The Transparent Hypnotist

This policy is valid from 13 July 2007

This blog is a personal blog written and edited by me. This blog accepts forms of cash advertising, sponsorship, paid insertions or other forms of compensation.

The compensation received may influence the advertising content, topics or posts made in this blog. That content, advertising space or post may not always be identified as paid or sponsored content.

The owner(s) of this blog is compensated to provide opinion on products, services, websites and various other topics. Even though the owner(s) of this blog receives compensation for our posts or advertisements, we always give our honest opinions, findings, beliefs, or experiences on those topics or products. The views and opinions expressed on this blog are purely the bloggers’ own. Any product claim, statistic, quote or other representation about a product or service should be verified with the manufacturer, provider or party in question.

This blog does not contain any content which might present a conflict of interest.

To get your own policy, go to http://www.disclosurepolicy.org

It is time for another book discussion since I just finished reading Edith Fiore’s The Unquiet Dead: A Psychologist Treats Spiritual Possession. Are you grimacing again with Ellie’s interest with the uncanny? Hopefully not.

A fellow hypnotist told me she was reading this and it sounded interesting, so I decided to give it a go. The premise is that a lot of our problems are caused by spirit possession. This sort of possession is not like demonic possession, apparently. Most people do not know that they are possessed and according to Fiore, feel much better after a simple hypnotic process. I have personally never worked with anything like this, nor have I been asked to do so, and I am not sure how I really feel about the idea. The positive thing is that the author does not hammer in a necessary belief in spirit co-habitation to be successful.

Anyway I really enjoyed it. Have any of you read it?

And by the by, what you currently reading?

Oh, also I suspect you may be a fan of AlibrisBooksellers (Over 60 million used, new, and out-of-print books!). I am pretty addicted to them as my book source, so if you have not tried them for your reading needs (and perhaps Edith Fiore’s book), you should! I have had great luck finding hard to find books there and even out of print publications. Here’s a fun trick, though. If you go to couponchief.com, they offer promo codes for various discounts and savings, including Alibris.com coupons. Click here for the deals at Alibris. For instance, at the moment, they have a $3 off $30 deal (before July 22). Pretty nice. And every hypnotist I know is a book junky, so enjoy. And the same site has other decent deals for many online stores, so check those out as well.

Click here for Ellie’s Disclosure Policy.

Recently, I have been working with a client on smoking cessation, which has focused me on the process. We have had a few sessions and it seems to be going well, slowly cutting back on the cigarette consumption. I find for many smokers it seems like this is a really good solution, going slowly and gently into cessation. The process reminds me a bit of facing a terminal illness (negative I know, but stay with me). Giving up cigarettes can be a similar mourning process, so it seems. It has all the traits. Denial. Bargaining. Anger. Grief. And finally acceptance.

It also seems to be a love/hate relationship for many. It has becomes a comfort blanket, a friend. However, I think many who are on the page of giving it up, either find the comfort blanket becoming embarrassing (try standing out in the rain in midwinter just to get a few puffs) or the friend a bit backstabbing. But like an unhealthy co-dependency, the attachment is perverse. So, I am wondering if approaching smoking cessation as a mourning process would be an interesting way of looking at the change work that is necessary for success?

Any thoughts?

Are you going to the NGH (National Guild of hypnotist) conference coming up in August? Or are you just like me and have not been able to commit to going (I know, sad, sad, sad). I am just getting to the point where I am really considering it, but know that reservations probably will not happen at the conference hotel. So, I have decided to enlist the help of the internet and thought I would share.

In researching the cost and details of this trip (Marlboro, Mass.), I narrowed the playing field down by going to Hotel Discounts, known as HotelReservations.com. Everything you need to make travel arrangements seems to be centrally located on the main page. It is all there. Flights. Hotels. Rental cars. These are the standards, but this site also includes options for condo rentals, vacation rentals, and more. Though there is a lot of information on the main page, if you just take a deep breath and pay attention, this is a great way to arrange travel, plus it is very competitive price-wise with its competition.

It seems to be right in line with the other sites; sometimes the same, sometimes a little more, but often lower. I was especially please that it offered discount rates to various bed and breakfast (my personal preference).

For those who are not native to English speaking countries and prefer to make their hotel reservations, flights, rental decisions in their native language, this site actually offers corresponding web pages for a variety of other countries. In other words, you are not forced to stumble through the English language and can research travel in your preferred language.

And if you are like me and may need to change or cancel your reservations, there is no charge from this site to do so. A few years ago, during a family emergency, I ended up changing holiday plans at the last minute and was charged a few extra hundred dollars by another discount hotel site, so this is a nice to see.

I thought sharing this information might be helpful to those of you considering going to the NGH conference in August or for any of your travel needs.

And do let me know if you are going.

Click here to see Ellie’s Disclosure Policy.

I think I like this poll concept. Hopefully you do as well?

This week, I want to know more about you, my readers and your relationship status to hypnosis. By this, I want to know are you a hypnotist (basically do you do this professionally) or are you someone who uses hypnosis? If I have clicked all the buttons correctly, you should be able to give all the answers that apply.

Also, if you answer “other,” if you would, please elaborate by commenting on this post. And if any of you want to elaborate on any answer, again, please comment on this post.

I am going to keep a running tally of poll results on this posting: The Poll Results

As a hypnotist, how do you handle working with friends and family?

Do you refer them to someone else? Do you charge them (more/less or not at all)? Do you find them receptive to you as a hypnotist? Any thoughts?

It has often been said that friends and family are the hardest people to hypnotize. However, I have worked with both. As it turned out, my father, who was very protective of me, turned out to be one of the most hypnotically receptive people I have ever known. Had I not “practiced” on him, I would have thought it would have been the opposite, but it turned out to be a wonderful thing for us. I learned a lot more about my father (all positive) and it brought us closer. Plus, it is very empowering to have helped someone who had spent his lifetime “helping” me.

But on the other hand, one of my first paying clients was a friend. It was so frustrating I almost threw in the towel with being a hypnotist. He giggled through the first session, and was totally resistant afterwards. However that which does not kill you, makes you stronger (I hate that cliche, but find it most appropriate to struggles). I learned an awful lot from all that, such as dealing with giggles and nerves of clients, continued (as I still do) to develop better “pre-talk,” tried different techniques, and that sometimes it seems to pay when you play hard-to-get. After three sessions, I refused to work with him anymore, telling him he did not take me or hypnosis seriously. He was wasting both of our time. Suddenly, he became very serious about it and for weeks begged me to work with him. However, I sent him to another hypnotist.

Please feel free to share your stories here.

It was disturbing. It was brilliant.

This is my take on the movie Close Your Eyes (sometimes called Hypnotic). It is an uncomfortable movie that is about a hypnotist (and his problems with being a hypnotist), who inadvertently gets snagged into helping a particular police officer (trying to quit smoking) crack a serial killer case. The case does veer off into the occult. But, there are a lot of really interesting hypnosis references that I feel are beautifully done. The movie shows what goes on in the mind of the hypnosis client. There is particularly nice imagery related to smoking cessation. I cannot say enough about this. Wow. And I admit to trying this sort of imagery out on my clients with interesting results (that would make for another blog entry). There is even a scene in which the hypnotist becomes in tranced by his own induction, though it becomes a nightmare. For any of us who sort of go along with our clients when we hypnotize them, this really hits home.

Anyway, I tend to go into a movie prepared to like it (and I did). Others obviously do not and this seems to be the case. It has gotten a fair amount of panning, though there are some favorable comments. Judge for yourself and feel free to share here (even if you do not like it).

To learn more about the movie, go to http://www.flp.com/films/closeyoureyes/movie/index.html.

There are times when I when time sneaks by and lenghtens itself out within the day when working with clients. I suspect most do not mind, but I find when I do this, my energy tends to lessen. After spending five hours with one client (I felt bad and only took payment for two hours), I decided enough was enough.

So, I bought an alarm clock with wind chimes. When the regular session time is up, it gently chimes, reminding me to wrap it up.

Sadly, my wind chimes seemed to have stopped functioning. I am bummed.

Perhaps this has happened to you? You are at a party and someone finds out that you are a hypnotist. The questions begin (can you hypnotize me? will I bark like a dog? does it really work?) and answer obligingly because you love hypnosis and want to share your knowledge about it. Then sure enough, it begins - It being - hypnotize me. Do it. Then someone else chimes in that they want to be hypnotized.

Do you:

1. Laugh it off
2. Tell them to make an appointment
3. Seem highly offend - after all, you would never ask a brain surgeon to perform a little surgery at the same party
4. Do a rapid induction and turn it into a quick party trick

Today I will honor the United States in their ever-quest for Freedom. Let us hope for peace, and that they find it - SOON!

So forgive my New-Agy-warm-and-fuzzies as I suggest rather than writing much more here, that anyone reading this, please take a quiet moment and send some peaceful thoughts out into the world. We need it.