To my delight, he’s also included a whole load of free audio, video and PDF resources to go with it, including his “Hypnosis Without Trance” audio book. Now, I’ve been dying to get my hands on this for some time, so, with a couple of longish train journey coming up, I was relishing the thought of plugging in and getting to grips with hypnotic loops, the hypnotic partnership and the whole HWT thing.

I’m writing this on one of the said train journey’s (thanks to WordPress for iOS) and I have paused the book after only a few chapters.

Why? Because a throw away comment has completely changed my thought and frame of hypnosis and I am brimming with excitement at what this new understanding might mean!

James says that with the idea of traditional hypnosis comes the requirement to have a trance state that you must “deepen” and that this idea limits what hypnotic phenomena you can achieve because certain phenomena require a certain “depth”.

I think that any hypnotist who has actually hypnotised anyone will agree with me that some people don’t need as much depth to achieve things like hallucination while others can’t achieve the relatively simple phenomena of arm levitation despite great depth of trance.

The thing that has got me all excited is the idea that maybe the trance itself is a hypnotic phenomena.

Let that sink in for a moment…

When I consider that as a possibility all sorts of doors that I didn’t know were even there open up!

If trance is a phenomenon, then when we achieve other phenomena, we are actually stacking them together? What if some people can’t stack like that?

What if achieving trance is a convincer for the subject that they’re hypnotised? Or how about the other way round: that because they’re not feeling “tranced” that it’s not working…

If we dispense with the idea of trance as being a required milestone on the way to hypnosis, then engaging in what James calls the “Hypnotic Partnership” with the subject (although clearly I’m going to have to find another word to describe them now) becomes so much easier!

I bet that if budding hypnotists started with this as the frame around which to learn hypnosis, they’d find learning, practicing and engaging people in hypnosis sooo much easier!

I really can’t wait for the course and might have to start practicing this stuff before the date!

Right, I’m nearly back at Gravesend and I still haven’t gotten past chapter 2!

As I read this on the train from Gravesend to Durham the other day, I had to   re-read this sentence several times. Was it saying that the character was beset by dust and as a result considered it his enemy or was it that his enemy had been destroyed and was now dust and that he didn’t need to worry about them any more?

Putting aside the fact that there could well be some poor punctuation in the sentence, much like the classic description of a Panda “Panda: Eats, shoots and leaves”, it got me thinking about the importance of emphasis on our words and how that emphasis can   completely change the meaning of what we’re communicating.

In hypnosis and NLP, this is called “marking” where we deliberately embed suggestions in what we say and write by using things like pauses, punctuation and putting emphasis on specific words of phrases within an otherwise normal piece of speach or text.

In IEMT (see the glossary), one of the sentences I use regularly to help a client elicit a certain feeling is “When is the first time you can remember that feeling?” What I do is “mark” some of the words with emphasis in order to embed a command and what I actually end up saying looks more like “When is the first time you can remember that feeling?”.

Can you   see the difference? In asking a question, I am actually delivering a suggestion or embedded command that the client’s unconscious mind will pick up and act on (in order to make it truly effective I combine this with other subtle communications but that’s the art and science of psychology and one of the reasons I love it).

Returning to my example at the start of the post: “his enemy was dust.”

Now say the sentence out loud with the emphasis on each word in turn:
- HIS enemy was dust
- His ENEMY was dust
- His enemy WAS dust
- His enemy was DUST

Doesn’t the emphasis on the different words completely change the meaning of the sentence!

How much does the emphasis, be it pronunciation, punctuation, tempo, pitch, spelling, font etc. make on the interpretation of YOUR communication? Next time you’re in a public place and you can overhear people talking, why not listen out for those markers and see how you could have changed the meaning of the communication simply by stressing the same words in a different way or in a different place.

Now of course it’s easy for me, as an outside observer, to help my friend discover the problem and allow him to come up with a solution (phone them up and ask!), but I know we all have things in our lives that we want to do but don’t purely because we don’t know what’s involved.

“Hypnosis in Gravesend”

I’d always wanted to learn hypnosis but had never done anything about it because I’d no idea what was involved. One day I just happened to be in the right frame of mind and I casually Googled hypnosis training in Gravesend and guess what: There was a course running not far away and at a price and time I could afford. It didn’t take much thinking to sign up after that.

Fear holds us back from so many things, but so seldom do we realize that the “fear” is not in the doing or becoming whatever it is: it is the fear of the unknown process of getting there!

Think of something that you really want to do but haven’t. Get a new job? Go on a trans-European holiday? Learn a new language?

Now ask yourself what is it that is holding you back from that and what you would like to have happen.

Could it be that you don’t know what is available, how to organize it, where to go that is the problem? In other words; could be the mystery, the lack of knowledge, which is what you’re afraid of? It’s not the holiday or the job or the language that is scary is it, so it must be the organising of the holiday, the “finding” of the job and the fact that you don’t even know if there is somewhere nearby that even teaches languages.

Diminish the power of the unknown with knowledge

This year, why not choose one of those things that you always promise yourself you’d do and rather than promise yourself that you’ll do it, simply find out what is involved. Choose a starting point and go from there. I bet you’ll find it’s not as difficult as you imagine.

Phoning the nearest garage resulted in me having to deal with a grumpy and reluctant mechanic who clearly didn’t really want my business or know anything about customer service. honestly, it amazes me that they can get away with the sort of surly and unpleasant demeanour and still be in business!

So widening the search slightly, I selected a company called Auto22 who had their company logo and web site address on their Google maps presence (always a good sign in my book). Despite being after closing, they took my call and were very helpful and understanding about the situation I found myself in and arranged for someone to come out first thing to collect the offending vehicle.

All fixed, they came and collected me and en-route to their garage I got chatting to the service advisor (Mark) who explained that they are actually a social enterprise, able to invest all their profits in supporting young people in gaining work experience opportunities, work placements, apprenticeships and eventually getting their first job.

Catch22: a charity for young people

The parent charity is: Catch22 and their website says:

“Catch22 is a national charity that works with young people who find themselves in difficult situations. Whatever the reason for their situation, we help them out. We work with their families and their communities wherever and whenever young people need us most; in schools, on the streets, in the home, at community centres, shopping centres, in police stations, and in custody”

Auto22: a social enterprise

It turns out that Auto22 is one of the mechanisms that the charity use to enable young people to gain education (they have a classroom in the next door Catch22 building where they are taught maths, English and more practical things) and provide hands on mechanics training with the aim of placing their graduates into apprenticeships and actual work placements.

I could not have been happier to be handing over money for the work on my car and the whole experience was easy and honest and I feel good that I’ve been able to contribute to a charity that directly benefits the local Gravesend community. Plus I’ve got a working car to get to my sister’s wedding AND a reliable garage to get the car serviced and MOT’d later in the year so I am more than happy to recommend their services here, plus its such an unusual and yet fantastic idea that its worth reading about anyway.

Doing something to support Catch22 and Auto22

I’m jumping out of a plane on the 28th of August, so please read my post about it and then contribute a little something to help. Thanks:

http://www.benwhite.me/2010/07/going-crazy-for-what-you-believe-in/

Recommended: happy, smart, efficient and good for the community

Auto22 offers: servicing and repair on all makes of cars and light vans, MOTs, and tyre and exhaust replacements.   All work is carried out by professionally qualified and experienced technicians using the latest diagnostic equipment, and they offer a free customer drop off and pick up service within a three mile radius.

Website: www.Auto22.co.uk

Call them: 01474 362 413

Hypnotist Ben White demonstrating the power of imagination

With a background in business analysis and customer relationship management, one could say I’ve been helping businesses get to grips and install better ways of thinking for a long time. Throw into the mix hypnosis, NLP, IEMT and Provocative Change Works and you find yourself reading about someone who achieves change with people individually and as an organisation. On this site, you’ll discover the personal side of Ben and if you continue reading, you see he’s pretty dedicated to finding the best way to enable you to tap into the inherent ability to change within all of us.

After my first hypnosis course I headed straight for my local post office and posted a note in the window: “Trainee hypnotist requires volunteers...” Needless to say I was literally inundated with three requests to help all of whom I worked with successfully. What a great start!

Hypnotically, I have trained with Freddy and Anthony Jacquin of the UK Hypnotherapy Training Collage on rapid hypnosis techniques as well as using hypnotic and NLP techniques with your children. This excellent series of techniques that will work with any aged child (really! I’ve used this stuff on my daughter since she was 1) to gently help in many areas from Attention Deficit Disorder to exam nerves and even simply family relations (Freddy’s branded the techniques: Potensharu).

I have studied body language and the now extremely popular Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) and in 2009, I certified as a practitioner for an amazing technique called Integral Eye Movement Therapy created by Andrew T Austin. IEMT combines various NLP techniques with a structured interview approach to achieve some of the most incredible change work that simple counselling would take many many sessions to achieve.

I have trained with Norman D Vaughton (who studied with Ernest Rossi for many years) in Ideodynamic hypnosis. Norman’s approach also utilises one of my favourite techniques: Clean Language and is used to avoid polluting or influencing your processes with the my own expectations or presuppositions. The technique is therefore extremely respectful and gentle and yet very powerful in gaining you both conscious and unconscious insight and in generating lasting and sometimes dramatic change!

As you can see I’ve done quite a lot of learning!

What I am passionate about is that the power to change is within all of us and if you want to change: you can

.

Simples.

.

Look me up using the Find Me Online section on the right, or simply drop me an email direct.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Ben

Whenever we learn or are taught something new, we often try it out and indeed most any form of training will have you do exercises to practice the new skill. What I find interesting is that, as someone who does a lot of self-learning, I am often testing out things I learn or theories I concoct in real life and I have to be extremely careful when I consider something a success or something a failure.

Most of us, at one time or another, have tried something new and we’ve fallen at the first hurdle, thrown our hands in the air and scoffed at the so-called experts who were clearly wrong as it demonstrably doesn’t work! I watch my daughter do this regularly and it is both challenging to encourage her to have another go and delightful to watch her eventially achieve it (normally after walking off and only coming back when she thinks I’m not watching). 

As adults while we are aware of the concept of perseverance and not judging a book by its cover, I still regularly see both clients and myself making these same mistakes. What is also fascinating is that we also do this in reverse:

We give something a go and when it works first time: pronounce it incredible success and champion whatever it is to any and all who will listen.

So when we fail at something, we have learnt by now that we should give it a few more goes before writing it off, but do we do the same when we succeed?

I wonder how many times we have succeeded the first time we tried something new, pronounced success and then had a series of failures and rather than criticise the new thing, we assume that we are doing something else wrong and embark upon some detailed analysis of everything except the new thing? After all: you clearly demonstrated that it works… didn’t you?

Food for thought and it certainly made my conversation companion go “hmmmm” yesterday.

Now as you read that previous sentence you may or may not have noticed that it seemed to have a rhythm and flow in the words and statements because I was employing the use of the words of power which means that after a while of listening or reading these words, the conscious mind starts to just allow the words to flow through from one side to the other without getting the full scruitiny enjoyed by a normal sentence which doesn’t employ these words in this way because the natural and continuous flow of the language and words in this way is much easier to allow the unconscious mind to process them because  our short term memories which is of course a function of the conscious mind can be commanded by your unconscious mind to change and as the words continue to flow from conscious to unconsious because your unconscious is capapble of processing an amazing amount of information without needing the imput of the conscious mind and I wonder if your conscious mind is starting to wonder which words in this text are the power words and perhaps what happened to all the punctuation.

The hmuan brian is aslo albe to udsenrtnda colmpex pasasges of txet lkie tihs.

And because we are able to process this kind of language where the letters are not necessarily in the right place it means that we are also capable of understanding and processing the meanings and understandings from entire paragraphs and literature where words are missing and in the wrong order and the wonderful thing about your unconscious is that you’re able to process both the surface meaning and the subsurface or unconscious meaning and whether you choose to consciously or unconsciously allow that flow from conscious to unconsious can happen because we are programmed this way to benefit the most from being able to do things consciously and unconsciously.

Now we’ve all heard of the four stages of learning from unconsciously incompetent, to unconsciously competent which means that if we are able to learn new things and make changes on an unconscious level because we evolved this incredible ability I wonder just how limitless our power really is.

Just a few conscious and unconscious thoughts. Enjoy.

Ben

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There is a kind of standard statistic in hypnosis that (whether through suggestion or genuine experience) most hypnotists will agree on:

About 20% of the population is highly susceptible

About 60% of the population can be hypnotised

About 20% of the population cannot be hypnotised

Of course the actual numbers change by 5% or so depending on who you ask and which text book you’re quoting, but there is definitely agreement that some people are highly hypnotisable and some people are simply not worth the hours and hours it would take to create hypnosis making them, to all intents and purposes: un-hypnotisable (one of my early hypnosis subjects took 10 sessions before he was able to exhibit trance phenomena!).

This new research by Peter Naish of the Open University in Milton Keynes suggests that those people who are highly susceptible to hypnosis have a tendency to use the right side of their brains more than their left. The right side of the brain is the side that is typically associated with creativity, imagery and and the left with analysis and logical thinking. If you’re interested in what this might mean in other parts of your life, try a quick Google. I found this article which is very interesting (albeit somewhat student orientated), about how we should learn to study using the right (sorry) correct methods to match our hemisphere weighting…

This would agree with my experience that creative people tend to better at hypnosis than those who are more analytical and logical in the way they think and act. I have learnt that someone who comes to me for help (or while I’m doing street hypnosis) with colourful clothes or hair, an interesting clothing style or generally seem like they are happy to see where the wind takes them that they’re going to be great at hypnosis

My friend Parkey is an excellent example of someone who struggles with hypnosis because of his “analytical” brain and you can read the highs and lows of his journey to achieve hypnosis on his blog here. There is some good news for analytical people though: Find yourself someone able to do some transcranial magnetic stimulation on your left hemisphere which (temporarily) reduces left hemisphere brain activity. Apparently you’re much more likely to experience hypnosis.

One thing that amuses me about this is that scientists by their very nature, tend to be analytical people and this may explain why hypnosis research is not as frequent as it might be. After all, why research something that you can’t experience? Or at least not in the way that some of the highly susceptible people can…

I have added a page with my YouTube channel embedded in it so you can now watch the videos that I’ve recorded. You will see the page link at the top of the site next to the link to www.PractitionerOfTrance.com

If you want to find me directly in YouTube, search for “nedbloggs” and you’ll find my videos.

Have a good one.

Ben