Introduction

This post is in response to, and expanding upon, a post made earlier by /u/MrNatemare entitled "Recognize that your beta behavior may come from a domineering mother." If you haven't read it yet, I suggest doing it because it does some work to lay the foreground for this post.

This is the first of a series of posts, so be sure to check back tomorrow for the the next entry.

The main focus of this post is about a concept called "de-programming" one's self. In essence, this concept is about disregarding past experiences, and using one's sensory capabilities to interact with reality while simultaneously overriding previously programmed responses.

Neuro-Linguistic Programming

The foundation of "de-programming" or "unplugging" as it were, is a practice called Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP). NLP studies the relationship between an individual's cognition (neuro), their behavior (linguistic), and their experiences (programming). While the understanding of this relationship is far from complete, there is enough knowledge in the field available to practice NLP with a fair degree of certainty. An individual can find what "works for them" from NLP, and apply it to their self in order to yield a desired personal change.

To illustrate NLP and its various applications, here is a hypothetical example:

Imagine there is a eighteen year old male named Jimmy. Jimmy has just begun his first year of university and is very enthusiastic about having a stellar university career. He dreams of making a lot of sweet friends, having copious amounts of sex with beautiful young women, getting perfect grades and exclusive internships, and ultimately landing a sweet career after he graduates. Nice.

Now let's fast-forward four years to Jimmy's graduation ceremo--what? Jimmy dropped out of college?!

Enter twenty-three year old Jimmy, working at LardBurger. He has an ugly, domineering pregnant girlfriend, a serious addiction to marijuana, no friends except his League of Legends clan and his drug dealer/manager at LardBurger named Rocco, and he lives in a shitty part of town. But worst of all, he blames everybody but himself for the position he is in...It's his girlfriend's fault for being pregnant, it's Rocco's fault he has a shitty job and a drug addiction, it's so-and-so's fault he dropped out of college.

How the fuck did this happen?

This happened because Jimmy was programmed throughout the earlier stages of his life, via experiences, to think and behave with low-self esteem and submissive tendencies. Because he never experienced the benefits of high self-esteem and assertiveness--and lacked the self-awareness to initiate personal change manually--he did not know how to actually pursue the life he once dreamed of. Jimmy did not properly "de-program" himself, and he therefore carried his negative experiences through life, which thus resonated through his cognition and his behavior.

What could Jimmy have done differently?

This is the hard part. Jimmy needed to "de-program" himself in order to redefine his neuro-linguistic patterns. This, in essence, means coming to terms with past experiences by self-reflecting and letting go of emotional baggage, and focusing on developing new experiences that will create positive neuro-linguistic patterns in the future. On no uncertain terms, it is a two-step operation:

1. Disassociate current cognitive and behavioral patterns from past experiences.

2. Seek new experiences that will help inculcate the new, desired cognitive and behavioral patterns.

Conclusion

The two steps could be summarized as: stop making excuses, and get your shit together.

This is all I have time for today, so be sure to check back tomorrow so you can read Part II, where I'll provide an in-depth explanation of the first step, as well as some basic techniques and resources for success.

Also, look out for Bandler and Grinder's Frogs into Princes: Neuro-Linguistic Programming which provides a solid knowledge-base for NLP and de-programming; and Hawkins' Letting Go: The Pathway to Surrender which provides techniques for letting go of old emotional baggage (very helpful for de-programming!!)

Thanks for reading, and look out for Part II tomorrow!

/u/bruh_my_jays