NLP Persuasion and the Structure of Learning

By Rintu Basu NLP Case Studies, NLP Courses, NLP Products 11 Comments 27th January 2012

I was sent a great question and it gave me the opportunity to not only unpack material about accelerated learning hypnotic persuasion but also to demonstrate how I put persuasion metaphors together.

Inductive or Deductive Learning?

Do you prefer to learn in a step by step systematic way or do you like meandering from topic to topic building connections and a framework between different things? The real answer is it depends on the context and that you do both well. But your beliefs about your learning ability will make a difference to how effective any of this might be. Have a look at this email with a view to understanding where the writer is actually coming from.

From: EP

Sent: 25 January 22:24

To: Rintu

Subject: Question About APP course

Hello,

I have a quick question about the APP course. I got a little excited about it and just bought the full thing yesterday but I have yet to complete the black book and smaller persuasion course I have already purchased. I just wondered if it is best to completely go through all that material before starting on the APP stuff.

Thanks,

Asking the Right Question

When listening to people one of my favourite thoughts is to ask myself what has to be true for that person for the statement that they are making to be true. Applying that question to the email above one answer is that EP doesn’t have the confidence to just go with however they want to do it. Or they have a personality profile that says that there is a wrong way and a right way to do things.

In either case they would be more effective in their learning if they just leapt in and confidently did this learning stuff their own way. The reality is I do have a structure and some subject are better done in sequence etc. but the more you read around a subject the more frame work you put in place to connect and integrate the material. So the ideal solution is that you do dip and skim as well as go through systematically.

Remember I might not have this right. If EP was in the room I would ask more questions and check my ideas out before reaching for these conclusions. But I am going to assume these are the issues for the purposes of demonstrating the metaphor and because after years of busting people’s unhelpful learning beliefs I am fairly sure that this if EP doesn’t have this issue certainly other people reading this article will have.

Covert Persuasion Skills in Action

Now that you have seen the set up, below is my response. How well do you think I did?

Hi EP,

It is a quick question but needs a big answer.

The original version of the APP was delivered in weekly chunks and people did not have the opportunity to leap ahead. I deliberately overloaded the weekly chunks so people would not be able to keep up. This was for several reasons, I wanted to over deliver on my promise, make sure people had enough to study and never go hungry during the week.

As people “fell behind” I found that they were jumping backwards and forwards through the content rather than following the delicately balanced structured process I had carefully designed. And they were also going through in order at the same time. This based on the feedback I get is a remarkably great way of studying the material.

I am a firm believer of chaotic structures. Both The Persuasion Skills Black Book and the Advanced Persuasion Patterns Course have a carefully designed structure that is designed to help you install the information. In both I (over)use patterns in lots of different ways to encourage the reader to notice them and to seduce people in to going back, spotting and laughing about the patterns they missed and are now learning about.

So the short answer to your question is follow the process for both / either and have the joy of reading ahead, behind and generally all around. I talk about learning these skills as a systematic, linear process because the teaching process has to start somewhere and finish somewhere else. The learning process on the other hand is about integrating things in much more multi-dimensional level. As such reading around the subject is vital.

I hope that answers your question. If it doesn’t wait until you have been through the metaphor section of the Advanced Persuasion Patterns course and come back to it.

Cheers

Rintu

Final Thoughts

Here are a few questions for you to ponder:

How well do you think I did?
What impact did it have on you?
What would you do differently?

Feel free to leave comments below. If you have not yet looked at the Advanced Persuasion Patterns Course you can find out more about it here:

Tags: Accelerated Learning, Products, Reframing

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Steven Blake mba

Following a recent training course where we were instructed not to take notes and how to ask questions a change took place in the way I learn. I now make connections between lots of disparate things. So I think your response was spot on. If we learn any part of a process it does tend to leave questions to be answered that not only come from the next part of the training program, it also comes from life. To me this enhances the learning process by giving it practical application from your own thought process.
- http://www.theNLPcompany.com Rintu Basu
  
  Thanks Steven,
  I compeltely agree with you. I thnk the most effective way of learning is sticking to the process if there is one AND randomly going in whatever direction the connections take you.
  
  Cheers
  
  Rintu
http://twitter.com/yogainspiresyou Ntathu Allen

I am a random learner and prefer to dip in and out and find/make connections as I go along. Often the real learning takes place outside of the textbook/ecourse, when i get an “ahha” moment, then I will go back and reread the appropriate section and usually spend time going deeper into the material. Then again, I have been on structured courses and find that process ok, but prefer sharing and talking with others about the learning as we go along.
- http://www.theNLPcompany.com Rintu Basu
  
  Hi Ntathu,
  The comments are moderated so it takes some time for me to get to them. Since your second post is essentially the same I will just put the one up.
  
  I think you are spot on and completely agree with this approach.
  
  Cheers
  
  Rintu
Taxiorlando

Hi Rintu: I agree with you that when approaching new material a lot of us are afraid that we will Not be Doing Right and so put off until that perfect moment. I teach English as a Second Language and totally agree witht he saying “The Learniug is in the Doing’ Just jump right in and let your brain figure out the way to string it in perfect fashion. In learning a second language there is always that Aha! moment, but it takes time and just doing the work. I imagine it’s like that for any new material. The wonderful thing is that when you have done something long enough it all becomes Intuitive.

Thanks for all the good work. Just wondering if you actually get some sleep or are you up all nite working through all of this.

Cheers,

Ignacio
Richard Faulk

To add a couple of additional dimensions to what you have already presented, I would like to address motivation. When people are motivated to learn they are willing to put in extra time and devour things that they are interested in learning. So when someone is eager to learn and something strikes their fancy, they will read ahead and also go back to try to gain more awareness of the topic. In addition, there are people who are systematic (and legalistic) and believe they have to go through things in the logical methodology that it is presented. However, we also know that there are unstructured individuals who will rebel against any form of structure because “they know a better way of learning or presenting” the material, so they go through the material “their way.”
- http://www.theNLPcompany.com Rintu Basu
  
  Good Point Richard,
  Your profile and the way you prefer doing things will make a big difference to your approach. And as a discussion point here is a question for you to ponder:
  
  What would make the best result for you; expanding your comfort zone by taking the knowledge in a way that is different to your norm or focussing on getting the knowledge by using the method of input that you are most comfortable with?
  
  Cheers
  
  Rintu
  - Richard Faulk
    
    The answer is both. If you learn the way you are used to, you will learn faster than doing it another way. However, if you learn the other way you will put the information in different and possible more parts of your brain, so you end up learning the material better.
    - http://www.theNLPcompany.com Rintu Basu
      
      Yes Richard,
      
      I almost completely agree and would suggest an alternative third answer of doing both at the same time.
      
      I know that this was not one of the two options and I would also suggest that is the point. Breaking the assumptions and asking the question, “How else can you do it?” might be a useful place to go with it.
      
      Hope you are finding these musings useful, or at least entertaining.
      
      So the next question is how many language patterns have you found in my reply.
      
      Cheers
      
      Rintu
      - Richard Faulk
        
        I almost agree . . . = 1st
        and I would also . . = 2nd
        changing subject to what you want to talk about … = 3rd
        There are probably more, but they are revealed in the advanced program, right?
      - http://www.theNLPcompany.com Rintu Basu
        
        Yes and I would also add you don’t need the advanced programme to see the patterns. That said the big / important stuff is exactly how you have described it.
        
        Thanks for letting me play.
        
        R

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