• • •
IT IS LUNCHTIME NOW. I walk past the Bentley. A delegate sidles up to me. “You’re a very naughty boy!” she says. “Richard will be very cross with you!”
“What?” I practically yell.
“You kept writing when Richard was talking even though you know you weren’t supposed to!” she says. “And you didn’t have a smile on your face. Everyone was laughing, but you were scowling.”
I missed yesterday’s session, which is perhaps why everyone is so far ahead of me in the frenzied-adoration stakes. In fact, earlier today Richard Bandler said he had no unhappy clients. His exact words were “The reason why all my clients are a success is that I killed all the ones who weren’t.”
Lots of delegates have told me they signed up because of the TV star Paul McKenna but the great revelation has been the man they hadn’t heard of: Richard Bandler.
• • •
THREE OF PAUL MCKENNA’S NLP-inspired self-help books (Change Your Life in 7 Days, Instant Confidence—which is dedicated to Bandler—and I Can Make You Thin) are currently in the WHSmith Top 10. So that’s the therapy side. The NLP-can-do-wonders-for-your-business side is thriving too. In fact when I meet Iain Aitken, the managing director of McKenna’s company, he says the phobic delegates are becoming the minority now that NLP has become so widespread in the business world. I ask Iain what is it about NLP that attracts the salespeople. Bandler, he replies, teaches that everyone has a dominant way of perceiving the world through seeing, hearing, or feeling. If a customer says, “I see what you mean,” that makes them a visual person. The NLP-trained salesperson will spot the clue and establish rapport by mirroring the language.
“I get the picture,” the NLP-trained salesperson can reply, rather than “That rings a bell” or “That feels good to me.”
• • •
AFTER LUNCH, we split into small groups to practice NLP techniques on one another. I pair up with Vish, who runs a property company in the Midlands.
“What did I miss yesterday?” I ask him.
“It was great,” he says. “We did anchoring. Let me show you how it works.”
Vish moves his chair closer to mine.
“How are you enjoying your time here?” he asks me.
“OK,” I say.
Vish pokes my elbow.
“Brilliant!” he says. “Did you have a good lunch?”
“It was all right,” I say.
Vish prods my elbow again.
“Fantastic!” he says. “Have you got kids?”
“A son,” I say.
“Did you have fun with him last weekend?” he asks.
“Yes, I did,” I say.
Vish pokes my elbow.
“Brilliant!” he says. “Now. Did you notice what I was doing?”
“You were poking my elbow every time I expressed positive feeling,” I say.
“Exactly!” says Vish, although he looks peeved that I spotted the poking, which is supposed to be so subtle as to exist only on the unconscious level.
“Now,” says Vish. “When I want to sell you something, I’ll touch your elbow and you’ll associate that touch with a good feeling, and you’ll want to buy. That’s deep psychology.” Vish pauses. “What I really like about NLP is how it can hypnotize and manipulate people. But in a good way.”
• • •
I STAND UP to stretch my legs and I spot Paul McKenna at the front, near the stage. Even though I’m still supposed to be doing the small-group workshop, I decide to introduce myself. I take a few steps toward McKenna. Instantly, one of his assistants swoops down on me. There are about forty assistants in all, scattered around the room.
“Do you need help?” she asks me.
“No,” I say.
“Have you finished the workshop already?” she asks sarcastically.
“Yes,” I say.
“Well, you must have finished quicker than everyone else because everyone else is still doing it,” she says.
“I’m a journalist and I’m going to talk to Paul McKenna,” I say.
I walk on. Ten steps later, two more assistants appear from nowhere.
“Aren’t you joining in?” asks one.
“You’re going to miss all the benefits,” says the other.
“I’m OK, honestly,” I say.
Another assistant appears.
“Didn’t you understand your instruction?” he says. “Paul explained three times that you’re supposed to do the workshop for fifteen minutes.”
Finally, exhausted, I reach Paul McKenna. I introduce myself.
“How did you end up in business with Richard Bandler?” I ask him.
“I know!” he says. “It seems incredible from the outside. But he’s one of my best friends . . .” Then he excuses himself to do a spot of speed-healing on an overeater.
• • •
AN HOUR LATER Paul McKenna’s PR rep, Jaime, tells me in the corridor quite sternly that I am not to hang out with Paul or Richard before, between, or after sessions because they’re far too busy and tired. I can meet them next Wednesday, she says, when the course is over. I go home. I don’t think I have ever, in all my life, had so many people try to control me in one single day. Advocates and critics alike say attaining a mastery of NLP can be an excellent way of controlling people, so I suppose the training courses attract that sort of person. Ross Jeffries, author of How to Get the Women You Desire into Bed, is a great NLP fan, as is Duane Lakin, author of The Unfair Advantage: Sell with NLP! (Both books advocate the “That feels good to me” style of mirroring/rapport-building invented by Bandler.)
But still, the controlling didn’t work on me. Nobody successfully got inside my head and changed—for their benefit—the way I saw NLP. In fact, quite the opposite happened. This makes me wonder if NLP even works.
E-mails and telephone calls fly back and forth. I tell Jaime the PR rep that I don’t want to be kept away from Richard Bandler during the sessions. Finally it is agreed I can meet him before he goes onstage on Monday.
• • •
THINGS IMPROVE. There’s a nice, normal delegate here called Nick who teaches executives how to be good public speakers.
“These group things are always a bit creepy,” he says, “but that isn’t the point. The point is that NLP isn’t bogus.”
I tell Nick about Vish noticeably prodding me in the elbow.
“Well, he was just doing it badly,” says Nick. “Honestly. NLP is the most sensible thing out there.”
I corner Paul McKenna and tell him his assistants are driving me crazy.
“You have to make them leave me alone,” I say.
He looks mortified and says they’re just overexcited and trying too hard. But, he adds, the course would be a lot worse without them energizing the stragglers into practicing NLP techniques on one another.
Onstage, Bandler and McKenna cure a stream of delegates of their phobias and compulsions. There’s a woman who’s barely left her home for years, convinced the heater will turn itself on when she’s out and burn the house down.
“Do they pay you to think like this?” asks Bandler. “It seems like an awful lot of work. Aren’t you fucking sick of it?”
The woman says a bossy voice in her head tells her the heater will do this.
Bandler gets her to turn down the knob in her brain that controls the volume of the bossy voice.