April 2008

For this month's subject, we take our inspiration from a news story that has been sweeping the internet in hypnosis circles. It seems a bandit operating in Italy has been hypnotizing bank tellers and clerks to hand him the money. At the end we have a link to 2 videos that show the remarkable ability of the human brain.

Hypnotizing Bandit
That's right, if you believe news stories, in Italy, there is a bandit that goes up to the bank teller and says, "Look into my eyes." And the next thing the bank teller knows, the money drawer is empty and the video surveillance shows her handing the bandit the money.

We think that the first thing to keep in mind when reading stories like this is that these stories are written for entertainment value and not for getting the facts out to the public. In other words, a story like this can not be trusted to be completely honest about the facts. Perhaps the bank tellers were in on the robbery and used the hypnosis angle as a way to seem innocent. Perhaps, the bandit said, "look into my eyes" merely as a way to capture the teller's attention after which he told her about the gun he had. You just never know with these kinds of stories.

Control
A story like this brings to mind one of the mis-conceptions that many people have about hypnosis. Many people believe that when hypnotized, they are in the control of the hypnotherapist. This is an absolute false concept about hypnosis.

While it is true that when hypnotised a person becomes more suggestible, a hypnotized person does not become more gullible. Being hypnotized requires a large amount of rapport between the client and hypnotherapist. This degree of rapport accounts, in part, for the fact that the client can let down their defenses and become more suggestible. However, a hypnotized person never lets down their defences to the extent that they would go along with a suggestion that is against their own moral values. If a hypnotherapist were to suggest such a thing, it would break rapport and the client would come out of trance.

Dr. Milton H. Erickson, M.D., psychiatrist and the father of modern hypnotherapy who was most gifted at hypnotizing people, conducted scientific experiments in which he tried unsuccessfully to hypnotize people to do things against their moral values. His experiments were published in the August 1939 issue of Psychiatry.

Some Clients Want to be Controlled
Many people do not get the help they want because of this mistaken belief in the power of the hypnotherapist to control the client. On the other hand, we have had clients who want to be controlled. Their attitude is one of, "ok, go into my mind and make me do whatever," such as stop smoking or lose weight. We like to explain to clients that we can not make them give up smoking or stop biting their finger nails or lose weight.

Clients must first decide that they want to make a change. Most people have problems to the extent that their conscious mind and unconscious minds are working at odds with each other. For example, a client wants to stop smoking, but the unconscious mind keeps creating an urge to smoke a cigarette. The conscious mind can never control the unconscious mind in the long term. People who try to control their unconscious mind, such as the person who says, "I am going to make myself stick to this diet and only eat these foods in prescribed amounts on certain days" may be able to exert that kind of control in the short term. However, in the long term, the unconscious mind will win the battle and the person ends up off the diet and eating all the unprescribed foods.

We hope that you take away from this article the knowledge that hypnosis is not about control, making a person do something. Really, it is about resolving conflicts between the conscious and unconscious minds. The hypnotherapist's only function is to help the client resolve these kinds of conflicts. When both your minds are operating in the same direction for the same goal, you can easily achieve any goal.

Remarkable Human Brain
These videos do not have anything directly to do with hypnosis. They both show the remarkable abilities of the human brain.

This first video is about a young girl who had the right half of her cerebral cortex removed and is now living a normal life. The left half of her brain was able to pick up the slack.
Brain Plasticity

This second video is of a brain researcher describing her experience of having a stroke. She describes what is was like to be aware of some of her brain function shutting down. This is a must see video.
Stroke of Insight

We hope you have found this E-Zine to be informative and of value. If there is anyway we can help you achieve faster healing, please call us at 888-658-6899.

Sincerely,
Greg Turner, CCHt.
Certified Clinical Hypnotherapist
Pain Management & Accelerated Healing
Center For Faster Healing With Hypnosis
Quit Smoking San Diego
Ask About Medical Hypnosis
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