How happy are you? And how can you increase your happiness? This blog post is part of our Global NLP Training Happiness Series, which can be found on our blog as well as our YouTube channel (youtube.com/globalnlptv) each week for the next three months. Please request the Global NLP Training Happiness Guidebook by emailing us here.
In our NLP training and life coaching certification courses happiness is a frequent topic of discussion, and many people join our classes to become happy or coach others to achieve this. Did you know that most life coaches cannot tell you what happiness is? They bounce that question back to you by asking what makes you happy. People who have done an NLP training may come with actionable tools to achieve happiness, but most certainly cannot define it (unless you have trained with Global NLP Training, as we like to bring science into the training room). More importantly, how can you find out what level of happiness you experience in different areas of your life? Have a measuring system by which you can tell, let’s say 3 months from now, how happy you are then. Understanding what happiness is and becoming conscious of it allows us to take active measures in your life. A scientist, a person who has taken an NLP training, a person who has done a life coach training and certification course, each have a different perspective.
In the coming weeks we will teach you 3 ways to measure your happiness:
- Your life wheel (life coach tool)
- Using the scientific definition (Science & Psychology)
- Using values (NLP training technique typically taught in NLP Master Practitioner)
For this week, please complete your life wheel. The life wheel can be found in the Global NLP Training Happiness Guidebook mentioned above, which you can get from us free of charge. Then watch the video below and follow the instructions.
So now you have completed your life wheel, typically taught in a run of the mill life coach certification training. This tool is unfortunately neither scientific nor NLP based, which is a drawback, but it is most certainly an invaluable tool. The Jedi lightsaber of the life coach.
What would happen if we would attach your wheel to a bicycle? Would it be a bumpy ride? Perhaps we would end up with an expensive dentist bill, in which case I recommend starting to work on your happiness right now! Because as long as you are not working to become happy, the more you are putting yourself at risk for ill-being, physical and mental illness, and not leading the life you should be leading.
We are now going to explore further using specific questions that are typically taught inside an NLP Practitioner training. These questions are called the meta-model and help to make conscious what is otherwise unconscious, below are a selection of them to facilitate your happiness exercise.
Ask yourself the following questions:
- What specifically are areas in your life wheel that are noticeably interconnected preventing you from having 100% satisfaction? Or in the case of happiness, how happy are you in those areas specifically?
- What would happen if you worked on these areas as part of a goal or a series of tasks? How specifically would that change your life?
- What small activities or tasks could you do in the next two weeks to increase these parts of your life wheel? List 5 and commit to completing them. How specifically would this impact your wheel?
- Look at 3 lost scores. For each, write down 3 specific obstacles you find in this area.
- Write down how you are going to navigate these obstacles through actions.
- Write down 3 specific tasks for each area where you are going to get to work (may overlap with the previous NLP questions).
- What goal specifically should you be setting for yourself to get the most yield strategically?
For each task:
This is where another piece of NLP comes in, using what we call in NLP training: association, dissociation, future pacing, and submodalities.
Step 1. Imagine seeing yourself do each task from start to finish, like a movie with you as the main star in it.
Step 2. When the outcome is reached, imagine stepping into this you as if you were looking through your own eyes. What specifically would you see, hear, and feel?
Step 3. Augment the feelings by making the sounds a little louder, the image a little brighter, bring it closer. Or locate a positive feeling, or your sense of motivation on the inside of your body and intensify this feeling.
Please take your time to reflect on the above and the exercise. Isn’t it worth it if they payoff is that you will become happy? You will find this exercise valuable not only in creating conscious awareness for yourself and how happy you are, but also to use life coaching and NLP techniques to start improving your happiness scores.
Now for those who have taken an NLP training or a quality life coach certification training, the above should offer you a lot of food for thought as to how you can bring a lot more life into the life wheel exercise.
Now immediately after you finish reading this article start completing one of the first tasks.
Interested in doing an NLP Training or a life coach certification? Please check out our website at globalnlptraining.com. We teach a lot of tools for you to become happy or allow others to achieve happiness as well.
