Advanced Therapeutic Specialist 2008

Back in the 1970’s a group of young people got together in Santa Cruz to try out some new ideas and through that they began noticing more and more about human behaviour and the ways in which people operate.

It’s November 22nd 2008 and the morning is bright and clear. The skies are blue and there’s a slight autumn chill in the air as I make my way to the tube station. I’m travelling to Bloomsbury square in London and as I arrive at the Georgian building I get the sense that something special is about to occur. I pause for a few moments to take in a breath of chilled air before stepping through the large oak doors. I’m finally there and ready to begin the adventure. This is the Advanced Therapeutic Specialist track of 2008.

The next nine days are going to be spent with just nineteen other people and Two Master Trainers, Gabe Guerrero and Eric Robbie.

With over 25 years of teaching, developing and revolutionising NLP, Eric Robbie is the Society of NLPs most senior trainer in the UK and has co-trained alongside Richard Bandler across the world. Having developed Submodality Eye Accessing Cues (SMEACs), Meta Program Accessing Cues (MPACs) and much much more, Eric is considered by Richard to be one of the top three trainers in the world.

As Associate Professor of Bandler Technologies, Gabe Guerrero is one of a rare group of people who are challenging many of the things we think we know about NLP and developing new and improved ways of studying human behaviour. Having designed the Advanced Therapeutic Specialist track, trained alongside Richard Bandler around the world and become one of the only people to ever co-train with Richard in his Personal Enhancement workshops, Gabe is considered part of a new breed of NLP trainer who are continuously developing new ideas and taking NLP to the next level.

The course begins by learning what it means to work with a persons global structure and how being able to notice the way in which a person maintains their problems can enable the practitioner to build a full representation of what holds together the problem and create the most systemic and lasting changes. We learned how to find patterns in beliefs, values, meta programs, language and behaviours and began to build up an idea of how to predict responses based on the information provided.

Over the next few days we continued to work on many of the different ways of being able to notice more information, build representations of human behaviour and learn which changes would affect which aspects of a persons life. Using our internal simulators we were able to predict how a person would respond based on their global structure and then test out those predictions in order to verify what we were noticing. Learning how to create metaphors that run specific programs and sequenced meta programs in a persons mind as well as how to unconsciously seed and install useful beliefs and ideas in our clients , we began to work with one another to better understand our behaviours and patterns.

Working with Eric we started to learn how to notice what people are doing inside their heads by noticing what’s available on the outside. The day began by learning about the different types of internal dialog as Eric lead us through some exercises to train our minds to sort for the kinds of information necessary.

Outside of the training course both Gabe be and Eric generously shared their knowledge and many of us got together to discus new ideas, ways of practicing and the latest developments in the field. The evenings were filled with (everything else you’d expect) good food, good wine and some amazing people.

This training was one of the most advanced I’ve ever done and both Gabe and Eric brought to the training a passion and enthusiasm I rarely see from trainers. Their style of teaching makes even the most complex of ideas extremely understandable and brings some of the most advanced language and behavioural technologies in such a way that we all began to change and improve the way we work.

After just the first two days of training it became increasingly difficult to not notice how people were operating, what generalisations were being maintained and how they were structuring their experience of the

Before we began the training each of us sent in a wish list just as you might if attending a personal enhancement workshop with Richard. This meant that both Eric and Gabe knew exactly what we wanted to get from the training and were able to structure the training in such a way that we all got more than we’d expected. On the final three days, five people agreed to have their wish lists looked at by the rest of the group. We worked together in (small groups) groups of three , using the wish list and noticing what patterns and structures were holding all of these wishes together. By using these lists and talking with our “client” we started to generate ways of enhancing their lives in a generative way and creating within them the changes they desired. This was our ultimate exam and pushed us beyond what many of us had been used too on previous courses.

It’s November 30th 2008 and the sun has just set. All the lights in the area are lighting up the streets and we’re making our way to the local pub for a few farewell drinks. Soon we’ll all be going back to our old lives except something magical seems to have happened to each person. There’s something different in the air, a faint glow of warmth and a twinkle in each persons eye.

Looking back to how we all were on that first day of November 22nd and noticing how each of us was by the end of the course, it was obvious that everyone had dramatically improved beyond most of our expectations.

In the 1970’s there was a revolution taking place. Here in 2008 we’re starting the next revolution and we’re only just uncovering the beginnings of what could prove to be the most diverse and exciting NLP explorations yet.

Are you ready for the fun to begin?

Jamie.