Positive Intentions

Positive Intentions

A presupposition that is an important principle of NLP  is that of ‘positive intentions’. It presupposes that at some level, all behavior has an underlying positive intent or a positive purpose.
To better understand this, consider that the positive purpose behind ‘fear’ might be ‘safety’.

Or in the case of smoking, the positive intentions of this ‘bad’ habit might be ‘relaxation’, ‘reflection’, ‘being kind to yourself’ etc…

You might recognize ‘defensiveness’ having a positive intention of ‘self-protection’ and ‘anger’ with the positive intention (purpose) of ‘motivation’.

When I work with clients who want to stop smoking, I will help them break
down their behavior into its positive intentions so that we can find alternatives
to smoking for each one. It’s not simple, but it works!
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