NLP courses contain a syllabus that will teach you about the power of language. In NLP, much emphasis is given to using what is termed ?Clean Language?. This doesn't mean you should avoid swearing at all costs, rather it means using language that is empowering and positive for both yourself and other people.

On an NLP course, you will learn that language can act as a filter for external sensory information, meaning that your language can actually affect what you focus on and attend to, which in turn affects what information you store and keep in your memory. We use language to describe primary sensory experience, thereby giving the experience meaning.

For example, we know that depressed people usually display distorted thinking patterns, which influence what information they attend to in the environment. A depressed person will usually focus and pick out negative aspects of an experience and delete positive aspects and their language will contain words that are limiting, and self-critical.

NLP courses teach you about being more aware of the language you use in your own head, during thinking and self-talk because we know that people communicate with themselves in ways that can have positive or negative effects on how they feel and hence how they behave.

NLP supports people in developing and using positive patterns of thinking, so that the person will feel more positive, behave more positively and therefore get better results in their life.

Take a look at the following two sentences:

I feel so angry

I feel peeved

You may have noticed something about how the sentences make you feel? Perhaps you have noticed that the second sentence feels less reactive and a bit calmer or that it opens up more options for behaving.

NLP courses also emphasises that it is important to focus on what you want, rather then what you don't want. This is because our minds are wired in such a way that we struggle with processing negatives such as ?don't? and ?not?. For example, if we were to say to you now, ?Do not, whatever you do, think of a pink elephant?, you would have most probably experienced a fleeting image or feelings or sounds about the pink elephant, as your mind found the pink elephant in order to then reject it as something not too be focused on.

On an NLP course that covers clean language you will be taught how to phrase your goals in the positive and how to communicate to others what you really mean.

Besides the huge beneficial changes that can be achieved by using clean language in relation to yourself, NLP courses teach you how to support others in achieving change and moving to more positive emotional states using language. This is an invaluable tool for someone wanting to become a therapist, teachers or people managing and motivating others.