 January 2011
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NLP Canada Training Inc. Newsletter
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Greetings!
Just like that, the holidays are over and the new year is in full swing. The sun shines for a few more minutes each day, tentatively making its way back into your life a little at a time. There are emails in your inbox, and people waiting for you to make things happen. And so it begins.
Of course you have lots to do, and of course the weather can make it harder to get where you want to go. We know all the reasons you might not make it to an evening or weekend event. That's why we make it special when you arrive. You take off your coat, and we put a hot cup of tea or coffee in your hands and invite you to become completely engaged with interesting ideas and terrific people.
Whether you come to be inspired to use the skills you have or to learn new skills and perspectives, we will be very glad to see you. We will welcome you into a gathering that lets laughter, reflection and practice carry us into spring.
We hope you can read through our news, maybe more than once. We have a lot to tell you this month,
Linda and Chris
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Highlights of the Latest News
What are Chris and Linda working on as the new year begins? The results of our work at the end of 2010 will be revealed gradually over the next few months. Here's what we can tell you today:
* We were in the recording studio in December to work on a CD that features Chris & Linda working (and talking) together. We'll be launching the CD at Great Connections: Rapport & Innovation on February 1. Mark your calendars, then call Carole to reserve your spot at the event. If you are outside Toronto, watch our website for a link, beginning February 2, that will allow you to purchase the recording for download.
* We were working (hard!) on complete course outlines for the new 5 day certification on Managing Choice. You can read all about it below. It represents a major leap in blending NLP with social science research to develop practical ways to develop your own decisions and influence the choices that other people are making.
* We were celebrating our marvellous business manager for her persistence and follow up. Thanks to her efforts, NLP Canada Training has been certified by Revenue Canada to offer tuition tax certificates for our NLP Practitioner Certification and NLP Master Practitioner certification. This will go a long way to offsetting the increases from the HST for those clients who cannot claim their course fees as business expenses. We're delighted!
There is, of course, much more going on behind the scenes, from the holiday message we put together with a retrospective of pictures from 2010 to plans for a retreat to set our direction with good counsel. We are learning lots and looking forward to 2011 and beyond.
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Coming Soon to NLP Canada Training Inc.
All programs at 47 Queen's Park Cres. E. All programs require registration. Evening programs by donation to Shelterlink. Call Carole at 416-928-2394.
Evening programs
Thursday, January 6 Inspired! An Introduction to NLP, 7:30pm - 9:30pm
Tuesday, February 1 Great Connections: Rapport and Innovation, 7:30pm - 9:30pm
Managing Choice
A new series of 5 one day courses on how to recognize and influence the way people make choices. Register for one course at a time, or be part of the launch of a new certificate when you take all 5.
Saturday, January 8, 2011 The Elements of Choice
Sunday, January 23, 2011 The Well-Conditioned Mind
Saturday, February 5, 2011 Whole Brain Thinking
Certification programs
NLP Practitioner Certification (Feb 12/13 and Feb 26/27 and Mar 12/13, 2011). This course is filling up fast. We limit registration to 14 practitioners. If you are planning to train with us this winter, please call Carole soon at 416-928-2394. |
2nd Notice: Pricing Changes on January 10 2011
We are extending 2010 pricing until January 10. Register and make a deposit before next Monday to take advantage of lower prices for some NLP certification courses.
We've held our prices steady for several years, but in 2011 some prices will rise to reflect changing conditions. We're raising the cost per person when two or more people register together for the NLP Practitioner certification but holding the price for individuals steady.
until January 10,
2 people may register together for $2650 + $344.50HST = $2994.50
on January 10 the price rises to $3300 or $1650+214.50HST = $1864.50 per person when 2 or more people register together (which is still a really good deal!)
The cost of our one day courses is rising to $175. This reflects our commitment to providing effective change and professional development within a short form. All of our courses provide a rich training experience and many contain new applications designed to raise awareness and skill levels.
We will continue to provide evening events by Pay-What-You-Can charitable donations, and to occasionally provide special events to our community of NLP practitioners. We also have a limited number of bursaries available that substantially reduce the cost of training for full-time post-secondary students.
Click here for our complete price list.
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 The Benefits of Managing Choice
Special Introductory Pricing: $175 + HST for each one day course or $700 for all 5 courses (payable by deposit and installments). All 5 courses must be complete to earn certification in Managing Choice.
Even after you take our new certification on Managing Choice, you will almost certainly struggle with some decisions and wish you had made some others differently. The truth about choice is that it is a complicated process of letting what we want interact with what we know and the circumstances in which we are choosing. Having the courage to choose means facing the certainty that some of your choices will have unpredictable results. You will never feel entirely in control.
There's a difference between controlling something and building a skill. When you take all the courses in the new program, you will build the skills associated with both making your own choices and influencing the choices other people make. You'll gain new perspective on what different kinds of research suggest about how people make choices, new insights into how you make your own choices, and new practices for tweaking the relationship between conscious and unconscious processes to influence choice (your own or other people's).
This is a program that takes various kinds of information about how our brains and bodies naturally function and integrates it into practices that allow you to notice more, evaluate better, and face the consequences of your choices with courage and humour. We guarantee that you will become more familiar with what actually happens when people must make a choice where there is no right answer, a choice where they do not have enough information or a choice where they do not much like the information they have. You will develop practices for moving into and through choice and liking who you are on the other side.
Managing Choice is about understanding and supporting good processes for making choices. It will be useful to anyone who wants to feel better about the way they make and explain their own choices. It will also be useful to anyone who manages, teaches, coaches, sells or otherwise has a stake in the way other people make decisions. Like all our courses at NLP Canada Training it will involve lots of hands-on work in which you explore your own thoughts, actions and reactions. We will use games and other practices that allow you to maintain your privacy while making real-time progress on choices that have had you stuck or left you unhappy.
Each of the five days is designed to work as a stand-alone course, so feel comfortable trying one or two before deciding that you really want all five. We will offer the courses again, although scheduling and format will depend on our evaluation of the pilot program. The structure of the program as a whole involves the kind of repetition with difference that accelerates learning and gives the unconscious permission to play. You'll also find that you laugh - probably a lot - and that you find you are more engaged and energized than you might expect.
Here's a summary of the five days and what you can expect to gain from each of them.
Saturday, January 8: Elements of Choice. You'll explore the three elements that define every choice: identity, intention and situation and learn how to approach choices through the filter of each element. Expect a quick and useful summary of major personality type systems, a systematic approach to forming intention, and an opportunity to experience a new perceptual position (in addition to the 3 taught in the NLP course).
Sunday, January 23, 2011: The Well-Conditioned Mind. Expect a review of the elegance of natural neurological functions and inborn instincts, and a process for developing instincts in new areas so that you can make fast, effective and replicable choices without conscious struggle. This is the course for people who would like to be in the zone more often.
Saturday, February 5, 2011: Whole Brain Thinking. How does going for a walk clear your head? Have you ever been so mad you couldn't think straight? Learn to be systematic in allowing your senses, your body, your emotions and your stories to help you make better choices.
Sunday, March 6, 2011: Creating Choices. What if you don't like any of the options available? If you want to be the author of your own destiny, you will need to create new choices. Borrow some of the techniques available to writers to us to create something new from what you already have. Learn how to use analogy and metaphor, mistakes, and narratives of possibility to create options that work better for you or to inspire creative thinking in others.
Sunday, March 27, 2011: Is It Your Choice to Make? The final course asks the big question: Are you stuck because this choice isn't really yours to make? We'll look at processes for exploring whether someone else should make the choice or whether this choice is better made through an organization or network. At the same time, we'll revisit the concepts of basic drives and wellness that are foundational to the whole program. You'll end up knowing how to make a choice to be well, even when it means leaving the specifics to someone else.
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An Introduction to the Elements of Choice
Most people faced with a decision at work assume they will do something like this: decide what they want, analyze the situation thoroughly, then make a logical decision that will provide the most benefit at the least cost. If it works, they will take credit for great decision-making. If it doesn't, they will blame something in the situation that was hidden or unpredictable. Most people are blind to the interaction that is at the heart of every decision: who they are determines both how they define what they want and what they are able to notice about the external situation. All three elements are present and active in every choice we make.
Language makes it difficult to explain how three forces can act simultaneously in one mind to produce a particular decision. In language, one word follows another neatly in linear sequence. In your brain, patterns of information are formed and applied as patterns. In your brain, many different things are always happening simultaneously. More than this, your brain's main way of dealing with the outside world is to search for similarities to stored patterns and then to apply them. 
Your brain, paradoxically, loves "no-brainers" - situations which match previous experience so exactly that you are not aware of making choices. Instead, you simply apply a pattern. And the patterns you apply - the choices you make - have two basic functions. Either you act to keep yourself safe or you act to keep yourself comfortable. You are neurologically designed to respond to danger and to use as few resources as possible in all other situations (so that you will have the resources you need to respond if danger arises). You do this within the context provided by the three elements: identity, intention and situation.
Your identity can be described in different ways. You may identify with a family, community or nation, with your astrological sign, or with the work you do. In North America, however, you are likely to identify yourself as an individual, and there are at least three dominant paradigms for exploring your identity in terms of the choices you make. In the Myers Briggs Type Inventory, you are characterized by the way you interact with information: you are how you think. In the DISC profile, you are characterized by your behaviour at work: you are what you do. In the Enneagram, you are defined by your motivation: you are what gets you moving. All three systems give you the option of making decisions the way somebody like you makes decisions: instead of facing the world without a guide, you are handed a map that shows key landmarks in any situation. Because you notice different things, you make different choices. You do run an analysis but the analysis is conditioned by your identity and much of that conditioning is unconscious. You really don't know what you're missing.
Your intentions grow in part from your identity and in part from your situation. An intention is not just a desire: it's a desire with muscle, an outcome that you are prepared to take action to achieve. You intentions make you conscious of the parts of your identity that will be useful in satisfying them, and send other aspects of your identity back into unconscious process. They act the same way on your analysis of a situation: what you notice depends on what you want. Sometimes you form intentions deliberately, consciously building them up to increase the probability that you will make choices in thought and behaviour to satisfy them. Sometimes you learn your intentions by looking at your behaviours and inferring them. If you haven't explored your intentions in a situation, you are likely to miss aspects of the situation that do not seem relevant. Or the choice itself may seem irrelevant if you cannot identify a way to get what you want in a given situation.
The situation does matter: it's just that it is seldom entirely what we think it is. To make a decision by considering the situation does mean conducting a rational analysis of all the factors that you can consciously identify as relevant. It also means letting go of ego (another word for your perception of your own identity and its intentions) and opening yourself to information at the edges of what appears to be significant or useful. While your conscious attention can only deal with a limited amount of information and so wants just the important facts, your unconscious attention wants to gather lots of information so that it can find the best fit between a new situation and an existing pattern of experience. This is why the trick in analysis is always to know when enough is as good as a feast and when only a feast will do.
In the end, even with the best appreciation for all the elements of choice, choice still requires courage. In a world of infinite possibility, sometimes we will make good choices for the right reasons, sometimes we will make good choices for the wrong reasons, and sometimes we will make choices we wish we had not made. We can improve our skill but not perfect it. Choosing means recognizing our limits and doing the best we can with what we have.
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