5 fun facts about hypnosis

I discovered early in my hypnotic career that hypnosis comes with a lot of baggage. Ideas about what it can and can’t do come from stage shows, movies and books. They are often misinformed or just plain scary. I’m always happy to answer questions about it, but also wanted to offer a few facts to redress the balance.

It’s also a good opportunity to say a word to clear up any confusion in terminology.

• Hypnosis is the process of putting someone into a hypnotic trance. This is true whether you are on a stage or in a therapy room.
• Hypnotherapy is a process of offering therapy whilst someone is in a hypnotic trance. It usually only happens in therapy rooms.
• Those who offer therapy in hypnosis, in the UK at least, tend to call themselves hypnotherapists.
• In some other countries, the term therapist is reserved for those with medical training. People who offer therapy in hypnosis in these places usually call themselves hypnotists.
• There is no difference between a hypnotherapist and a clinical hypnotherapist, the word clinical is simply there to indicate they don’t do stage work.

So here are some more fun facts…

Hypnosis is not the greatest word for it anyway

The term hypnosis was coined by James Braid, in 1841. He was trying to separate his therapeutic procedures from Mesmerism, which was not taken seriously by most of the medical community. (You can find out why here.) It comes from the word ‘Hypnos’ which is Greek for ‘sleep’. Later, Braid realised that being in hypnosis wasn’t much like being asleep at all. He tried to rename it but, unfortunately, chose ‘monoideaism’ (meaning focussed on one idea) and it never caught on. Probably because no one could spell it!

It’s different on the stage

Developing the point made above, hypnosis is not the same as sleep. Stage hypnotists probably use the word ‘sleep’ because they use fast inductions (methods of hypnotising people). They need a single-syllable word that is easy to say quickly and emphatically. If you were asleep in trance, nothing I said would make any difference because you wouldn’t hear it. Then the therapy wouldn’t work.

Hypnotherapy relies on us accepting suggestions made by the therapist

We are all susceptible to suggestions. There is a massive, worldwide advertising industry based on that very fact. But we can always reject suggestions we don’t like or which are inappropriate to us. Hypnosis puts us in a calm and focused state where we are more than usually susceptible to suggestion. When therapists use it to suggest ways in which we can be happier or deal with our problems, we comply. But we always have the ability to say no.

Operations can be carried out using hypnotic anaesthesia

James Esdaile worked in India in the 1840s. He used hypnosis as his only anaesthetic for operations to remove what he called ‘monster tumours’ (up to 80 pounds in weight). Before this, many patients had died from shock or blood loss because no anaesthetic was available. Esdaile claimed that the introduction of hypnotic anaesthesia cut the death rate in these operations from 50% to 5%.

Hypnosis is not a lie detector

I’ve had the odd call from people who want me to hypnotise their partner and ask if they’re having an affair. Unfortunately for these callers, people in hypnosis can invent or imagine information, make mistakes and even tell lies. This is one reason seeing a hypnotherapist who is well-trained and will not ask inappropriate or leading questions is important. These can result in you working with inaccurate information and have an effect on the results of the therapy.

Bonus Fun Fact

Despite the image at the top of this page, I have been a hypnotherapist for over twenty years, and have never swung a watch!

Get in touch if you want to learn more.