This is a copy of the newsletter that was sent out on October 24h, 2025.
Recently, several of my mentoring clients asked me the same thing: why does an NLP technique seem to work during the session and then fall apart the next day? Or… Why does the “magic” disappear after the session?
The reason is simple. Most of the material still taught in NLP belongs to another time.
Walk into most live NLP trainings today and you’ll notice something odd. The techniques are the same ones taught decades ago, recycled again and again. The participants are shown the same demonstrations and hear the exact same stories, almost (or literally) verbatim. They’re the exact same handouts copied from courses taught decades ago.
Think about how NLP is usually taught. A trainer calls someone up, runs through a pattern, and the audience looks for any sign of change. The person feels different for a short while, and the group treats that as evidence. Outside that setup, there’s no structure to hold the result and no feedback from real situations. The so-called change disappears because it was never anchored in daily reality.
Worse, the exercise doesn’t touch the real conflict underneath. It treats the surface behavior while the deeper pattern keeps running unchecked. You polish the symptom and leave the problem intact.
These courses still depend on setups that make profound change appear easier than it actually is. The group energy pushes the volunteer to cooperate and follow the lead. It is the same setup as in those stage hypnosis acts. These group dynamic exercises are built to produce instant and visible reactions, not durable results.
When everyone expects something to happen, even a brief chemical rush in the brain feels meaningful. It’s easy to mistake that moment for transformation. But the effect doesn’t last. The feeling fades once the client leaves the session and the trainer’s charismatic influence is no longer there.
This phenomenon is the main reason I stopped teaching seminars and started offering private training sessions. When a method only works in an ideal setting, it has little value in your private practice because you are paid to effect long-term change, not a temporary “feel good.” Many practitioners still hold the expectation that NLP approaches will provide instant results.
Let’s take mirroring as an example. In theory, matching someone’s body language is supposed to build rapport.
In practice, your gestures often seem strange or intrusive.
Outside the seminar room, people often unconsciously feel repulsed or alarmed when you’re copying them. Mirroring does not create trust; it breaks it. Real connection comes from paying attention, not from cheap manipulative tactics like mimicking someone’s gestures. Interpersonal communication has changed, but much of NLP hasn’t caught up.
The bottom line is this: Rapport is built by genuine attention and care, not by attempting to manipulate someone by copying their body language. Perhaps it worked for a little while in the 1970s, but it surely stopped working after that.
If NLP is about modeling what works, then the models need to reflect the present. The founders of NLP didn’t treat their work as finished. They were curious, they observed, and they tested and adjusted (TOTE anyone?). That spirit of experimentation is what made the field powerful in the first place.
If you want to practice NLP as it was intended, stop repeating the past and start modeling the present.
NLP was never meant to be a museum of old tricks. To ignore that is to practice nostalgia, not NLP.