One of these directions will feel right when they think about their feeling. From this, people typically get the idea that it is moving ever so minimally. The fact that it’s moving means that you can move it faster, you can move it slower, you can move it forwards and you can move it backwards. Our feelings are not outside of our control. In fact, this is the very thing most of us need to gain control of because, when you do, you can alter it.
The qualities of your thoughts, these submodalities, determine how your thoughts affect you. When you make big movies of things that you are associated with, generally, the feeling will be more intense. When you make the movie smaller and move it, disassociated, into the distance, the feeling will be smaller. We can also learn how to use our control over submodalities to manifest the kinds of feelings we need when we need them. I like to call this running your own brain.
RUNNING YOUR OWN BRAIN Changing Neurochemistry
One of my main focuses in the work that I’ve done has been discovering ways to help people achieve what I call Personal Freedom. Personal Freedom means having the freedom to be able to control your thoughts and to manifest the kinds of feelings you want in your life.
We are often imprisoned by the chains of our thoughts and we allow ourselves to think ourselves into problems. However, since most problems are created by our imagination and are thus imaginary, all we need are imaginary solutions. So, here are some effective ways of controlling your thinking for a change.
Think of a time when you felt really good and then start playing around with the qualities of the images, sounds and feelings. By changing these submodalities, you get to intensify the feelings.
For example, think of a time when you felt really, really good. Now, step inside that time and see through your eyes, hear through your ears, and feel the really good feeling all the way through your body. Make the images bigger, brighter, more colorful and you’ll probably find yourself feeling even better. Make the sounds louder and crisper and if there are no sounds, add sounds. Start to intensify the good feeling.
Next, find out where in your body the feeling starts and where it goes. Discover the direction it spins inside your body and spin it faster and faster and, again, notice your feelings intensify. There lies the control you have over your brain to create powerful feelings inside of you.
You can then attach these feelings to other thoughts. If you keep spinning this feeling inside your body and you think about your future while it’s spinning, you will start to associate the feeling with your future. By doing this, you will start to feel better about your future.
How to Feel Wonderful
1 Think of a time you felt wonderful.
2 Close your eyes and imagine that time in vivid detail. See the image clearly, hear the sounds loudly, remember the feelings like they were then.
3 Imagine yourself stepping into that experience and imagine being in that memory as if it’s happening now. See what you’d see, hear what you’d hear, feel how good you’d feel. Make the colours stronger and make it brighter if that helps. Notice how you were breathing back then and breathe that way now.
4 Pay attention to the wonderful feeling in your body and get a sense of where the feeling starts, where it goes and the direction it moves in. Imagine taking control over the feeling and spinning it faster and faster and stronger and stronger through your body as the feelings increase.
5 Think of a time in the future where you could use these good feelings. Spin these feelings throughout your body as you think about the future and the things you are doing over the next few weeks. Don’t be too surprised if you find yourself feeling really good for absolutely no reason.
Similarly too, if you find yourself in a negative or unresourceful state, you can change it by changing the qualities of the feeling.
For example, think about somebody who annoys you, intimidates you or irritates you. Make an image of them and see them look at you in whatever way they look at you when they are annoying you. Hear them say whatever it is that they say and notice the bad feeling that happens in your body.
Next, take this image and make it black and white. Move it far off into the distance. Make it much smaller, one eighth its size. Place a clown’s nose on their face. Hear them say whatever it is that they say but hear them say it in Mickey Mouse’s, Donald Duck’s, or Sylvester the Cat’s voice. This changes the feeling that you have towards them and allows you to deal with them with more confidence and effectiveness.
Changing Bad Feelings
1 Think about somebody who annoys you, intimidates you, or irritates you. Make an image of them and see them look at you in whatever way they look at you when they are annoying you. Hear them say whatever it is that they say and notice the bad feeling that happens in your body.
2 Take this image and make it black and white. Move it far off into the distance. Make it much smaller, one eighth its size. Place a clown’s nose on their face.
3 Hear them say whatever it is that they say but hear them say it in Mickey Mouse’s, Donald Duck’s, or Sylvester the Cat’s voice.
4 Notice how you feel differently. Then distract yourself for a few moments and think of them again. You will still be feeling differently about them.
When you practice using your brain in this way, you will find yourself feeling really good a lot more often. This is all about developing new mental habits and skills and making it so that you get used to mentally running your brain the way you choose to run it.
The next element that I want to cover is the process of dealing with beliefs.
BUILDING NEW BELIEFS The Structure of Certainty
One of the most important aspects of what human beings do is that they build beliefs. Beliefs are what trap most people in their problems. Unless you believe you can get over something, get through something, or get to something, there is little likelihood that you will be able to do it. Your beliefs refer to your sense of certainty on some of your thoughts.
Most people listen to their parents, teachers, and authority figures from an early age and learn lots of limitations that they supposedly have. If you were told that you were not clever enough or not good enough at a subject or at a sport, the danger is that you believed it. As soon as we believe in something, we search for ways to prove it’s true. What we are looking for here is to learn to doubt your limitations and be more certain in what is possible for you.
In order to create any change, it’s necessary to help the person change their beliefs and build new beliefs that will allow them to maintain the change into the future. In order to change beliefs, we first need to learn a way of finding out the qualities of beliefs.
Once again, this is where submodalities come in useful. Like any thought, our beliefs have a structure in terms of their qualities. If I were to ask you, Do you believe the sun is coming up tomorrow?, what would your response be? Typically people immediately answer, Yes but there is an intervening process. In order
