Today in my Facebook group I have a guest speaker talking about her My Mood Stars which are used my parents and teachers to encourage emotional literacy in children from the youngest age. We are used to using emoticons in our messages and social media posts and these small squidgy faces are brilliant for children because without having to use words, they can recognise the emotion and show mummy and daddy what they are feeling. Many takes Sleepy star to bed with them or snuggle up with Sad Star. You can play games with them, hiding them or asking children to name the emotion and Wendy has written lovely books to accompany the Mood Stars. 

But how do we get our mood in the first place? 

Here's a diagram showing the NLP Communication model. 

Let's start with the 'external event' this is something you see , hear or feel, touch, taste or smell. 

That experience has to be filtered otherwise we'd be in 'overdrive' all the time trying to figure out how we feel about it. So we 'generalise' by comparing it to other similar events we've experienced, maybe deciding that whatever it is doesn't matter because 'mummy always says that'. We 'delete', pay more attention to certain parts of the event (the parts that matter to us) and we 'distort' which means that we make a belief or a decision based on the event that may or may not be a fair representation such as 'mummy loves my sister more than me' or 'my brother is mean'. 

Other filters are called metaprogrammes and these are ways we prefer to process the information; maybe we like to have choices but we aren't given one so that makes us cross. Maybe we like to know the detail about the homework assignment but we've just been given an essay title so we are confused and don't know what to do. You can read all about these in my book 'Understanding children and teens' see the link below. 

After all this filtering, each child will create their own internal representation of what that even means to them. This will be unique to them based on their filtering and also their previous experiences and memories of similar events. 

From there they express a physiology and that is where the mood stars come in, this will be a facial expression and a body stance. 

This then morphs into a behaviour and this becomes the next external event. And so it goes on. 

The kids have gone back to school and you're so proud of the way they've handled it. So you want to tell them so. Maybe you say "I'm so proud of you" or "You've done so well" but wait! What do they take from this? 

In order for feedback to be effective, it needs to be labelled. By this I mean, imagine your child's mind is like a filing cabinet. There are a number of folders in there. Each one is labelled with one of the values you want your child to espouse; family values. These might be: perseverance, being brave, kindness, honest, sharing, generous, sensible and so on. In order for children to understand what these are and live by these values, they need examples. So when you give feedback to them you need to tell them which folder it belongs in. With folders full of examples, it's easier for them to repeat that behaviour you want to see more of. So you'd say "You were brave today when you ....(give precise example such as, when you walked in and waved me goodbye). "  or "I noticed that even though you looked a bit nervous you persevered." "That was kind of you to show Max where to go.".

We've all heard of the feedback sandwich and this is the way we help children by cushioning the feedback between two positive statements so they receive both the good response from us as parents but gently contained within it is our feedback as to what they could do more of or less of next time. Although this can be delivered as a question, "how do you think you can make this even better next time?". 

Here is a list of tips for delivering feedback.

Feedback to children needs to be

1)Immediate – there’s no point in spending days thinking about it and then expecting them to remember what they did. Children have very short memories and will have forgotten what they did, what they did it and wonder why you’re talking about it days later.

2)Specific – you need to draw their attention to the specific thing they did or said and what exactly they need to do more of or less of because they won’t be able to read your mind. They need to know what you want from them.

3)Sincere – the feedback needs to reflect what you think and what you believe and be something they can see is of value to you. Use ‘I’ to show that it is what you think and don’t bring other people into it. It doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks. Keep this between you and your child.

4)Short – avoid long sentences and lengthy explanations about why you feel like this it isn’t helpful. Use the KISS principle – keep it simple stupid.

5)What you do want – avoid the word ‘don’t’ tell them instead what you want them to do; either more of something or less of something.

6)Avoiding the word ‘but’ because your positive start will be forgotten once you use the word ‘but’. Replace it with the word ‘and’.

7)Accepting because you are not a mind reader so don’t presume to know what their intentions were. Instead give them the benefit of the doubt and look for their positive intention. For the most part, children want to please you but their map of the world is different to yours with other more pressing priorities such as playing!
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8)Focused on the behaviour rather than being a personal attack on their identity.

I want to share with you a number of ways you can tackle anxiety for yourself and help your children and teens.
 
1. You are brave
 
Anxious children are not anxious all the time in every situation, although they often believe they are. I’ve even had children arrive for an appointment announcing that they are anxious as if it’s their name! ‘Hello I’m anxious’. When they are like this, they expect to be anxious and it becomes their norm such that they don’t even notice the times when they are not. They delete that evidence and simply talk about all the times they are anxious because those examples fit their persona. I’ve had children who when something happens at school to make them anxious, they consciously think to themselves ‘I must remember to tell Mum when I get home’ even though it might have just been fleeting. But think, they’re dwelling on it all day as they want to remember it to recount when they get home.
 
If you think your child might be doing this, start to pay more attention to when they were brave. Ask them when they get home from school “when were you brave today?” and they will start to look out for examples of this during the day and think about those positive experiences instead ready to tell you when they get home.
 
Imagine how different their day will be and how this new pattern will start to make changes in their neural pathways!
 
2. Create a brave anchor 

Continuing on this theme and remembering that the word you’re focusing on does not have to be ‘brave’ it could be ‘confident’ or ‘calm’ the important thing is that you are focusing on the positive desired state rather than the state you don’t want. It’s called ‘towards thinking’ and we are taking responsibility for the outcome we want and putting it out in our energy field as in The Law of Attraction (which children totally ‘get’).
 
So how do we create an anchor?
 
When your child does the thing they want to do more of, decide on a sign that will mark it out so a thumbs up sign perhaps. Encourage them to use that sign each time they experience that positive state. After a while that becomes associated with it such that when they need to find that positive state, by using the sign they can instantly create it.
 
3. Five finger breathing
 
Hold your left hand up and use your index finger on your right hand to trace up the side of your left hand and gently run the finger up and down each finger of your left hand , finishing with your thumb. As you go up one side of the finger, breathe in and as you go down the other side, breathe out. Now go back round repeating the action until you arrive back at the base of your little finger.
Breathing is a very effective way to change state. Your breath affects every part of your body and increases the oxytoxin as you take in more oxygen and breathe out more carbon dioxide.
 
4. Colour breathing
 
What is the colour of your child’s anxiety? That might sound a strange question but actually they will be able to answer it quite easily.
 
Ask they to breathe out that colour from wherever they hold their anxiety in their body, often the chest or stomach area.
 
What colour would they like to breathe in? What does that colour represent to them? It might be a colour for ‘calm’ or for ‘relaxing’, for ‘confident’ or just ‘being ok’. If they don’t know what the colour represents that doesn’t matter. The idea is that they breathe in a colour to ‘lighten and brighten’ the anxiety, whatever colour they choose is right.
 
5. Visualisation 

Sometimes when children get stuck in a rut of anxiety, it becomes difficult to see another way. So ask them to visualise a positive outcome. Ask them to imagine what they’d like instead. I like the phrase “What would you like to have happen?” This gets them out of the rut to consider other options.
 
It often helps to suggest they look up when they are imagining as this connects us to the visual part of our brain. It also takes us out of our feelings which may be negative. When we look down we can become a bit reflective and by looking up it encourages us to have new more positive ideas.
 
6. EFT Tapping 

I teach my clients how to tap when they feel anxious. I also run free children’s tapping groups only via the Time to Tap Facebook group. Do join us! There’s one for children, one for teens and one for mums and dads.
 
7. Gratefulness Diary 

When children go to bed recording three things they are grateful for on that day, they find it easier to get to sleep, are less likely to wake up during the night with worrying thoughts about the day ahead and feel more positive when they wake up in the morning.
 
Some children like to write them down but it isn’t necessary so long as they ask themselves before they settle for the night ‘what are the three things I’m grateful for today?’.
 
8. Mindfulness 

I expect your child has learnt mindfulness at school. There are plenty of great mindfulness youtube videos, apps and downloadable scripts. I like the basic Body Scan as it’s so easy to do and children seem to like it. Get in touch if you’d like me to send you the MP3 or talk you through it.
 
9. Self – Compassion break 

Put your hands on your chest and tune in to how you feel
 
“I feel……………..”
 
Then stretch out both hands in front of you and say
 
“Children all over the world are feeling this right now”
 
Then take your hands back to your chest and say
 
“And what I need now is……………”
 
This is a great way for children to realise that they are part of a universe of children all over the world who are feeling just like them. They aren’t alone. It also encourages them to become aware of their needs. Maybe they need a hug, a glass of milk, to say sorry, to have some quiet time.
 
10. A mindfulness jar 

Take an empty glass jar and put some water in it. Now take a selection of different colour glitters. Tell your child to imagine that each colour represents a feeling. Ask them to out as much of each feeling into the jar as they have. They are to name the feeling as they put the glitter in the jar.
 
When they have finished. Put on the lid and shake the jar.
 
Explain that this is like their head full of all sorts of thoughts ; angry thoughts, sad thoughts, frustration, envy, jealousy and so on. They get all jumbled up and agitated. But when you sit quietly and watch, they all gradually settle on the bottom of the jar and the water becomes clear. When we are calm and still and wait, our bad thoughts settle and we can soon feel clear again.
 
If you have a child who is experiencing anxiety at the moment please get in touch and we can have a chat. I charge £50 for a 45 minute EFT Tapping session or £85 for a one hour therapy session. The Time to tap group tapping sessions I mentioned earlier , are free.
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Some people thrive on choice and enjoy the element of selecting from a number of options, whether it be what to wear, what to buy, what to cook or eat or even what to say but others prefer to just pick something and go with it. In NLP terms we call it choices or process to indicate that those who don’t like choices want to work their way down a list of task as a process rather than branching off or pausing to make decisions. It isn’t really a bipolar scale, these are just the two ends of it.

“Having just one choice is no choice at all. The more choices you have, the more freedom you have to be in the driving seat of your car.” Steve Bannister

“The whole point of NLP is having more choice.” Richard Bandler

“You’re not just a leaf on the wind.” Anthony Robbins

“We are making hundreds, thousands even millions of unconscious choices every day about what we pay attention to and what we don’t. And this is fine, provided those choices work for us. However, if we are not getting the results we want, we can learn to make new choices until we find what does work.” Sue Knight

“Identifying, acknowledging, examining, and employing our parts, rules, and inner wisdom help us transform our internal process and deal with present circumstances. By removing our self-made limits, we expand our choices.” Virginia Satir

There may be situations in which you want choice, when you go out for a meal perhaps or in the boutique but in the rush of the morning you may prefer not to spend ages choosing what to wear or what to eat for breakfast. This means that you will be sliding up and down the scale depending on the situation. However, being aware of whether you want a choice or not can be helpful. If as you think about the situation presenting itself you decide whether choices will help or hinder the process you will work more efficiently. This is particularly the case when working with others.
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In a family situation it is very important to make it clear to your children what are options and which are not. There has been a growing trend to encourage children to make choices even at a very young age, whether to drink out of a red mug or a blue one, whether to wear this or that dress. This is inclined to make children capricious as they assume they can make decisions about everything which isn’t of course the case and can lead to some very lengthy preparations for leaving the house! You need to prepare your children for accepting your decisions and make it clear when they can choose and when it isn’t possible or appropriate. You can signal this by asking ‘would you like to choose?’ when there is a choice.

In the family you would similarly offer false choices to children who want choice so “would you like to do your homework with a cup of tea or a glass of milk?” Note that not doing homework wasn’t an option! Also, with ‘like’ and ‘homework’ close together in the sentence you are giving them a slightly hypnotic connection which might not have been present for them.

First decide on your compelling outcome. What end result do you want from the discussion or negotiation? What will you concede and what is non-negotiable? Simply going through this process has a remarkably calming effect and puts you in the driving seat. If for example the pick-up time is non-negotiable you can give them a choice of how they come home, with whom and by what means of transport. If the time you have to leave for the school run is non-negotiable give them a choice about getting dressed before or after breakfast or whether to wear a jumper or not, whether they need to give their shoes a clean.

There is always a choice, not just in terms of the ‘how’ but also a choice in how you ask. You can speak in rapport, using your child’s preferred language pattern – visual, auditory or kinaesthetic. If they are talking about what they don’t want e.g. “I don’t want to put on my shirt” mention something you don’t want in order to match them “and I don’t want to be late for the bus.” If they say ‘yes but’ or ‘no’ this is a mismatch pattern which you can still match for rapport by using the same pattern ‘yes but homework needs to be done first’ or ‘no, it has to be done first, then TV.

Learning about NLP means that we have choices based on more knowledge about ourselves and how we see our world and a better understanding of the other person’s world. We can then choose how we want to communicate with them.

Find out more about the NLP metaprogrammes and about how to apply NLP principles and techniques in your parenting. Maybe you'd like to talk with me about becoming an NLP Kids Practitioner yourself or learning about how to combine NLP with your existing job in teaching or other child-related work.  

As parents or teachers, carers of children, you have a very important role to play in giving them feedback. Feedback is a gift of love that shows you care about them and have an investment in their personal development. Can there be anything worse than being ignored? Children need to know that you’re paying attention to them and they want to know where they need to make changes because that’s your job as a parent, to guide them so they can achieve all they can in life. 

The giving and receiving of feedback is how we learn. At its simplest level a stand-up comedian will adapt his programme constantly to suit his audience with more of what they are clapping and cheering and less of what gets no reaction. We need to be a bit like the stand-up comedian and notice where we get a connection with our children when they do what we asked and being resourceful. When they are not we need to use feedback to get them back on track. We need to constantly be open and curious to what is working and getting a result, the result we want anyway! We are getting feedback from them and giving them feedback, it is a constant flow of energy and learning. 

Many people feel that they learn more from their mistakes than from successes. In fact, apparently pupils who struggled with maths at school become excellent maths teachers because they understand how to get it wrong. As parents we can be inclined to jump in and do things for our children, take responsibility for organising them and their free time, even decide when and where homework should be done. Allowing children to take responsibility from an early age means that they will make mistakes and our job is to allow them to do that and let them get the learning so that the next time they do it, they do it better. Encourage them to be curious because that is how children learn, by wanting to know more and to understand rather than being told.

Feedback is how they learn whether that is feedback in terms of a bad mark at school or school report, losing a tennis match or football game, losing a friend, missing the miss, getting a detention for homework not completed correctly; these are all feedback from which they will learn how to improve and get a better result. When these sort of things happen to children let them get the feedback rather than believing that unless you tell them they won’t know.

When we aren’t introduced to feedback as learning we can find ourselves taking it as criticism and becoming defensive or we feel a failure and lose self-esteem. You can show your children how to respond to feedback by how you demonstrate it yourself. The best way to show them how to respond is to pause, be curious about the learning and thank the giver of the feedback. 

Encourage children to give themselves feedback. We all, even children, have a nagging little inner voice that gets cross and tells us off but it needs to learn how to give feedback in a way that we can learn from it, not feel permanently stupid and lose confidence.
Here’s how to do it:
a)What specifically went well today? (3 things)
b)What could have been better? (1 thing)
c)How could I do that better next time?
d)Overall, what lessons have I learnt? 

 You can find more about feedback and tips for homeschoolers on my Facebook group and I've recorded several videos that talk about how to apply these NLP principles at a practical level. You'll find them on my You Tube channel

Kinaesthetics learn by doing, they need to physically experience the learning because they are active full body learners. You’ll see them fidgeting in classrooms when they have to sit still for long periods and they need to take a break regularly to run about and stretch. They’re usually quite sporty and in touch with their body and how it feels so they will be quite tactile and sensitive to the heat and cold. They will also be quite expressive. 

“If they are kinaesthetic, slow waaay dooown . Talk to them about feelings. Change your pace so that it matches theirs, and really get a feel for what they are communicating.” Terry Elston
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“What I hear, I forget. What I see, I remember. What I do, I understand.” Confucious 

Characteristics of kinaesthetic are that they will be active speakers and listeners and use facial expression, hand and body gestures and will fiddle and fidget when talking rather than the stiller pose of the auditory student. They refer to their ‘gut feelings’ and ‘being in touch’ with their feelings and may respond more emotionally to events than one might expect. Comfort and bodily temperature is important to them so extremes of heat and cold are not endured easily. It is important to them to be comfortable in their own skin, wear clothes that are comfortable rather than ones that look good (visual). Furniture is also bought for comfort rather than style.

They want to get ‘stuck in’ and do rather than watch or be told. It’s all about involvement physically and mentally. Given a new piece of equipment, rather than read the instructions they’ll just work it out for themselves by trial and error. They will get themselves from A to B by what feels like the right route rather than read a map or listen to the satnav. They will be conscious of atmosphere and want to be in rapport because not to be would feel so uncomfortable.

Physically they are very active and will want to stand much closer to you than you may be comfortable with but don’t move away as this will break rapport. They may want to touch your elbow or arm as you’re chatting and they will probably hug and kiss on greeting and leaving. They talk slowly , even slower than an auditory person and tend to look down as they speak as they get in touch with their emotions. Their choice of words will reflect their action and feelings orientation so expect to hear words like ‘feel’, ‘touch’, ‘get hold of’, ‘catch on to’, ‘get a handle on’ and ‘make contact with’. If you work with a kinaesthetic child, you’ll find that they need to be moving and learn best when they appear to be doing something else. Avoid static learning situations.  

Kinaesthetic learners learn by moving touching and doing. Hands-on learning is what they like best actively exploring the world around them. They will remember well what they have done but will have trouble remembering what was said or seen. Fiddling is second nature as is doodling  - why do one thing when you can do two? They’ll have trouble sitting still in a classroom so plenty of active breaks are needed as well as opportunities to move about through class activities such as group work or practical activities.

As a kinaesthetic student you may not be able to control your classroom environment or ask for breaks but there are things you can do to aid your learning. Use coloured highlighters to mark up your notes and use mind maps to transfer information into a form that makes it easier to remember.
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When you have subject choices choose subjects that are more practical or those that have practical elements such a Geography with field trips, science, drama, sport and design. At home when revising or doing homework use flash cards or memory games, interactive programmes on the computer in order to make the most of the material. Many computer based revision programmes offer multiple choice questions and these will suit you. 

I've taken this content from 'Secrets of the NLP Masters' a book I wrote a few years ago which has examples of NLP principles and techniques from all walks of life; work, home, school. sport, health. More specific family examples can be found in 'Be a happier parent with NLP'. Both are available from my website, Amazon and The Book Depository. 

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Whether as students of teachers we need to know which internal representation system we naturally prefer although flexibility is essential because very often we have to adapt to someone’s teaching or learning style that doesn’t come so easily to us. You are auditory if you prefer to learn by being told rather than reading off a white board or printed sheets or book. 

“If you want to get good rapport, you can speak using the same kind of predicates that the other person is using. If you want to alienate the other person, you can deliberately mismatch predicates.” Richard Bandler and John Grinder 

“Your students with the auditory learning style, about 20 per cent of your class, will also be your social butterflies, so it's important to make good usage of their strengths while dampening their need for social time during a lecture.” Kelly Roell

People who would describe themselves as auditory enjoy sounds and music but not noise as they want to control the sounds around them. They enjoy conversation and listening to other people talking such as radio plays and discussions. What people say is very important to them as well as the way they say it. There are two variations of auditory; auditory internal and auditory digital. They are both forms of self-talk. The voice behaves like an inner check to sound out whether what someone says is logical or makes sense. It’s like having your own personal radio in your head and can enable you to be slightly disassociated or disconnected because you don’t directly respond but check out first whether your response is ‘correct’. This can be useful in jobs where an emotional or unguarded response could be unwise such as in the Police or teaching.

Auditory learners learn best through spoken lessons either direct from a teacher in a classroom or via videos , CDs , DVDs MP3 audios , audio books and other online learning environments where there is a spoken word. They enjoy learning through discussion as well so they can assimilate what they’ve learned. Equally in the work environment an auditory boss will favour giving oral instructions and you will prefer being told what to do rather than receiving an email or text. We want to work in rapport so match your bosses preferred representational system and if you are auditory and he or she is not, ask him to tell you, explain it briefly or let you hear it from him. If they are auditory and you are not then you’ll need to write down what they say so you have a visual record to refer to if you are visual and if you are kinaesthetic then you may need to ask them to ‘run it by you again’ if you aren’t clear so ask them to ‘repeat it’.

 When communicating with an auditory learner use words like hear, listen, sound, question and resonate. In order to gain rapport with auditory learners or indeed an auditory teacher speak slowly and choose words carefully. The pitch should match theirs which will be fairly low with their breathing from the mid chest. They will look across not up or down and construct long sentences with questions because they like to interact. When you are talking it may look as if they are thinking about what they want to say next but they are probably just processing what you’ve said so leave a silence for them to get their thoughts and the right words together. If you jump into the silence you will break rapport by not enabling them to contribute to the conversation. 

For more information and ideas about parenting or educating (or both if you're reading this as a homeschooling parent, you can find plenty of information in 'Secrets of the NLP Masters' or 'Be a happier parent with NLP' both available via my website or from Amazon. 

65% of the population are visual learners and it is defined as ‘keeping pictures in our heads’, This is the first skill babies are tested for at 6 weeks when they are checked to find out if they recognise their mother. They do of course but if mum then puts on a pink curly wig they will cry because the picture doesn’t match the picture they’ve got in their head. We use our visual memory to create words and pictures, to do comprehension, revision, sequencing, mind mapping and for short term memory. When people learn visually they make pictures in their head and it is easiest when teaching visual learners to teach them through the pictures they generate. Indeed 90% of the information that comes into our brain is visual . They notice what they see and are very observant. They can easily switch from a 2D image and imagine the 3D version so for example they can see a picture of a house and then imagine it as 3D. Whilst this is an essential skill for architects and designers it can be quite confusing when children are learning to read and the 2D images of the letters become 3D and move about.

When children learn visually they see a picture of the word and associate it with the picture of the meaning of the word and if they are counting they visualise say two apples and three apples. In order to access their visual memory they need to look up so do this if you’re a visual learner and if you are a teacher be sure to tell children who learn visually to look up. Some teachers have been known to tell children gazing up into space ‘you won’t find the answer up there’ but actually they will.  

Words to use when teaching or communicating with a visual learner.

See, look, view, appear, show, reveal, imagine, clear, focused, hazy, picture.

When they ‘don’t see what you mean’ you will need to ‘show them again’.

Use diagrams, maps, mind maps, graphs , colours and pictures to teach visual learners and if you are the student, take what you are told and represent it visually to make it easier to learn. You probably already love drawing and doodling with colours so you’ll not need any prompting. You enjoy organising your notes into coloured folders or with file tabs and different colour dividers. Careers that will suit you will be artistic ones such as photography, video or film, design, planning, art, architecture and similar. 

How do you know if you’re visual?

Of course you won’t only be visual, you will have times when you are enjoying your auditory and kinaesthetic processing systems but you can check which your preferred one is quite easily by doing the following.

Thinking about yesterday, what comes to mind? Are you thinking about what you saw, what you heard or what you did?

When you think about your holiday plans do you imagine where you’d like to go, remember what people have told you about somewhere or think about what you’d like to do on holiday?  

In conversation with friends do you notice how they’re dressed and their facial expressions, do you pay attention to what they’re saying or do you notice what they’re doing?
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Picture an elephant. Is it still or moving, where is it? If you’re a visual learner you will have lots of information about that elephant going on in your head at the same time. You’ll also have a choice and can picture it in different locations, different sizes and doing different things quite easily because as a visual learner the image will probably be moving and changing all the time. In fact you may sometimes get confused when you have too many options and too many images in your head all at the same time.
Just as visual people pay attention to what they see and like to have nice things around them, they will be upset by untidiness or ugly buildings, unattractive people or unpleasant areas. If you find yourself feeling like that then you are probably visual. 

Feedback is the response we give and get from communication, either verbal or non-verbal. Distortion is the effect of mind reading and making assumptions about a person’s behaviour rather than checking it out with them. 

When we give feedback it needs to be clear and specific and it needs to be what we think based on what we have observed rather than assumptions we make based on our view of the world. Distortion occurs when we make 1+1=3 , where the evidence doesn’t point to the conclusion we’ve drawn because we’ve added in something of our own into the mix. An example of this is ‘my children are fighting to annoy me’ or ‘my boss has given me extra work because he doesn’t like me’. You can also recognise this type of distortion where you have sentences divided by the word ‘so’ or ‘therefore’ for example ‘he hasn’t told me he loves me recently so he must be having an affair’ or ‘she is playing on her computer therefore she isn’t doing her homework’. When we add our own meaning we are distorting the original meaning. It assumes we know better what the intention of the behaviour or communication was. We compare what they say and do with our own map of the world and it becomes our truth. Feedback needs to be given in the spirit of curiosity and respect for the other person’s map of the world.  What else could they mean? Where someone has presented two linked statements for them there is an association or meaning in their map of the world. We need to challenge this using clean questions such as ‘in what way…’ or ‘and how is…and that’s like what?’ we’re looking to understand how 1+1=3 in their map.

When we are given feedback the same thing applies. Be curious about the content, what they have observed and question any assumptions they have made which have distorted it. This is all part of the feedback because you need to know what it was that you communicated that gave them this impression because you are responsible for your communication.

Reverse mind reading is also distortion. This is when someone says ‘if you knew me …..’ or ‘if you cared about me you would……’ or ‘you should know that………’. Here you are criticising someone for not responding in the way they should yet you have never told them what you wanted.

Another type of distortion is cause and effect when we feedback to someone that they ‘make’ you feel a certain way. This isn’t true because someone can’t make you feel something, this is your choice however what interests us is how this can be so for the other person so we’d ask ‘how exactly did I do that?’ or ‘how did x do that exactly?’ 

Parents frequently distort feedback to and from their children partly because the relationship is so intense and emotional that it becomes difficult to objectively observe behaviour. There is a huge amount of mind-reading that goes on because parents unecologically assume that they can do this because the child is theirs, of their own flesh and blood therefore they ought to be able to read their mind. Of course they can’t.
When children disobey their parents it isn’t usually because they want to ‘make ‘ them angry or upset even thought his is often what parents say. Parents often take the action of their children at a very personal level assuming they are involved when usually they are not. Next time you respond to your child feedback what you have noticed without putting any interpretation on it from your own very different map of the world. Be curious about their map as you feedback to them how you feel about what they have done or said. By taking this slightly more disassociated stance you allow for improved rapport and connection. You also model for them how to give feedback and how to receive it.
When you children are giving you feedback that seems distorted , question the assumptions using clean questions such as ‘and how exactly did I do that? or ‘and how exactly did I make you feel this?’  

Some people thrive on choice and enjoy the element of selecting from a number of options, whether it be what to wear, what to buy, what to cook or eat or even what to say but others prefer to just pick something and go with it. In NLP terms we call it choices or process to indicate that those who don’t like choices want to work their way down a list of task as a process rather than branching off or pausing to make decisions. It isn’t really a bipolar scale, these are just the two ends of it. 

“Having just one choice is no choice at all. The more choices you have, the more freedom you have to be in the driving seat of your car.” Steve Bannister

“The whole point of NLP is having more choice.” Richard Bandler

“You’re not just a leaf on the wind.” Anthony Robbins

“We are making hundreds, thousands even millions of unconscious choices every day about what we pay attention to and what we don’t. And this is fine, provided those choices work for us. However, if we are not getting the results we want, we can learn to make new choices until we find what does work.” Sue Knight

“Identifying, acknowledging, examining, and employing our parts, rules, and inner wisdom help us transform our internal process and deal with present circumstances. By removing our self-made limits, we expand our choices.” Virginia Satir

In a family it is very important to make it clear to your children what are options and which are not. There has been a growing trend to encourage children to make choices even at a very young age, whether to drink out of a red mug or a blue one, whether to wear this or that dress. This is inclined to make children capricious as they assume they can make decisions about everything which isn’t of course the case and can lead to some very lengthy preparations for leaving the house! You need to prepare your children for accepting your decisions and make it clear when they can choose and when it isn’t possible or appropriate. You can signal this by asking ‘would you like to choose?’ when there is a choice.

It is useful to know whether the person you are talking to likes choices or not in each situation because you will have greater rapport if you give choices to someone who wants them and not to someone who doesn’t.  You would similarly offer false choices to children who want choice so “would you like to do your homework with a cup of tea or a glass of milk?” Note that not doing homework wasn’t an option! Also, with ‘like’ and ‘homework’ close together in the sentence you are giving them a slightly hypnotic connection which might not have been present for them.
  
Parents need to know how to give choice when there is none because offering choices is not always an option when you want your children to get dressed to go to school by a certain time, eat healthy meals or do their homework. If you have older children you may not want to give them choices about what time to come home or where they go and with whom.

First decide on your compelling outcome. What end result do you want from the discussion or negotiation? What will you concede and what is non-negotiable? Simply going through this process has a remarkably calming effect and puts you in the driving seat. If for example the pick-up time is non-negotiable you can give them a choice of how they come home, with whom and by what means of transport. If the time you have to leave for the school run is non-negotiable give them a choice about getting dressed before or after breakfast or whether to wear a jumper or not, whether they need to give their shoes a clean.

 Even when there appears to be no choice in the ‘what’ that we have to do, there is always a choice in the ‘how’. There is a choice also in how we communicate, what we choose to believe about a situation and a choice in how we frame it. We can use anchoring to choose our most resourceful state and we can choose to communicate in rapport. These choices give us flexibility which puts us in control if we choose to be. 

This extract was taken from 'Secrets of the NLP Masters' by Judy Bartkowiak.