1. What is hypnosis and hypnotherapy?

Hypnosis is an altered state of awareness/mind, that allows positive changes to occur at the unconscious and subconscious levels.

Hypnosis is a natural everyday occurrence. For example have you ever had the experience of driving a familiar route and suddenly realised that you had passed your normal destination. It was as if you were driving on autopilot, and you were!

Another example is when you are reading a book or watching television, where you become so absorbed in the plot that you don’t hear someone calling your name.

The most typical example is daydreaming, where you just allow your creative imagination to take you on a journey, you may be sat in your car, but your mind is focused on something else. You typically block out the outside world and enter your own inner world. This is an intense focus and this focus is one of the things which creates the hypnotic state.

Hypnotherapy, is the therapeutic use of the hypnotic state to bring about changes in a person’s beliefs, behaviours and identity to move them forwards to where they want to be.

2. What are the conscious, unconscious and subconscious minds?

In reality you only have one brain and one mind, however since different parts of the brain seem to provide different functions, scientist and psychologists have found it useful to split the mind into several parts.

3. The Conscious Mind

The conscious mind is the part which you use to think with consciously every day. What you are aware of as you read this sentence is one of the things your conscious mind is currently focusing on. The conscious mind is limited in the fact that it can only focus on a finite number of pieces of information at any one time, typically 5-9 pieces of information.

4. The Unconscious Mind

The unconscious is the part of your mind that controls the body, regulating your heart rate, breathing, and reflexes, like swallowing, blinking and blushing are some examples.

Hypnosis can have a direct affect on the unconscious mind, hence it’s application with pain control and it’s ability to positively affect the systems of the body.

5. The Subconscious Mind

The subconscious mind is the part of your mind that has stored everything that you have experienced throughout your life. It is like a giant store of memories, feelings and behaviours.  Hypnosis can be used to directly affect the subconscious mind by bypassing the normal filtering process of the conscious mind. Hypnosis in effect opens a door directly to the subconscious to allow instant change to occur to old habits, beliefs, feelings that were causing a person distress.

Therefore hypnosis a very rapid way of changing old, even ingrained habits. 

6. Is hypnosis safe?

Yes, if used by a qualified hypnotherapist, like me, hypnosis is completely safe.

No one can make you do anything against your will or values while you are in hypnosis. Films have often portrayed hypnosis in a less than favourable light, but I’m here to remind you that these are pure fiction. The truth being that hypnosis, when used by a qualified hypnotherapist will bring about changes in you which will often be quick and effective.

7. Will I get stuck in hypnosis?

No you can’t get stuck in hypnosis, after all hypnosis is not a thing, it’s a process. You don’t get stuck in sleep, you wake up every morning! Milton Erickson, one of the world’s greatest hypnotists once said that hypnosis is all about learning how to go into hypnosis. So if you were left in hypnosis, you will just drift off to sleep and wake up as usual. Hypnotherapists however don’t leave their Clients in hypnosis, but direct the level of hypnosis by means of suggestions. People who meditate for many years are attempting to prolong a hypnotic state for as long as possible, because the state feels so nice.

8. Will I still be the same person after hypnosis?

The answer to this is a resounding yes. In fact you will be a “better you” than you were before, because you will have added to your inner personal resources during the sessions.

9. What is the difference between stage hypnosis and hypnotherapy?

Hypnotherapy is completely different from stage hypnosis because the stage hypnotist is using the tool of hypnosis purely to entertain crowds of people. Whereas the clinical hypnotherapist uses the same tool of hypnosis for therapeutic change work.

10. What is NLP?

NLP stands for Neuro Linguistic Programming, and although the title may sound complicated, the use of NLP is very simple and yields dramatic results, usually in a very short period of time.

In a nutshell NLP is about finding out how people have solved challenges before and then applying this information to your challenge. If someone can do something, then you can learn how to do it too. It’s amazing that challenges that you might have had for years, can disappear after the application of NLP to the challenge.

11. What can I expect to get out of the sessions?

Every person has different expectations about hypnosis, and what they might experience. Sometimes a person’s actual experience can be different from that what they imagined it might have been like. Typically some Client’s have told me that they have not been hypnotised when in fact they have. The best way to approach a session is to trust the therapist, relax and simply allow the changes which you’re powerful mind is capable of doing to happen quickly and naturally.

12. What will a session be like?

A session of hypnotherapy will last 1 hour. By the time you arrive for your first session (the one after your consultation) you will already be accustomed to the treatment room. The hypnotherapist will have worked out an appropriate plan and will guide you into a hypnotic trance using language. During this trance state, the hypnotherapist will guide you into a pleasant state of hypnosis using language. You will usually find that the state of hypnosis is very pleasant, relaxing and comfortable. You will be aware of what the hypnotherapist is saying to you. Just relax and enjoy the journey. Sometimes you may experience feelings of lightness or heaviness or other altered feelings, this is natural and just a part of the process of entering a hypnotic trance.

13. How many sessions will it take?

You are a unique individual, and it is only after a consultation with you that I can make a decision on the likely number of sessions you will require.