As a linguist I have always been interested in improving my linguistic ability. Learn about a new approach to Linguistic Excellence using NLP to develop latent skills you may have only ever dreamed about.

When I was working as a translator in Russia I met a young woman who was an amazing polyglot. She spoke fluent Russian, Georgian, English and German, and knew Ancient Greek and Arabic. She told me how she learnt Georgian. When she was five years old she was taken to Georgia and enrolled in a Georgian school to learn the language. Throughout the year she was unable to speak a word of Georgian. Then in the final two weeks of school she became seriously ill. On returning to school the following year she spoke perfect Georgian. This story seems incredible but is true. Being a linguist myself I wanted to learn what had happened inside her mind which enabled her to suddenly start speaking Georgian fluently.

Since I was working in Russia I started experimenting with my own Russian and by using hypnosis and guided meditation was able to improve my Russian considerably. However, this interesting experiment was just the beginning of what is now an entire programme. The key behind my friend's success with languages is that she has an ability to not only store information in her subconscious but to activate it. I therefore started developing techniques to help people develop their latent linguistic skills so that they can focus and learn much faster and achieve a greater level of success than would otherwise be possible.

In my experience this comes down to mainly two things background and strategy.  People with a linguistic background understand what is important about language and focus on the language itself. People who struggle with languages tend to focus on understanding the concepts. This distracts people from the language itself and also is inadequate because they are trying to understand a concept without an overall understanding of how the language fits together or works. People with a linguistic background understand these keys to success. Furthermore, they have positive learning experiences with languages which gives them greater persistence and assurance that they can learn material quickly and easily. Since linguistic ability is strongly related with what goes on in our heads, our believes about how easy languages are can be vital to the ease with which we acquire linguistic knowledge.

Another key to developing linguistic ability is reducing the number of cognitive processes that are involved. Often we get taught rules to help learn the grammar of a language, but this means that instead of focusing on speaking the language, we have to try to remember the rules for the language. By adopting an approach which is more focused on rote learning information we reduce mental processes which enables people to speak faster. The disadvantage is that it requires learning by rote. fortunately, we have techniques for that too.

© Peter Campbell, NLP Master Practitioner, Christchurch, Mind Design Ltd. www.mind-design.co.nz

About the author

I am a trained linquist and have spent much of my life travelling. The linguistic component on NLP has always interested me and having experienced some of the powerful changes that NLP is capable of producing in terms of professional life, personal relationships, health and personal development, I was overcome with a desire to train and teach people these life changing skills.