Mightier than the sword? The power of the written word
The power of language and words cannot be disputed. The things that we write about ourselves and other people have the potential to shape and affect many lives. At any one time, there will be several stories in the media about arguments over what one celebrity writes about another on social media.
People keen to share the gossip will share controversial posts and written opinions far quicker than positive or complimentary material, which is, sadly, deemed less newsworthy by many. The trouble with the written word is that it doesn’t come with the nuances or facial expressions that help us understand the context of the spoken word, nor the intentions of the person conveying the message. So, it is far easier to take something that someone has written out of context and either wilfully or unknowingly misunderstand its intentions.
In the world of NLP, language is a vital component in learning how to change behaviours and thinking. We all react more positively to text that mirrors our own way of thinking, or which fulfils a need in us, such as providing information or offering an interesting viewpoint. Even when we read something that we do not agree with, if it is written in an engaging, respectful way, we can still gain from it.
The fact that writing physically sticks around a lot longer than the spoken word also helps us use the NLP-related technique of disassociation.[1] This works by identifying the emotion or behaviour that you want to change, focusing on it and visualising a related scene to remove the immediacy and drama of that emotion. While this can be done purely by imagining the scene in your mind, it can be even more powerful and easier to do if you have a piece of text that provokes the emotion which you can re-read as many times as you need to in order to disassociate from how it makes you feel.
Another key NLP technique is anchoring, or making connections between a stimulus and an emotion and then changing that emotion to give you more power.[2] For example, if you are feeling nervous before an exam, think about how you would rather feel and identify a time in your past when you felt the same, positive emotion. Take a mental snapshot of that time and use it as an anchor to steady your nerves every time they threaten to re-emerge in the lead-up to, or during the exam. This connects directly to writing, as you can use something you have read or written yourself to act as that anchor.
Chunking up and down
Much is shared about the concept of chunking – extracting certain phrases or pieces of information from a larger source and analysing its language patterns, ideas and reason for existing. The idea of chunking can really help shape written communications to make what you are trying to convey easier to understand, more logical and more persuasive and engaging.
When reading a piece of writing, NLP methodology teaches that you can ‘chunk up’ or ‘chunk down’ in order to extract what you need to inform or alter behaviour. Chunking up helps you consider more abstract ideas such as ‘productivity’ ‘improvement’ or ‘growth’. It can help you decide whether or not you agree with what is being discussed. Smaller chunks, or ‘chunking down’ looks at detail and more specific facts pertinent to the bigger concepts being written about.
Having a good balance of chunking in written communications both gives you the greatest chance of not only understanding everything, but gaining more out of it. Chunking up allows people to understand the general question of: ‘why am I reading this and why is it important to me?’, while chunking down helps you answer more practical queries around ‘who, what, when, where and how?’.[3] Journalists are often taught how to start a news article with brief answers to these five questions in order to grab people’s attention and allow them access to the key facts of the story straight away. This can also be effective in written sales and marketing collateral.
Small words, big meanings
I have already said that words are powerful. However, just like some of the animal protagonists in George Orwell’s Animal Farm are more equal than others, so certain words carry more weight behind them than others, even if they are quite short[4]. Here are four examples of what I mean:
- ‘Yet’ – much is said in the competitive worlds of elite performing arts, academia or sport about the power of ‘not yet’ – i.e., you have not passed the audition, made the team or secured an A grade YET. That doesn’t mean you never will. There is still hope!
- ‘Or’ – this two-letter word opens up huge possibilities by offering a choice other than the first idea presented. However, to provide even more options, writers should aim to open up discussion beyond a binary ‘either/or’ choice.
- ‘Don’t’ – asking someone not to do something inevitably leads them to think about the thing they should be doing first. Try NOT thinking about a pink elephant right now. DON’T do it! See? Impossible! Swap out negative instructions like ‘don’t’ for more positive written phrases that point readers directly to what you DO want them to do.
- ‘Can’ / ‘can’t’ – these little words can often cause problems in things like emails or texts when people are organising an event, collectively managing a project or allocating jobs within a group. Sometimes, ‘I can’t’ can mean ‘I don’t feel confident enough to’ or ‘I don’t have the time/resources to.’ Working this out through chunking down and then asking for clarification or offering support can often turn a written ‘can’t into a proactive ‘can’.
Self-reflection through the written word
Writing for self-reflection can be a highly effective tool, not only for self-exploration but for healing too. There’s a reason why lots of people keep a journal or diary to write down what has happened to them and how they feel about it. NLP encourages us to look for patterns in emotions and behaviours in order to use our previous experiences to change things going forward.
What better way is there to identify patterns than examining things we have written down about ourselves? Writing helps us get our thoughts in order, as the things we want to say must travel from the heart and head through the body and out via a pen or keyboard. We can then read them straight away or put them away for a while before returning to them afresh later on. We can add more writing later on or put our thoughts into different categories to identify the events and experiences that have made us feel certain ways. For many people, this is much easier to do electronically, rather than writing things out by hand.
Finally, we are able to read what we have written about ourselves from a more dispassionate, objective viewpoint than we can by examining our thoughts as they happen without then expressing them on paper or screen. It can sometimes feel like reading about someone else, which makes it easier to work out what we need to do to help change undesired emotions or behaviours. We can use the chunking and disassociation methods already described above to help with this. Best of all, we can turn thoughts, emotions and worries into tangible, controllable actions.
In the field of mBraining, bigger concepts are often turned from abstract nouns into verbs. This makes them feel more immediate and active – something you can start working on achieving right away.[5] Think about the concept of happiness. We don’t achieve happiness simply by focusing on the idea and hoping it will come our way by itself. Rather, by actively choosing to pursue happiness, or engage in ‘happiness-ing’ we take control of the situation and identify strategies for success.
When writing down your goals, therefore, choose active verbs and targets that feel manageable and can be measured to show you how you are doing. Tick things off as you achieve them – I love writing lists and crossing things off them. It makes me feel proud of the items on the list that I have achieved and inspired to get on with the rest. See? Another way in which writing can be a powerful thing!
For more information about NLP and its benefits, get in touch with me today.
[1] Source: https://exploringyourmind.com/nlp-neuro-linguistic-programming/. Accessed 30 March 2023.
[2] Source: https://exploringyourmind.com/nlp-neuro-linguistic-programming/. Accessed 30 March 2023.
[3] Source: NLP for Business Success, Jeremy Lazarus, published 2013, p85-87
[4] Source: NLP for Business Success, Jeremy Lazarus, published 2013, p96-98
[5] Source: Avoiding the Enemies to Happiness, Grant Soosalu, published 2014, p476
