What happened to sex with cars then?

It seems my blog is becoming less orientated to my sex life doesn't it?

Well, whilst I won't ever get bored with sex, hell I'm spending some of today lying with a gorgeous boat, I will get bored writing about it. So you'll see the odd post but really, the obsessive looking past material is actually mostly the total of what I wanted to say over years on the subject more or less. That is, what I do, how to do it, and why.

That is not to say there won't be more, the occasional story etc. Just other stuff as well.

Book Review: Adam Eason-The Hypnotic Salesman.

Ok this arrived 2 days ago and I had the squits (otherwise known as the "runs"). I read half of it at least on the throne as it happens. Already I've decided to reread it a few times. Firstly I thought it would complement D Moines book I reviewed a few days ago. Well, it goes further than that.

Adam is an excellent writer, with only the slight jarring of the odd "haha!" to pick at. He covers body language, first impressions, even dress sense very quickly. He gives a solid concise definition of hypnosis before you dive in and then proceeds rapidly onto a variety skills. Rapport, language patterns, sleight of mouth are just some areas he covers. All these are explained in a way that any average person would follow with ease-even me!

He makes no secret of the fact he uses some hypnotic language to get ideas and skills over to you as you read. You always have the choice whether to fully allow such helpful suggestions to be taken in or not. Personally I'm going to reread it again, induce a deep trance and reread it until I can recall every important point easily ;).

His book recommendations are definitly worth perusing-I myself own at least half of them and found them all excellent in some way.

One thing to note, if you are familiar with NLP-this is NLP the way Bandler and Grinder would have hoped to see it. Naturally applied, with sensitivity, flexibility, common sense and elegence. This is not to say it's all NLP, but to my eyes so far it's all the best bits used well.

At some point I shall produce my own recommended reading list for anyone interested in brief therapy, influence and related areas. For now, I recommend a few authors.

Richard Bandler-Great fun to read (not counting patterns and structure of magic-they're more academic)

Stephen Heller-I wish he'd lived a lot longer, his one book was brilliant even if not the most rigorous of writers.

Steve and Connirae Andreas - Excellent communicators, demonstrate elegent NLP application in their various books

Bill Lankton-Practical Magic, again elegent use of NLP in a psychotherapeutic setting.

Bill O'Hanlon-He's as easy to read as Bandler or the Andreas siblings. Very worth having his works

Milton Erickson, Battino and Rossi, Jay Hayley - I bunch them together purely because between them they've documented so much about Erickson's brilliance that its worth having everything they've all done just about. Erickson's work and life itself has triggered off so many books and lines of inquiry that he's become a legend in the fields of hypnotherapy and brief therapy.

Julie Silverthorn and John Overdurf-Training Trances. I've to read this one through a second time, however it's another elegent example of using hypnotic language to teach hypnotic skills.

Dave Elman-Hypnotherapy. A classic and rounds out any collection of hypnosis books with a more directive approach to the subject.

Robert Cialdini-Influence, A modern classic that should be on the shelf of all people influencers of any stripe. Excellent in that he's done years of on the ground research, taken a lot of trouble to make his work solid and he communicates it in a clear and interesting manner. Get it, you'll read it straight through, twice. :-).

Kevin Hogan - Cited by Adam Eason, I've been looking at his book on influence and having a digital copy have felt the need to actually go buy it. It's another take on persuasion, with again a lot of ideas and techniques crammed in. It's not just NLP either, at least not on the first reading. A mixture of influences inform this book. I'll be doing another review when I've digested this one. I do get the impression its well worth reading however.

Dan Short, Betty Alice Erickson, and Roxanna Erickson Klein--Hope and Resiliency is another that whilst aimed at therapists is actually one who's contents I can see being applied to other situations. Distraction,progression, partitioning, reorientation, utilization and suggestion are the six philosophical themes with case histories to illustrate the various subthemes within the book. The authors attempt to give any reader ways to consider creating individual interventions with these concepts in mind. Lovely work that needs rereading a bunch of times at least.

Charvet Shelle Rose-Words that change minds. Elegent work focussing on metaprograms in particular. She lays out a model that you can use to analyse how people are motivated and sort the world mentally, in order to communicate well with them. Taken as a generalised guide, with sensitive flexibility and total attention to the person you are with, this books contents will simply give you a great framework of pointers that will help you choose your words. They are not guarantees just likely to give you better odds.

Genie Laborde-Influence with Integrity-Another elegent book that the NLP revolution spawned. Worth having, and reading especially if you are a student of influence in general.

Albert Ellis-He's got a lot of books out on his Rational Emotive Behavioural Therapy, and I've picked up several of the most recent. I haven't taken them in enough to do a decent full review, again another for the future-and what I have read is great. Common sense prevails for sure. Your thoughts can dictate your feelings and how you dispute irrational beliefs are some of the themes he covers. For someone like myself, his work is a nice balance to have when studying this area in general. Worth getting and worth knowing the basic distortions and the ABC model alone (for non therapists).

This isn't an exhaustive list as I've many more that I've acquired over the last two years, however these are the ones I've either read or started on that all stand out right now.

At the moment the list looks like its more NLP and hypnosis orientated, because it is. I've widened my search for all kinds of other approaches to influence and brief therapy however. NLP has had a lot of flack over the years, it's not surprising as there were many people eager to make bucks and make wild claims. I spent a lot of time reading, and checking out all kinds of reviews to try and find the gold amongst the crap.

Before you ask, no I haven't taken NLP training, and don't intend to as such. Instead I highly recommend Tom Vizzini and Kim McFarland's courses to you instead. Go look for yourself, www.essential-skills.com . They take no bullshit or prisoners, the courses are a heck of a lot of fun and incredible value. I myself will be repeating the seminars I did with them as it happens.

At this time, I'm still working my way through Paul Ekman's work on the FACS system (the software is worth having too!) and also Stan Walters Kinesic Interview Technique. The spookily heartening thing about both books (intended for police and FBI use) is that the Essential Skills calibration methods hand a lot of this to you on a plate. Get the hang of calibration, you'll never need a body language "dictionary" again. I tested out at 86% on the micro expression training tool, before training-using what I remember from the course.

Just a thought.

The majority of the books on selling and influence I've mentioned all point out one major ethical point. To truly influence another, you have to have a total win/win and honest outcome in mind. If you don't, well rapport is two way for one, and should you manage to get a dishonest outcome to happen, it will certainly come back to roost. This isn't namby pamby ethics, this is cause and effect.

If I sell you something that you didn't truly want or need, you'll never do business again. You may come back for a refund. Either way, that profit I made was a maximum of a one off.

Say you came to me for something you wasn't sure if you needed, or wanted however, and I help you clarify both points. I then gain a relationship with you that allows you to trust me enough to really explain what you want and why. I then find you the very best way that I can help you get it. What do I have? A future customer who likes me and my business.
A business is built not on profit margins but on profitable Relationships.

Right that's me all type and talked out for today. The quality of my writing will improve, the more I practice :-). You don't need to imagine what it could be like if you can take the most elegent and the best skills of top influencers and apply them in your life for honest outcomes...you can probably imagine it without my input :-). Good night.