What is Hypnosis?

View a short video clip of Joe explaining hypnotism.

As long as there have been human beings, there has been hypnosis. We use this commonly occurring, and natural state of mind, unknowingly, all the time. It is just natural for us. For example, if you have ever watched a television program or movie and become really absorbed into the program, you were probably in a trance. This trance is what caused you to not hear your mother calling you to dinner, until she raised her voice for the third time. (Advertisers understand this. They use television programs to induce a hypnotic trance and then provide you hypnotic suggestions, called commercials!)

Another common example of this naturally occurring state of mind is when you are driving down the road, with your mind focused on some other task (a day dream perhaps), and next thing you know, you have passed your next turn. That is called "highway hypnosis".

The U.S. government defines hypnosis as having two parts: (1) the bypass of the critical factor, and (2) the establishment of acceptable selective thinking.

This seems to be a useful and accurate definition of hypnosis. This "bypass of the critical factor" simply means the release of limiting beliefs. For example, the use of hypnosis for anesthesia has been accepted by the American Medical Association since 1958. It is well established to be a fact that hypnosis is useful for creating anesthesia. However, if you have the limiting belief that the mind cannot create a powerful anesthesia, you will be unable to do so. However, in hypnosis, this limiting belief can be bypassed, and hypnotic anesthesia can be quickly created. "The establishment of acceptable selective thinking," the second part of the definition, refers to the process of guiding someone into hypnosis by using a hypnotic induction. The establishment of selective thinking creates the mental environment or state of mind that enables you to reject limiting beliefs (that you picked up by living in our society), so that you can accept new more empowering ones.

The hypnotic state is an optimum state for making changes in your life because you can set aside limiting beliefs that may have been preventing you from moving toward a more healthy, and happy you.

So now you know that you can be hypnotized. You have done it literally thousands of times. You did it yourself when you were daydreaming and missed that turn (self-hypnosis), you have been hypnotized when you enjoyed a television program (being hypnotized by someone else), and you have followed hypnotic and post-hypnotic suggestions when you preferred some brand name that you saw repeatedly on television (hypnotic compounding of suggestion).

Now let's use hypnosis to make your life better. Give us a call and find out if hypnosis is right for you. We will be happy to answer your questions about hypnosis and our services.

What is Hypnotherapy?
 

The Problem Is Like A Weed In Your Yard!

Notice the drawing of a weed at the left of this page. Pretend for a moment, that your mind is like your lawn out in front of your home. Even some of the best cared for yards, if you look close enough, are going to have a couple of weeds! Weeds are interesting because they are so persistent. You see, most of the yard is made up of good green grass, shrubs, and flowers (the good things about yourself).

The grass has good roots, but the weed's roots go much deeper. That is why if you try to remove a weed by cutting it off, or pulling it up, and you don't get all of its root, it is most likely to just come back, and sometimes there are more weeds (symptoms or problems) than when you started.

Taking this example a little further, you could look at the picture of the weed and divide it up into three distinct areas: first there is the area where the roots are, the soil, that is equivalent to the subconscious mind; the second area, where the grass is, is equivalent to the conscious mind, the part that is easy to see; and finally, there is the part that sticks up into the air for yourself and everyone else to see, the weed, the part of ourselves that we don't like.

The part we don't like might be a bad habit like biting your finger nails, or something more serious like smoking, a fear, or even some diseases like ulcers.

Some treatments just deal with the behavior or the outward symptom, and that would be like mowing off the weed, it is likely that it will return. In the short term you might feel better, like going on a diet, losing the weight, and then the weight returns, because the real cause of the excess weight was never eliminated! Then you feel frustrated, and may even gain more weight (more weeds!).

Hypnotherapy done properly will remove the problem at the root, by helping the client to see or experience the situation, thought or idea, that started the problem differently. If the root is removed, then the problem ceases to exist!

The Problem Developed Like A Stack of Bricks!

Notice the upside down stack of bricks. How the problem evolved, into what it is today, is kind of like that stack of bricks. The brick on the bottom is like the first situation in your life (usually forgotten) that started the whole thing.

It is some situation, thought or idea that occurred in your past, it was like a "seed" in the above example of the weed. All by itself, it does not amount to much, but given the "right" circumstances, enough reinforcement in subsequent days, months and years (the next three layers of bricks), and it can develop into some real troublesome symptoms (the top layer of bricks). Each brick on the top layer could represent a different symptom, compulsive eating, head aches, low self-esteem, drug abuse, etc. (like the part of the weed that sticks up in the air).

Hypnotherapy done correctly, removes the bottom brick ( the power of the initial event) that holds up all of the rest of the stack of bricks. If the bottom brick is removed the whole thing crumbles, symptoms, problems and all! (Brick example is from Stephen Parkhill's, Answer Cancer.)

Kind of exciting isn't it!?! This is why hypnosis can work so fast and be so effective!