The NLP Model – The Four Stages of Learning

The "Four Stages of Learning," is a theory posited by a psychologist named Abraham Maslow. This is a nlp model that to explain how we learn anything. The four stages are:

Stage 1: Unconscious Incompetence

This is the very initial stage by which the person knows nothing either consciously or subconsciously. For instance, if I ask you: “can you speak Mars planet language?” Sure your respond is totally confused, because you never heard that language before and even not sure whether there are existence of such language.

Stage 2: Conscious Incompetence

Then, if somebody demonstrates to you how to speak Mars language, now at least you can recognize there is existence of such language, at the same time, you are very sure you don’t have that capability yet to speak because you are yet to learn. This is consciously incompetence.

Stage 3: Conscious Competence

The individual understands or knows how to do something by consciously in paying full attention in learning the skill and foundation of that language. Mean you know you are mastering that skill better and better.

Stage 4: Unconscious Competence

Over the time you have putting lots of effort in repeating the learning, you will soon discover that this skill has becomes the "second nature" and can be performed easily. What surprise yourself is, may be you don’t even know you can speak so well in that language.

Even though in the example above, Mars language is used by which it is not available for the time being, but you can recall any skill and capabilities that you are owning now, like car driving, any language other than your mother language, drawing skill, public speaking skill and etc. Can you see that all these skill is developed by going through these 4 stages? The answer is absolutely, all of us gone through the same process in learning something. This nlp model is very useful for us to understand the whole picture how the skill is owned.