Hypnotherapy uses the power of suggestion while the person is in a hypnotic state.

What is a hypnotic state? It is a state of altered consciousness: the body is relaxed, the conscious mind is distracted and the sub-conscious mind is open to receive suggestions. This state is a normal phenomenon. We all pass through a hypnotic state every night: it is that dreamy, floaty state between being fully awake and fully asleep. The only difference is that we try to put a person into that state and keep them there, artificially and not at bed-time. A person may fall asleep if they have a hypnotherapy session at the end of a long busy day; if they fall asleep, they probably were tired. I must admit there were times when the person started to snore in the middle of a session!

A good analogy is to look at the sub-conscious mind as the mind’s filing cabinet, that contains all information, all events, all knowledge - in short, everything that has ever happened to the person. The conscious mind is like the secretary: all information must go through the secretary before it is filed. The information may be modified, translated or interpreted before filing. Under hypnosis, the secretary is “out to lunch” and information can be put into the filing cabinet without the secretary. When information is later retrieved, it is assumed to be correct: it is not questioned. So in summary, under hypnosis, positive suggestions are implanted into the subconscious mind directly and this has a positive effect on the workings of the conscious mind.

Hypnosis did have a disreputable start, but over time it has slowly gained respect. Really now it is not “alternative” but a part of main-stream medicine.

Under South Australian law, only registered doctors, dentists and psychologists can practice hypnotherapy, while at the time of doing my course in 1990, in New South Wales, anyone could learn and set up practice.

Can anyone be hypnotised? Yes and No. Firstly yes, but only if they want to. I think everyone can be hypnotised if they want to but not everyone can do it. The person I cannot hypnotise could be hypnotised by another practitioner and vice versa. There must be a fairly strong inter-personal relationship, the person must be comfortable and relaxed with you. If there is some personality clash, then hypnosis will not occur.

Generally there are three requirements to achieve hypnosis: Concentration, Relaxation and Co-operation.

1. Concentration. To be able to hypnotise, the patient must be able to put all their focus onto a point, or onto the hypnotherapist’s voice. This focusing helps to distract the conscious mind, so that the subconscious mind can be opened. If they cannot focus or concentrate, their thoughts flit around and a hypnotic state is almost impossible to achieve. Some people try hypnotherapy for pain management. If the pain is severe, it is very hard to get them to focus away from the pain. Hypnosis is very difficult in these cases.
2. Relaxation. The person must be relaxed. A tense person is hard to hypnotise because part of relaxation is to loosen tense muscles. The patient must also be at ease with the surroundings and with the therapist. The office must be quiet, not too hot or cold, or light, or noisy. The therapist must have an air of confidence that is passed onto the patient. This builds rapport which helps in achieving relaxation.
3. Co-operation. Without co-operation, hypnotherapy cannot be achieved. The person must want to be hypnotised. They must be part of the solution and not part of the problem.

Hypnotherapy can be done sitting or laying down. I prefer the person laying down because I think that it is more comfortable and relaxation can be achieved much more easily.

[Extract from There is Always an Alternative, by Peter Baratosy, MB BS PhD DipAcup DipClinHyp FACNEM]