The Art of Unning

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The Art of Unning

Can you Un? Say it like running but without the ‘r.’

I’ve discovered a new verb – to un! You read that right – to un. No I haven’t missed anything at the end of un – yet! The Art of Unning came to me the other day when I was working with a client. For most of us the leap from a negative feeling to a positive one can be simply too big. For many clients it is simply impossible. That is where the Art of Unning can help.

When we do opposites of words in school many words are paired together. Success – failure. Tall – short. Easy – difficult. Fast – slow. Happy – sad. Active – lazy. Stuck – unstuck. It was this last one that got me into thinking about the Art of Unning so I tried it – and it worked!

Imagine if you were feeling sad. What if instead of thinking you had to be happy you thought about being unsad?

What if instead of thinking about being active you thought about being unlazy?

How about instead of thinking you had to be a success you thought about unfailing?

How about you thought of something challenging being undifficult?

You see it confuses the brain long enough to start making shifts. The Art of Unning can make such unusual words that our conscious mind is so busy trying to come to terms with what unsad means that the unconscious mind gets to work on those blocks without you going ‘Yes but …’.

Have fun with it too!

For organised – disorganised use undisorganised.

For tidy – untidy use ununtidy.

For years we’ve unned positive words – so how about unning some of those negative words and see what happens? As a mathematician might say ‘two negatives make a positive’ so unning negative words kind of makes sense to me – I hope it does to you too!

Why not give it a try and see how the Art of Unning works for you and your clients?

Let me know how you get on!

Soo Matthews

NLP4Kids West Yorkshire

www.westyorkshirechildtherapy.nlp4kids.org

PS Dictionary definition of ‘Un-‘ is a prefix meaning ‘not’ freely used as an English formative giving negative or opposite force in adjectives and their derivative adverbs and nouns.

A new strategy for Samosas and Dyslexia

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My New Samosa Strategy

I’ve got a new strategy for samosas. A strategy for samosas? Why on earth do you need one of those? A few weeks ago I went out for a lovely meal to celebrate curry week. I’m vegetarian so we chose a vegetarian mixed starter. It was very tasty – until I got to the samosa. The pastry was really crispy and crunched nicely when I cut one of the corners off. I was so busy chatting that it took me a moment to realise it didn’t taste like the samosas I usually have. There was an odd texture to it – one I’m not used to. There were little chewy bits in it!

I had already chewed it and swallowed before my brain processed what I was tasting. Luckily it was just a small piece and I took a pause to look more closely at the other part. In the dim light of the restaurant it didn’t look like a normal vegetarian samosa. My friend had a look and tasted it and confirmed my worst fears – that it was a meat samosa! The waiter was very apologetic when we told him. He told the manager who then came over and said we wouldn’t be charged for the starter.

We all have strategies for getting us through the day. Sometimes we learn them from other people, sometimes we read about them (usually on the internet these days!) When I first started teaching (31 years ago) there were very few strategies for working with children with dyslexia. Indeed it was very often not recognised. Nowadays there are loads of strategies to help with dyslexia and workplace accommodations can easily be made if you need them.

Like me with the meat samosa a dyslexic’s brain may take longer to process what they are seeing or see it in an entirely different way.

Here are just a few –
• Using a coloured plastic strip to place over the writing. These come in different colours to suit the particular needs of the person.
• Using a pale coloured paper (white can be too dazzling)
• Use matt paper that is thick enough that the text on the other side doesn’t show through.
• Using specific fonts designed for those with dyslexia (Dyslexie and OpenDyslexic can both be downloaded from the internet.)
• Avoid using text in block capitals as this can be harder to read.
• Allow your child to talk their answer instead of writing it down.
• Using audio books alongside real books.
• Using NLP techniques to help visualise words.

Above all your child needs to know that they are still creative, intelligent and can be as successful as anyone else. Maybe even more so. Famous dyslexics include Richard Branson, Albert Einstein, Henry Ford (of Ford cars), Walt Disney and Stephen Spielberg to name just a few.

There are lots of helpful websites out there too here are a couple in the UK –
www.bdadyslexia.org.uk
www.dyslexiaaction.org.uk

So I nearly forgot back to the samosa strategy. The manager told us they buy in the samosas in separate boxes of meat ones and vegetarian ones. They are cooked separately in the kitchen so the mix-up happened in the factory where they are made. (I was a little disappointed they are not hand made in the restaurant). So my new strategy? I’m going to cut off one of the corners and look at it first before popping it in my mouth! After all – mix-ups can happen anywhere!

If you’d like help for your child contact me at soo@nlp4kids.org or call 0785 144 7612

By Soo Matthews

www.westyorkshirechildtherapy.NLP4Kids.org