Motivation Strategies

Motivation strategies are one of the seven basic classes of strategies identified by NLP. The others include: Memory, Learning, Creativity, Decision, Reality and Belief (or Convincer). Motivation strategies relate to the sequence of cognitive steps and operations that people go through in order to inspire themselves to do all of the things necessary to get what they want.

Motivation strategies are similar to processes involving mental rehearsal, such as the New Behavior Generator and Future Pacing, though they differ in important respects. Both mental rehearsal and motivation strategies involve using imagination and visualization. The primary purpose of mental rehearsal, however, is to prepare oneself in one's imagination to respond or behave the way one wants in some future situation. Motivation strategies are ways to stimulate or propel oneself forward toward a dream, goal or outcome. Motivation, for instance, may be required in order to get oneself to go through mental rehearsal at all.

Many people experience problems around the process of motivating themselves or others. This is often because, as Aristotle pointed out:

[A]ppetites run counter to one another, which happens when a principle of reason and desire are contrary and is possible only in beings with a sense of time (for while mind bids us hold back because of what is future, desire is influenced by what is just at hand: a pleasant object which is just at hand presents itself as both pleasant and good, without condition in either case, because want of foresight into what is farther away in

One way NLP addresses such conflicts between short term and long term consequences is through the use of time lines and the "as if" frame, in order to create "foresight into what is farther away in time." This involves the use of visualization and the creation of an associated experience of the future.

In addition to helping create positive expectations, motivation strategies are procedures which help people to tap into and direct their own inner source of motivation. Motivation strategies are typically formed around key values or "criteria." To get a sense of your own values and criteria, consider for a moment the following questions: "In general, what motivates you?" "What inspires you?" "What moves you to action, or 'gets you out of bed in the morning'?" 

Some possible answers might be:

Success

Praise

Recognition

Love and Acceptance

Setting my sights on something that I want to make my own (a home, an education, a thinner body, a job, a cause)

Making a difference in the world
These are all examples of "criteria" or "values" that form the basis of people's motivation strategies. Of course, a next important question would be, "How do you know if some behavior or consequence fits a particular criterion or value?" NLP would call these conditions your "criterial equivalences" or "evidences." These are typically much more sensory based than criteria or values themselves, and can be influenced by various sensory qualities of an experience.
Consider the ways in which your sensory perceptions influence your degree of motivation. Think of an advertisement on television that made you want to own the product being advertised, for example. What was it about the add that inspired you to go out and buy the product? Was it the color, brightness, music, words, tone of voice, movement, etc. These particular features are known as "Submodalities" in NLP, and often play a significant role in people's motivation strategies.

 

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