In the United States in the 70s, Neurolinguistic Programming, better known by its acronym NLP, was born. A methodology that is currently taught and practiced especially within the world of human development for the ability to model excellence that it provides, but that many apply without knowing its origin and, more importantly, why it was created.
In many cases we find NLP teaching focused only on showing its dynamics and techniques, which makes knowledge of the discipline partial: If those who use this methodology do not know its fundamentals, they will be able to use its tools, but in an empty and limited way because they do not know the bases on which they are based and all the possibilities they really have.
We can make a simile with a chef and his kitchen knives. The chef can know all the knives very well and what each one is for. But if, in addition, you know that the bread knife fulfills its function because it has serrated teeth that make it easier to tear the bread without breaking it, you will have a broader vision of that knife and you will understand that, even beyond bread, you can use it in other cases, such as to cut cakes, panettone or other foods with a similar texture.
Thus, in recent years a current has been consolidating within NLP training that advocates study the theoretical foundations that made the birth of the methodology possible in order to better understand it in its entirety and, with this, get much more out of the techniques and tools that support it.
One of the main defenders of this trend is Frank Pucelik, unknown to many, but a key figure in the world of NLP: he is one of the co-creators of Neurolinguistic Programming along with the two figures whose names are the ones always are associated with his birth, Richard Bandler and John Grinder.
Why has Frank Pucelik been ‘erased’ in some cases from the NLP ‘fatherhood’? The truth is that there are no bizarre stories or hidden intrigues. We can say that it has been the result of the evolution of the study of NLP and the way in which Frank’s career subsequently developed.
The birth of Neurolinguistic Programming
Frank Pucelik served in the Vietnam War and returned to the United States in the late 1960s at the age of 21 and psychologically shaken for what was experienced there. Trying to answer his ‘demons’, he resumed his psychology studies that he had abandoned without very good results, a career that culminated with excellent certifications on this occasion, which allowed him to move to the University of California Santa Cruz in the early 70s. , the nerve center of the great thinkers of the moment, to continue researching Gestalt, the psychological current on which he based his career.
While there he met Richard Bandler, a psychology enthusiast who was at that time transcribing the presentations of Virginia Satir and Fritz Perls and to which Frank also often attended. Observing these famous therapists, as well as Milton Erickson, they realized that they always achieved successful results in their therapies and decided to do modeling work on their way of working to check for themselves if by applying those models they would obtain the same results. The seminars on Gestalt that they gave by doing ‘their experiments’ soon acquired spectacular fame: The two young people achieved the same successful results as prestigious therapists with many years of experience.
But there was a problem. Bandler and Pucelik couldn’t explain how it happened, what made these methods work. And then they invited the linguist John Grinder to attend those seminars, which finally served to answer their question through transformational grammar. What Grinder demonstrated is that there were language structures, patterns that they used and that were repeated and that were the ones that managed to model the behaviors in a masterful way and achieve the desired results.
After obtaining these conclusions, they realized that if they could extract a methodology based on how these excellent people acted, how they spoke and spoke to each other, that methodology, those tools, could be used by others to also achieve surprising results in their lives. Thus the germ of NLP was born, what they initially called ‘Study of Excellence’ or simply Goal (beyond)
The subsequent evolution and disappearance of Frank Pucelik
Although the three authors mentioned were the fathers who created the Goal (it was not yet known as NLP), they were also surrounded and supported by a group of 15 students.
The disparity in points of view of such a large and heterogeneous group led to Frank Pucelik being invited to leave the study group in the mid-1970s. For that reason, the books published immediately after by Bandler and Grinder, ‘The Structure of Magic’ I and II, where Neurolinguistic Programming is discussed for the first time, Frank Pucelik is not included: he had already taken another direction in the study of the discipline.
Frank Pucelik took the Meta name with him and created Meta International Inc. in 1977, the association that continues to exist today under the name Meta international. Soon Bandler and Grinder also separated their paths and the newborn NLP ended up being fully developed in the following years in the hands of other authors such as Roberts Dilts, Stephen Giiligan, Judith Delozier or Leslie Cameron, among others.
Although Frank Pucelik never stopped working in psychology, disappeared from the media focus of the PNL by not continuing to publish anything about it something that the other co-creators did in the following decades, which may be another key to why they are considered by many to be the only fathers of the methodology.
At the end of the 80s Frank Pucelik moved to Moscow and began to successfully develop his role as a business consultant there using his knowledge of NLP. At the same time, he focused on designing successful programs to overcome drug addiction both in the United States and in Eastern European countries.
The original NLP
Starting in the 2000s, NLP increased its global fame exponentially thanks to the interest in coaching. What Pucelik then realized is that, as a result of the disparate evolution that the discipline had after its creation, the people who were approaching it were studying in a way that was too simplistic, since In many cases, it was not explained where the methodology came from or why it had been created which limited its true potential.
In this way, Frank Pucelik decided to return to the public focus of NLP, sowing the seed of what is known as Original NLP (Meta), which is already being taught in Spain and Latin America. It is a return to that moment when the three co-creators were at the University of California conducting their studies on Meta to really understand the complexity of its use and truly take advantage of everything that this form of modeling excellence can be achieved in those who know it.
If you want to train in NLP and you want to do it with Frank Pucelik and knowing the fundamentals and original bases, at D’Arte Human and Business School we can help you.
