What is Hypnotherapy?
Clue: It doesn't involve tricking people into doing stupid or embarrassing things or waving pocket watches or crystals around, no-one will have control over you except you (and you will, much more than ever before) and it is as pleasant and relaxing as any spa-treatment with the added benefit of huge personal growth and self-mastery at the end of it.
“If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.”
Much of the public impression of hypnosis has been influenced by stage hypnosis entertainment acts shown on television or seen in live performance. The reality of hypnotherapy is very different from the misleading use of 'hypnosis' for entertainment which is a blend of magician's stage-craft, misdirection, showmanship and play-acting.
Real hypnosis, as used for hypnotherapy, does not result in the subject being under the control of the hypnotist – he or she retains their free will and control of their behaviour throughout and in most cases will have a full memory of the experience afterwards. The focus of attention of the hypnotic subject is encouraged to shift by the hypnotist away from the immediate events and stimuli going on around them at the time toward other ideas and imagined events in a process that is similar to daydreaming. This exercise is typically found to be pleasant and relaxing by the hypnotic subject. Just as with a daydream the subject can snap out of it at any time they wish.
What is Hypnotherapy?