How Real is Real?

Reality: is the state of things as they actually exist, rather than as they may appear or may be thought to be. In its widest definition, reality includes everything that is and has being, whether or not it is observable or comprehensible.

We as human beings are gifted in the right that we have our senses to rely on, our senses of sight, touch, tasting, smelling, and hearing are highly developed and in many cases provide us with vital information we need in our daily lives.  Not to mention the sheer amount of emotional responses we receive from these senses are tremendous and can in many cases make or break the emotional content of our daily lives as well. It is estimated that if you were to estimate the amount of information we take in from these senses and then compare that to how much we are actually able to process with our astounding super computer of a mind, you would find that our senses actually provide us with more information that we can process at any given moment. To put it in another way lets say right now our minds are capable of processing information at the rate of 8 million bits of information at any given moment, our sense by way of comparison are providing us with 8 billion bits of information at the same time.

With this much information being provided our brains have developed and amazing system of processing information that allows us to not only make sense of the information but to also interpret and function in a virtual flood of information. We filter the incoming messages from our senses in 3 ways;

1.)    Distortion: Ever notice that when you were with another person or in a group and you went to an event (sort of like a concert, a movie, a party, etc…) and later when you and your friend or group of friends, compare your experience and find that everyone’s recollection is not the same? This is because the details of our experience is determined by what particular sights, sounds, scents, etc… catches our attention there for we pay attention to. Also these particular details also have a way at times of becoming larger that life in descriptions we recall and share. (A friend of mine once told me about a concert that he went once. He spent a great deal of time telling me about the scarves tied to the singers microphone stand and how they swirled around the singer while he moved about the stage, I’m pretty sure if I found another person that was there that night I could probably get a description on how well that singer also sang that night.) But to simplify no matter if we and make certain details larger & more grandiose or make them smaller and/or less significant this is an example of how we distort information we sort into our minds as we have any experience.

2.)    Generalization: Generalization is when we sort information base on how similar something is to something else or we sort of blend details into the background of our thoughts. Also this can manifest as the grouping of details that we recall and describe as one description for a group of things. Such as if I asked can you describe the colors in a rainbow? You could say sure, red, yellow, blue, green, etc… But in truth, the colors of the rainbow are not just one solid pallet of any of these colors but a blending of them, (i.e. how many shades of orange are there between the colors yellow and red?)

3.)    Deletion: In this case there is any number of details we chose to forget as they may seem unimportant or insignificant as compared to others. This differs from the other filters in that there is not information from these details sorted into our memories for recall at another time. In comparison with the other 2 filters it differs because with Generalization and Distortion information about the details remain even though they have been altered in some form, whereas when we delete details there is nothing to recall and the information is simply no longer available.

The first time I learned this information I had to ask “is there no way that is a purely factual form of filtering that we utilize that keeps details unchanged?” The answer is no, there is no form of filtering we use that does not involve using these 3 forms of filtering. When it comes down it the thing we know as “reality” is a description of our experience based upon how we filter the information that is available to us at any given moment, in this sense we are separated from reality by senses, as we have no other way to interpret our surroundings and the events we are participants in or observe.

We all learned about this phenomenon when we were kids, it was shown to us with a game called “telephone” where a person whispered something into a persons ear at the beginning of a line of people, and then they in turn whispered into the next persons ear the thing they were told and so on till it gets to the last person in the line and then the last person says out loud what they were told, and it is always totally different from the original statement that was said.

It all boils down to the fact that we are separated from reality by our senses, and everything we experience is subject to our own interpretations as we filter it into our conscious minds. Which leaves us always asking the question in the back of our minds how real is real?

The Complex Matter of Weight

One phrase I hear often that I tend not to correct people on is when they ask me about losing weight. The phrase itself is a bit of an oxymoron after all if you lost the weight, why would you ever want to find it again? To be more correct I like to think of it as “Releasing stored excess energy” as far as I remember (per the anatomy classes I took in school) this is a more apt description. Generally people that come seeking weight loss are either two kinds of clients;

They are seeking to lose a small amount of weight, such as a dress size, or I would say within 20-30 lbs. often small amounts of weight like this can be attributed to habits that can easily be addressed with the client’s assistance within 1 to 2 sessions.

Are folks that have a more sever weight problem they have been struggling with an (and I personally hate this word) obesity problem for many years. Weight release for obese clients is one of the most complex issue’s hypnotist’s works with. To best assist these clients we must explore how the client responds to the complex issues that ultimately attract the weight they wish to release.

It is estimated 64.5% of the Northern American population is over weight and of this 30.5% are obese (American Obesity Association). This increase as compare to previous years, is attributed to many know factors, and alarmingly this type of weight problem is appearing earlier and earlier in life for those that are being affected by it. With all available data I have seen I can only deduce this is caused by two possible reasons.

The first is that we now live in a “food environment,” in the last 50 years the availability and variety of fast foods had increased drastically; add to that the increased amount of food additives, drugs, and other toxic chemicals now found in fat cells stored in the body. I recently read a study that showed that over 500 toxic chemicals unknown prior to 1950 stored in human fat cells, and these toxins actually are responsible for making it difficult for the body to process fat naturally. I was unable to find a reference as to where this study was conducted, but if it is true then it is no wonder why weight is becoming such an increasing problem. A doctor I spoke to recently told me about an article he read about scientists in Alaska, while studying glaciers had melted some samples they had taken from glaciers and found that the water contained birth control chemicals that had been frozen in the glacial waters. Never so harshly have I ever been reminded that the earth always gives back witch we give it in the most unexpected ways.

The second reason is something that is a very touch subject at times and that is the messages we received about our bodies in very early childhood. With mothers and increasingly fathers suffering from low body image and low self image related to their physical bodies. Body image is often confused with self image and the end result of with is low self esteem. The media emphasizes thinness as ultimate beauty; anything that deviates from the “perfect” (thin) body is thus “imperfect” or abnormal. Just walk into just about any child clothing store, and on its racks you can find clothes that would normally be reserved for adults like; sequined midriffs, crop tops, bras for 5 year olds, low cut jeans to increase the distance between their tops and bottoms. Now how exactly does a small child’s tummy behave in such clothing? As it should, jutting roundly and proudly. Yet today little girls who once grinned and smacked their bellies when asked to point out where their belly button at age 3, are now sucking in their stomachs at age nine so that they “do not look so fat.”

It makes me wonder why the messages our children hear these days affect their minds in such a complex way. The answer is that the unconscious mind takes its job very seriously, and it takes to heart things that are often said off handed when the child is present but we believe they wont understand. Did you know that your memory from before birth till today is stored intact inside of this powerful store house of resources we all posses? With this being said these off handed comment like “she is going to be a big girl” or “He is going be so huge!” although the child may not understand it at the time its said, their unconscious records theses things and even thought the child many not understand the language at that time, they will understand it once they are taught and the unconscious will translate these messages back to the child at another time when they will understand them, and all of the myriad of messages, supporting or limiting, create the adult the child will become.

A child’s mind is so beautifully wide open to suggestions in the first few years and messages from parents, caregivers, role models, and even television hero’s are often taken as absolute authority. Messages received in childhood that contribute to obesity are at best complicated by the continuing experiences of being a teen and into adulthood.

One of the most common misconceptions is that a person that anyone that is overweight must eat too much. In this people often overlook the incredible power of the unconscious mind and how it plays a part in controlling a person’s weight. If the unconscious has decided that being overweight will solve a problem for them it will find a way to create the fat needed, regardless of how much one eats. Then if the individual goes on a sever diet that gives their body no choice but to release the fat, then the unconscious will respond by finding ways to sabotage that diet. To complicate this, once the unconscious finds successful ways of handling traumatic issues, it will apply this solution to many other issues that the person may face.

I think the best way to illustrate this is by an example;

The following is a case I have read about of a client that grew up in a family with 3 siblings. Her family were overweight whom use the words “stocky, chunky, chubby” to describe themselves. She had a seemingly typical upbringing and at first report a happy healthy childhood. When the client was three her youngest brother was born with a physical issue that made eating for him an issue. Suddenly all of the adults in the family were spending all of their time and attention (time that used to belong to the client) to get food into this child. Of course the more he ate, the happier they were. What did the client learn at this point? In order to be loved, you must eat. The client unconscious stepped in to fulfill the clients desires to get attention causing her to eat when ever they felt unloved.

At 4 or 5 the client was eating popcorn with an aunt they idolized that called them a “piggy” and told the client that “nice people do not eat popcorn by the handful and should eat it one piece at a time.” Now we have a child that believes they have to eat to be loved but are also called a “piggy” for doing so, and is criticized in their method of eating. A new part of their unconscious now makes them self conscious about eating and the way they eat and thusly solves the problem by having them eat in secret.

Problems in the family cause them to stay with their grandmother for a time, where they are fed cake each time they were upset. Now they learn that when they go to grandma’s house they get loved with food. Therefore if someone loves you, or you love someone, you will cook, bake, and eat with them.

As a teen the client develops breasts early and is teased often by boys about having such a great body. They are stopped on the street one day and taunted to the point they felt physically threatened. They now understand that to have a body that attracted too much attention from men was unsafe and if they were not as physically attractive they would be safer. A new part of the unconscious decides that food worked well for the other two problems and applies fat to the problem; after all if they are fat they are safe.

As a young adult they get married, has a child, and then goes on a strict diet and loses weight. Then they find themselves in an extra marital affair with their new “hot” body. That again doesn’t feel safe, so the subconscious decides if she is fat that will not happen again.

In their career, they are “hit on” by a boss that causes them tremendous stress. They are accused of sleeping their way up the corporate ladder because of how attractive they are. Again, the unconscious is reminded that if they are fat they will not have this problem and so on and son on. By now their self esteem and self image are entirely affected by their obesity. Their self confidence has taken a beating through out their entire life.

With all of these potential pitfalls that can contribute to obesity it is no wonder why in our world today that maintaining a healthy weight is so difficult for so many. Not to mention a great lack of understanding over all pervades the prevailing philosophies of our society that being over weight should be a problem that can be easily cured by a simple diet and a few encouraging words, when the truth is that our weight is a very complicated matter that can be changed but it takes dedication and commitment to change not only our perceptions of food and how much we eat, but how we view ourselves and our perceptions of what the weight we seek to release is truly a product of. Even with the assistance it is not light matter, but with the open mindedness and the willingness to change, the goal that clients seek when they ask “can you help me lose weight” can be achieved, and the results can only last for the rest of their lives.   

Along Came a Spider

The other day I talked with a client that told me they had previously had a huge problem, she had a fear of doctors and hospitals. For someone that is diabetic this is a huge complication that can cause more than just a few problems. When I asked her why, like most problems she told she did not know why, she then explained that she did not have this problem a few years ago. It had started after she had to have surgery for a minor problem, but it was enough that they had to use anesthesia on the client. The next thing she told me is truly the thing that nightmares are made of; it seems that during the entire surgery she was conscious, she said everything was distorted, the sounds in the room echoed and varied, she had her eyes partially open and her vision was blurry distorted, but she was still conscious none the less, and also she felt everything they had done to her during her surgery. From this for over 2 years she nightmares about the distorted doctor she saw working on her and the events she went through. When I heard this, my heart about stopped. To be unable to say or do anything while a doctor was performing surgery on you no matter how small, words fail to describe how horrible an experience like this is, but its does speak volumes about how severely she was scarred by the experience that she re-lived night after night for over 2 years.  She is over her fear of doctors now thanks to the help of hypnosis and NLP and she is pretty much guaranteed that the night mares are over. But between this and my own experience of watching a couple of horror movies I recently watched that left me mildly disturbed and jumping at my own shadow for a couple of days made me think about the subject of fear.

Why is it that with all of the horrible things in life that exist and atrocities in real life, do we have movies and TV shows that have the intent to scare us? Some say it is by and large a hold out in our minds of times when we had rites of passage that marked our passage into being adults. While others theorize that we watch these things because it is our way of suppressing our violent tendencies left over from our more savage times before we became civilized. I personally find the theory that sometimes in life we need a good scare to remind us that even though we witness so many things that are horrible in our lives, in our own lives and in the lives of our friends and loved ones, that horror movies are there as a kind of safe haven where we can be frightened in a safe environment, where the danger is only in our minds and this allows us a modicum of comfort and humor while still being reminded there are worse things we could be forced to endure, simply for the right to survive another day.

Research has proven that no matter what kind of fear we experience be it real or imaginary, our bodies and minds reactions are exactly the same. Your pulse rate quickens, your heart rate increases and our minds race with alternatives and solutions to the problems presented before us. This is the very same state that helps us to empathize with others and allows us to create rapport with everyone we meet and know. Rapport is the foundation for all relationships with everyone we have and will meet in our lifetimes.

Also have you ever noticed that in the theatre people seem to react more profoundly to the movie that if they were watching in the seclusion of their homes? This is a powerful ability our minds utilize to create inside us a state that allows us to go into another form of trance. This phenomenon is what we call group or mass hypnosis. Basically when watching we empathize with the characters were watching and thusly in a large group it creates a state of rapport in the theatre, so in this sense we are actually sharing our fear, nervousness, bravery, sense of humor etc… Being an unspoken form of communication it easily affects everyone universally through out the entire group of people in the theatre. This same type of responsiveness from large groups is responsible for 100% of all riots. When I was a child I remember the cabbage patch kid’s frenzy that gripped America around the Christmas season, the news showed groups of adults fighting each other just to get one of these dolls for their kids. It amazed me and always made me wonder why people would go so far to literally fight over a toy. One specific piece of footage that comes to mind that serves as the best example I can remember is this woman facing off with an older gentleman off the back of a loading dock with workers throwing the dolls to the crowd, everything was fine till this gent caught the doll and this woman obviously missed catching it first, so she pauses for a split second and knocks the doll out of this guys hands and lunges for it, at that point the entire crowd literally goes ballistic and begins beating each other to get the dolls. The moment the woman stopped for a split second was the last moment of sanity in that entire recording, had the woman just turned and waited for another doll to be distributed, or even went somewhere else and found it later things may have gone different but her single moment of fear (fear she might disappoint her child on Christmas morning) not only provided the spark that set off about 50 already anxious and agitated people, but also caused exactly what she feared to happen, all of the participants were arrested and of course in the melee the most of the dolls were all but destroyed. This phenomenon is very universal and is in no way limited to fear and anger, any emotion with in the sphere of human emotions can and is transferred readily between people freely commonly. If you have ever gone on a double date with the one you love and another couple in love you will notice that when one couple kisses the other is soon to follow. It’s simply amazing.  

Our minds and bodies are inescapably, and completely linked, anything we can create in our minds our bodies will follow. In the case of emotions like fear, remember we were taught that to have certain reactions when we are exposed to certain stimuli we would encounter in our later lives as children. In the case of scary movies it could have been a sibling that came home from freshly seeing a movie like Friday the 13^th or A Nightmare on Elm Street, and they told us how frightening they were, but how cool the movie was at the same time. Personally I think this type of conditioning started even earlier than that, we all remember mother goose and her book of rhymes, many cases of arachnophobia could have been averted if we had but not hear the words, “Little Miss Muffet sat on her tuffet eating her curds and way…”

The Power of One

Often I hear objections people have in regard to hypnosis, usually these are very short phrases that are given with very little thought, but with a great stored amount of cynicism and curiosity behind the words they chose. Today I thought I would delve into some of these objections and hopefully shed a little light upon the truth behind these limiting thoughts and beliefs.

 1.”I have a friend who went to a hypnotists to stop smoking and he didn’t quit. If it didn’t work for him, why would it work for me?”

There are a lot of reasons that a course of sessions could possibly have little to no effect for a client. Hypnotism is an exacting science that requires not only the practitioner to be proficient in their chosen vocation but also is requires the client be an active participant in the changes they wish to effect in their lives. If neither of these things is present the effectiveness of the change work that can be expected can vary, like any other form of therapy. The most important thing to remember about hypnosis and achieving change is this; hypnosis is not a magic exercise that you just do once and suddenly your whole life changes. It is more accurate to say that on average you experience 3 or more sessions and find that a habit or problem you find is no longer the same, thus loses importance in your world and continues to become more insignificant over time, until the problem is completely gone. Often dramatic results can and do happen in one visit, but will still require at least one subsequent visit to follow up to ensure the change has been achieved and if any further assistance is needed to ensure the change blends seamlessly into the clients daily life. (I could elaborate further about this very question and get very in depth about the various ways success can be achieved through hypnosis, but I digress because it could fill many pages.)

2.)”Hypnosis won’t work for me, I can’t be hypnotized because I had too strong of a will.”

This assumes that hypnotism is something that is done against your will, or that it is a form of brain washing that is applied to reprogram ones mind in order to achieve results. Nothing could be further from the truth. Hypnosis is a natural state that we all achieve on average at least 13 times per day without realizing we are even doing it. Secondly free will is always present even when you are in trance you have the option to either accept or refuse suggestions you are presented at any time. Willpower is an act of self control we use to restrain ourselves from doing things we feel we need to abstain from, usually my reply to this statement is something like this; “Wow, that’s a lot of self control! May I ask how is it that your need for control has gotten so out of control that you unable to exercise control over your own free will long enough to make much needed changes in your life now?”

3.)”I saw a stage hypnotist once and he wasn’t able to hypnotize me, so I can’t be hypnotized.”

Stage Hypnosis is a statistical process in witch a stage hypnotist actually sorts the most suggestible members of the audience and then hypnotizes them for entertainment. The actually number is roughly 60% of people in any given audience are suggestible enough to go into profound states of trance at the moment the hypnotist is putting on his show and the stage hypnotist use a series of tests that appear to the crowd as a display of how hypnotism works, but in truth they are actually watching to see who responds best to the suggestions given. Then when they ask for volunteers they pick the audience members that had the best reactions to their previous suggestions.  In clinical hypnosis our clients require individual attention, it is then up to the hypnotist to find the best way to help the client go into trance. This is done by listening to the client closely, and paying attention to the details the client expresses in everything they say. Additionally clinical hypnotists do use the same tests that stage hypnotists use to determine how suggestive a client is, but they do explain the purposes of the tests. So if you went to a stage hypnotist and he couldn’t hypnotize you, chances are you just didn’t respond well to suggestion at that time for their purposes. Everyone both responds to suggestion and does not respond easily to suggestion depending on the circumstances of their experience at the time they saw a hypnotist.

4.)”Hypnosis is too expensive, I can not afford it.”

Truthfully being that I have 7 children, I understand the value of a dollar. But when you consider the cost of seeing a hypnotist, you truly have to consider the cost of the problem you are having, be it in cash, emotional self torment, relationships, or even just the amount of energy it takes out of you to keep a problem going in your life. All of these things and more, and when you truly look at it you will find the cost of not seeing a hypnotist can be far greater than the cost of seeing a hypnotist. I can tell you that if someone comes to me with a problem and truly wants help but can not afford it, I will take payments, and in some cases work at no cost simply because I think that happiness and being able to live your life has more value than any amount of money.

5.)”Hypnosis won’t work for me, it only works for other people.”

When I hear this I can not resist asking” who are these other people, and why are you not allowed to benefit from this amazingly powerful experience that has helped billions from as far recorded history as ancient Egypt?” Hypnosis is not an exclusive club that only those born under a luck sign, can join. One thing we all have in common is that were all unique. In that we all have limitless potential, so hypnosis is something anyone can use not just a group that you can join.


These are just some of the most common objections I hear consistently from prospective client, I wrote them out here because,  in my own life I find my own reasons for not doing things to be very elusive. But it all boils down to the conscious need to retain something in our lives even if its extremely harmful to us, just because its what were used to or it’s a habit we learned when we were young, or we believe we can not live with out, what ever the reasons we have for limiting ourselves, when you look at it from an outside perspective they are all reasons that have a very poor foundation at best and will crumble when we see them as they are, just another excuse in to avoid the fear of not knowing who we would be if we were free of the limitations we have learned that keep us from getting the very things in life we truly want. After all where would you be if you woke up tomorrow and found everything in your life is going exactly the way you would like? That is an idea most people have an incredibly hard time even imagining simply because somewhere we learned that was how life works, you cant have everything you want, you can only have a few small victories now and again, but surely not everything. But what if you could get everything you want? I mean who would you be if your wildest dreams came true?

For those of you who can't imagine it...

Just try; really picture it for one moment...

Where would you be? What would you be doing? How happy would you be? What would you be seeing? Hearing? Tasting? Smelling? Is it day or night? Who are you with or are you alone? If you answer these questions you will have a good picture of what it would be like to have everything you want inside your mind.
And if you can do that...now I’m sure if you think about it, you will also see what it would take to actually reach that place you see in your mind. Like GI JOE said, "now you know, and knowing is half the battle."

I tell people all of the time, you are the person that has the power to change anything you want, only you have that ability.

That my friend is THE POWER OF ONE.

Children, Adults and Self Identification

A wise man once said “The value of marriage is not that adults produce children, but that children produce adults.”

Studies have shown that we go through many stages of development in life, and that by the age of 10 we have developed the core personality that we will have basically for the rest of our lives. From that time we simply expand and add to our personality changing in many ways, and in these changes constantly in flux is our state of self identification. We are all many things at different times and in many situations in our lives. Many of us are parents, and all of us are the children of our parents, then added to that are our occupations, etc… These are all various identifications we use to describe ourselves, and with these ways we describe ourselves we also have accompanying mind sets that we use to determine our reactions to certain stimulus, events and situations we encounter in our daily lives.

The other night while watching a program on TV I found an example I never expected to see on such a show. I am speaking about the TV Show called Kendra, for those of you whom have never seen it, it is a “reality” based show about the life of the former Playboy “Girl Next Door” named Kendra. The show documents her life after being a playboy model and former girlfriend of Playboy creator Hugh Heffner. Recently she had released a biography about her life that tells of her life before Playboy and her problems in her early years with drugs, how she was a teenage runaway, and how becoming a Playboy model had actually saved her from a very self destructive lifestyle, as she has described in her show. Now, in this particular episode she was promoting her book and she was conducting a phone interview with a radio disc jockey, which proceeded to tell her that her days of being a Playboy model were over and that she could no longer live the life of a “party girl” because she was married now and had a child. She became very upset about this conversation and with good reason I would say, and the next day had photographers at her home shooting a layout to have published in playboy. Her husband Hank came home as this was happening and she stopped her photo shoot to talk with him a bit and when he asked the question “are you doing this because of what the DJ said?” She said yes, as that was in fact the truth.

Now this struck me as quite an interesting pattern of behavior, her identity as a Playboy model had saved her from a lifestyle that she believes would have eventually killed her, and instead she had a modicum of success that a lot of people only dream of. She has a television show where she only has to be herself, and a family where she is loved and more than wanted.

Why O Why would the punny words of a guy, who’s job is no less than to be plainly obnoxious, upset her to the level where she has to have photographers and her clothes off trying to prove that she is still a “girl next door?”

Simple, this identity saved her, it preserved her and until it was brought to her attention she had not realized that her life had changed, just like a paper cut you didn’t notice until you saw it on your finger. But because of the importance this particular identity to her and its function in her life, immediately without thought it caused her to defend it in the only way she knows possible.

Often we associate identity the various roles we fill in our lives, most common I have found that our age is one of the biggest. At 38 I find that I feel exactly as I did when I was still 21, but I have noticed that at times things I have not done for years, for instance I used to role-play various games such as Dungeons & Dragons for a very large portion of my life, if you had asked me if I was a gamer at the time I would have told you life is gaming. But since I met my wife and became a father it’s a past time I have retired and actually do not miss in my life. Some could say I out grew it, but it is better described to say that I disassociated from that identity and integrated the new identities of, Father and Husband to my self identification, which infinitely I find to be more satisfying.

What ever the case these things we do, roles in life we adopt, events that change us and teach us to react in ways etc… theses things are the make up of how we recognize ourselves, and at times can cause us to do things that are pretty extreme to defend them. In Kendra’s case she had to bare it all in order to prove to herself that she is still her, but inevitably she will probably notice, she spends most of her time doing other things, taking care of her son, writing a book, signing books, obviously she spends very little time in the Playboy mansion, doing photo shoots, and instead of partying at clubs she throws parties at her house. So is she really the same? Not really. But does it hurt to allow her to feel safe that she is still the same since she left the Playboy world? No, sometimes we all need a little time to adapt to change until it feels comfortable enough for us to admit it to ourselves that we have changed.  

Bad Hypnotists

Often I can be quoted as saying the best Hypnotists in your life is you. Unfortunately the worst Hypnotists in anyone’s life is anyone else that uses any form of communication to effectively create a belief in our minds that is detrimental to our own well being, whether they meant well or not. It could be a teacher, a doctor, lawyer, or family member; we all use communication to express ourselves or to share ideas and thoughts. By definition when we communicate with another we are expressing ideas, emotions, and thoughts in order help this person gain an understanding of our own experiences. Now in doing this we inspire images, sounds, feelings to occur in another persons, that can at times be very compelling and may in fact change our model of the world and influence our thoughts and deeds in many ways. So in essence all communication is hypnosis. Sometimes these communications inspire us to overcome obstacles in our lives and other times they can be very harmful. Being a diabetic and a hypnotist I often find there is a great deal of laymen hypnotists in the world that truly mean well but in truth are very bad hypnotists and are completely unaware of how their advice can truly have very detrimental effect on the very people they are seeking to help. I call these people “Bad Hypnotists.” One group of people I have found over and over again that fall into this category are doctors. Just yesterday I had the fortune to have an experience that reminded me how a few simple words could change our lives and not so much for the better if we just accept the voice of authority and believe they are experts incapable of making mistakes.

A few days ago I had to reorder my prescription medications from the mail order service I use and when I did my doctor refused my refill my prescriptions until I could be seen by the doctor. After a phone call and argument with the nurse I scheduled an appointment at the end of the discussion and few days later I went to see my doctor.

When I came into the office they weren’t very busy almost as fast as I sat down in the waiting room I was called in to go to one of the exam rooms, and after a blood pressure test and a brief conversation about how my blood pressure never lowering beyond a certain point with my current prescription the nurse advised me to speak to the doctor about that. The nurse then tells me about someone in the office that wants to quit smoking and is interested in using hypnosis to do it. I thought that was a good thing at least I could get a client and make something out of the time I was there and could get a positive conclusion to my visit there one way or the other.

Then the doctor came in a moment later and that’s when things started to go down hill.  After a few minutes of talking the doctor weighed me and applauded me for losing weight since my last visit. Then proceeded to tell me he wanted me to “lose 20 pounds by my next visit in 6 months, because most people once they reach 300 pounds almost always gain up to 400 pounds almost overnight.” He then proceeds to tell me he noticed I looked tired and yawned in his presence. So then he asked to listen to my lungs and when he was done he stopped and said to me “I know you don’t believe that you have Sleep Apnea, but I believe you do, but I‘m not going to argue with you about that today.”
I looked at him and said “Doc do you realize I sleep for about 4 hours every night, and I have 2 children that have night terrors that wake me up to clam them at least 2 to 3 times per night so what little bit of sleep I get is punctuated at almost every night?” He then totally ignores what I just said and replies by asking “your wife never complains that you snore?” A bit frustrated I tell him how my wife is an extremely light sleeper and knows I do not snore, and has refuted this claim from previous nurses and a doctor that simply would not believe that I am free of this problem. He then says “oh well she just probably doesn’t hear you when you do because she is tired from the new baby.” Then he sides steps the entire conversation and says “by the way congratulations on the new baby.”

The rest of my visit with him is a series of small arguments like this where he says something was either happening to me or will happen to me, including another warning about my weight and a reminder about the possibility of having to use insulin in the future if I didn’t lose weight.

I hear this everyday in my day job and in the people that surround me, since I began studying hypnotism my eyes have been opened to these kinds of suggestions that are give so off hand and careless by others that can and do sometimes create real problems where none had existed before these types of bad or negative suggestions are give to my friends or loved ones.  And today I bring this up because I want everyone not only to just listen to themselves because after all we are only human and we communicate with others everyday many times per day, and I want everyone to remember behind every problem there is a solution and a reason. Sometimes all it takes is one small comment that can cause things that are terminal and life threatening. But we always have the option to use words to bring great joy and fortune to those that surround us if we just use a positive phrase to express ourselves instead of a negative, and chose to not accept the deceptive words that negatively stated can bring great sorrow and pain.

One way to remember this is this; if I told you simply “don’t think of a blue tree!” The way our minds work is this in order for you to not think of a blue tree you must first think of it and then negate it. So no matter what you do you must first think of a blue tree to not think of it. This is the nature of suggestion, once said and it reaches our ears, it has already entered our minds and can not be avoided unless we make the decision to cancel out its affect. A doctor once told me that my pancreas was going to fail and that he knew this as a fact with out the ability to test it. I asked him what the odds were that he was incorrect; his reply was you have a 1 out of 99 chance. I simply looked at him dead serious and said “doc, I feel sorry for 99 people right now.” He then said you don’t get it you don’t get to chose.” And I just smiled and said “really? I thought you had a degree in medicine and were a doctor. Because right now you’re playing fortune teller and that I know is not taught in medical school! And I always have a choice!” And my friends so do you.

To me anyone who tries to tell anyone any different is just another bad hypnotist.

The Meta Model of Language

The Meta Model of Language

Today I thought I would write about something that is not only quite interesting but also that I also find useful in my everyday life. It is about the way that we express ourselves. Most times in casual conversation we say things that are meant to express our feelings but due to our need to leave out certain details, or draw importance to others we speak in ways that are vague, generalized, or even incomplete. In NLP we use certain filters that restore the meaning of our communication in order to best understand these details that can make a big difference in our ability to understand the nature of our communications with other people.

Below is a listing with descriptions of certain “filters” we use while communicating followed along with the type of question you can use to recover the missing or distorted information from just about any statement.

These are examples of common Distortions we use in conversation:

1.)    Nominalization: This is a word that is use to freeze a process in time.

Example: “We just can’t communicate.” 

Response: “How would you like to communicate? If were talking now, how is it we have failed to communicate?”

(* This is my favorite, I hear nominalizations all day every day!)

2.)    Mind Reading: This is claiming to know a persons internal state.

Example: “You have a problem with authority.”

Response: “how do you know….? What lets you know…?”

3.)    Cause – Effect: Someone or something is causing something without an adequate                           

      description.

      Example: “You make me angry.”

      Response: “How does what I’m doing cause you to feel angry?”

4.)    Complex Equivalence: Two experiences interpreted as being similar.

Example: “The look he is giving me means he doesn’t like me.”

Response: “Has anyone you ever know given you a look like that and liked you?”

                 “How do you know he doesn’t like you because of how he looked at

                   you?”

     

5.)    Presupposition: Presupposes something in the statement is assumed true.

Example: “If she knew the importance of  school. She would study harder.”

Response: “What makes you believe that she doesn’t know the importance of                         

                    school?

                              “How do you know that statement is true?”

These are examples of Generalizations used in conversation.

6.)    Universal Quantifiers: Universal generalizations such as all, every, never, no one, Etc…        

      Example: “Everyone lies to their parents.”

      Response: “Everyone? No one tells their parents the truth?”

7.)    Modal Operators: Words that describe reasons for doing something:

a.)    Operators of necessity / desire given as should, shouldn’t, must, must not,     

      have to, need to, it is a necessity, etc…

Example: I have to take car of her.”

Response: “What would happen if you did? What would happen if you didn’t?     

                   Or?”

                  

                 b.)Operators of possibility / impossibility as in can, can not, will, wont, may, 

                      may not, possible, impossible.

            Example: “I can’t tell him the truth”

            Response: “What stops you? What would happen if you did?”

8.)    Lost Per formative: a statement that makes reference to something that was said by another person with out identifying the source.

Example: “Her book was highly acclaimed.”

Response: “Acclaimed by whom?”

Finally these are simple Deletions in witch and important element is missing from a statement.

9.)    Simple Deletions:

Example: “This is really important to me.”

Response: “What is important to you? How important is this exactly? What is                    

                    this?”

    10.) Comparative deletion: This is a statement where a comparison is made but the    

                                                   basis for comparison is unstated.

            Example: “This is so unfair.”    Response: “How is this unfair?”

                            “I feel worse that ever.” Response: “Worse than before what?”

11.) Lack of referential index: Is to the use of personal pronouns (they,                      

                them, you, he, she, men, women, ...) when the context is unknown.

      Example: “They don’t listen to me.”

      Response: “ Who doesn’t listen to you?

12.) Unspecified Verb: This is a statement where the person doing the acting or                            

                                        desired action is left out of the sentence.

      Example: “You don’t care about me.”
      Response: “How specifically do I not care about you?”

The English Language can be very confusing and frustrating to understand. But for all the work we have done in our lives to learning to express ourselves through this language form where every word has atleast 2 menings, we do have some added benefits to show for our efforts. Our minds have learned to use it so well that right now, you’re reading this and you can do nothing but understand the words and not have to think about it. When we were young we worked very hard in school to practice, practice, practice, so that we could learn our letters, and sentence structures and pronunciations and now its so automatic its second nature to us But. to me the most unique thing about it all is this:

No mttaer how I tpye tihs you can raed tish as lnog as the frist and lsat lteter of evrey wrod is corerct tihs is our brians intreprtieng egenislh for us in its msot craetvie way! But tihs is aotnher sjbucet for anthoer tmie.

Now to me... the fact alone that you can read that, is very cool!

The Value of a Yo-Yo

Yesterday a friend of mine told me about a problem that about made me slap my forehead for 2 reasons; 1 because I had a good inkling of what the solution to the problem could be and 2 because I had not previously realized this to use it earlier in my own life a couple of times previously when my own kids had some problems in school with certain teachers. The problem is my friends daughter has a teacher that is basically being of no help to her in a certain subject and her grades are suffering significantly. Most times we attribute such problems to our children’s reluctance to do work that was assigned or maybe even allowing personality conflicts with a teacher to hinder if not completely stop any possibility of learning anything about a particular subject, and first reaction is always to blame the child and tell them to work harder or to try harder and sometimes this actually does solve the problem. After all when they grow up they are going to face this almost daily in their life and where better a place to learn to overcome this type of adversity than in school?

But once it’s established that it’s not the child’s fault and they are doing as much as they can to overcome this problem where does the real problem lie? Is it in the teacher, the school board, or even the education system itself? Or the worst thought of all I think “maybe they just aren’t cut out for this particular subject.”  This phrase I believe should be eradicated from our vernacular as it is one of the most destructive things one can level on a child. Just by saying it creates limitations that may stand in the way in their future for a life time.

A few years before I met my wife I reached a point in my life where I was doing the same thing over and over and really I felt I had no prospect of ever achieving anything near what I had envisioned when I was younger, and I had to ask myself, “is this all there is to life?”  I actually questioned all the things my parents and teachers had told me about how I could do anything at all if I just applied myself and shouldn’t let anything stand in my way. Over the years I noticed that this message went missing from a lot of the teachings I was to receive in almost every area of my life and was being replaced with the phrase “you can’t do anything unless ….”  The thing with this is that it actually teaches us what is referred to as conditioned helplessness. To better illustrate here is an example of conditioned helplessness.

Many of us have been to a circus or two, and as a part of any good circus it must have ELEPHANTS! Now elephants are large and very powerful animals, once trained and utilized in combat situations of the old world. Hannibal used them to cross the Alps, and lay waste to the Roman armies. They could crush a man with one foot or with their trunk, let alone the potential to deal death and destruction with their tusks. With all this raw power why is it you see elephants when not performing in the circus out side in the back held down by a bit of chain and a large wooden stake hammered into the ground?  Doesn’t the elephant know how strong he is? Do the trainers and handlers know he could simply walk away and the chain and stake would offer no resistance? Of course they do. But you see as a point in training elephants when they are very young they tie them to a post sticking out of the ground that has a solid base of concrete heavier than the elephant, so that the elephant tries and tries to walk away and only finds he can’t and eventually it accepts that they are held fast to this post and there is no escaping it, so they stop trying and from that point on they never try again believing every stake they are tied to is like the first one and accept it.

Humans it seems do the same thing as the elephants. We get used to doing things in a prescribed method or in the case of schools the preferred method is the standardized method. This would work flawlessly if we were all standardized people, but in truth we are not. Various means and methods are required to truly educate the students at any educational facility. A flexible approach in teaching is required always; the students need to be flexible to learn in different styles and ways of learning, as teachers need to be flexible in their style of teaching to truly teach the students if they are to learn anything.

As a parent I have had to learn this first hand, to get my four year old to know the value of certain things, I deduced a method to teach him and so far it works well. See my son got a dollar and bought a dollar store Yo-Yo, he was so happy he could burst with excitement. And of course in five minutes after we left the store and he dropped it and it shattered. The next one was a bit better a two dollar Yo-Yo from a bit better store. That one lasted a couple of hours before his little brother took it and hit the wall with it and it broke. Now he knows 1 dollar was wasted in 5 minutes and 2 dollars was wasted in a couple of hours. But a good Yo-Yo that wont break so easy costs five dollars! He wants this Yo-Yo pretty bad and he’s going have to work to get it. But in this he also now understand that our TV cost’s 40 Yo-Yo’s, His bike costs 6 Yo-Yo’s, and 1 happy meal from Mc Donald’s is almost as much as 1 Yo-Yo. I couldn’t be prouder! I’m his Dad and one of his teacher’s. When I saw he didn’t understand larger numbers beyond 10 yet, I noticed he understood 5 in relations to the cost of the Yo-Yo and I was flexible enough to see if he knew this he could learn larger numbers easily with the right reference to draw from.  I have to admit yes it’s cute and I’m going to enjoy it as long as I can.  But I will keep looking for better ways to teach him that allow him understand easier and better, I expect no less of anyone else that makes their career or had the urge and passion to follow their dreams to teach as a career.

Most teachers I believe are out there doing everything they can think of to teach the students they have in their class. But even one bad teacher can give the impression that all of them are just there to follow a curriculum and/or a book and let those who “get it” learn. In either case they all get paid to do their job to educate others. The pay rate in some cases can be very insulting. But either way if you look at what they make.

That’s a lot of Yo-Yo’s!