I once wanted to win a toy on the rifle range at the fair. (I should point out, this was quite a few years ago!).<\/p>\n
To win, I had to fire wet sponge pellets at a cuckoo clock bird. If I fired when the doors were shut, the pellet just bounced off. To ‘hit home’ I had to wait until the doors were open, and fire before they closed again.<\/p>\n
Later, as a therapist, I realised that people’s minds need to be open before new ideas can properly ‘hit home’.<\/p>\n
How often have you read under ‘what is hypnosis?’ on a hypnosis FAQ something like: “Hypnosis is simply a state of deep relaxation…”?<\/p>\n
This is reassuring to the cautious public, perhaps, but far from the full story! If you only have one <\/em>way of inducing hypnosis – the undoubtedly pleasant path of relaxation- then you are considerably less flexible as a therapist than you could be.<\/p>\n Because hypnosis is about focus<\/em>.<\/p>\n We can get people to focus by gently lulling them into deep calm (relaxation) or we can use other ways. Such as shock.<\/p>\n