The trouble with many professional ethical codes, whether they are humanistic, analytic or anything else, is that they limit your behaviour.  And whenever you accept any “I won’t do it,” there are people you are not going to be able to work with.  We went into that same ward at Napa and I walked over and stomped on the catatonic’s foot as hard as I could and got an immediate response.  He came right out of “catatonia,” jumped up, and said “Don’t do that!”

Richard Bandler and John Grinder, the originators of what has become widely known as Neurolinguistic Programming, or NLP, began their work when they set out to study the work of some of the most effective therapists of their era, including Milton Erikson, Fritz Perls and Virginia Satir.  Frogs Into Princes, first published in 1979, is compiled of live transcriptions of some of their early seminars.

I must confess that, prior to studying NLP through a number of Practitioner, Master Practitioner and Coach programmes (where I chose to follow up on my own initial participation by becoming a member of the teams that supported these trainings to further my learning), I found reading about NLP about as easy a way to learn as learning Chinese by reading Mandarin.  I just didn’t get it.  Later, when I had already completed my NLP Practitioner, I made a mental note when a colleague told me that, for her, reading Frogs Into Princes was the experience that had first brought NLP alive.  And when I found a copy recently for less than twenty pounds I decided to buy it.

Reading it, I can see that it has something for everybody.  For the reader who is new to NLP it contains many examples of the ground NLP has covered, from specific techniques (re-framing and the phobia cure to name just two) to a number of assumptions which have become guiding principles of NLP.  The example given at the top of this posting illustrates at least two of them:  If what you are doing is not working, change it.  Do anything else and The meaning of the communication is the response you get.

For the seasoned Practitioner, Frogs Into Princes offers insight into Bandler and Grinder’s work, including the initial context in which they worked and the work itself.  They really did mean it when they encouraged you to try something else – anything else – if what you are not doing is not working.  I laughed out loud when I read the example given above and a number of other examples.  I was also reminded of the power of NLP to open up any number of new possibilities to the practitioner in his or her own life and in the lives of the people with whom he or she lives and works.

I talk about the people we work with in the broadest terms because NLP has expanded in its application way beyond the therapeutic field in which Bandler and Grinder originally studied.  The lessons of NLP are available to be applied in every area of life.  NLP can help the most senior leaders to share their visions in ways which capture the imaginations of those they lead.  NLP can help the classroom teacher to adjust his or her approach in order more effectively to support individual pupils.  NLP can help the husband or wife, at his or her wits end, learn how better to communicate with his or her partner.

I would add, almost as a PS, that there is one criticism that has often been levelled at NLP, that it is in some way manipulative.  If you want to form your own view of this, you could do worse than read Frogs Into Princes.  Who knows, you might well discover that turning your own frog into a prince begins with you.  NLP is, above all, about self-mastery.