Submodalities: The Secret Language of Your Mind

Submodalities represent one of the most fascinating discoveries in Neuro-Linguistic Programming. They are the fine-grained qualities of your internal experiences, the specific characteristics that distinguish one mental image from another, one internal voice from another, one feeling from another. By learning to identify and change submodalities, you gain precise control over your emotional responses.

Visual submodalities are the qualities of your mental pictures. They include size (large or small), distance (close or far), brightness (bright or dim), color (full color, black and white, or selective color), focus (sharp or blurry), and border (framed or unframed). When you remember a happy event, notice the visual qualities of that memory. Now compare it to a memory that makes you uncomfortable. You will find consistent differences in these submodalities.

The practical application is powerful. To reduce the emotional impact of an unpleasant memory, try making the image smaller, dimmer, further away, and black and white. Many people find that this simple adjustment significantly reduces the emotional charge. To intensify a positive memory, make it larger, brighter, closer, and in vivid full color. These changes happen instantly and produce immediate shifts in how you feel.

Auditory submodalities are the qualities of your internal dialogue and remembered sounds. They include volume (loud or soft), tempo (fast or slow), pitch (high or low), tone (harsh or smooth), location (inside or outside your head), and rhythm (steady or irregular). Your inner critic often has a specific auditory pattern, perhaps a loud, fast, harsh voice. By changing these qualities, you can transform your relationship with your inner dialogue.

Try this exercise: recall a critical inner voice. Notice its specific auditory qualities. Now deliberately change them. Make the voice soft, slow, high-pitched, and coming from far away. Notice how the critical message loses its power when its auditory qualities change. You can also make an encouraging voice louder, clearer, and closer to amplify its positive influence.

Kinesthetic submodalities are the qualities of your internal feelings and body sensations. They include location (where in your body you feel it), size (how large the sensation is), shape (round, pointed, diffuse), temperature (warm or cool), movement (flowing or static), and intensity (strong or gentle). Understanding your kinesthetic submodalities allows you to directly influence your emotional state through body awareness.

To apply kinesthetic submodalities, locate where you feel a particular emotion in your body. Notice its size, shape, temperature, and movement. Now experiment with changing these qualities. If anxiety feels like a tight knot in your chest, try expanding it, warming it, and watching it dissolve. Many people find that deliberately changing the kinesthetic qualities of an emotion gives them direct access to shifting that emotion.

Submodalities also apply to how you think about the future. Compelling future visions have specific submodalities that make them attractive. When you create a vision for your life, pay attention to the visual, auditory, and kinesthetic qualities. Make it bright, vivid, close, and emotionally rich. This creates a powerful internal pull toward your goals.

Practice identifying submodalities throughout your day. Notice what changes when your mood shifts. Over time, you will develop an intuitive ability to adjust your internal experiences in real time. This skill alone can transform how you think, feel, and live.