The Transparent Hypnotist

Photograph provided by di_the_huntress (cc)

She sweated. Seriously, she actually sweated as she read through the induction for the first time. It was a simple progressive relaxation and a pre-created suggestions for forgetting my name. As she lurched about in a halting voicing, I could not help but open my eyes and see what she was doing. She was so stressed out, I wondered why she was taking a course in hypnotism. So, I stopped her, gave her a pep talk and then asked her why she was taking the class. It turns out, she was a nurse and wanted to find ways to potentially sooth and help some of her patients. Very noble. We continued on and for a moment I forgot that my name was Ellie Blunt. 

She and I still talk. Depending on the circumstances one of us ultimately becomes a cheerleader for the other. It is one of my most satisfying relationships, and one in which I find myself always learning something new.

Recently, her world has been somewhat revolving around swine flue phobia (I was wondering if that topic would make its way to these post). She says the phobia is so much worse and rampant that the actual manifestation of symptoms. I asked her how she was handling that - are people seeking her out for hypnosis to deal with the flu? Not exactly, but she is doing a community program on being prepared for the actuality of it, and yes, there is a group hypnotism aspect to it. Brilliant! As she reminded me, most people are afraid of catching it, so it is not really a deep set phobia. With a few behavior modifications, people can protect themselves against it (wash your hands, you!). 

That really started me thinking about the fact that prevention seems very doable, but I also realized I do not know that much about swine flu and the like. So, I looked up nursing resources on the web and found Scrubs, the nurse’s guide to good living. Its audience targets nurses and is a not-so-sterile-or-clinical resource. Instead it is the lighter-side, like the Real Simple of the nursing world. It is upbeat and seems like it would apply to any level of nurses no matter how long they have been in the field. Interestingly enough, the first header is “mind” (YES!), directly followed by the headings health, beauty and style, not to be left in the cold but the other headers of work, love, money, and news and entertainment.

You know, I might have once brushed sites like this away with the mental broom of “it is not relevant to me.” But the truth is, all things can be fairly relevant to a hypnotist. Everything can be a source of inspiration or a site of learning. I have my nurse colleague to thank for this and helping me be more open, realizing that things that affect the nursing industry are often the same in clinical hypnotism. For instance, there is an article on swine flu prevention called What Nurses Can Tell Patients About Swine Flu. Very apt and very timely. And the things is, the articles are written in an informative, easy to understand way, instead of filed with esoteric medical terms that one can get lost in reading (if you are not a medical professional). In other words it skips scholarly and goes for the meat and potatoes of the subjects. Some of my professional colleagues would probably be appalled at my words here, but there are only so many hours in a day. Reading with a dictionary as a reference tool can get really old.

My friend agrees. From our swine flu conversation, the conversation moved to actual scrubs - do I think institution green goes with her eyes?

This entry was posted on Saturday, May 2nd, 2009 at 7:05 am and is filed under Esoteric Saturday. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.