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NLP Origins

Wow, been waiting for this book for a long time!

I was in contact with Frank Pucelik almost 2 years ago.  He had “re-surfaced” in the UK as the 3rd man in the co-creation of NLP and, through some online correspondence, had let me in on some of the early stories of how NLP actually happened. 

Fascinated I asked if he had considered writing a book and he responded that he was currently engaged in exactly such a project with John Grinder and that the book would be released by year end (2011). It wasn’t and through email the following year I again enquired about the release date.  More confident he replied that they intended to launch it at the November 2012 NLP Conference in the UK, which I understand happened although, being in India, I didn’t manage to attend.

I eagerly awaited the release via the online book stores, first in January 2013 then February then April, then May and although the book was released for purchase in the UK, somehow via the online sites it wasn’t going to be available to us until the end of May, then June. 

Fortunately I had released an online bot to look out for it becoming available on Kindle and as soon as I received the email saying that it had been, I purchased it and read it over the following two days.

That in itself is recommendation as it contains a great deal of fantastic information.  I had previously settled down to read Terry McClendons “Wild days of NLP” for the weekend, only to finish it in a couple of, highly entertaining, hours but the brief experience left me wondering if perhaps some chapters had been omitted from my copy.

For me personally the highlights of NLP Origins were Frank Puceliks and Stephen Gilligans contributions. Another nice touch for me was that Carmen Bostic St. Clair thoughtfully added an epilogue which addressed some of the unanswered questions at the end of the book, particularly regarding ‘NLP Modelling’.

The lowlights were that some of the original group members, including David Gordon & especially Leslie Cameron-Bandler, elected not to contribute. It certainly would have been nice to have had Richard Bandlers voice added to it and perhaps in time a revised version may appear with all these ‘voices’.

Another lowlight for me was the naming of NLP!  I’ve been telling the story of how Bandler looked down and saw three books, one on Neurology, one on Linguistics and one on Computer Programming…. Much better story, but do I continue to tell it or the true but less interesting story!?

What really stood out was the amount of testing and experimenting that went on in the early days. The early NLP Groups met with ‘JohnandRichard’ (Grinder & Bandler) twice a week and on their own 4 times a week. After reading that, I ask, how can anyone expect to learn NLP in 5 days?! Even the best NLP Practice groups now meet once a week or once a month! Let’s take this as encouragement to set up and regularly attend NLP Practice groups in India.

The contributors are some of the originals of NLP and what I particularly loved was the way sensory based language and metaphor is used throughout, Carmen Bostic St. Clair completes the book with a wonderful Theatre metaphor.

The book certainly answers many, many of the questions about the origin of NLP and of course, through multiple voices, cloudy memories and differing perspectives and motives, the book raises even more questions.

Stephen Gilligan contribution captures perfectly the disconnect that has arisen in NLP, my thoughts echoed perfectly in John Grinders response.

John Grinder raises the question toward the end of his section, how many NLP’ers have actually spent time modelling something new?  How many of us have?

The Book, NLP Origins, authored by many, edited by John Grinder & Frank Pucelik is now available at the online book stores in India.  Get it and devour it!

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