These articles are written to be equally useful for the beginner of NLP and the NLP Trainer although some of the articles may be more advanced than others. If you find yourself reading an article that’s too advanced, give us a call or send us an email. We will be happy to clarify the issue for you.
Marketing Tricks: Article No. 15
Well, here is what’s actually going on, just in case you care. Since fact and truth seldom fail on their own, they must be overcome with spin and linguistic manipulation. Those who are professional in this art apply fairly well defined and observable tools in this process.
Sadly, the public by and large is not well aware of these techniques and falls prey to the impressive intelligence and skill of these people.
This is why we continued this series of PR techniques based on NLP linguistic techniques. We make them available here for you one by one, so you can learn and recognize them. Remarkably, not even many people in the media or law enforcement are really aware or have been trained to deal with these issues.
For the most part, only the players themselves understand the rules of the game.
If you are a professional painter, you don’t just throw expensive paint onto the canvas – you know that first you need to prepare it in a certain way. If you are a professional graffiti artist, you need first to prepare the wall.
If you were going to change the meaning of words, one by one, and give the “one meaning = one word” concept to which we all are so accustomed to, different meanings, you should have started to observe the preparation beginning about 80-90 years ago. Today, the process is continuing at a greater speed than ever before.
I’ve been observing this preparation going on in the field of language for a long time and the truth is that I have been watching real professionals at work. And they are really good!
Do You Think President Clinton Was Joking?
Remember President Clinton when he ask innocently (or, not) what is the meaning of the word “IS”?
He wasn’t joking, folks. He really asked a legitimate question. Nowadays nothing is as it seems. Especially words!
Do not get confused – I am not speaking here about likes or dislikes. I am not speaking here about whether you were a fan of President Clinton or not. The person is not important for our discussion. What I’d like to focus your attention on, is the absolute masterful usage of words and linguistic patterns displayed by the best.
The pros in the public relations industry and the spin doctors have elevated the skill of using language to modify our internal representations and therefore our behavior so masterfully, that it does not cease to amaze me every time I see the process at work.
Everything is redefined, and what we think and what we hear is not what it really is. And then information becomes dis-information written magnificently by the disinformation professionals.
The next pattern is based on the NLP Hypnotic language of Milton Erickson. It is called Ambiguities. We teach it in our NLP Practitioner Training together with 18 other similar patterns – different from those you learn here.
Pattern No. 15 – USE AMBIGUITIES – use abstract nominalizations, high chunk abstractions and values like love, intelligence, success, happiness, joy, excellence, superiority, progress, innovative, exciting, comprehensive, etc.
This is a more difficult pattern. If you have trouble with it – email us or call us and ask questions
People’s complex equivalents (CEq) – the way they equate a word with something – are different. A CEq is a piece of NLP jargon which means that if you write down 5 meanings of a word (say love) for yourself and then ask others (without suggesting anything to them), they will give you different meanings for the same word. They think differently!
Here is one of the meanings given by Wikipedia:
“Love may be understood as part of the survival instinct, a function to keep human beings together against menaces and to facilitate the continuation of the species.”
First question is then, how is it possible to think that one word means only one thing? This is one of the greatest fallacies of the modern time.
Get It?
Jon Rappoport has a great quote which describes wonderfully this idea, and it is best to quote it verbatim:
“If Al Capone came to my house and said, ˜Look, you’ve got to eat your broccoli’, I would be justified in wondering what Big Al really had in mind. Broccoli might be code for, ˜Sell me your warehouse so I can store bootleg whiskey in it or my boys will kill you.”
Furthermore, particularly with respects to public forums such as newspaper letters to the editor and internet chat and news groups, the usage of PR techniques has a very meaningful function. In these forums, the principal topics of discussion are generally attempts by individuals to cause other persons to become interested in their own particular position, concept or solution.
Many People Don’t Just Chat In These Forums!
The use of Milton Model is a great example of all these. The use of abstract words and nominalizations (a category of the Milton Model from NLP) induces trance and a large degree of guessing since the words have so many possible connotations and interpretations. In the absence of a specific definition or exact specification of the concepts used, the presenter can appear like s/he is making a lot of sense when in facts s/he may say something little of substance.
NOTE: A nominalization is a process frozen in time. It is a noun that cannot be put in the wheelbarrow. Some examples include love, friendship, peace, communication, enjoyment, gain, loss, etc. we teach this explicitly in our NLP Coaching Practitioner training.
This technique can be used in two different ways: to support something or to diffuse an unpleasant question or situation.
For instance if you say “Bill X is a good trainer” – actually you say nothing. “A good trainer” is a too abstract of a concept – without enough specificity – for critical left brain thinkers. Good at what specifically? Good looking? Charismatic? Knowledgeable? Good teacher? Produces good students? Good at what trainings? You get the idea,
Observe that we are not told. We can guess, but that’s all that we do: a wild guess! Which may or may not be correct. But when we examine that sentence critically we realize that it really tells us nothing!
Critical thinkers will need to know far more than just the fact that Bill X is “good”.
Here is a purposeful utilization of the pattern:
This is “truly” an “excellent” program.
It does not say anything specific and yet it sounds impressive and convincing.
Conversely, a word can be used to label something or someone who you don’t like:
This person’s actions are out of bounds.
What Does This Mean?
NO! Don’t guess!!!
What does it mean really? You don’t know! And that’s the point!
The trouble with our competition’s product is not that it isn’t good,
WHAT? Are you following closely? It is NOT that it is NOT good. What is that? It means it is bad!
, it’s just that they have far less quality wood than we do and their design is made so that isn’t quite, conforming.”
Pay attention now! What does the above sentence really mean? It sounds good right? It sounds even like it makes sense. But logically and rationally we don’t have any specificity at all but a bunch of words.
Admittedly, this is a more difficult pattern. You may have trouble understanding it or using it yourself mostly because you’re used to guess and make up stuff in your head based on such utterances, stuff that is not there to begin with.
This is why because the human mind needs to make some sense even out of ambiguous and imprecise utterances. But your “making sense”, your interpretation based on guesses may be so far removed from what the utterance really means as the moon is from your cell phone.
If you have trouble with this pattern, email us or call us and ask questions.
Here is what you can do to slowly master this pattern. First, as always begin to notice it. Begin to listen carefully and whenever you hear something that makes you try to guess what it means, you have it!
After that, begin yourself to use ambiguous words. First one at the time in a sentence that is very non-specific. This is the key – you should NOT be specific and clear at all. Some people do that naturally,
Then try to write a short request to a young group of people for something you want. Make sure you know exactly what are the ambiguous words you have used in your request.
Good luck!
Until next time, be well.