There are a lot of misconceptions about hypnosis. It’s not what most people think. The preconceived ideas are typically related to movies and how things have been dramatized in movies, or maybe someone’s been to a stage hypnosis comedy show where it’s meant to look shocking and surprising and mysterious.
There are concerns for many different reasons as to whether a pearson, while in hypnosis, will tell all their secrets. Your subconscious mind holds all your memories and all your experience. It’s programmed in there. Everything you’ve ever seen, heard, smelled, tasted, and felt. So if somebody actually wanted to try to recall something, it’s very easy to recall infroamtion in hypnosis, but it’s only if you’re willing.
Ultimately, they are the same state of mind. There’s lots of different kinds of meditation, but ultimately, the state of mind (alpha-theta) is identical. In hypnosis, we just deliberately use that state of mind to access the subconscious which is where you’re able to change programming and habits and such, really cool things like that.
We’re used to attempting to make changes at the conscious level, but our subconscious mind is where habits and patterns exist. Habits and patterns can be related to actual physical actions. When you quiet your conscious mind, and stop all the negativity, worry, and regret… There’s a door opening to the subconscious and suggestions can be given to you that instantly change that programming, It would be like going into a computer and changing the software. It seems miraculous but only because nobody ever taught us how to do this.
You have to know first that all hypnosis is self hypnosis. A hypnotist just happens to understand the mind and understand the techniques to help you to go into a relaxed state where you’re able to access your subconscious and your programming. That’s where your habits are, whether you want to eliminate bad habits or implement a new healthy habits. So in order to be successful at it, you need to first not have any misconceptions.
Hypnosis seems miraculous to most people because they’re so used to struggling with a bad habit, struggling to implement a good new healthy habit. The only way for that to be successful is if you are super deliberate, super mindful, very strict with yourself for as many days as you can so that you can get repetition of the new behavior enough so that it’s reinforced and becomes automatic.
A common misconception is that the hypnotists can make you do things you don’t want to do and that it’s mind control. There’s a lot of misconceptions about it. It is not mind control. It seems mystical because we’re not taught about the subconscious and the conscious in school. We have very powerful minds, and we have the ability to access our “software” or “programming”. Nobody can make you do anything you don’t want to do.
Some people have the misconception that they will not come out of hypnosis. They think that if they go into it that they won’t be able to come out and that they’ve lost control… and that’s not true. You are very aware of what you’re doing. You make the choice to follow along so much so that if you don’t want to follow along, you won’t.
A lot of people have concerns as to whether or not they’re going to be aware of what’s going on when they are in hypnosis. That’s a possible concern that can keep a person from relaxing. They fear that they’re not going to know what’s going on so they won’t let their guard down and they won’t follow the directions or the guidance to relax. It is important for a person to know that they will be aware of what’s going on around them when they’re in that hypnotic state.
There are people that will say “I can’t be hypnotized” or “I tried it and it didn’t work for me.” Those are two misconceptions. If a person actually understands what hypnosis is, they’d realize that everybody can be hypnotized because it’s a natural process for the conscious mind to go from very active to less active to less active to what we call asleep.
Some people think they’ve already tried hypnosis or they already tried meditating and they’ll say “it” didn’t work. I’d like to say there’s no “it…..” All hypnosis is self hypnosis. A really good hypnotist will help you to feel comfortable with the hypnosis process, with the hypnotist, with your environment, with everything so that you can feel comfortable enough to actually close your eyes and then relax.
What sets somebody up for success is that they trust the process, they trust the hypnotist, and they want the suggestions. So you can close your eyes in my office. You can fly across the country or across the planet to come to my office, or you can stay in the comforts of your living room and listen to me through earbuds.
If you’re new to doing hypnosis and you’re at home, then the first thing you want to do is set up your environment so that you’re most comfortable and have the least amount of distraction… you want to set yourself up for success by controlling the environment.