On my website I mention that a session with me is only partly about the formal hypnotherapy bit – it’s like the icing on the cake. A lot of the work I guide my clients through is done before we even reach that part, and this week I had a perfect demonstration of how it can work fantastically.
I have a colleague who has had a 15 year relationship with….her cigarettes. I call it a relationship because, well, that’s what she called it. She spent money on them, she devoted time to them, she often got a taxi to drive across London to reach them (they are apparently not well stocked, but she wouldn’t switch to another brand because she is a loyal person). Most of her didn’t want to give up on them, but a small part was curious about life without them.
So we chatted occasionally. We talked about how good that relationship really was, whether it might be a bit one sided… those sorts of things.
I knew she’d give up when she was ready to, and this week I discovered that was exactly 21 days ago.
22 days ago I’d said something that it turned out had completely and utterly resonated with her – it wasn’t anything especially clever or hypnosis-y (I think that’s probably a new word there); just a suggestion that I wondered about out loud that she’d not considered before. She took it to a place that worked for her and the next day made a choice to try it out. Three weeks later, no gum, no tablets, no vape, she’s not had a cigarette and is rightly so very proud of herself.
People seem surprised to find out that hypnotherapy – and solutions based psychotherapy – is not focussed around closing those eyes and going into a trance state. That icing is really lovely and often clients favourite part, but actually the focus is on It’s a lot more on both of us making the cake and being sure to add exactly the right ingredients.
We all know you can’t have your cake and eat it, but solutions focussed hypnotherapy does feel a little like you can; you can get to where you want without the long drawn out process you might anticipate and it’s really a rather enjoyable experience too. Sorry, but I’m going to take the analogy a little bit further here….it is pretty much a piece of cake.
