Knowledge of Neural Anatomy: Steve Andreas on NLP, Phobia and Anxiety

Knowledge of neural anatomy can help explain how the brain and nervous system function, but it does not replace clinical skills, psychological assessment, or therapeutic experience. Steve Andreas, an influential contributor to Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP), explored brief techniques designed to change how people experience distressing memories, phobic triggers, and anxiety. His approaches emphasise perspective, sensory imagery, and the possibility of responding to an experience differently. However, the reported benefits of these techniques should be distinguished from established clinical evidence.

Who Was Steve Andreas, and What Was His View on Neural Anatomy?

Steve Andreas developed, taught, and propagated patterns in NLP from 1977 onwards, working alongside his wife, Connirae Andreas. At the Psychotherapy Networker Symposium in Washington, D.C., in March 2014, Andreas discussed the importance of combining clinical skills with an understanding of neural anatomy. Having studied chemistry and psychology, Andreas maintained that the brief-therapy methods taught in NLP training were not intended to replace clinical and counselling psychology. His approach emphasised the importance of understanding how clients experience their problems and how therapeutic communication may help them respond differently.

The following sections explore several principles Andreas discussed before demonstrating his approaches to phobias and anxiety.

What Three Important Principles Underpinned Steve Andreas’ Approach?

1. What Does It Mean to Make an Unconscious Change?

Many people seek therapy because they experience problems that they cannot easily control through conscious effort. They may describe these as unconscious problems because their reactions seem to occur automatically, even when they understand the situation rationally.

In such cases, reasoning and talking about a problem may not always be sufficient to change the person’s emotional response. Andreas expressed the idea this way:

“If you use your rational mind to do something different then you have a chance of changing the unconscious experience”.

The central idea is that people may be able to change how they experience a situation by deliberately altering aspects of their mental representation of it. Within NLP, this is often approached through changes in imagery, perspective, and sensory qualities. These methods are intended to help people discover alternative responses rather than simply analyse their difficulties intellectually.

However, the distinction between conscious and unconscious processes is more complex than this description suggests. Talking therapies can be effective for many emotional difficulties, and their usefulness depends on the individual, the problem, and the therapeutic approach.

2. Why Does Therapeutic Communication Involve More Than Description?

There is an important distinction between describing an experience and communicating in a way that helps a person understand and emotionally engage with it.

Descriptive language explains what happened, while directive or injunctive language suggests an action, such as “try this” or “do that”. In therapy, communication also involves the meaning, emotions, and associations that people attach to words.

The way a therapist communicates can influence how a client understands an intervention and whether they feel comfortable participating in it. Tone, pacing, word choice, and the therapeutic relationship may all contribute to this process. The aim is not simply to give instructions but to communicate in a way that respects the client’s experience and helps them engage with the therapeutic process.

3. What Are the Two Ways of Remembering an Experience?

Andreas described two broad perspectives from which people may remember an event: the associated perspective and the dissociated perspective.

Associated perspective (self-position): A person remembers an event from their own point of view. They may recall where they were sitting, what their hands and feet were touching, what other people looked like from their perspective, and what they were feeling or thinking at the time.

Dissociated perspective (observer-position): A person imagines observing themselves in the event, as though watching a scene from the outside.

In NLP, changing from an associated to a dissociated perspective is intended to alter the emotional intensity of a memory. Some people may find that viewing an event from an observer’s perspective feels less emotionally intense, although this response varies between individuals. Andreas discussed this distinction in relation to people who experience distressing memories or flashbacks. The technique proposes that a person may be able to change their perspective on a remembered event rather than repeatedly experiencing it from within.

A dissociated perspective is an imagery technique, not a guaranteed way to stop a flashback or treat post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Trauma-related memories can be complex, and deliberately revisiting them may increase distress for some people. Established treatments for PTSD include trauma-focused cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) and, where appropriate, eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing (EMDR). These treatments should be delivered by appropriately trained practitioners.

How Does Steve Andreas’ Fast Phobia Cure Work?

At the 2014 conference, Andreas discussed a case involving a woman who had fallen into a bee’s nest as a teenager and had been stung hundreds of times. Approximately 20 years later, she reportedly continued to experience a phobia of bees.

According to Andreas’ demonstration, he used his phobia technique with her in approximately eight minutes. The video, The Fast Phobia Trauma Cure Part 1, presents the procedure and includes a follow-up account in which the woman reportedly described the improvement as immediate and long-lasting.

This is an account of a therapeutic demonstration, not by itself proof that the technique reliably cures phobias. Individual case histories can illustrate a method, but controlled research is needed to establish its effectiveness, limitations, and suitability for different people.

What Are the Steps in Steve Andreas’ Phobia-Cure Technique?

The following sequence summarises the procedure described in The Fast Phobia Trauma Cure Part 1 (2012).

1. How should the initial response be assessed?

Ask the client to think about a situation that triggers a phobic response or to recall the relevant experience, if appropriate. Observe changes in their behaviour and emotional responses. This establishes an initial reference point against which any subsequent change can be assessed. The process should be adapted to the client’s level of distress and should not involve forcing them to relive a traumatic event.

2. How can the client be brought back to the present?

If the client becomes distressed, help them orient themselves to their current surroundings. Andreas’ demonstration included examples such as asking the person to look at others in the room, identify someone present, or engage with their immediate environment. Physical contact, such as holding the client’s hand, should only be used with clear consent. Grounding techniques should be chosen according to the person’s needs and preferences.

3. Why introduce the procedure with the phrase “before we begin”?

Before beginning, Andreas recommends using the phrase “before we begin”. The intention is to reassure the client, reduce uncertainty, and help them understand that the procedure has not yet started. This is a communication strategy rather than a guarantee that performance anxiety or distress will disappear.

4. How does the imagined cinema help create distance from the memory?

Ask the client to imagine sitting in a cinema and seeing themselves on the screen. In the technique, the scene is initially presented in black and white. The cinema provides a metaphorical setting in which the person can observe the remembered event rather than experience it directly from their own point of view.

5. Why does the client imagine moving to the projection booth?

Next, ask the client to imagine floating away from their seat and moving into the cinema’s projection booth. From this imagined position, they should be able to see themselves sitting in the audience and also see their image on the screen. This creates two levels of observation within the exercise.

6. How should the distressing memory be played in black and white?

From the projection booth, ask the client to run the remembered event on the screen from beginning to end. In the bee-phobia example, this involved watching the scene of falling into the nest and being stung. The client is encouraged to imagine the glass separating them from the cinema and the screen. Within the technique, this separation is intended to help establish psychological distance from the memory.

7. What should happen if the client cannot visualise the entire event?

Some people may find it difficult to imagine the entire event as a continuous film. They may see a single picture or repeatedly return to the most distressing moment. In such cases, the original procedure suggests helping the client turn the image into a sequence and gradually move towards the ending.

In the woman’s case, Andreas reported that she needed several additional attempts before she could visualise the event reaching its conclusion. The important point within this method is that the memory is represented as a complete sequence rather than remaining fixed on one distressing moment. If the exercise intensifies distress, however, the practitioner should pause rather than press ahead.

8. How should the client’s response be checked after watching the film?

After the scene has reached its end, ask the client how the experience felt. Andreas reported that people may describe some discomfort while finding the imagined scene less distressing than the original event. Responses will vary, and a reduced reaction during an exercise does not automatically indicate lasting therapeutic improvement.

9. Why does the technique return the client to the end of the scene?

The next stage involves imagining leaving the projection booth and the audience seat and entering the scene at the point where the event has ended and the person is safe. In the technique, the client then imagines the entire film rewinding rapidly, in colour, until it returns to its beginning. The purpose is to change the way the sequence is mentally represented.

10. Why is the reverse playback repeated?

Once the client is comfortable with the imagery, the procedure suggests running the film backwards several times, potentially at increasing speed. The client should be given time to become familiar with the exercise. The speed and imagery should not be forced if they cause discomfort.

11. What should the practitioner observe during the exercise?

Notice how the client responds to the repeated imagery. Changes in facial expression, posture, breathing, or other observable behaviour may offer useful information, but these cues should not be treated as definitive proof of a particular internal state.

The client’s own description of their experience is also important.

12. How can the practitioner determine whether the response has changed?

Finally, ask the client to imagine the original trigger again and describe how they feel. Where appropriate, the practitioner may compare the response with the initial assessment.

The aim is to determine whether the person’s reaction has changed. Any improvement should be assessed carefully, including whether it persists outside the session and affects everyday functioning.

What Are the Main Ideas Behind the Cinema Technique?

Several elements of the procedure are intended to change how the memory is experienced.

• Initial assessment: Comparing the client’s response before and after the exercise helps identify whether an immediate change has occurred.

• Grounding: Returning attention to the present may help the person regain a sense of orientation when distressed.

• The phrase “before we begin”: This is intended to reduce uncertainty and reassure the client before the exercise starts.

• The cinema metaphor: Representing an event as a film may help the person distinguish a remembered experience from what is happening in the present.

• Dissociation: Viewing oneself from an observer’s perspective may create psychological distance from the scene.

• Black-and-white imagery: The technique uses this visual change as one way of altering the representation of the memory.

• The imagined glass barrier: The glass is intended to symbolise separation between the observer and the scene, giving the client a sense of distance and safety.

• Completing the sequence: Reaching the end of the film allows the person to represent the event as something that happened in the past, rather than remaining focused on its most distressing moment.

• Rapid reverse playback: Reversing the imagined sequence is intended to disrupt the familiar way in which the memory is represented.

  
  

These are explanations of the technique’s intended psychological effects. They should not be interpreted as established findings about what happens in the brain during the exercise.

How Does the Peak-End Rule Relate to the Technique?

The article’s discussion of changing the ending of an experience can be connected to the peak-end rule, associated with research by Daniel Kahneman and colleagues. The peak-end rule describes a tendency for people’s retrospective evaluations of certain experiences to be influenced disproportionately by their most intense moment and their ending. Research supports this effect in several contexts, although its strength and applicability vary depending on the type of experience.

Within Andreas’ technique, reaching the end of the imagined film and then reversing it is intended to change how the experience is represented. The connection to the peak-end rule is an interpretive link, however, rather than evidence that the phobia procedure works through that rule or that changing a memory’s ending will necessarily eliminate a phobia.

Why Does the Technique Reverse the Film?

In the original explanation, a phobic response may follow a familiar sequence: a trigger is encountered, followed by a strong emotional or physical reaction. The technique asks the client to imagine the sequence in reverse, moving rapidly from the end of the event towards its beginning. Within the NLP model, this provides an alternative way to represent the experience and may alter the person’s emotional response to it.

The proposed benefit is that the memory becomes less tightly linked to the usual pattern of distress. The method should not be understood as literally reversing a neurological process or erasing the original memory. Memories and emotional responses involve multiple interacting processes, and the specific mechanism of this NLP procedure has not been established by the demonstration alone.

What Question May Help Establish the Client’s Willingness to Participate?

The procedure also includes the question:

“If it did work would that be OK with you?”

The intention is to explore whether the client is willing to consider a different response to the problem. It may help open a conversation about expectations, reservations, and the possibility of change. The question should not be used to pressure someone into participating. A client’s concerns, consent, and right to stop the exercise remain important throughout the process.

Does the Phobia Cure Depend on Neuroscience?

Andreas’ position was that this procedure did not depend on detailed knowledge of neuroscience. He compared therapy to carpentry: a carpenter needs to understand different types of wood, tools, and fasteners, but does not necessarily need detailed knowledge of the molecules and atoms that make up those materials to do the work effectively. By analogy, Andreas argued that a therapist does not always need to understand every internal process of the brain to use a psychological technique.

His position was that therapists should not rely on neuroscience as a substitute for clinical skill. This distinction is worth preserving, but it should not be taken to mean that neuroscience is irrelevant to mental health care. Knowledge of the brain and nervous system can contribute to understanding psychological difficulties, while research on clinical outcomes helps practitioners determine which interventions are safe and effective. A technique can be explored as a practical psychological method without assuming that its proposed explanation is neurologically proven. Equally, a compelling demonstration or positive case report cannot establish that a technique will work for everyone.

How Does the Spinning Feelings Technique Aim to Relieve Anxiety?

Another brief pattern described by Andreas is Spinning Feelings, a technique associated with Richard Bandler’s NLP work.

According to the NLP explanation, feelings may be experienced as having a direction or movement within the body. Bandler’s approach involves identifying the perceived direction of an anxious sensation and then imagining that it spins in the opposite direction. The exercise also invites the person to change the imagined colour of the sensation. These sensory changes are intended to alter how the feeling is experienced.

The approach is based on subjective imagery and bodily awareness. It should not be interpreted as evidence that emotions literally rotate inside the body or that changing an imagined direction necessarily changes the underlying physiological processes responsible for anxiety.

What Are the Steps for Rapid Anxiety Relief Through Spinning Feelings?

The following steps are based on Rapid Anxiety Relief with NLP: Steve Andreas Demos Spinning Feelings (2015).

1. How should the stressful situation be identified?

Ask the client to close their eyes, if comfortable, and imagine a situation that induces stress or anxiety. The person should be able to choose an example that feels manageable. They should not be required to revisit a highly distressing experience.

2. How can the client identify the path of the feeling?

Ask the client to notice where the anxious sensation seems to begin, how it moves through the body, and where it appears to end. For example, Andreas described a client called Joan who experienced anxiety when she felt alone. She reported that the sensation began in her neck, travelled down the right side of her chest, produced a clenching sensation in her stomach, and ended in her groin.

Within the exercise, Joan’s perceived path of anxiety was therefore described as extending from her neck to her groin. This is an individual’s subjective description of a bodily sensation, not a universal pattern of anxiety.

3. Why does the exercise ask the client to imagine a colour?

The next question asks the client to imagine a colour associated with the feeling.

Joan described her anxious sensation as opaque white. The purpose is to help the client pay attention to the sensory qualities of the experience. The colour is an imagined representation and does not indicate a physical substance or process in the body.

4. How can the client identify the direction of the sensation?

Ask the client to notice the direction in which the feeling appears to spin. They may describe it as clockwise or anticlockwise, from right to left, from left to right, or through another description. Some people may find it easier to demonstrate the direction with their hands. There is no requirement that everyone experience anxiety as a spinning sensation. The exercise depends on what the individual notices and can comfortably imagine.

5. What happens when the direction and colour are changed?

Ask the client to imagine the stressful situation again, allowing them to notice the anxious sensation. This time, invite them to imagine the sensation spinning in the opposite direction and changing to a colour they find more pleasant. Then ask what, if anything, changes in their experience. The client should be free to report that the exercise makes no difference or feels uncomfortable. A change should not be assumed simply because the technique has been completed.

6. How can the client evaluate the results in other situations?

If the client finds the exercise comfortable and potentially useful, they may try it with other manageable situations.

Ask whether the new sensation feels preferable and whether they notice any change in how they respond to the imagined situation. In Joan’s case, Andreas reported that she experienced a more comfortable bodily sensation and smiled during the demonstration. According to the account, a follow-up approximately a year and a half later indicated that she was coping better with anxiety, although she had continued to face challenges.

This follow-up is an encouraging case report, but it cannot establish that spinning feelings caused the improvement or that the technique is an effective treatment for anxiety disorders in general.

What Can These Techniques Teach Us About Coping?

The central idea behind both techniques is that people may have more than one way of responding to an experience. Changing an image, perspective, or sensory representation may help some people notice a difference in how they feel. However, coping strategies should be understood in context. A strategy that appears ineffective to an observer may serve a purpose for the person using it, such as reducing immediate distress or helping them feel safe. It is important to understand that purpose before encouraging change.

In cases involving phobias or anxiety, introducing alternative coping strategies may be helpful when done collaboratively and with appropriate care. The client should understand the proposed method, have the freedom to decline it, and be able to report their experience honestly. The claim that these techniques will not work for someone with “zero insight” should also be treated cautiously. Insight can influence engagement with therapy, but it is not a simple, all-or-nothing condition that determines whether a particular intervention will succeed.

For clinically significant anxiety, phobias, or trauma-related symptoms, NLP exercises should not replace appropriate assessment or evidence-based treatment. For PTSD, clinical guidance recommends interventions such as trauma-focused CBT and EMDR in appropriate circumstances, delivered by trained practitioners.

Can People Change How They Experience Distressing Memories?

Andreas challenged the idea that a powerful emotional experience permanently determines how a person will respond to it.

In a response to a prominent therapist and author who had reportedly said, “Neural pathways are created by strong emotions that never go away. They are burnt into your brain”, Andreas replied:

“Well they may be burnt into your brain but you can look at them differently”.

The underlying message is that a person’s current response to a past event is not necessarily the only response they can ever have. Psychological experiences can change, and people may learn new ways of understanding and responding to memories. At the same time, the brain is capable of both learning and retaining emotional associations. Changing one’s perspective does not guarantee that a memory or an emotional response will disappear. Progress depends on the individual, the nature of the difficulty, and the intervention used.

The most useful takeaway is therefore not that every distressing memory can be resolved in minutes, but that therapeutic work can explore different ways of relating to difficult experiences while respecting the person’s needs and the evidence supporting each method.

What Are the Key Takeaways from Steve Andreas’ Work?

Steve Andreas’ work on phobia and anxiety techniques illustrates an NLP approach that uses mental imagery, perspective shifts, and sensory representations to explore changes in emotional responses. The Fast Phobia Cure uses an imagined cinema, observer perspective, black-and-white imagery, and reverse playback. Spinning Feelings asks clients to notice and alter the imagined direction and colour of an anxious sensation. These methods are presented through demonstrations and individual case accounts, which can help explain how the exercises are intended to work. However, such accounts do not establish their effectiveness as reliable treatments for phobias, anxiety disorders, or PTSD.

Andreas’ broader emphasis on clinical skill remains relevant: psychological interventions should be selected thoughtfully, adapted to the individual, and evaluated by their outcomes rather than by the appeal of their explanations alone. Knowledge of neural anatomy can inform clinical practice, but it must be considered alongside psychological research, professional judgement, and the lived experience of the client.

This article on 'Knowledge of Neural Anatomy' has been contributed by Rucha Lidbide, a psychology student at the Savitribai Phule Pune University. She is part of the Global Internship Research Program (GIRP), which is under the leadership and guidance of Anil Thomas. GIRP is an Umang Foundation Trust initiative to encourage young adults across our globe to showcase their research skills in psychology and to present it in creative content expression.

She is interested in the field of I/O psychology, specifically ergonomics. In the future she wishes to explore opportunities that involve research.