What we call hypnosis is of a collection of techniques that allow your conscious and unconscious mind to communicate between themselves and with your body more effectively. There’s nothing mysterious about hypnosis. We pop in and out of trance many times a day. Hypnosis simply takes advantage of this natural ability and uses it in a directed manner. We do this by deliberately reproducing and exaggerating the conditions that cause us to go into trance naturally.

When in trance we experience a state of heightened suggestibility. When we enter spontaneous trance states we often imagine or suggest negative outcomes to ourselves and reinforce negative habits. Whenever you have a thought that contains something like, “I’ll never,” “I can’t,” “It’s too hard,” or “I always,” you can be pretty sure that you have entered a negative trance state. Take an moment to think of some of your particular global negative thoughts. Do you have thoughts like, “I can never stick to a diet,” “Oh, I can’t balance a checkbook,” or “I don’t have time to exercise?” That’s negative self-hypnosis.

Fortunately, well structured and routinely practiced self-hypnosis creates deeper and more effective trance states that allow you to counter these spontaneous negative trances and create real and lasting change in your life.

I’ll use the terms conscious mind and unconscious mind. The conscious mind is the thinking part. It will remain active during hypnosis though you may choose to pay less attention to it. The unconscious mind is everything else that goes on in our bodies and unconscious thoughts. The goal of hypnosis is to open the communication channels between these parts of ourselves that normally speak different languages and have trouble communicating.

Structure of a hypnosis section

Most therapeutic self-help hypnosis scripts follow the pattern outlined below. You will find scripts samples for each section in the Scripts section of this site. I’d recommend attaching scripts from the appropriate sections together in the following order.

1. Seeding
2. Going into trance
3. Deepening the trance
4. Using the trance to give messages to the unconscious or ask for answers
5. Post-hypnotic suggestions and anchors
6. Coming out of trance
7. Post trance

Seeding

When we want to grow flowers or vegetables we plant the seeds. When we want to grow new patterns of thought and behavior, it is often helpful to plant seeds of positive intention before entering out hypnotic session. This can take the form of generic positive statements of intent such as, “I will find this session useful,” or specific suggestions that mirror the intent of the session, such as, “I realize that it is easy and enjoyable to exercise.” Some hypnotists always use seeding, some don’t use it at all. Since it is simple to do and can help speed change, why not try it?

Seeding is something you do yourself. You may choose to make positive suggestions to yourself before the beginning of the hypnosis section and/or take a few moments to image the positive outcome you desire.

Going into Trance

To deliberately foster a trance we use an hypnotic induction. That’s the technical term for focusing attention deeply enough to create a hypnotic state. Trance induction techniques are cues or signals that you give yourself to say that you are going into trance or hypnosis. Popular myth has hypnotists swing a watch or use a spinning disk to induce trance. In my 25 years of trance work the only time I’ve ever seen a pocket watch used was during a hypnosis workshop when some participants decided to ham up trance induction for laughs.

As you might expect with a naturally occurring phenomenon, there are numerous methods that will induce trance. Deliberate relaxation, attention focusing, sensory or intellectual overload, guided imagery, focusing on body sensations, slow speech patterns, and a number of other techniques all work. Most hypnotic inductions combine several techniques that work in unison.

Deepening the Trance

Sometimes you can fall quickly into trance. Sometimes it takes longer. It can be helpful to extend the normal trance induction phase with suggestions that deepen the state. This period may or may not be necessary and there can be a gradual transition from trance induction/deepening suggestions to therapeutic suggestions and become absorbed in your thoughts and feelings. You may string more than one induction script together or add a deepening script for this phase.

Using the Trance State for Positive Movement

Once the depth and focus of the trance state has reached sufficient intensity, the nature of hypnotic suggestion shifts from creating the trance state itself and moves to suggesting positive and/or therapeutic goal attainment or asking the unconscious mind to figure out how to solve a problem. This can happen through the use of direct or indirect suggestion, guided imagery, metaphor (stories), altered body sensations or through deep introspection. It is often helpful to pose questions to the unconscious mind and suggest that we will receive the answers either now or when the unconscious mind has had time to process the question. Often a mix of techniques that target right and left brained thought process will be helpful in utilizing this very powerful state of attention.

Post-hypnotic suggestions and anchors

If the benefits of hypnosis only last as long as the session there wouldn’t be much point to using it. Hypnotic suggestions should address feelings, thoughts and actions in the waking state. One helpful technique is to connect specific suggestions to specific external events, called triggers. “Isn’t it interesting that when she says that, you can simple observe her as if from a great distance and feel curiosity and calm.”

Coming out of Trance

As naturally occurring states, trances are self-limiting. But everyday life generally requires us to shift fairly quickly back into a more go-get-em mode and not hang out in the relaxed hypnotic one. It may take quite a few minutes to induce trance but ending it will happen much more quickly. A few suggestions directed towards returning to the normal, alert and awake state, comfortably renewed and refreshed, generally suffice, especially when the speech pattern is quickened. It’s also helpful to add a few reinforcing suggestions at this time.

If you choose to play a recording at your normal sleep time then omit the Coming Out script or add suggestions that you will now drift off into a refreshing sleep and awaken at the appropriate time.

Post Trance

Hypnosis opens up two way communication between our conscious and unconscious minds and enhances creative insight. Immediately after a self-hypnosis session it is often helpful to jot down thoughts or ideas that came to you during trance, for not only are you giving directions to your unconscious mind in trance but your unconscious is also sending you back messages that you can use, both in normal life and in your next trance session. Such insights often reveal the reasons why we follow certain unhelpful patterns, and once acknowledged, offer us more choice in our life and open up positive paths towards achieving our goals. You may realize why you head toward the refrigerator when you are down or why you react to your boss’ suggestions as criticism. Often we find that the reasons why we think that we act in certain ways are either incomplete or wrong. Taking advantage of insights gained during trance will speed our progress.