Techniques
Anchoring Techniques
An anchor is a stimuli that accesses a specific emotional state.
Say you have lost a loved one and are at the funeral. All the friends and family come to you and squeeze you on your left shoulder as they say how sorry they are. 10 years later you are in a job interview and as you walk in your boss squeezes you on your left shoulder as he welcomes you. Suddenly you feel sad and want to cry and don't understand why.
Anchors. You nervous system has anchored or associated being sad with someone touching your left shoulder.
It is very interesting to identify the positive and negative anchors in your life. Then you can decide which resourceful states you would like to be able to access anywhere and then anchor it!
These techniques are very powerful when used correctly and I strongly recommend that you not play with them too much.
The Anchoring Process:
• Close your eyes.• Select a situation where you want to be more resourceful (making a speech, driving, etc).
• Select the required emotional state (confidence, happiness, etc)
• Think back to a time when you possessed that resource or model it on someone else if you have not experienced it.
• Select the anchor to be used (a word, or sound, or making a ring with your thumb and index finger, etc).
• Think about a time in your life when you had access to that resourceful state.
• Associate with the state by reliving the past event through your own eyes; becoming aware of feelings, sounds, sights, smells, etc.
See what you saw, hear what you heard and feel what you felt.
• When emotion reaches its peak, fire off the anchor/s.
The peak is between 7 and 10 seconds long.
• If peak is not reached, try again until you succeed as the anchoring is of no use if the anchoring does not happen at the critical time.
• Test your anchor by returning to your pre-anchor state and imagining a time in the future where you will require this resourceful state-
Fire your anchor and see what happens
It is possible to collapse negative anchors like the one I mention above. We are able to do this by confusing the nervous system. When you fire off 2 anchors at the same time, the stronger one will remain and the weaker one will collapse.
Collapsing Anchor Process:
• Select the negative (anger, fear, jealousy, addiction) and positive (confidence, calm, happiness) states• Create the positive state- feel confident, happy, calm, etc.
• Break state (open eyes, stand up, take deep breath)
• Summon up desired state again and anchor it (see above on how to create an anchor)
• Break state
• Test positive anchor.
This anchor needs to be really strong for this to work.
• Identify negative state and anchor it
• Break state
• Now elicit both states in turn without breaking state in between
• Fire off both anchors at the same time
• Remove negative anchor
• Remove positive anchor
• Test by firing off the negative anchor
• If neutral state is not achieved- continue by stacking positive anchors. (Adding more resourceful feelings to positive state)
• Now elicit both states in turn without breaking state in between
• Fire off both anchors at the same time
• Positive anchor MUST be stronger than negative in order for this to work.