What is nlp anchoring

You walk to the elevator and press the button to go up. Then you wait for the doors to open. You press the number of the floor you need to go.

Next you wait while you experience the elevator going up. The elevator doors open, you walk out and come to the conclusion you are not on the right floor. Many people I have trained and spoken to experienced this phenomena.

So in technical terms this happens: If [A] happens, the response is [B]. What happens you hear the sound of the ice-cream cart? Probably now you hear the Walls tune.

And of course this works two ways. Imagine you walking on the street and you hear the Walls-tune. What do you think of? You are able to complete it with the second part. For the non-Dutch people under us, we Dutch people have a strong association with this example to think about Heineken beer. So the marketing industry utilizes the same NLP anchoring techniques to bring their product to your attention.

They use a stimulus to recall behavior and to their Product. Think of Intel, they have a sound and a logo that triggers behavior. In pricing there is another great example: You are thirsty and walk into a convenience store on a hot summer day. You are thirsty and looking for … Soda! For a measly 20 cents, you can get almost twice as much Coke! So by studying NLP Anchoring you are able to apply the anchoring effect to how you price products or services for your business. Working with NLP and anchoring we want to create an association, a connection, between a peak-state and having the ability to recall that state and to connect this state to future situations the client will face and experience.

When Dr. Richard Bandler and John Grinder worked on mapping the talents of Virginia Satir and Milton Erickson, they discovered that they often used word anchors to provide change for their clients. Before we continue explaining NLP and Anchoring, you have to know something about the human Neurology.

Our body is controlled by our Nervous System. Consciously and Unconsciously. So nerves are running through our body, helping us act in a way that is best. Now, when you press with your right index-finger on your left-underarm, something happens. Besides that you are doing it yourself, something else happens.

When you press with your right index-finger on your left-underarm it is registered by your nervous system that you press. Yet what you need to know that the pressure you experience on your left underarm in this example, needs a fraction of time to be registered by your brain.

So to apply an anchor we need to work a bit on timing. We want to anchor the peak-state with the client by pressing on the lower left arm. Logically we need to discover how the client goes into a Peak-state first. Now as we have learnt that such an anchor takes a littlest of time to register with the brain, we do know that we have to apply the anchor just before the peak-state of the client.

The proof is always by eating the pudding. Now you have conditioned the client to recall the peak-state you fire off the anchor. You press the exact spot at the lower left-arm and see what is happening. Does the client go into his or her peak-state?

Well done! Or does it work a bit? Recall the peak-state of the client and reapply the anchor. We guarantee you that the moment you found your result, you will do it easier every time you do. Sure we can. Let me state first that you play with this NLP technique in a proper manner. So to give you an example of playing around with anchors, we give you two. Did you ever meet someone who is ticklish? They start to giggle and smile you poke your finger gently into the sides of their body.

Or even worse; only by pinpointing your finger into the direction of the sides of their chest, they start to make movements. A great example of a gesture, or an external trigger, followed by an internal response. This may be used for exam nerves, overcoming fear, feelings such as happiness or determination, or to recollect how one will feel if a good resolution is kept.

Anchoring is also used by skillful film makers to evoke suspense in the audience. Think of your own psychological changes that occurred when you heard the soundtracks amplified, pounding heartbeat rhythm in the moments leading up to each of the appearances of the huge killer shark in the movie Jaws.

What anchor was established in you by the crescendo of the sound of the music meeting the shark? Did your heartbeat increase? Did your palms begin to sweat? Did you have to see the shark, or was the thumping music enough to start your slide to the edge of your seat?

Leitmotivs recurring themes in music and literature also serve to re stimulate a previously established response. For trauma victims, sudden noises or movement can serve as terrifying anchors capable of recollecting the traumatic experience. In this case, amongst other approaches, NLP might be used in a slightly different way — to desensitize the stimulus and perhaps instead also sensitize it to some more neutral or positive feeling.

The desired outcome for this section is for all participants to be able to anchor a specific state in a person, at any time in any modality. Definition: An Anchor is an internal state that is triggered by an external stimulus. Any time a person is in an associated, intense state, if at the peak of that experience, a specific stimulus is applied, then the two will be linked neurologically.

Anchoring can assist you in gaining access to past states and linking the past state to the present and the future. The best states to anchor are naturally occurring states. These days I use a different type of way in to the states. Next best are past, vivid, highly-associated states. Least preferable are constructed states. Can you remember a specific time? To stack anchors elicit several instances of states and anchor them in the same place.

The state chosen for a particular stacked anchor can be the same or different. In collapse anchors, the states stacked should be different and in chaining anchors the states used for each stacked anchor should be the same. Is that O. Make it clear which states specifically are involved. Make sure that the client is in a fully associated, intense, congruent state for each of the states you anchor.

Anchor all the positive states in the same place, I. Watch the client; they will usually exhibit signs of asymmetry until the integration is complete.

Think about the anchors in your life: alarm clocks, picture of your friends and loved ones; that look from your mother, etc.

Imagine the following scene: Man comes home from work, in a very bad mood, and the woman, as a response rushes to hug him. If she does that often enough, he will get the same bad feelings just from hugging her. Although this might not be her intention, it just happens. So, how exactly does anchoring work?

So, someone goes has an intense experience positive or negative , and at the peak of that experience a specific stimulus is applied. Be vivid, and describe how it felt. Picture that moment in your head, and recall the feeling. I want you to hold your left index and middle fingers in your right hand, and gently give your fingers two quick squeezes.

As you do the second squeeze, make the picture of the happy moment larger, bringing it closer to you, and imagine the happy feeling multiply in strength. Describe again how you are feeling. Describe what you were thinking at the time. As you do, squeeze your fingers twice. On that second finger squeeze, the happy feeling doubles, again. The clearer you can imagine the feeling, the better this technique will work. Repeat these steps until you have described then doubled the intensity of the feeling five times in a row.

That's the first part - laying the anchor. Later we can recall this anchor by using the exact same double-squeeze to recall a sense of happiness. You are psychologically associating the neural signal of "two squeezes on my left fingers" with "happy". Therefore it stands to reason that the more times you lay the anchor as above and the more clarity you have in the feeling, the better this technique will work. We can combine this with plenty of other NLP techniques to make that feeling more clear and vivid, but for now we'll make do.

This is known as conditioning.