About Hypnotherapy - Background
So what exactly is hypnosis? Hypnosis, as a term, only came into public awareness, in the middle of the19th century following work done by James Braid. But this does not mean that what we now consider to be the essential experience of the hypnotic state only started in that period. Far from it, the altered state we experience in hypnosis has been around as long as man himself. Hypnosis is a totally natural state of mind but also an altered state of mind. A mind that allows the client to focus on their internal reality rather than their external reality. It provides the client with a vehicle to access the vast resources in their unconscious mind.
There is enough evidence to show that people have been reaping the benefits of altered states of consciousness for thousands of years. The problems that people face regardless of their culture or where they live are more or less the same – the degree to which people experience suffering may differ but the causes are much the same. It is the desire for, and lack of, happiness, good health, loving relationships, security that ultimately causes us to suffer - this is the human condition – and this causes us to live our lives as a series of parts rather than as whole beings. For example we might be happy in our personal relationships but unhappy in our professional life which results in imbalance.
Ancient Egyptian paintings show people making hypnotic patterns over what appear to be sleeping patients. A process that was apparently used in their sleep, or dream, temples. These temples, according to the World History of Psychiatry (1975), were associated with Imhotep, considered by some to be the founder of Egyptian medicine (around 2900 B.C.). Sleep therapy was used to ask the gods to heal the patient; the patient was placed in a trance while incantations were recited to prepare through suggestion and then religious rituals carried out to cast out evil spirits.
In Greece they employed healing temples in the 4th and 5th centuries BC similar to the ancient Egyptian temples. These temples were dedicated to Aesclepius the healing god. The healing process involved ritual and the belief in the power of the priests. This gave great power to the healing suggestions delivered to the patients, many of whom suffered from mental illnesses. The patients entered a deep trance like state and were sometimes kept in this state for days at a time while experiencing deep healing suggestions from the priests. Hippocrates, around 400 B.C., was the first westerner to record that there was a connection between body and mind saying “The affections suffered by the body, the soul sees quite well with shut eyes”.
From the 15th century onwards physicians from many countries further developed the concept of hypnosis and its uses. Swiss-born, Paracelsus, was one of the earliest pioneers of medicine to advocate the use of chemical and mineral treatments for illnesses and considered the imagination as an instrument of healing. Paracelsus also used magnets to effect cures on clients and the use of healing magnets, in connection with trance work, continued to be of interest to others as the centuries passed. Paracelsus believed that magnets could attract disease. His idea was based on the belief that the body had a magnetic like fluid running through it, and that if this was in any way defective then disease could attack the individual. Even today strong magnets are considered by many to be a source of healing energy. The idea of an invisible fluid (or energy source) running through the body is common to eastern medicine and is the basis for a number of other complimentary therapies used widely today such as acupuncture and emotional freedom technique: the latter therapy increasingly being used in conjunction with hypnotherapy.
One of the most important individuals in the development and acceptance of hypnotism, as we have come to know it, was Franz Anton Mesmer (1734-1815). Even if people have never heard of the man they most probably have used his name at some point (mesmerized). He is generally considered to be the Father of Hypnosis.
Although he initially relied on actual magnets to apply his cures he later stressed that magnets were not essential and that other substances could be used. He called his new theory Animal Magnetism believing that the bodily fluids needed to be kept in balance and that animal magnetism was the way to achieve and maintain this balance. He believed that magnets could be influential in developing cures. Following significant success with a number of important individuals, including the director of the Munich Academy of Sciences, his methods gained widespread acceptance. He was even elected as a member of the Bavarian Academy.
By the early 19th century Mesmerism had spread to England mainly through the efforts of John Elliotson. Elliotson, like many others before him who saw the benefits of trance work, was medically qualified. He was Professor of Medicine at the University of London and is probably best remembered for inventing the stethoscope. He used his techniques successfully for surgical procedures and for the treatment of mental disorders.
At this time two important medical figures took an interest in the effects of hypnosis - James Esdaille (1818-1859) and James Braid (1795-1860). Practicing on friends and colleagues Braid became certain that magnetism played no part in the success of treatments and that it was suggestibility in the patient in conjunction with expectancy of results that was responsible for successful outcomes. Practising on his family and friends he would get them to fix their gaze on an object, such as his hand, believing that this effectively paralysed nerve centres. Braid was the first person to coin the term hypnosis, after the Greek word for sleep, Hypnos. He later came to regret this name as he learned that trance and sleep were two different states. However the name stuck, despite trying to change it to monoideism (one word, one thought) which he felt more accurately reflected the patient’s state. He wrote his book Neurypnology based on his findings. He wrote that in the trance state patients were still in control - “I am aware great prejudice has been raised against mesmerism, from the idea that it might be turned to immoral purposes. In respect to the Neuro-Hypnotic state, induced by the method explained in this treatise, I am quite certain that it deserves no such censure. I have proved by experiments, both in public and in private, that during the state of excitement, the judgment is sufficiently active to make the patients, if possible, even more fastidious as regards propriety of conduct, than in the waking state” (Neurypnology p.6). His good friend James Esdaille spent most of his professional life working in Calcutta and experimented with hypnotic anesthesia. Esdaille performed thousand of operations, including around three hundred major operations such as amputations, using hypnotic anesthesia with an amazing success rate, reducing the death rate from 50% to 5%.
Later, Sigmund Freud had become interested in the power of hypnosis after witnessing the acclaimed Danish stage hypnotist Carl Hansen. Working with his friend Josef Breuer he cured a number of patients using hypnotherapy. Despite having considerable success with clients using hypnosis Freud distanced himself from the technique by the mid 1890s. This decision had a huge impact on the development of hypnosis into the 20th century. In effect, because Freud was so highly regarded, many others decide to stop using hypnosis as a means of bringing about change in their patients and it lost much of its public acceptance in the process.
By the turn of the 20th century another interesting development took place. A contemporary of Freud, the French pharmacist Emile Coue (1857-1926), discovered the benefits of “waking” suggestion, a forerunner of what we might call positive thinking. In addition there are some similarities to the later work of Milton Erickson who refined trance work to such a degree that formal inductions no longer became necessary if you understood the appropriate language to use; something that was to be picked up on even later by Richard Bandler and John Grinder in their development of Neuro Linguistic Programming. Coue was truly compassionate and believed that people healed themselves and that the therapist was merely a facilitator. His famous auto suggestion statement is still widely recognised today: “Every day in every way I am getting better and better”. His belief was that rapid repetition of phrases such as this prevented negative thoughts from entering the mind and that over a period of time the repeated phrases would become embedded as part of the natural thinking process of the individual.
Coue’s thinking was based around the premise that the imagination is much more powerful than the will and that belief in the ability to get better is often more important than the actual treatment being administered. Modern research into placebos seems to suggest that this is true. Also some modern day therapists have also used the placebo approach with interesting results. For example Andy Austin in his book “The Rainbow Machine “ published in 2007 notes the outcome of some placebo sessions he delivered to a number of obese clients needing to lose weight. He writes “I would quickly hypnotise the client into a deep and satisfactory trance, leaving them for 40 minutes and then wake them up with the suggestion that they would be amnesic for the session, I would also suggest that the work undertaken in trance would continue to operate deeply at an unconscious level. But in actual fact, in between the rapid trance inductions, deepening suggestions and waking them up I did and said nothing at all. All five…found that weekly sessions of this nature over a 10-week period proved to be highly beneficial. All clients reduced down to their desired weight…” (p40). Not only was the weight dropping off but they all found new, more active hobbies to pursue which, of course, added to the success of the treatment. Initially he was unsure about how this could have been achieved until he checked the language he had been using unconsciously as part of the deepeners. This provides real insight into both the importance of language used in a session and trusting the client to make correct sense (for them) of what is being said to them while in trance. Implicit in this story is the notion that clients heal themselves. Despite the success of his methods Coue never found the acclaim that he deserved either in Europe or the United States. However it is interesting to note how widespread his techniques are today in many therapies and self help programmes. You only need to look at other modern complementary therapies such as Emotional Freedom Technique and Tapas Acupressure Technique to see how positive affirmations are essential components of their therapeutic approaches.
In the 20th Century Milton H Erickson (1901-1980) is considered to be the most influential developer of the hypnotic approach to therapy. Erickson was a highly respected psychotherapist who studied with many leading hypnotists of modern. Erickson completely reshaped our thinking about hypnosis both in terms of how clients could be induced into altered states and how the therapeutic process could be applied. He was an absolute master of indirect suggestion and was so adept that he could take clients into trance simply by telling them stories or engaging them in casual conversation. It was Erickson who believed that hypnosis could elicit and then use the potential that already resided in the patient’s unconscious mind but could not impose anything that was against his/her internal code. This is echoed in the NLP presupposition that each person has all the resources they need to achieve their goals and demonstrates the far reaching influence of Erickson on 20th century therapies and beyond. As hypnosis began to resurface as a valuable therapeutic tool once again it also became clear that Ericksonian hypnosis was possibly the most effective approach. This approach included the use of metaphors, humour, confusion, surprise and imagery as well as a whole host of unusual instructions that the client was required to carry out in the waking state; all done to get the patient to access their internal resources and transform their lives.
Ericksonian hypnosis is often used in conjunction with other approaches notably techniques from Neuro Linguistic Programming. This is no accident of course because the originators of NLP, Richard Bandler and John Grinder, extensively modelled the work of Milton Erickson in the 1970s (as well as other prominent therapists of the period). They developed the Milton Model, an exquisite set of language patterns which serve to elicit change in the client’s way of thinking about their problem. Bandler and Grinder developed fast track therapeutic techniques based on these observations and language patterns of Erickson with the intention of being able to teach them to others easily. When used in conjunction with hypnosis, techniques such as 6 step reframe and Time Line Therapy can bring about profound and relatively rapid and lasting change in patients.
Hypnosis is accepted today as a valid therapeutic tool for treating a wide range of emotional disorders and physical illnesses. For example it is used for stress management, anesthesia, pain control for issues such as Irritable Bowel Syndrome, and pain management for terminal cancer patients. Many other disorders are also successfully treated using hypnotic inductions (in conjunction with therapeutic techniques) including: phobias, anxiety and the root causes of depression.
Brian McHugh, Clinical Hypnotherapist, NLP Master Practitioner and IEMT Practitioner
