Submodalities refer to the internal representational systems that help us to
experience our environment. These are the smallest distinctions that occur at a
level that most of us are completely unaware of (at least until your attention is brought upon them). If your submodalities were tiny droplets of water, your
thoughts would be oceans (in a sense). Our submodalities help us to remember
our experiences, whether past, present or imagined, through what we feel, see,
hear, smell and taste. Each droplet of water (or submodality) contributes to the
overall ocean of experience of a thought. When we change the way we
experience that droplet of water, we change the thought (or the way we think).
NLP breaks the submodalities down into the five main senses:
Kinesthetic (Feeling): This relates to texture, temperature, pressure, location, vibration and frequency.
Auditory (Sound): This relates to volume, tempo, timbre, clarity, location, pitch, tempo, rhythm, digital, duration and distance.
Auditory (Digital): This relates to calculating, precise, analytics and
understanding.
Visual (Sight): This relates to shape, size, color, brightness, contrast, movement, speed, clarity, location, three-dimensional/flat, transparency, orientation, density, framed/panoramic, associated/disassociated.
Olfactory (Smell): This relates to potency, aroma, odor, scent.
Gustatory (Taste): This relates to flavor, bitterness, sour, savory.
BOOST YOUR BODY-IMAGE WITH NLP – NICKRITCHIELIVE.COM
20
The three main submodalities are Kinesthetic, Auditory and Visual; this is because most of us rely primarily on these representational systems for experiencing the
world around us and within us - with most people having a primary reliance on
one of the three (either Kinesthetic, Auditory or Visual). You can easily learn
about which primary representational system someone uses by being aware of
the cues they give you through the way they express themselves.
A visual person… Will tend to verbally communicate through using words such as,
“looks”, “appears”, “watched”, “sighted”, “see” etc.
A kinesthetic person… Will communicate through words such as, “feels”, “felt”,
“touched”, “warm”, “rough”, “soft”, “hard”, “gripping” etc.
An auditory person… Will communicate through words like, “listen”, “hear”,
“sounds”, “musical” etc.