Neuro Linguistic Programming's "Phobia Cure"

NLP's "phobia cure" reduces the emotional change associated with some past or imagined future negative experience. As it was originally created by studying how certain certain people had rid themselves of phobias, it is usually referred to as the phobia cure. The phobia cure is one of the key NLP techniques we teach in our NLP Practitioner Training here in New York

Anyone with a diagnosed phobia should seek qualified medial assistance.

V-K (Visual-Kinesthetic) Dissociation

The "phobia cure" is sometimes called V-K dissociation (ie visual-kinesthetic dissociation), because it relies on seeing the unpleasant event as if watching oneself a movie, hence being in a "dissociated" position in relation to the experience. This tends to reduce the feelings associated with the experience. The technique should only be done by a properly qualified person.

Visual and Kinesthetic refer to the sensory systems or representational systems as we say in NLP.

The technique is essentially as follows:

The Phobia Cure Technique

• There is some unpleasant or negative memory, or some thought about what may happen in the future. This is in the form of a "movie" that runs in the mind.
• There is some point before the experience begins when one feels safe. Let's call this the opening scene.
• Similarly there is some scene at the end of the movie when we feel safe again. Let's call this the closing scene.
• Imagine sitting in a movie theater that plays old black and white movies. The screen is blank. Now imagine floating back into the projection booth and seeing yourself in the theater. Anchor a feeling of safety and dissociation.
• See the opening scene where you are safe. From the projection booth watch yourself watching the movie, in black and white with no sound.
• When the final scene appears, float into the screen, into the "you" in the closing scene.
• Now put color and sound back into the movie and run it backwards, very quickly. Repeat this process 4 or 5 times.

How is the memory different now that you think about it, now?

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