From Hollywood to hypnotherapy
Self-hypnosis can be used to stop smoking, eliminate phobias, reduce your weight, help you sleep, reduce stress, enjoy relationships, maximize your potential and more – in fact the list is endless. And to make these changes it only takes the use of specific words in a hypnotic trance. It sounds so easy and it really is.
What’s more, overcoming a ‘major’ problem can create a snowball effect because in clearing away one issue you will find many other difficulties, connected with the major issue, begin to evaporate too. For example, you might use self-hypnosis to help you lose weight or get fitter and, as it begins to work, so your self-confidence and self-esteem increase too. Think of it as a mind clean up to start the process of creating the life you want. But self-hypnosis doesn’t only have to be used for problems but can also be used to make life easier for you, for example, to give you more confidence in yourself, allow you to enjoy life more, enhance your sports, music, art ability or even help you to learn a language or other skill more rapidly.
However, before you start reading how to use self-hypnosis to create these and more incredible outcomes in your life, you may be wondering why I am able to teach you how to get the most out of hypnotizing yourself. It’s partly due to my extensive research and 30 years’ experience of practising and teaching hypnotherapy, but, mainly it’s owing to the memory loss I suffered in a near-fatal car accident in 1978, which eventually inspired me to switch roles from Hollywood reporter and magazine publisher to hypnotherapist.
After the accident I suffered amnesia, leaving me with a 24-hour memory. When the Daily Mirror heard about this strange phenomenon, they featured me in an article entitled ‘Will Bride Remember her Husband?’. While holidaying in California, John Austin (international editor of The Hollywood Reporter) had proposed to me. The problem? I was in danger of forgetting he even existed when I returned to the UK.
A well-known hypnotherapist from the USA (Gil Boyne) was visiting London at the time and contacted me after reading the article. Under hypnosis, he was able to help me regain part of my memory and literally give me back my life. From then on I took a keen interest in understanding the complexity and workings of the inner mind which has given me a unique perspective on the subject of hypnosis.
When I first had the accident, I could only remember one day at a time and only a little of the past if I were asked about it; otherwise, I lived in the ‘now’. Not being able to remember properly, I found I functioned in the almost ‘pure’ subconscious. As a result, when I was commissioned to teach my hypnotherapy course in universities I didn’t even make notes, as I simply wouldn’t have remembered that I had made them. This left me with no alternative but to work purely from my subconscious.
However, this unique understanding of the workings of the subconscious mind gave me a special edge when working with clients to resolve their issues, and this was paramount to becoming a successful hypnotherapist. I was able to come up with successful, new and innovative hypnosis techniques that were easily taught because of their simplicity. These new methods have now helped many people over the years to make positive, and sometimes life-saving, changes.
As well as having extensively studied and taught hypnotherapy and self-hypnosis to other therapists and clients, I’ve always maintained that the secret of good results from hypnotherapy is the ability to use self-hypnosis outside the consulting room. I’ve tested my self-hypnosis scripts with hypnotherapists I’ve trained and with clients, so I know how effective they are.
In recent years, I’ve been able to help two close friends use self-hypnosis to help them through their ordeal of dealing with a cancer diagnosis. The power of the mind has been acknowledged as a contributory factor in pain relief and aiding recovery from serious illnesses, and they both acknowledge that a daily dose of self-hypnosis made a huge difference to them.
As well as having trained hundreds of therapists for three decades, I’ve worked with thousands of clients, and written five bestselling books, which were translated into six languages. I believe the three most important reasons why I was able to become a top hypnotherapist were my background: first, before my car accident I was always one of the top salespeople in my company. Second, I was an investigative reporter for major newspapers before also publishing two of my own major London magazines, London People and Weekend People. Finally, and most importantly, I was trained by some of the most influential hypnotherapists, including Gil Boyne, surgeon Dr Jack Gibson and Ormond McGill. Psychologist John G Watkins was a friend of my husband and was a great help in explaining the therapeutic strategies that became the basis of my technique for recovering traumatic memories.
In this book you will find techniques and self-hypnosis scripts for changing and improving your life, as well as dealing with issues such as phobias and weight loss, together with case studies from my own practice and those of hypnotherapists I’ve trained over the years. I look forward to sharing this knowledge and experience with you, showing you just how powerful self-hypnosis can be.
Throughout the book, I use a few terms that have special meanings in the language of hypnosis, so I have included them below.
Depth of trance: The words used to describe the level of hypnosis.
Deepeners: The words used to deepen a trance.
Hypnotist: Someone who practices hypnosis. Hypnotherapist is a relatively new word but describes a hypnotist who uses therapy while his patient or client is in hypnosis.
Induction: The words used to ‘induce’ a hypnotic trance.
Relaxation: Being fully relaxed and breathing deeply and rhythmically. Deep relaxation sounds simple but it is generally something that has to be learned through practice, patience and persistence.
Subconscious: In hypnosis the subconscious or inner mind seems to be nearer the surface and is more readily accessible to suggestion.
Suggestibility: A person’s susceptibility to accepting a suggestion in hypnosis.
Suggestions: The words used in hypnosis to instruct the subconscious mind to create change. Hippolyte Bernheim, a 19th-century French physician and one of the founders of modern hypnotherapy, explained that ‘suggestion is an event through which an idea is introduced into the mind and accepted by it’.1
Script: This is the exact wording that is used to form a new program for the subconscious to follow.