often will limit our own behavior and abilities based on the frame of mind that we have in the moment.
If you want to be a good public speaker, for example, acting as if you already are one will give you a much greater advantage than acting as if you are brand new at it. If you already were a good public speaker, how would you stand? What would your posture look like? How would you talk? Would your voice be meek and quiet or would you speak powerfully and confidently?
Olympic athletes, motivational speakers, and a wide array of other inspirational people use this technique to “get in the zone,” and it’s much easier than you think.
Here are the steps:
- Imagining someone directly in front of you who already has the skill sets you want. It can be a role model, a parental figure, an actor, a superhero, whoever. You can imagine them as a hologram, a mist, or whatever you feel is appropriate.
- Build them up in your mind. Imagine them doing the thing you want flawlessly. Notice their posture, their appearance, the way they are dressed. Have them use the talent or skill that you want.
- Now physically step into that person where they are. Breathe deep and feel what it’s like to be them. How do you stand? How do you move? What gives you confidence? Take those resources with you.
In our experience, it is much easier to perform at your best when you feel your best. Taking on the As If reframe will greatly enhance your performance in many different aspects of your life.
Reframe #2 - The Failure To Feedback Reframe
Earlier we mentioned that a vast majority of people were never taught how to overcome being stuck in their limited mindset. When it comes to receiving criticism, whether at school, work, or at home, often a person will tend to take on the words of the critic as though they have failed in some way.
Another awesome NLP reframing technique is the Failure to Feedback reframe. This shift in perspective will help you get out of the mindset of “losing” and instead begin to consider what is being told to you as data.
In other words, if you constantly focus on failure, you’ll end up spending your time thinking in phrases like, “Why did I do that?” “I’m such a loser” or “This always happens to me..” When in reality, it would be much more beneficial to focus on the lesson.
One of the key elements to changing failure into feedback is to label what is being said to you as information rather than judgement. Instead of focusing on the inflection, tone, and emotional component of what is being said, place your attention on the words being used.
It might help to dissociate from the situation as well. This simply means to imagine you are viewing a critical conversation as though you are sitting on a park bench or standing off to the side, listening in with curiosity.
What can you learn from the data that is given to you? Is there a lesson here? Is there any truth to the information you are receiving?
When you separate yourself emotionally from the information being given, you open yourself up to the possibility of learning something new and improving.
Reframe #3 - The Problem To Solution Reframe
The last reframe is one of the most important reframe techniques because it will help you orient the way you think and the specific language you use.
What do we mean by that?
We like to think of the human brain as a big organic search engine. You can recall information, remember steps in a certain order, and if you ask yourself questions, you’ll get answers!
More often than not, people who are stuck in the wrong frame of mind are keeping themselves there because of the types of questions they ask themselves. Simply put, there is a single word when asking yourself questions that will all-but guarantee you will stay stuck in the problem state.
That word is: Why
Now, don’t get us wrong here, why is an awesome word when you are wanting to find evidence of something. If you want to know what happens to make the sky blue, then asking, “Why is the sky blue?” makes a lot of sense.
If however you are wanting to become smarter, asking yourself, “Why am I so stupid?” will send your brain on a mission to find the evidence.
Instead, it’s much more beneficial to ask yourself questions using two types of processing words: What and How.
In the same case of wanting to become smarter, asking yourself, “What will I do to become smarter?” or “How will I become smarter, today?” will serve you better than asking, “Why am I so dumb?”
As a bonus, we also recommend you use Will instead of Can when asking yourself questions. ‘Can’ gives you the recipe or steps, ‘Will’ implies you’ll put the steps or recipe into action.
Read more about this here: Power Language Secrets for Excellent Results
So You Want To Learn More Ways To Improve Your Life
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Inside the Mike Mandel Hypnosis Academy, you’ll discover methods of helping other people to overcome their own stuck states, as well as ways to help others overcome stress, manage their weight, or make pain disappear. With the Mike Mandel Hypnosis Academy, you’ll gain access to monthly guest trainings, a private community of like-minded hypnotists, and have the opportunity to become fully certified as a hypnotist.
With NLP Essentials, you’ll learn techniques to unlock your confidence, access powerful resourceful states, and upgrade your emotional responses, all from the comfort of your home. NLP Essentials contains short, bite-sized videos that are easy to understand, and in just about 6-hours, you can become really good at using neurolinguistic programming.
