Using NLP Technique: Meta Mirror Exercise
Published May 5, 2009 | 
There’s an old expression that recommends walking a mile in someone else’s shoes before you judge them….and there’s an NLP technique that has that very quality about it. It’s called the Meta MirrorTechnique. You’ll come across many different variations of this – but I’ll share one version of Meta Technique with you now and how I used it personally.
Often Meta exercises are about tackling a relationship with which you are unhappy. So there’s YOU and someone (or something) else. Examples might be you and your mother in law…you and your partner…you and your boss etc. However, think wider than that – you might have a less-than-appropriate relationship with money…with your health…with religion. So Meta technique can be used to tackle any relationship difficulty – and my personal example, (don’t laugh too hard) was when I decided to do something about the clutter in our house! I wanted to work on my relationship with Clutter!
For the exercise, you establish 3-4 different areas in the space or room you are in. I put 3 cushions on the floor in a triangle to represent:
Position 1 – represents YOURSELF
Position 2 – represents The RELATIONSHIP (in my case: clutter)
Position 3- represents SUPER YOU – yay!
(Position 4 – you might even want to have a 4th position, representing SUPER DUPER YOU – double yay!)
So to start, I went and stood in Position 1 and was ‘myself’ – looking at Position 2, which I had deemed to represent Clutter. Oh the power of metaphor! I then thought about Clutter – what it looked like, how I felt about it, what caused it etc – and spoke to that area of the room, pouring out all my negative feelings of how I hated Clutter, how it wasn’t fun and that I felt ‘brought down’ by it. Got that off my chest then!
I then had a little break (called Breaking State)…shook myself off, had a sip of water, and then went to Position 2. Here I was no longer ‘me’ – I was Clutter! I had to think and speak exactly as though I was Clutter. Looking over to Position 1, I found myself able to perceive and vocalise a different viewpoint. ”Well, the trouble is, I don’t want to be Clutter. I am mostly made up of lovely items and that’s what I want to be – nice things, beautifully displayed, appreciated and enjoyed. I need to be separated out, placed in the right place or thrown out if I’m no use – not jumbled up and causing a blockage in energy and space. I hate being a mess, I want to be appreciated again.” Break State again. Hmm. Food for thought. Position 3 next – and there I was Super Jane – able to look at Position 1 and 2 and able to take into account both viewpoints.
From the new Position 3 Super-Jane viewpoint, it wasn’t quite as black and white as I’d first presupposed. In fact, both Jane (me!) and the Clutter wanted the same thing really – to have no Clutter and to have everything in its place, being enjoyed and used. Gosh. And so now, as Super-Jane, what could I suggest? Well, durr, Super-Jane could quite easily see that Jane needed to separate out the Clutter into the categories of Junk or Precious, but the process had to be made more fun with bouncy music…and then time had to be found to display these items appropriately so they were no longer Clutter. In fact, that process, not only got rid of Clutter – but resurrected hidden Treasures that could be loved again. And who doesn’t want to be loved?! Awww. It reminded me of the character Woody in Toy Story when he’s superseded by the Buzz Lightyear toy… Oh no. That’s what I had done to some lovely items by not storing/displaying them properly.
So, that is the essence of the Meta technique – you end up viewing things from a new perspective, hearing new and helpful viewpoints (albeit from your own mouth!)…and finding fresh solutions to a relationship that had previously bugged you. You can keep moving back and forth between the various Positions, always ‘being’ the character that that Position represents, until resolution is reached….and resolving these relationship conflicts in this way (even though it’s just You ‘playing’ all the parts in this ‘play’) has a positive Reframing effect that completely spills over into ‘reality’.
I’ll just finish by adding that one chap I coached who loathed his female boss…did this exercise with my assistance, working on his relationship with her in this way. When he contacted me after his first day back at work again, he said he needn’t have done the exercise actually, because when he saw her the next time, she’d changed and was now nice. Ha ha. Funny that!
