Category Archives: Goals and Outcomes

March NLP and Hypnotherapy Newcastle Practice Day Sunday 17th is Excellent Value

If you have problems and no one, not even you can solve it, and if you can find one; maybe you can use the A-Team of solutions in a metaphorical representation. If you are hearing the tune of an America anti-hero series, so am I, its OK. Im OK, you’re OK.

This Newcastle NLP and Hypnotherapy Practice day will be exploring goals and outcomes using emerging and transforming metaphor; as well as any processes or explorations that are decided on the day.

NLP Hypnotherapy Practice Newcastle

One of my favorite books, which is an in-depth analysis of Metaphor is ‘Metaphors We Live By’ from Lakoff and Johnson. In a recent conversation this book was mentioned as a unsung source for so many advances not just in understanding metaphor but in using metaphor deliberately as a change tool.

An example in a further book by the same authors is what is up as a change tool for reaching a goal ( and that is moving out of stuck to journey towards that goal ) is a way of creating a metaphorical landscape that represents the journey with all of the obstacles and ‘issues’ that compose what is a real world problem.

The Source Path Goal Schema

If you imagine a metaphorical landscape and you ( or a vehicle or agent ) moving across or through or over the terrain towards your goal, starting from some known origin; You can create a metaphor as a representation to navigate.

Direct from the Philosophy in the Flesh ( 1999) this has the following articles:

  • A trajector that moves ( you for instance or a representation )
  • Starting point ( source location )
  • A Goal ( the intended destination of the trajector )
  • A route, from the source to the goal
  • The actual trajectory of motion ( a path )
  • The position of the trajector at a given time
  • The direction of the trajector at that time
  • The final destination ( which may not be the goal )

As you can see, this could be determined as a math equation of some object moving if such equations could be found. We are not math equations so moving to the representational field of metaphor can provide fresh insight and potentials for new movement within this metaphor field to be sure.

Additionally, again from PITF, some extensions or additions are: a vehicle ( or other representation ), the speed of motion, obstacles to motion, forces moving one along the trajectory, additional trajectors ( anthropomorphisations ) and so on. The idea being to create a metaphor ‘field’ representative of a journey or transformation towards some outcome.

Now this metaphor field, representing a journey towards a goal can be created consciously or equally this could be the contents of a dream or could be elicited from a coach. What is important is that once there is a such a field created it can be explored.

Gestalt and Jung in the Metaphor Field

In Gestalt work, you may be working on a dream with all of the dream elements, such as a hat, a hill or even a book can be given over to anthropomorphic exploration. No object or thing in a dream is inert. You can play that role as in identifying with a specific object in a dream. The idea in Gestalt is moving towards an integration of seemingly different parts.

So with this in mind, any element of your metaphor can be explored, identified with and potentially integrated into a greater whole.

Now as one structure for identifying with an aspect or object of the metaphor field representing a future goal we can use Jungs four functions of sensor, thinker, feeler and intuitor as a structured way of exploring the identification with a metaphor ( or dream ) object or aspect.

In addition to a metaphorical exploration of a goal or outcome there will be which ever topics or explorations are requested on the day. I look forward to seeing you there.

Sunday 17th March
9.30am to 5pm
Jesmond Dene Conference Centre
Only £20 for a full day of NLP Practice and Play
BOOK NOW





Meaning In … Unity … In Meaning

A Workshop To Explore & Connect With Your Soul – Act From Your Heart & Speak Your Truth

“If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.” ~ Gospel Of Thomas

Unity comes from Latin ‘Unitas’ from Unus, meaning ‘One’.

There is a fundamentally available and known space we can occupy

  • A space where we can simply be accepting of all that is arising.
  • A place where we accept others as they are; a space where we accept ourselves as we are.
  • A space where we can connect with everything and nothing; be moved and unmoved.

This is a Soul space

We humans are makers of meanings and we are meaning makers. How we relate and compare, how we evaluate and judge and how we include and exclude can be apprehended as characteristics of our Internal World, our Shared Reality and a deeper understanding of Feminine and Masculine energy. None of these are fixed and if anything, they are infinitely expansible.

Paula and Nigel in this one day workshop will facilitate an exploration of how we can all connect more deeply with our own and shared purposes in business, play and life. How we can welcome and accept our deepest selves and use this experience to welcome difference and diversity whilst holding ‘true’ to our own unique and individual purpose. This is about enabling a more Soulful life, here, now.

We cannot not judge. We cannot not evaluate. We cannot not make decisions. Masculine and Feminine typically do this in different ways. Cultures and Societies have different intrinsic values and beliefs that create certain world views. Aiming to be appreciative and accepting of how all this happens will open perspectives even more so we can realise the Unity in Diversity and come from the deepest recognition.

Knowing we can be moving more expansively to places where we can accept without trying to change others beliefs, values and meanings to allow us to be much more accepting of other and ourselves without the need to understand ‘why’.

The only meanings this life has are the ones we create, share, and accept as ‘true’. Being able to have the Heart Space and Mind Space that together opens a Soul Space is a genuine experience of what can’t be said with words. Come and dis-cover your Soul Space, your Unity …

A one day workshop with Nigel Hetherington & Paula McCormack
Jesmond Dene Conference Centre, £40 Saturday 12th November (30 places only)

Act Right Now! Book Your Place!

North East NLP Practice Group : Improvisation In Therapy & Coaching : Nigel Hetherington & Ruth Hindmarsh

This month’s offering at the Newcastle & North East NLP & Hypnotherapy Practice Group is Improvisation Skills in Therapy & Coaching … It’s for those of us who will go the extra extra mile to engender generative change.

20th April : Powerful and Exceptionally Meaningful Therapist Skills … Come … Here … And Co-Create …

When we are working in the role of a change consultant, therapist, facilitator or coach we do have an outcome in mind that is to facilitate a real, honest and empowering environment of exploration for our clients. How can we tune into being this creative?

Way too many change consultants can’t get out of their own way, in terms of making a real step or going out of their own comfort zone to enable their clients to do the same. What can we do to get to grips with getting out of our own way and facilitate real change experience?

There is a real need and requirement to be able to create a context for generative change which is enabling and at the same time, truly an honest and very creative place. When we hold a perspective of being seriously creative, we can see a clear path to genuinely enabling changes …

Performing arts and drama facilitation expert, Ruth Hindmarsh will facilitate a fun and safe space to really be the change consultant you know are, with fun and real purpose.

Within a sequence of exercises, Ruth and myself will integrate play, fun and creativity into tools and process’s you can easily merge into your professional practice and your life to make your sessions and interactions much more creative as well as bringing a smile and sense of something more deeply connecting into our work, play time and life as a whole.

Very much for those of us who are serious about change …

Facilitators : Ruth Hindmarsh & Nigel Hetherington

Entry Level : Open To All

Places are limited to 15 so book in advance to guarantee your place

Come join in and explore in a warm, comfortable purpose built training environment. The Newcastle Hypnotherapy Practice Group, The Trance Cafe meets at St Oswalds, Regent Centre, Gosforth. Third Wednesday of the month.

tea / coffee & biscuits included
7-9pm for only £10.00 book online now!


Newcastle NLP & Hypnotherapy Practice Group : Thought Provoking Dialogue

clown_noseImage by cudmore via Flickr

NEWS The Trance Cafe is Changing Dates : Now 3rd Wednesday of the Month.

February 16th Trance Cafe : 7-9 : Thought Provoking Dialogue

A humorous and client centred approach to change work. Guaranteed learning with outrageous laughter included as part of the process.

The topic for explorations and practice is Thought Provoking Dialogue. Thought Provoking Dialogue is the creation of Phil Jeremiah who recently ran an excellent two day Thought Provoking Dialogue workshop in Newcastle, sponsored by Nigel Hetherington. Thought Provoking Dialogue according to research is incredibly effective, fun, caring and totally client focused.

Phil is running two workshops in Thought Provoking Dialogue in Newcastle upon Tyne in March and April ( advanced ). Book both for £200 and get four days training. Excellent Value and Guaranteed Learning with Outrageous Laughter.

Phil studied extensively with Frank Farrelly the creator of provocative therapy and Phil has updated this approach for the 21st Century. Thought Provoking Dialogue is the latest cutting edge development in the use of humour in coaching, therapy, mentoring and helping people make positive changes in their lives.

In the months to come … Guest speakers will include Paula McCormack, Heider Imam and other very, very special people with a clear focus to  seriously positive learning outcomes that you can incorporate into your life and professional practice.

The practice evening will include demonstrations and plenty of practice time, focusing on specific Thought Provoking Dialogue patterns

Thought Provoking Dialogue

Facilitator : Nigel Hetherington

Entry Level : Open To All

Places are limited to 15 so book in advance to guarantee your place

Come join in and explore in a warm, comfortable purpose built training environment. The Newcastle Hypnotherapy Practice Group, The Trance Cafe meets at St Oswalds, Regent Centre, Gosforth. Third Wednesday of the month.

tea / coffee & biscuits included
7-9pm for only £10.00 book online now!


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End Your Job Loss Worries – Calling All Public Sector Workers

Fractal ArtImage via Wikipedia

It is predicted that the UK job market will stall this year. Research from the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development states a full one third of employers expect to cut jobs in the next three months. This can read as a very scary and particularly worrying prospect if you have a family to support, a mortgage to pay and a life to live outside of worrying how to meet the bills if the worst happens.

Many people buy insurance from the banks and building societies for things like job loss, ill health and a variety of other predicaments that can happen. These insurance policies depending on their type of cover and exclusions can certainly be on the expensive side. I know that when I was employed working in the software industry, I was paying out well over £500 per month in insurance alone. This covered my mortgage and a proportion of my wages in the event I lost my job or was unable to work. Now this policy ( on reading the small print ) would only come into effect for a maximum of 12 months for job loss. So there was a time buffer but sadly no magic purse that would pay all of my outgoings for more than 12 months. In short it was an illusion of security or a security buffer, and a very expensive one at that.

What if you could look through the illusion of security of what you think you can get and see what you actually want?

Think about it! There has never been any way to really guarantee that a job will be secure for life or that all of your bills will be paid. That kind of security is an illusion yet worrying about job loss, making ends meet and the dreaded ‘Yes But, What If …‘ scenario is extremely real in our present economic climate.

Standing still will pile on the stones of life. NLP helps blast the stones so you can begin to live as life intended

William Ingram

Research indicates the people hardest hit in terms of job loss will be public sector workers because the government will shed good people to cut their wage bills that the public actually pay anyway. We can worry and blame this on the recent wars in the middle east, we can worry and blame the greedy bankers and governments that fuelled and fed the housing bubble before it popped. We can blame any and all but you can also choose to stop worrying and blaming and start to direct your attention onto what you actually want. A novel idea I know!

Get your free 47 page e-book – Surviving A Recession

It will be commensurate of the government to give any and all employees who’s job it will cut some kind of retraining or compensation package and it is how you use this that can determine your own relative security in the months and years to come.

I have seen changes in myself that I wouldn’t have thought possible. Thank you so much

Felicity James

It is all too easy to concentrate on the problems we face to the point it will eventually immobilise and in worst cases lead to depression and ill health. Which could be good if you have an insurance policy, maybe good for only 12 months though! On the other hand how about exploring your options in terms of what you can do for yourself about your current situation and how to move into the future with more confidence in yourself and how you will feel?

This is a golden opportunity to take a look at your life in terms of your wants, needs and expectations. A time to set some meaningful goals and a time to learn ways to run your own brain. To get out of patterns of negative thoughts and concentrate on what you really want to experience, achieve and do in your life.

I have met new people, become more confident and learned new skills. The trainers teaching style is excellent, the learning is fun and experiential.

Jane Smith

So here is the solution – Neuro Linguistic Programming Practitioner Training Course. The Newcastle upon Tyne NLP Practitioner training is not a therapy course per say, though all participants through exercises will become more confident, find higher self esteem and in general will be more able to live life in the ways that matter the most. It is a course that delivers the most effective life and communication skills you can learn.

If you are interested in NLP Practitioner Training please read this : Choosing Your Training Provider.

There has never been a time, now, more important to be investing in your future. NLP Practitioner Training’s in Newcastle upon Tyne begin in September ( 10 month ) and January 2011 ( 6 month ). They are lots of fun, you will make great new fiends and you will meet like minded people who are choosing to continue their personal and professional evolution.

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Coaching and NLP using Neurological Levels

One of the tools I use with performance Coaching in Newcastle upon Tyne is Dilts’ Neurological Levels Model.  The NLP Neurological Levels is an excellent way to compartmentalise and partition an experience or equally an outcome or a problem. Such that any ‘situation’ can be explored in terms of Environment, Behaviour, Capabilities, Values, Beliefs and Identity.

The purpose of partitioning, one of Erickson’s hypnosis strategies, is to explore an outcome or equally a problem with the intention of discovering points of maximum intervention, this is what I call a Change Points. A Change Point is any place of intervention where there is greater potential for positive change to occur.

This first video introduces NLP Neurological Levels to a group of NLP Practitioners in Newcastle upon Tyne. The following videos will illustrate how to use Neurological Levels to explore both outcomes and problems.

Perceptual Positions – NLP – Spinning Dancer

This is a ‘great optical’ illusion to see the ‘dancer’ spin both ways.

One of the easier ways to see it spin the other way is to close you eyes and imagine it spinning the ‘other way’. Alternatives are to watch the shadows. So seemingly ‘it’ is seen to spin both ways.

Here is the challenge, can you see it spin a third way?…

Spinning Dancer

NLP Pattern Interrupt – Problem States

Everyone I know ( me included ), at some time has the experience of a ‘problem’. A problem IS at some level the sum total of the bio-chemical and bio-electrical ‘chemical/electrical bath’ that is then filtered, interpreted, filtered again and then experienced as a problem.

The well know and well coined NLP phrase ‘NLP Pattern Interrupt’ is one of those NLPisms that really deserves a closer look. After all what is a pattern? And what is a pattern interrupt? I prefer to think about this NLPism as State Alteration. What I mean by this is by way of my actions I am interfering, interrupting and changing the state that holds the problem together.

Again it is not the state that is the the problem, it is the end interpretation of the state. As a therapist / coach, by acting outside the level of interpretation and labelling it is much easier to alter the structure of the perceived problem.

The experiencer of a problem and the experience in and of itself are inextricably linked, at some level they are the same. What would the ‘problem’ or more accurately the perception of ‘a problem’ become or change to when the bio-chemistry and the bio-electrical responses to the initial experience or thought process that holds the ‘problem’ together change?

One way to pretty radically alter the internal state that ‘holds the problem’ in its current form is to Frustrate The Problem. This approach really does require a LOT of honest rapport. This approach is possible only with trust, rapport and a deep connection.

Of course, this is not a full change process, it is one part of a solution. Very good therapists and coaches know this!

Making It Feel Even Better – For Christmas Time

Here is a clip from our NLP Practitioner Newcastle of a demonstration of how to use NLP to enhance and intensify an already pleasurable experience. This can be used to increase, intensify, improve and generally make even better almost any experience or memory ( past or future ) you care to work with and change.

This particular method uses Kevin Creedon’s excellent Could Process. Try this for a real Christmas Present!

Therapist Thriving Practice Builder : Andrew T Austin : Newcastle upon Tyne

More Clients Thriving Practice

A workshop specifically for Therapists, Counsellors, Coaches, Hypnotherapists and any one in the profession of helping people to lead better, more productive and satisfying lives…

Andrew T Austin is probably the UK’s premier therapist. If you have had the experience of training with him you will know why. He is skilled, congruent and extremely successful.

Having a thriving practice is about much more than being extremely skilled.

Success, like Andy’s is not just about being a skilled therapist. Yes of course, this is a crucial part of the success equation, but only one part.

Success is not about luck, thought the better the strategy you follow the luckier you may well get.

Andy has built his reputation and practice over the past fifteen years, and this two day course is for all therapists, healers and people helpers to get to know what and how Andy has built his practice. This is the secrets and strategies that you can use to establish and build your own thriving practice.

This workshop is truly excellent value because depending on what you charge for the services you provide, you will have made you money back with between 2-6 clients.

A workshop specifically for Therapists, Counsellors, Coaches, Hypnotherapists and any one in the profession of helping people to lead better, more productive and satisfying lives … including you!

Saturday-Sunday March 6-7 2010

Caledonain Hotel
Jesmond
Newcastle upon Tyne

Cost £195

Book Before Jan 2010 for £175