NLP Scripts - should you use them? How do you avoid them?

I can't remember the title of the session and even if I could, I'd prefer not to identify the trainer as hopefully he has moved on to bigger and better ways of working. Either that or left NLP to set up some kind of new age retreat or whatever.

What I can remember is that the session had a 'spiritual' overtone (nothing to do with Michael Hall's 'Spirit of NLP' I should add), and that the trainer turned up with two young women as his entourage who sat in adoration at the side of the stage, while he walked us through an NLP process of his own making. Then, when it was our turn, we were handed written word for word instructions including exactly what to say to the client at every step of the process - this was his NLP script.

During this session where a good friend of mine tried to enhance the intervention with her group of three by adding a little light trance work and was told by of of her partners that 'we don't do hypnosis here' - someone really didn't 'get' NLP and I don't think it was my friend.

Yes, you can use an NLP script to talk someone though an NLP process such as a NLP Fast Phobia Cure but what about rapport? What about language patterns? Do you write down all the inflections too? That would be effective!

Good artists don't learn their art by painting by numbers, and when it comes to the art of NLP, neither should you.

You need to practice the language patterns until they become second nature, and then listen to hypnotic inductions enough to know exactly what is going on, and then you need to practice some more. For advice on learning language patterns check my article NLP Language Patterns.

You've be surprised how quickly you learn to skip from one language pattern to the next and weave them into an NLP induction or NLP installation. Then all you need to know is the steps in the process to guide the client through it, and you can probably give reasonable instructions without an NLP script.

NLP language like any other form of language needs to be integrated into your own language circuits; Anything else just isn't going to be effective and you'll outgrow it anyway - I can't remember ever seeing a child who was satisfied when they had mastered riding a pushbike with stabilizers.

And the next time someone gives you an NLP script - you know what to do with it!