Derren Brown NLP Swish Pattern 

Derren Brown is amazing. His clips are amongst the best demonstrations of NLP, I've ever seen outside of a training seminar and to see these principles work on people that don't have an expectation of how they are 'supposed' to respond is priceless. He is brilliant.

he anchors uncertainity to HER left shoulder and certainity to HER right shoulder so every time he shows her a color he touches her on the left and then she starts to doubt wether it's really yellow/red/green/blue... Very well done, coolest thing is that I have been seeing so many NLP videos by known that I start to recognize the anchors!

i can do my paper! "um, why did you submit this entire essay in, RED INK?"

I've been hypnotized before and it is real, but its something you can fight off. Its like the feeling of being distracted and not able to concentrate for a minute, like seeing a celebrity and being unable to look away, or blocking out your girlfriend talking to you during a important sports' match on tv. Everyone's been hypnotized you just didnt know what it was. It's just the feeling of being distracted temporarily and during that time you allow things you know not to be true to seem true

Derren Brown the reason why I'm getting certified as NLP practitioner.

Richard Bandler has a bunch of great books on NLP. Derren Brown recommends a few in his book Tricks of the Mind. Namely, "Frogs into Princes", "Trance-formations", and "persuasion engineering". He also says the eye-accessing cues have limited use, and may differ between people, so watch out on that part.

Good to know. I've anchored feelings in people and developed rapport using mirroring quite well on several occasions, and I've also used the handshake break to elicit a (admitedly light) rapid induction, but it's encouraging to know that NLP can be used to that extent. Cheers, James

He would have had a field day with that black and blue dress

3:05 Derren was way sneaky the way he switched to the "certainty" anchor and got her to say a yellow card was definitely red. Wow.

says who! that's a pretty sweeping statement. for general readers - nlp is a huge field and is not inherently manipulative! it also has amazing therapeutic and learning applications

Very clever technique he uses here. He first starts anchoring a stat in wich the woman is certain of things and a state in which she doubts. He does this with the school example, when talking about uncertain things he touches her right shoulder, certain things are anchored to here left shoulder. Then when he starts to ask here if the card is definetly yellow he touches the uncertain shoulder to get her into a state where she doubts herself. In theory its not hard ^^

@Dooley You are right. I have tried this swish pattern on my fellow students to make them more motivated and more drawn towards studying. Sometimes it works, sometimes it dont. It depends on the situation and on the concentration and determination of the subject. And of course how I present it.

There are all kinds of resources. Google or find NLP books, audio books, videos by Richard Bandler, Michael Hall, Robert Dilts, Kenrick Cleveland, etc. Even Darren Brown has an interesting book out.

wow just read about Swish and Anchoring and now I understand what the hell he's doing here! NLP is great. Derren is a master at this :D

guys, look, really look, he associates the "unclear image" with the touching of the left shoulder and vice versa. when he shows her the blue card he touches her left shoulder to unconsciously establish uncertainty in order to manipulate her to see the yellow as red and then, only then does he touch her right shoulder to establish a "solid" picture (solid indicating block colour red) making her see yellow as red and red as black. its not witchcraft, its child psychology and yes, also runs along the same lines as Collapsing Anchors

she has been hypnotized by darren brown using NLP tricks making her think red is black and yellow is red.

Outstanding example demonstrated as usual by Derren Brown. However, this would be better described as anchoring. Not Swish. Great vid!

Completely agree, her left arm was anchored with her deep feeling of uncertainty. Her left right was anchored with her definite believe. By tapping the left shoulder he could create uncertainty of the colour red and by keeping the verbal pace up and slowly talking her in to believing it was red he then fired the definite believe anchor.

In the start he was talking about somethiing she felt unsure with and he touched her left shoulders every time he mentioned what was unsure, and then he talked about her home that was defenitely Vegas and touched her right shoulder every time he mentioned something that was absolutely true. Later when he talked about the colours he asked stuff like "but this doesn't have to be yellow, does it?" and touched her "uncertain" left shoulder qhile doing so, making her uncertain. Amazing! =)

Besides the use of (NLP) anchoring; note that the RED of the couch is reflected by the yellow card (pause the video at 2.33). Very clever of Derren.

@MikeoWar I'm pretty sure it has something to do with the difference between your right and left brain too. Left = logical, analytical, right = creative. That's theoretically how nlp is applicable to eye movement.

no no no, if u see when she was explaining 'uncertainty' he made the sign for 'maybe' to be touching her left shoulder. and sign for 'sure' to be touching her right shoulder. so whenever he asks a question and wants her to show uncertainty he does so by touching her left shoulder. and vice versa with opposite shoulder.

Some NLP techniques can be used in mass media. However, in this example, Derren is calibrating to the girl in the video and anchoring her responses. In the case of mass media, the anchor could be something else, like the sound of someones voice or an image.

He sets an anchor of 'dubious belief' when he touches her on the left shoulder and an anchor of 'firm belief' when he touches her on the right shoulder while she visualizes images of her beliefs (his hand leads her eyes to access her right and left cortex of her brain). He reinforces the anchor. Then he "swishes"--pulls over the dubious image into the firm belief mode--as he triggers the anchors. When he changes her beliefs about colors, all he is doing is triggering the anchors he just set.

Actually according to Richard Bandler the up right is common for visual construction and he also says that it can differ from person to person. Her cue for visual reconstruction might not up top right. I did notice that thought and thought the same thing

I noticed something REALLY cool in this video. Derren associates the right side of her body (touching her right arm) with certainty. Then when he tells her that yellow is red, he gets her to say that it's red while he's touching her right arm. Cool. So it's not JUST verbal.

Its really interesting that when you really think about his word usage for the "uncertain" feeling and then for the "certain" feeling its soooo different. On the uncertain side he plants, maybe, not so sure, not quite certain and he shakes his hand more. Then for the certain side he uses, definately, positive,

he does use NLP but he also uses a technique known as anchoring. He causes her to associate a tap on the left arm with uncertainty, and a tap on the right with certainty. So he suggests certain scenarios and causes her to feel an emotion that would make them more convincing by tapping her arms.

It is a swish pattern method in NLP. simply the whole thing starts at the beggining... he anchor(trigger) the state of "not sure about" on her left shoulder and he also anchor(trigger) the "its solid that..." on the right... he uses pattern while he move his hand over sides... that gives actually 'swish pattern' next things was just a shoot off the 1 anchor to "not be sure about that BLUE is BLUE" and fire same on the blue one AND then the second anchor "im sure and its solid that its RED(yelow)

Plus, I should say spatially (/visual) AND kineasthetic anchoring, thereby covering her most likely preferred modality.

Dude made my fucking day! I was looking for indepth details of this, and got the funniest post ive seen on youtube by far.

Notice how touches her left or right arm at times. It's not just something he does - he's creating an anchor. It seems from this video left arm for certainty and right arm for uncertainty, along with the visual positioning.

@oniluaPogaihT She probably only pictured a part of her house which is in Vegas, or her house, but floating in the space of her mind rather than Vegas, but she get's a kinesthetic feeling of certainty know it's her house and it's definitely in Vegas. So the anchor was effective regardless of how she thought of it.

I'll add that it's amazing what people will do to be part of a special group. The "anti-social" behavior of recent years (internet instead of actual talking) has something to do with this... I think these 'subjects' try to fill a void of acceptance within a social group, for lack of belonging to groups. She's playing along.. She is TOTALLY aware of the camera, yet doesn't look at it. A sign of "natural acting" to be accepted as a professional. That body language is her saying "I can do this!"

NLP in eye accessing cues up and right is Visual remember. The way I remembered it was if you think the letter C comes before R in the alphabet. So when you look at someones you know that VC is up and to the left VR is up to the right..I hope this helps .

when he makes her imagine the not-definite feeling he touches her left shoulder (00:19), associated the two, and her right shoulder with the definite belief. and at 02:35 says that it is not definitely yellow and touches left shoulder, reminding her of that non-definite feeling, so she doesnt think its definitely yellow, and around 03:00 he has her think that it could be red, and then touches her right shoulder making her think it is definitely red

Someone asked: Why left/right handed. Handedness depends on your brains dominant hemisphere. This is a genetic thing, but is as mentioned, not always expressed in absolut terms. Eye patterns is by no means exact. They differ from person to person, and you can have to get a baseline before using them

@oniluaPogaihT Sometimes this pattern is switched for a few people, so they use the Right hemisphere for rational thinking while their left is used for Creative thinking. But yeah her eyes move over the horizon extremly.

@oniluaPogaihT you could always immagine your house or smth... besides, the "looking" thing isn't always right for others.... what I noticed is the shoulder touch... he makes the Swish Pattern and touches her shoulders. When he makes the same for colors, he also touches her shoulders, activating the Swish Pattern... (google swish pattern to understand it) yellow - right shoulder, when he says red (for yellow) - left shoulder.... kinda reprograming the brain

@oniluaPogaihT The top right is actually visual remembering. Top left is visual construction.

As soon as you work it out its great

I've actually tried this on an extremely impressionable kid at school during a music lesson, most of the stuff you've written here might help, but its by no means necessary.

Nice example of Anchoring, you like me, will be impressed too.

Anchoring: Notice how he touches her left shoulder when he wants (and convinces) her to feel UNCERTAIN. Then, he touches her right shoulder when he wants her to feel CERTAIN. First he conditions her to his touch as he tells her things that she deems absolutely true (ie, school and home). Then he reinforces that touch by convincing her of things that are questionable (This yellow could be orange). Finally, she is conditioned to his touch and reacts accordingly.

very obvious how he does it but he does it better than most peole would ever be able to do it. a true genius.

This is actually NLP Mapping Across, not the NLP Swish Pattern.

@oniluaPogaihT yes it could be fake. If she is left handed though, the eye patterns tend to change sides

"'touching the shoulder' thing" Notice which side he touched. Left side for uncertain/not solid, right side for certain/solid. This is supposedly mapping to the opposite sides of her brain - left side of the brain (right side touch) is analytical/rational, right side of the brain (left side touch) is emotional/irrational. Don't know if it was necessary, he probably could have done his Pavlovian conditioning w/o touching a particular side. Hell, ppl can do it thru TV.

Actually visual cues and eye movement can differ from person to person. though top right is much more common for reconstruction its not exclusive

this is awesome! derren brown is a true master. this is not the swish pattern though. the swish pattern is similar to a 'map across', taking the submodalities of one state and mapping them into another, while adding movement, 'swishing' the problem state into the outcome state. x

This guy is a master of NLP...

@Dooley id like to understand why it would matter if they are a left handed person or not.

@davidxrodriguez , david, you just already answered to your own question. what I mean? if your guys allways asks wtf are you doing with touching them, it means that your still didnt managed to direct the attention away. and you just still cant do IT such smoothly with no "misunderstanding" ;)

I llloove this! What a clever idea and wonderful implemtation!

right hand up is anchoring the whole talk about being uncertain,difficult.. Tap on the left shoulder is to anchor once again and trigger the words itself. same thing with left hand right shoulder only it is certain, clear. now when he tells her the color is not actually blue he does the tap which brings back the feeling of being uncertain and when says yellow is red taps other and there u go, she now CLEARLY knows its red and shes CERTAIN about it =) surprised how he pulls it off with his accent

notice how he associates uncertainty with him touching her left shoulder and certainty with her right shoulder. also his tone of voice changes when switching from uncertainty to certainty.

I don't think these same exact results would happen with just anyone else. Possible, but perhaps not even probable. Great demonstration. This is interesting stuff. But seeing red instead of yellow? I think not all people are that suggestable.

@oniluaPogaihT I've heard it's the opposite for left-handed people. Though the way she lies the cards down would suggest that she's right-handed.

if you read the entry Derren Brown on Wikipedia, u'll notice that he has some books about this stuff, and also some videos for a selected public... just for experienced magicians and mentalists. also he teaches this kindda thing in other videos, jus like the one named "Derren Brown NLP, which is related to this one (7:14 minutes)...

Is that what happens when I do that? It makes sense, in a way. I look in people's right eyes and then unfocus my eyes and look "through" them to put them into an altered state of consciousness. I then walk away and they forget that I am there for the rest of the encounter. It gets me away from people I don't wish to speak to.

You did get this right but you reversed the uncertainty/certainty shoulders watch again its her left shoulder uncertainty and right certainty...simple anchoring then suggestion linked to it.... making her "certain" that yellow is red like she is certain where she lives

hypnopotamus. that is so funny. Derren brown is brilliant. Oh and JohnnyAlpha8, i have seen this shit up close and personal, and it is not fake. Derren is particularly good at it.

Psychologically, This is the most intriguing derren brown thing I've seen... is she still seeing the colours the same, but the words have changed? Or is she somehow seeing the colours differently? If it is just the former, then how come she cannot recognise her car?

@oniluaPogaihT Depends on if youre left or right handed.

@TwistingWays: It is not them that go into trance when you do that...you go into YOUR trance...and if you have rapport with them, they will follow and also go into trance. But if you don't have rapport then you'll just seem weird to them and you'll probably confuse them...which can of course be another opportunity for you to ASSIST them in going into trance. Pace their confusion and desire for something sensible...then give them the most sensible thing to do....SLEEP!!!!

Fun stuff! He's got his NLP stuff DOWN!!!!

watch as he is talking, he touches her left arm when somthing is unsure, and her right when it is definate

It's not about the NLP itself. It's about how it is "sold".

He he. Clever. He anchors her at the start, when he's talking about her not being sure about herself, by touching her on the arm. He then uses that same anchor about her not being sure when he's going through the coloured cards, to make her unsure about them...

@oniluaPogaihT looking at that direction doesn't always mean a visual construction. It does for the most of us....just like most of us are also right handed. But in her case it could be the opposite side is her visual construction

@oniluaPogaihT She could be left-handed, in which case it is not uncommon for the pattern to be reversed. Just something to think about

this is unbelivable

This could be true i learned that color interpretation is just what we perceive in our minds a couple days in my psyc class ago thats crazy

after he helps her believe that she can get better teaching he says: "that little change can make all sort of changes...you will find out what they are..." then it takes out the color cards. looks like he connected the first successful change to the help do the second, harder, color change.

WOW. Simple shoulder touching...

the hands are anchoring shoulder not sure.. maybe also part of anchoring

@N12MAR She named the cards correctly the first time...

when derren brown asks about her school work and where she lives and then he asks her to move the one image to the other thats the swish...its a technique in NLP.

are you sure you like cake? *touches left shoulder* Yeah pretty fucking sure.

I got really thrown off when he said "So what color would you call this" and she just straight-up said "red." Did he drop some subtle hints to make her see red there, or was it simply the conversation about the colors that did it?

Easy To Know What Color Car She Had. Probably Saw Her Earlier Getting Out Of It Then Chose Her For The Trick. Pretty Sweet Actually. I Kinda Understand How Its Done But I Don't Think I Could Pull It Off

@poroto931 He got her to mix up a whole series of colors that cover 95% of the colors that cars are.......... So even though he probably did know what color her car was he didn't need to know that.

@oniluaPogaihT it's because she visualize her house

Now, this is my trouble with Derren Brown. I have never seen NLP have such a strong response as Derren Brown claims to use it to. Would appreciate a reply from an adept NLP practitioner. Can NLP have effects to this degree? Surely this is Derren's "Misdirection" ans "Showmanship"?

i understand how he made her think of yellow as red but how did he make her think red was black?

@oniluaPogaihT Seems to be more like she is checking out the cameraman, since her private information (where do you live) was being recorded.

Yes, but I was talking about the technique, not about those NLP-trainers. But I know what you mean, they are in most of cases just after the money, using some known technique like hypnosis or NLP as their own brilliant invention that is gonna change your life! It's sad, but hey, if they make some simple people happy, I don't see a problem.

this guy rocks... the vid in which he buys stuff with blanck piece of paper is great, hilarious. and how about that one in which he asked the subjects wallet, watch and stuff? great.

The technique he's using is described in Persuasion Engineering by Richard Bandler.

I recently bought a book on NLP...but I feel that I am too much of a skeptic for the exercises to work for me...

about the mass media nlp, the other day i saw an advertisement on tele and it was for a compensation claims company...the actor started by saying how "you are entitiled to compensation" and then he turns to a woman...

Very cool indeed. Something I want to try. But, how does one reverse it? Just un-anchor the thought?

"Who painted my car black" LOL!

@hossrex: So you did study up on NLP and Hypnosis??? I don't think so. I'm very much into hypnosis and NLP and you wouldn't believe what is possible. Sometimes the possibilities in life are far more complex and rich than they seem when you look at things only on the surface.

that guy is awesome

and says "sue! you also had a great lump sum paid you you from your claim didnt you?"...Sue!...get it? this really startled me as I actually fell for it completely, and then caught myself...we are all being controlled subliminally, this is common place in all our news reports, politial broadcasts etc etc

I don't think it's hallucination. I think it's more like rewiring concepts. What I think happend is that he "rewired" the sensation and the words.

wow, I don't really understand though what technigue did he used..? NLP is so amazing!! yet, there maybe negative consequences - which, after we lookback at everything will not appear so important to us anymore, am I not wrong? =)

ya its just a reflection from the ceiling

but how does that do w/ the fact that she sees a different color?