Learning and Hypnosis

Hypnosis is as old as humanity. People go into altered states naturally and spontaneously on a more or less daily basis. We are all familiar with that half way house between sleeping and wakefulness which we experience every morning and every night.

Unfortunately a lot of people's only real exposure to hypnosis is via television and stage shows. Whilst these are great fun they often give the impression that hypnotists control their subjects. Our experience and certainly our intention, as fully qualified clinical hypnotherapists, is that our subjects access greater control of themselves.

We all go through many alterations in our state of mind on a moment by moment basis. What few people ever have the chance to learn is that our 'state of mind' does not have to be prey to our environment - the situation we are dealing with or the people with whom we are interacting. We can actually learn to choose our state of mind, irrespective of the context we are operating within.

In addition, once you begin to create a more focused and positive relationship with your own unconscious mind through self-hypnosis you can begin to adapt your attitudes, beliefs and habitual responses in a way which broadens your horizons and opens you up to the limitless possibilities of human existence.

Young people are especially attuned to their natural ability to alter their state of mind and their focus of attention although not necessarily in a structured or purposeful way. We have long believed that teaching young people self-hypnosis has tremendous potential in healthy development. Learning how to process information and deal with life challenges healthily has all kinds of benefits both in the context of learning and also in growing up.

We are also convinced that the use of hypnotic language patterns, metaphors and stories, used ethically, can significantly increase engagement in learning. Young people naturally engage in fantasising and daydreaming. By facilitating and guiding these episodes of intensely creative thought and internal processed experience we encourage and possibly even accelerate the formation of new neural networks (i.e. learning) in a way which is often far more effective than conventional teaching and learning.

The real tragedy is that as we grow older, many of us begin to discount our ability to lead a rich internal life, driven, as we are, by the external pressures and demands of modern society. Every challenge benefits from a period of quiet, meditative reflection. Many of us have awoken with the solution to a seemingly intractable problem. Hypnosis is one way in which we can utilise this fantastic and significantly under-used learning resource.