Hypnosis Or Is It Really?

Author : Rick Collingwood
Although it has been documented as far back as ancient Egyptian times hypnosis continues to lose it's 200 year image of mind control and stage performance tomfoolery, and has now become an acceptable, if not fashionable way, to maximise inherent skills, make behavioural changes, or move beyond long held undesirable habits.Considering that in the original writings of Mesmer he declared that he was a conduit for an Etheral Fluid, and that the trance state was completely un-necessary to glean healing benefits from attendance at his famous VATS (circular wooden tubs filled with shards of glass iron filings and what Mesmer termed "Certain Substances").It is entirely correct to state that Franz Anton Mesmer was not a hypnotist by any past or present measures.
It was in fact the British Doctor James Braid, who after witnessing a demonstration in Manchester England in the late 1800s by the famous magnetist healer La Fontaine, with the initial intention of proving La Fontaine a fake and a quack, returned home and hypnotised his wife, a servant, and his friend Walker by holding a shiney button above the bridges of their noses and suggesting they sleep, coined the term hypnosis, so named after the daemon of sleep "Hypnos".Since Braids time hypnosis has ebbed and flowed in its popularity with the Medical Professions And although hypnosis was accepted by The American and British Medical Associations, before psychology enjoyed the same prestige by significantly sacrificing its initial strong spiritualistic adherents to become what psychology is today, there are many, what I call, hybrids of hypnosis appearing more and more readily, such as NLP, Time Line Therapy, and Ericksonian hypnosis.Although Doctors Dentists and Psychiatrists had used classic hypnosis often and successfully to treat among others such conditions as hysteria, post traumatic stress disorder, and pain control, hypnosis began to fall significantly out of favour due to time constraints of hypnotic induction, no actual preferred methods of induction, and the rapidly advancing wares of the pharmaceutical industry, hypnosis fell by the wayside and was left mostly in the arena of stage performances. In spite of this, to this day and in spite of any eveidence to suggest that hypnosis is or can be harmful some doctors, dentist, psychiatrists, and psychologists the world over still claim ownership over the practice of hypnosis.To this end, in my opinion as a successful clinical hypnotherapist and trainer of hypnosis, I am hearing more and more often from clients and other people a statement that goes something like this "Oh hypnosis. I had hypnosis and it doesn't work". Personally, and with qualification, I believe that much of what is touted as hypnosis by both the academics and also many lay hypnotists is very much misconstrued and misunderstood, by too many of those who practice it.The American psychiatrist Milton Erickson bought hypnosis back to promenance in the 1950s and is well remembered in medical circles for his classic "Handshake Induction" upon one of his peers that gave a real WOW to the medical profession. But it should be remembered that stage hypnotists had been using this very induction for at least 50 years before Erickson wowed his peers. There is no doubt that Erickson was a brilliant behaviourist and psychiatrist known for his vagaries, and he definately got the due credit of bringing hypnosis back to medicine. But he specialised in mental and psychological disorders, and it can be read in his own writings that he delighted in ensuring he never directly or completely answered questions posed to him by medical students during his lectures. Upon closer scrutiny he also never actually taught them how to induce the state or himself used classic hypnotic inductions. So since Ericksons death on the 25th March 1980, there is a litany of 1000s of so called Ericksonian hypnotherapists, trained in, and using somebody elses opinions of what they perhaps think Ericksonian meant, whereupon the facts show that Erickson himself was not even a hypnotist in the classic sense of the word.
This is not to say that Ericksonian hypnosis is not an effective therapy tool, because it most definately is. I myself practised the modality for 5 years before I became brave enough to move into the highly skilled arena of classic hypnosis, and inducing instantanous inductions, disproving to peers the incorrect professionally acceptable assumption that "Making" another do something against cannot be done.To my way of thinking, if a client wants to make a morally reasonable change within themselves there is nothing wrong with using an instantaneous induction and direct suggestion to implant the new behaviour. If anything it it much shorter in treatment and many less sessions are required, and I have often pondered whether the postulation offered by many mental health academics, "That nobody can be made to do anything against their will", is more likely attributable to the fact that they don't have very good hypnosis skills, or they don't want to lose potential income by limiting their services to 2 or 3 sessions.Even in the training of hypnosis today, around the world many of the trainers and lecturers do not have the necessary skills or ability to induce a rapid induction. So in my opinion they have no right to call themselves hypnosis trainers, at least not in the classic sense of the word. Therefore they are not hypnotists themselves.Now in the modern era there is Bandler and Grinders NLP. A modality born of the combined skills of Erickson, Virginia Satir, and the British linguist Gregory Batesons, which, disregarding the fact that the 3 therapists that NLP was modelled from were very gifted in their own right, has gained much favour and financial acclaim for its so called inventors. But NLP, according to scientific scrutinty, does not stand up to the claims often made regarding both in its long term effectiveness and claims of superior communication skills.Also there is Time Line Therapy, another hybrid that uses apparent time lines in the unconscious to change present time emotional patterns and reactions to past traumatic or unpleasant events, again this modality does not stand up well to scientific scrutiny. Another popular misconcieved hypnosis is progessive muscle relaxation followed by the therapist frequently instructing relax and go deeper, or "Now just imagine you are walking along a beach on a warm sunny day" type patter. This may lead to a trance state of some sort, but once again cannot be termed true hypnosis in the true sense of the word. This is not to say that some benefit cannot be had by the recipients of these verbal therapeutic modalities, but my professional experience has prooved to me time and time again that none of the forementioned are anywhere near as powerful or permanent as the true hypnosis taught by the true hypnosis trainers such as Gil Boyne, Gerald Kein, Tom Silver, myself or the lately deceased master Ormond McGill.
In the final analysis, with correct and thorough investigation it can be easily determined that virtually all of the modern hypnotic modalities are not in fact hypnosis at all, more so they are simply hybrids of some aspects of true hypnosis. And many can drag out to expensive frequent and regular sessions that could perhaps have been much more effective and less expensive for the recipient than if they had been receiving what they thought they were which is true hypnosis.Not all hypnosis is hypnois.If you want to know more on this fascinating subject visit www.mindmotivations.com one of the largest hypnosis sites on the web.
Keyword : hypnosis, hypnotherapy, time line therapy, ericksonian hypnosis