April 14, 2026
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There are moments in life when everything seems to be moving along as expected, in flow and then something unexpected arrives out of nowhere. It could be a conversation you did not anticipate having, a sudden change in circumstances, a loss, a setback, or an opportunity that feels just as destabilising as a challenge. Whatever form it takes, it lands without warning and for a time, it can feel as though the ground beneath you has shifted.
This happened to me recently. I was at my desk, diligently preparing for a coaching session with a valued client. I was ready to give everything to the session and to the desired outcomes of my client. I was in a calm, nurturing, open and motivated state. I was ready and the online session was less than 10 minutes away. Then there was a knock at the door of my office and the building manager emerged through it. “Have you got 5 minutes?” he asked. I explained that I literally had 5 minutes until my client session began. Then he chose to land a shocking blow. He delivered some news about my circumstances in the building that completely undermined my business model. Finishing his delivery with, “Is that OK?” and my simple response, “No, it’s not.”
It was time to engage with my client and the earth had just shifted beneath me. My mind was spinning, my state changed to one of confusion, shock and the first physical signs of anxiety had begun to manifest in my body. My client appeared on my screen. “Good morning”.
In moments like this, your mind often scrambles to make sense of what has happened. You might find yourself replaying events, questioning decisions, or projecting into an uncertain future. It is not just the situation itself that feels overwhelming, it’s the rapid cascade of thoughts, emotions, and physical responses that follow. What was once clear can suddenly feel complicated, and what once felt stable can feel fragile.
This is where your internal patterns become incredibly important. Neuro Linguistic Programming offers a useful lens for understanding how you experience these unexpected moments and, more importantly, how you can begin to regain a sense of control. At its core, NLP suggests that your experience of life is shaped by what happens and how you represent those moments in your mind.
When something hits you from left field, your mind quickly constructs an internal representation of that event. You create images, sounds, and feelings that give the situation meaning. Often, these representations are intensified. The images may feel large and close, the sounds loud and intrusive, the emotions strong and immediate. This amplification can make the challenge feel bigger than it objectively is, and it can leave you feeling as though you are reacting rather than responding.
What NLP encourages you to recognise is that these internal representations are not fixed. They are constructed, and therefore they can be adjusted. This does not mean ignoring reality or pretending that challenges do not exist. Rather, it means changing how you experience them so that you can engage with them more resourcefully.
When you begin to shift your internal representation, you create space. Instead of being fully immersed in the intensity of the moment, you can step back slightly and observe it. This change in perspective alone can reduce the emotional charge and allow you to think more clearly. You move from being inside the experience to having a degree of choice about how you respond to it.
Unexpected challenges can trigger patterns from the past. Your mind searches for similar experiences (a trans-derivational search) and applies old meanings to new situations. This can be helpful in some cases, and it can also lead you to respond in ways that are no longer useful. NLP helps you to interrupt these automatic patterns and choose responses that are more aligned with who you are now, rather than who you were when those patterns were first formed.
There is importance in recognising that disruption, while uncomfortable, often carries the potential for growth. When life is predictable, it is easy to stay within familiar boundaries. When something unexpected happens, those boundaries are tested. You are invited, sometimes pushed, to adapt, to think differently, and to discover capabilities you may not have realised you had.
This does not mean that the experience is easy or that you should immediately feel positive about it. It means that within the disruption, there is an opportunity to reshape how you think, feel, and act. NLP provides practical ways to do this, not by changing the external event, by changing your relationship to it.
One particularly useful approach involves working with submodalities, the fine distinctions that encode and give meaning to your internal representations. These include qualities such as the size, brightness, distance, and movement of the images you create in your mind, as well as the tone and volume of internal sounds and the location and intensity of feelings in your body. By adjusting these elements, you can change how a situation feels to you and in doing so, change the meaning you have attributed to it.
Here’s a simple exercise which will empower you to experience this for yourself.
Think of a recent moment that felt overwhelming or unsettling. Bring it to mind and notice how you are representing it internally. Pay attention to the image you see. Is it close or far away? Is it bright or dim? Is it still or moving? Notice any sounds associated with it and how loud or intrusive they are. Also notice where you feel the emotion in your body and how intense it is.
Now begin to gently adjust these elements. Imagine moving the image further away from you, as though you are placing it at a comfortable distance. Allow it to become smaller and perhaps dimmer. If there are sounds, lower their volume or change their tone so they feel less sharp or demanding. As you do this, notice what happens to the feeling in your body. As the representation changes, the intensity of the emotion begins to shift as well.
Once you have reduced the intensity, you can introduce an anchor, a way of accessing a more resourceful state when you need it. Think of a time when you felt calm, capable, or resilient. Bring that memory to mind as vividly as you can. Notice what you see, hear, and feel in that experience. As the feeling builds, gently press your large knuckle. Hold that touch for a few moments while fully experiencing the resourceful state.
Then release the touch and briefly think of something neutral. After that, return to the original challenging situation and, at the same time, apply the anchor by pressing your large knuckle again. Notice how the resourceful feeling begins to influence your experience of the challenge. With practice, this creates a reliable way for you to access a more balanced state, even when life feels unpredictable.
What this demonstrates is that while you may not be able to control when life throws something unexpected your way, you do have influence over how you experience and respond to it. You are not simply at the mercy of events. You have the ability to adjust your internal world in ways that support you.
Over time, as you become more aware of these patterns, you may notice that unexpected challenges no longer feel quite as overwhelming. They may still be difficult, and they become more manageable. You develop a sense of trust in your ability to navigate whatever arises. Instead of feeling completely thrown off course, you begin to see these moments as part of the flow of life, moments that test you, shape you, and ultimately strengthen you.
When life turns things upside down, it is natural to feel unsettled. Within that disruption, there is also an invitation. An invitation to pause, to become aware of how you are experiencing the moment, and to make small and meaningful adjustments. Through that process, you do not just get through the challenge. You come out the other side with greater resilience, greater clarity, and a deeper understanding of yourself.
I quickly closed my eyes. I noticed my internal representation of the situation that had just presented itself and immediately made it small and dark and zoomed it off into the distance. I pressed the resource anchor that I keep topped up for use in occasions like this. I took a long, slow breath, “Good Morning. How are you today? Let’s go”.
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