168 Part III: Opening the Toolkit
Eliciting kinaesthetic submodalities
Guess what! Submodalities to do with feelings also have qualities that help to
define them:
Kinaesthetic Submodalities Questions to Discover Them
Location Where is it in your body?
Point to where you can feel the feeling.
Shape Does the feeling have a shape?
Pressure Does the feeling exert a pressure?
Size Does the feeling have a size?
Is it big or small?
Quality Does the feeling make you tingle?
Is it spread out or knotted in one place?
Intensity Is the feeling strong or weak?
Still or moving Can you feel the feeling in one place or is it
moving around your body?
Temperature Is the feeling warm or cold?
Constant or intermittent Is the feeling constant or intermittent?
Texture Does the feeling have a texture to it?
Picture Can you make a picture of the feeling?
Tom was prone to feeling very anxious before his weekly meetings with his
manager. Consequently, he felt unable to make his case when his manager
raised certain issues with him. Over a period of six months, Tom found that
facing going to work became harder and harder and he was in despair when
he consulted Romilla.
When questioned, Tom said that the feeling of anxiety looked like a heavy,
metallic, black cube just below his sternum. Romilla asked Tom to change the
colour gradually from metallic black to grey to silver. As the colour changed,
the cube got lighter until Tom was left with a very ‘poky’ square. When Tom
imagined getting hold of a corner of the square, he was able to ‘pull’ it out of
his body and allow it to float away. Tom has gone on to use this process for
dispelling other, unhelpful feelings, in different situations.
When you’re playing at changing the submodalities of a memory, you need to
make a list before you start changing submodalities around. If you start to get
uncomfortable with the process at any point, you can then put the picture,
sounds, or feelings back to how they were. In the later section ‘Submodalities
Worksheet’, you can find a worksheet designed for this very purpose. Make as
many copies as you need.
Always ask yourself whether going ahead with any change to a submodality is
okay. If you discover a resistance – a feeling that makes you uncomfortable –
acknowledge the feeling and thank your unconscious mind for making you
aware of possible internal conflict. You can simply overcome this issue
