History.....
The earliest recorded use of what we call "hypnosis" today dates back to Egypt, more then 6000 years ago. People were placed in sleep like trance by temple priests and while in trance, they were offered suggestions and prayed for. The suggestions for the curing of disease by the priest and the subjects belief in the power of the priest and their personal gods, often led to a cure.

Other primitive cultures used the same principals with their belief in the power of their healers and the suggestions of healing given by them.

The Viennese physician, F. A. Mesmer is credited with bringing hypnosis to the attention of the medical and scientific community in about 1730. Although he believed his "cures" were the result of his use of "lodestones", natural magnets, which he used to stroke his patients bodies, it was actually the trance state he induced and his patients "mental expectation" of a cure.

In 1841, another physician, James Braid, coined the term "neuro hypnosis" meaning "sleep of the nervous system", later shortened to "hypnosis". Even then, it was recognized that hypnosis is not sleep, only a deep state of mental and physical relaxation. During that same period, another English physician, James Esdaile, used hypnosis as an anesthetic in performing hundreds of operations including amputations in a Calcutta prison. You must remember that this was before chemical anesthetics were developed and if a person needed to undergo surgery, they were held or tied down and it was just done with no pain killer what-so-ever. The high death rate of 50% was usually due to shock. With hypnosis, Esdaile was able to drop the death rate to less then 10%, and the level of deep hypnosis he induced is still known as the "Esdaile" state today and surgery without anesthetic is sometimes done using only this level of hypnosis. Hypnosis was, unfortunately used for only a short time before the first chemical anesthetic, Chloroform, was developed for use in surgery. And, like it is today, in our "pill happy" field of medicine, Chloroform was the easy and quick thing to use..... even if it wasn't the safest!

Hypnosis was kept alive as "entertainment" on stage and at parlor shows for many years and lost much of its reputation as a tool for healing until it surfaced again as a valuable medical tool in World Wars I, II and the Korean conflict. It was used in the form of "suggestion" when medics ran out of pain killer for the wounded. With proper suggestion and belief on the part of both medics and the wounded...... water worked like morphine. Later it was used to over come battle incurred neuroses and to deprogram prisoners who had be "brainwashed".

In 1959.... the American Medical Association approved the use of hypnosis by their members, and now a number of fine schools are teaching and improving the skill levels of hypnotists and the therapies they are offering to the public. Even though we, as hypnotherapists, are finding greater acceptance among the medical community, there is still a great deal of misunderstanding about just what hypnosis is by the general public.

Hypnosis is a very normal, natural state that most of us experience every day. An example of daily hypnosis would be driving a car and realizing that you can't remember the last three of four streets you just passed. Perhaps you drove right by your exit! Another example would be a person watching television, and, when being called to dinner doesn't hear the call. Being deeply involved in a novel or a movie and experiencing the emotions of the characters.... daydreaming. These are light hypnotic states. In all cases, the conscious part of the mind has been distracted, allowing the subconscious part of the mind to take over. In hypnosis there may be deep relaxation, but the conscious mind must agree to "step aside" and allow the subconscious mind to be addressed in order for hypnosis to occur.

So, actually, hypnosis is a contract between the hypnotist and the client. The client must want what the hypnotist has to offer and be willing to follow instructions...... That's the clients part of the process, or contract. The hypnotists part is to offer suggestions to the subconscious mind that will bring about the results that the client desires, and to do so in a safe, caring, confidential manner.

Any one with an IQ of 70 or better can be hypnotized, if they are willing to follow instructions and have no unanswered fears about the process. There is no danger of a person failing to come out of the hypnotic state. In fact, if the therapist left the office or even died, all that would happen is the client would drift off into a natural state of sleep and wake up after he was rested.

When you are hypnotized, you are aware of all suggestions given to you, and will not do anything you are opposed to doing. All hypnosis is self hypnosis and the therapist has no power or control over anyone. If I suggest something you dislike, disagree with doing or do not want to talk about, you won't do it. You will ignore my suggestion or come out of the hypnotic state. That's why I can't make anyone stop smoking!.... or give up other bad or destructive behaviors. I can only help my clients to achieve their goals and only then if the motive to change is their own.

Why hypnosis......
A question I am sometimes asked is why would anyone want hypnosis.... other then to stop smoking or to lose weight...... the answer is that those two items are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to what hypnosis can do.

From birth until about age 12 the critical factor of the conscious mind is not fully developed. The critical factor is that part of our minds that filters all incoming information for content and decides how it will be programmed into the mind. It's job is to keep out thoughts or ideas that might create conflicts in the mind. If a incoming idea doesn't fit with what is already stored in the mind, it will probably be bounced off and the thought or idea will remain outside of our belief system, which is located in the subconscious.

There are 5 ways that ideas become fixed in the subconscious mind.
1. REPETITION- The slow, hard way to convince the subconscious.
2. IDENTIFICATION WITH GROUP OR RELATIVE- "All the women in our family have migraine headaches, I probably will too." 3. IDEAS PRESENTED BY AN AUTHORITY FIGURE- An authority figure is anyone we consider to be smarter or more powerful than we are, parents, older siblings, teachers, doctors, "experts". 4. INTENSE EMOTION- Emotion is to the mind as light is to the camera. It opens up the mind and allows the image to become fixed. It can be any emotion. It does not have to be a negative emotion. And 5. HYPNOSIS-

In a child, there is no filter in place to keep damaging information out of the subconscious. Children are wide open to suggestion, with no safeguards to tell them when something is true or false, and their belief in what their parents or other AUTHORITY figures say is complete. Our belief systems about who and what we are was formed before the age of 12. The younger we were when the "programming" took place.... the deeper our belief.

"You're a slob, just like your father". "You can't ever get anything right!" " How could you be so stupid!" "I guess you're just a poor speller, like me." "You should never have been born!".........Add to those things that were said to us, the things that were said in our presence, like ...."My oldest son is the smart one in this family". "She was always a sickly child." "No one in this family was smart enough to go to college." "If she wasn't so fat, she would be a pretty child." How many statements like these have you heard? How old were you when you first started hearing them? This doesn't mean that the adults in our lives meant to be cruel..... they just didn't know any better and were responding to their own programming. But the damage was done just the same..... to most if not all of us. If you look at your negative responses to many of your life situations today..... poor health, relationships, jobs, poor self esteem, lack of self confidence, destructive habits, weight and many others that you may think of........ there is probably a connection to something that slipped into your subconscious mind as a child. As adults, we use only 10% of our minds at the conscious, logical, rational thinking level. The other 90% is our subconscious mind. 90% ...... in control of our emotional responses, working under the influence of the programming we got before the age of 12.

With hypnosis, the client and the hypnotist, working together can unlock some of the secrets of the subconscious and reprogram it so that the client can get control back and break destructive habits and emotional responses. Add to that the use of hypnosis in reducing chronic pain, post surgery pain and dental pain. Hypnosis speeds healing and stimulates the immune system, reduces stress, builds self esteem. Students can use hypnosis to improve study habits, end test fright, mentally rehearse for sporting events. Clients may seek hypnosis to break habits like nail biting, bruxism, procrastination and stuttering. And one of the things I like best is with programs developed by people like Marie Mongan, of the HypnoBirthing Institute I can now offer hypnosis for childbirth and offer women a wonderful, natural, comfortable birthing experience. There are lots of reasons to seek out a hypnotherapist other then to quit smoking or lose weight.

Linda Hamilton CHt