target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="#fb3_img_img_252a26e6-c597-5420-bb50-605548efc687.jpg" alt="image"/>| V | visual | seeing |
| A | auditory | hearing |
| K | kinesthetic | feeling |
| O | olfactory | smelling |
| G | gustatory | tasting |
Joy, pleasure, understanding and keenness of thought, everything that makes life worth living comes through your senses.
| ATTENTION |  |
Attention is directed through the senses. By paying attention on the outside, you enrich your thinking. By paying attention on the inside, you become more sensitive to your own thoughts and feelings, more sure of yourself and better able to give your attention to the outside.
External Attention
There is so much that we could be aware of. Our conscious attention is limited to about seven things, but there is much more that we notice unconsciously. NLP grew by modelling – noticing differences that other people had not noticed before, differences that turned out to be significant. NLP pays attention to eye movements, for example. When you study NLP you become aware of eye movements in a way that you never did before, yet they were always there. What else could be out there in your environment that is significant, but as yet unnoticed?
Some things are missed because people favour one sense. You may notice a lot visually, but not listen so much. After talking to someone, you may remember what they looked like very well, but may not be so clear about what they said or their voice tone. You may listen well, but not be so visually acute. After a conversation you may remember what was said and the nuances of voice tone, but not remember so well what the person looked like or what they were wearing. You may pay attention mostly to feeling. You may remember feelings and emotions and intuitions from a conversation, maybe a sense of empathy, but will not be so clear about the details of what was said or what the other person looked like.
The way to develop yourself is to play to your weaknesses. Set aside certain times when you will deliberately pay attention with your weaker senses. It will be uncomfortable, but you will learn more.
If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you always got. And there is always more.
Internal Attention
What are you aware of in your body?
Often we try to blank out signals that we do not like instead of paying attention to them. When you pay attention, you will be able to understand and appreciate yourself on a deeper level. This is part of pacing yourself – simply being aware of your thoughts, feelings, emotions and states without necessarily trying to change them. The more we become aware of our internal world, the more we will appreciate who we are and come to know ourselves.
Systematic internal awareness is called ‘taking a personal inventory’.
| TAKING A PERSONAL INVENTORY | |
What are you mostly aware of?
What feelings do you have in your body?
Feel the connection between all the parts of the body.
Which parts feel at ease and which parts feel uncomfortable?
Do not try to change anything, just notice, without judging.
Look at your mental pictures, if you have any at the moment.
What are the qualities of these pictures? Do they move quickly or slowly or are they still?
Whereabouts in your visual field are they located?
How far away do they seem to be?
Are you talking to yourself?
What sort of voice quality does this have?
Are there any other sounds?
Where do they seem to be coming from?
Do you feel as though you are leaning too far to one side or too far backwards or forwards?
What is your predominant emotion?
Be aware of it without trying to change anything.
An inventory does not try to change anything, only to pay attention internally.
| REPRESENTATIONAL SYSTEMS | |
Just as we see, hear, taste, touch and smell the outside world, so we recreate those same sensations in our mind, re-presenting the world to ourselves using our senses inwardly. We may either remember real past experiences or imagine possible (or impossible) future experience. You can picture yourself running for a bus (remembered visual image) or running down the canals of Mars wearing a Father Christmas outfit (constructed visual image). The first will have happened. The second will not, but you can represent both.
We use our representational systems in everything we do – memory, planning, fantasizing and problem solving. The main systems are as follows.
The Kinesthetic System
This is made up of our internal and external feelings of touch and bodily awareness. It also includes the sense of balance (although in some literature this is treated as a separate representational system – the vestibular system). The emotions
