your brain the computer
neuro-linguistic programming
"We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit" - Aristotle
We hear a lot about the subconscious, yet few of us understand what it is, and how to use it. Many people disregard its existence because they cannot see, touch, hear, smell or taste it.
The human mind consists of two levels of activity, the conscious and subconscious. Your conscious mind carries out the logical, reasoning part of your thinking. It uses the 5 senses to gather information and come to logical conclusions by both deductive and inductive reasoning. What we commonly regard as "thinking" we do with our conscious mind.
However, more than 90% of mental activity is subconscious. It is the part of the mind that controls autonomic functions such as breathing, digestion, and the beating of your heart; it also takes over activities and skills when they become automatic, such as riding a bike and speaking a foreign language.
The subconscious mind acts like a computer program that manages our thoughts, habits, beliefs and convictions, and can be "programmed" like a computer. It acts like an unlimited-size hard drive that stores every image, sound, feeling, taste and smell we have ever encountered, making vivid associations between these and our experiences. Our mind's programming started early in life by our family, friends, teachers, and the media, a fact that advertisers are very aware of and exploit.
We can "re-program" ourselves, by exploring and exposing subconscious assumptions, associations and behaviour patterns, and choosing to re-create them.
Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) is a practice which models aspects of effective, successful behaviour, and in particular, good communication.
NLP techniques focus on associative, as opposed to rational thinking as a way of working on complex issues, using metaphor as a way of mediating between the conscious and the subconscious.
NLP offers many powerful tools and techniques to the Innovation BoosterTM process, in terms of sorting complex issues into hierarchical levels, challening assumptions, and adopting new perspectives.
