Chapter 2
Before we begin this chapter, write down your current understanding of what hypnotherapy is. Make a note of any worries you have regarding hypnotherapy.
There is neither mystery nor magic to hypnotherapy, but there are many misunderstandings concerning what it is.
Perhaps the most popular misconception of hypno-therapy centres on an all-powerful, sinister hypnotist placing a weak-willed victim into a sleep-like state to gain complete control over them for their own amusement or wicked ends. Given this media-fuelled scenario, the thought of being made to squawk like a chicken on command, or rob a bank, or worse still, typically creates a sense of mistrust and fear, even amongst the most open-minded. It would me.
But the above bears no resemblance to clinical hypnotherapy. Phew!
Clinical hypnotherapy is a safe, non-addictive and, above all, effective form of treatment for many psychological and physical (yes, physical) conditions. The chief aim of hypnotherapy applied within the clinical context is to help people overcome issues that are having a detrimental impact on their life.
You’ll all be aware of hypnotherapy being used to help people stop smoking (mentioning some names you’ll probably be familiar with: Matt Damon, Ashton Kutcher, Ben Affleck and Drew Barrymore); to lose weight (Lily Allen, Sarah Ferguson, Sophie Dahl and Geri Halliwell); to overcome fears and phobias; to control panic and anxiety; to enhance performance (Tiger Woods, Jimmy Connors, Kevin McBride, Adam Walker, Steve Hooker and Rod Carew). But hypnotherapy is also used to help people combat physical issues and illnesses (for example, Bruce Willis and Julia Roberts saw hypnotherapists to help them overcome stuttering problems).
Please be aware from the outset that I’m not suggesting for one moment that hypnotherapy can provide a remedy for all physical illnesses. No, no and no, again. If a client presents with a physical ailment, I ask them first to visit their GP and then work alongside the GP’s diagnosis and choice of medication. But, having said this, hypnotherapy has been used to ease a wide range of physical ailments ranging from pain relief to speeding up the process of healing broken bones, to even enabling people to undertake surgery and dental treatment without medical anaesthetic, and so much more. And, of course, every physical illness has psychological consequences that hypnotherapy can help address.
Myth busting
What is ‘hypnosis’?
‘Hypnosis’ means the trance state. The trance is created to bypass the logical conscious mind and its Reticular Activating System, and gain direct access to the unconscious mind.
The trance is a calm, pleasant feeling, similar to daydreaming, in which the conscious part of the mind is relaxed and the awareness of the unconscious mind heightened. ‘It is a mental state in which a person’s perceptions and observations flow unobstructed’ by pre-set procedural programmes (Stephen Wolinsky, 1991). The brain wave activity during hypnosis slows down to a frequency level called alpha, a state we pass through on the way to and from sleep. Importantly, people remain aware of what is happening to them, and retain absolute free will and self-control at all times.
Relaxation of the conscious mind is actually a naturally occurring state that you will have experienced every day of your life, many times a day – you simply didn’t realise it. As you’ll remember from the previous chapter, we spend much of our waking lives in various trance (autopilot) states of mind.
Stephen Wolinsky suggests that the human trance state is universally experienced and that 100 per cent of the world’s population experience it on a daily basis (2007). In fact, we dip in and out of trance states every day, at times in which we’re physically present but consciously absent. For example, you will feel it nightly just before you fall asleep or when you’re daydreaming or absorbed in a book or film, or even when you’re driving – so-called ‘highway hypnosis’. The reason television advertising is so powerful is because watching TV typically relaxes the body which, in itself, induces a trance-like state. Therefore, many of the advertising messages to buy something slip through the RAS of the conscious mind and lodge in the unconscious, creating a demand and a desire for a product that you didn’t have before. Ah, yes – that explains why I went off-piste and felt impelled to buy that room freshener!
How do you hypnotise someone?
As far as I’m concerned, there are three stages to the hypnotherapeutic process – induction, re-programming and emergence.
Induction
There are many ways to help a person enter trance – it’s called the induction process – but none of these is effective if that person insists that they will not be hypnotised. My preferred method of induction, the technique I use with most of my clients and the approach I use in the audios that accompany this book, centres on encouraging the Reticular Activating System of the conscious mind to slip away through simple relaxation of the physical body. This is referred to as a Permissive/Progressive Relaxation Induction, using language that invites the body to let go. Such an induction is not only effective, it’s also thoroughly enjoyable and incredibly beneficial to both the body and the mind.
Relaxation is physically restorative. It boosts the body’s immune system, lowers blood pressure, allows the muscle cells to strengthen and re-build, and the organs of the body to function optimally. And, relaxation benefits us psychologically too. It re-balances the mind and the body, calming the mind, allowing us to see things in their true perspective, to tune into our knowledge base and find the solutions to our life issues. Relaxation has also been shown to reduce psychological conditions such as depression and anxiety.
To give a little more detail of how you will be eased into the trance state, each audio will ask you to find a comfortable, warm and safe place in which to lie back and begin relaxing. Neutral music will play in the background of the audio. When a person is experiencing a psychological or physical problem, their breathing can become very shallow and/or overly fast, so, each recording begins with an exercise to deepen and slow the breathing – the 5/7 breathing. The breathing exercise is very straight forward. It simply involves inhaling slowly for the count of 5, allowing the stomach to rise with each inhalation, and then exhaling for the count of 7, allowing the stomach to fall with each outward breath. My voice will then guide you through a gentle and pleasurable process of physical and mental relaxation. Following the induction process, the focus of each session will then gently unfold.
Remember, I cannot force you to relax – I invite you to do so; you will enter the trance state when you allow yourself physically to let go.
Re-programming: Hypnotherapeutic methods of change
Once the trance state is achieved, there are many varied and creative methods available to the hypnotherapist to facilitate positive re-programming of the unconscious mind. Should you be interested in learning about these and other methods in more depth, I recommend you investigate the references at the end of this chapter because, in an attempt to keep ‘on point’, I will only (and briefly) describe the methods that are specifically relevant to this book.
| 1. | Direct Positive Suggestion |
Direct Positive Suggestion is one of the most straightforward, therapist-directed methods employed by hypnotherapists to enable change. Based on pre-discussed goals, new information that will override old dysfunctional beliefs and behavioural responses is put forward to an individual whilst they are in the trance state. Because the conscious mind is switched off, these messages get through to the unconscious mind to form new neural pathways that inform more beneficial beliefs, thoughts, feelings, physiological responses and behaviours.
| 2. | Parts therapy |
Parts therapy is an empowering technique to help people identify their own solutions to specific issues. It is based on two specific concepts: that each person has the resources within them to solve their own problems, and that human beings are comprised of many different parts or sub-personalities, each with different drives and abilities.
Within our everyday lives, we perform many different roles, each role requiring specific capabilities and skill-sets to best function within that role. For much of the time, these parts operate in harmony with each other, each part coming to the fore at the appropriate time. For example, in our work role, the part of us that is organised, goal-directed and assertive will perhaps be dominant, and, when we’re out with our friends, the part of us that is fun and sociable might take the lead. But, there are times when these parts are at odds with each other generating conflicting feelings and behaviours. Let’s say that someone wants to become a non-smoker, yet they keep buying cigarettes. Here, the part of the person that focuses on health and well-being is in conflict with the part that defines itself as ‘smoker’. Parts therapy provides the opportunity to mediate between these opposing parts to resolve the conflict.
Sometimes we experience uncomfortable feelings yet find it difficult to put our finger on quite what it is we’re feeling and what might be causing those feelings (feelings of discomfort perhaps). This is where parts therapy can come into its own – it can be applied as a ‘bottom-up’ diagnostic tool. It enables a person to examine their discomfort in detail and to become more familiar with how it’s represented in their body and mind. By understanding how the discomfort feels in the body, where it’s located, how it looks and sounds, insights can be gained into what it is and what might be causing and/or maintaining it.
| 3. | Visualisation |
Experiencing discomfort and dissatisfaction can lead us to avoid the emotion-driving situations. But, avoiding the things that trigger the discomfort simply serves to perpetuate it. It stands to reason therefore, that exposure to the stimulus, gaining more comfortable experience, will be beneficial. But, the thought of exposure to something that we find uncomfortable can feel very challenging.
Visualisation offers us the opportunity to gain positive experience of the taxing situation in a completely safe and supportive environment. This is how: Neuro-imaging techniques have demonstrated that when we visualise doing something, our neurons fire as though we were really doing it. As far as our unconscious minds are concerned, what’s imagined is real and that information is then stored as factual. The more richly we imagine something, the more vibrantly it will be remembered, and the more powerful its effect will be in informing future behaviour. Thus, to gain positive experience of the challenging stimulus, all we need do is visualise it.
Visualisations can be therapist directed or the individual can be encouraged to visualise freely. Adam Walker, the first British man to swim the toughest seven oceans of the world, uses visualisation techniques whilst swimming to help him manage the cold of the water. He visualises the warmth of a bath, and imagines that warmth to such effect that his brain accepts that his body is warm and comfortable and so allows him to continue swimming despite the cold.
| 4. | Pseudo-orientation in time |
When people are experiencing difficulties, the future can often seem very bleak. But, within trance, by orientating the mind into the future, a person can be enabled to visualise a desired state of being as though that state had already been achieved. As with visualisation, the mind then accepts what has been imagined as though it were real and inevitable, and so automatically guides that person toward making this their reality.
| 5. | Anchoring |
Installing an anchor is a quick and effective method of enabling someone to enter a resourceful/beneficial state of mind on demand. Anchoring is a technique that overrides past detrimental responses to specific situations and provides a person with a sense of confidence in their ability to control how they choose to respond to something.
Anchoring without trance is an NLP (Neuro-linguistic Programming) technique that aims to override past detrimental responses (fear for example) to a specific stimulus (a spider), and put in place a consistent, healthy learned response to that stimulus (calm interest). But, my work has taught me that anchors set within the trance state (without the interference of logic) are even more powerful and enduring. The theoretical basis for anchoring lies within Classical Conditioning, learning through association. (For a more thorough explanation of Anchoring and Classical Conditioning, see Chapter 6.)
An anchor can typically take the form of a word or phrase, an image, a smell, a number or a physical action but can be represented by anything to do with our five senses. My preferred anchor is the gentle pressing together of the thumb and index finger of the dominant hand.
| 6. | Regression |
We learn from our past experiences, and some of those lessons are highly beneficial to us, reinforcing a positive sense of who we are and what we’re capable of.
Regression has many uses, but it is a hypnotherapeutic method chiefly applied to investigate and heal past unresolved experiences that are negatively affecting a person’s present life. Ideally it looks to resolve issues surrounding the initial event that first triggered the negative response, the Initial Sensitising Event.
It rests on the understanding that the unconscious mind stores memories of everything we’ve ever experienced (whether we can actively remember those experiences or not), memories that automatically inform and reinforce our belief systems, thoughts, feelings and behaviours. Whilst in a safe and relaxed trance state, these memories are encouraged to come forward to be modified through:
| 7. | Chair Therapy |
There are multiple ways in which Chair Therapy can be used and adapted within hypnotherapy, but, in general, Chair Therapy facilitates a sense of closure and healing. It encourages someone to imagine themselves in a very safe and secure room, sitting comfortably in a chair, facing a seated person from their past or present, a person whom, perhaps, they did not get the chance to say ‘goodbye’ to, a person who hurt them, or a person whom they hurt.
It is vital within Chair Therapy for each individual to know that they are the one who is in control of events that unfold, so, as I apply it, there are three primary directives within the process:
Depending on the nature of the issue in hand, the individual is given the opportunity to talk to the other person in the room with them, to get off their chest/release all they want to say where this other is concerned. It’s cathartic.
Chair Therapy can also be used to mentally rehearse future conversations/situations.
Emergence
The final stage of the hypnotherapeutic process is to bring a person back to full awareness – emergence. I do this by counting from 3 up to 1, with each count encouraging the individual to become more alert and more aware until, at the count of 1, I ask for their eyes to open and the conscious mind to fully re-engage.
Note that within each hypnosis session, you may experience a degree of time distortion, with time seeming to shrink or expand, and you may not have a complete memory of all that transpired during the session. Please do not worry about either of these things. If time seems to have slowed down or speeded up, it simply demonstrates that you were in a trance state. And, if you can’t consciously recall all that happened, fear not – your unconscious mind will have a complete memory of what was said and what was achieved, and will begin automatically to act on what was learned.
To re-cap: Clinical hypnotherapy is a safe and enduringly effective client-centred therapy, its chief goal being to help people overcome issues that are having a detrimental effect on their life. Based on our understanding that the majority of what human beings do, think and feel is automatically driven by the unconscious mind, clinical hypnotherapy uses hypnosis (the trance state) to by-pass the RAS of the conscious mind and gain direct access to the unconscious mind. Once access to the unconscious mind has been achieved, various methods are applied to generate positive, lasting change.