Here are 3 different hypnotic induction techniques. The first is based on utilizing a person’s leisure interests, the second is a more structured technique that many hypnotherapists use, that we have refined to make it more effective, and lastly, a technique based on utilizing a previous trance state to re-induce hypnosis.

Trance Inductions Utilising Leisure Interests

People enjoy participating in leisure activities for many reasons but not many people realise that one of the main reasons they enjoy it so much is because they enter a trance state as part of the activity.

Every leisure activity induces a state of receptivity.

Most people enjoy leisure activities. One of the reasons for this seeming addiction to leisure pursuits is the associated state of receptivity that accompanies every leisure activity. All activities are naturally trance inducing. For example, dancing and sports have a trance component in the same way that watching television or listening to music has a trance component. Because leisure activities are desired and experienced by most people, most people are familiar with the trance experience associated with them. However Patients are not usually aware that this particular state of reverie or trance is the same state required for hypnosis. By asking the Patient to think about their leisure activities and informing them that the state associated with their leisure activities is the required state for hypnosis the therapist is helping the Patient realise that they are already qualified to experience hypnosis.

Trance can be induced by recalling the leisure activity.

The therapist should give analogies about trance experience in everyday life. Analogies about ensuing trances that happen spontaneously when one daydreams or watches television can actually re-induce a similar trance state in the Patient. Alternatively, the therapist can direct the Patient to recall one of his own leisure activities. The therapist should judge whether an explicit request to recall a familiar leisure activity is the best way to re-induce trance or whether a more indirect approach based on the therapist’s own leisure interests is more effective. What might work for one Patient may not work for another.

Different leisure activities produce different trance states.

The trance states associated with sports are different from those associated with watching TV and other similar activities. The sports trance is a focused concentration on an activity where all of the senses are tuned acutely towards the activity. The TV trance however is a turning inwards type of trance where the senses are relaxed and not focused externally. Generally speaking, activities such as watching TV, listening to music, reading a book, painting a painting are better for inducing hypnosis than the more highly concentrated types of activities.

Trance is state-bound to contexts and associations.

All activities are state-bound. By state-bound we mean that a Patient enters a particular psychological and physiological state whenever they carry out some activity. When they move from one context or activity to another the psychological and physiological state changes. When they then return to the same activity at a later date they also return to the same psychological and physiological state. This is true of hypnosis. When a Patient re-enters trance he re-enters the same psychological and physiological state that occurred the first time he went into a trance state. By asking a Patient to recall a leisure activity we are re-evoking its associated state enabling the patient to automatically recall the same feelings. Therapists should always remember this principle of state bound experience whenever working therapeutically.

Examples of leisure activity trances:

• Daydreaming.
• Watching television.
• Listening to music.
• Reading a book.
• Concentrating on a task.
• Enjoying a sport.
• Listening to a lecture.
• Dancing.
• Performing music.
• Painting, drawing etc.

Contraindications of utilising leisure trance.

Some people experience trance states when driving a car. The therapist should avoid using the driving trance experience as a hypnotic induction and also avoid discussing it in case the hypnotic trance is indirectly associated (anchored) with future driving. If Patients have driven to a session it is usually a good idea to also suggest that they re-orientate fully before driving home. Associations between hypnotic trance and everyday leisure activities should only be drawn when those leisure activities do not involve danger. Or if you want an ethical hypnotic induction with more of a structure try this:

Hypnotic Induction Using a Visualised Staircase

First time your suggestions with the Patient’s breathing.

As the Patient exhales you should give suggestions for going deeper into trance. If you are counting, then each number that you count should be associated with an exhalation. By telling the Patient they can go deeper with each number, indirectly they will be helping themselves to go deeper simply by breathing. You do not have to count with each breath, you may prefer to count every’ other breath. This will give you the opportunity to intersperse suggestions along with the counting. By counting and pacing your suggestions with the Patient’s breathing you will be reinforcing rapport.

You should utilise all of the Patient’s sensory systems

Because the Patient experiences hypnosis with his visual, auditory and kinaesthetic sense, your induction should have visual inputs, auditory and kinaesthetic inputs. The staircase induction consists of a journey, one step at a time, down a flight of twenty stairs. As the Patient takes this journey he hears the sound of the therapist’s voice, he sees each Stair in front of him, he feels each stair under his foot. You should encourage the Patient to experience this induction in all three sense systems. At the bottom of the stairs the Patient can see a door, this door could be to the left, it could be in the centre or it could be to the right. There are not three doors, there is only one door. The therapist should ask the Patient to notice where the door is. By asking the Patient this it will get the Patient to become more absorbed in the experience. Behind the door is a room with a comfortable chair and as the Patient sits down in the chair he can see a small cinema screen on which appears a very relaxing scene.

During the induction you should slow down your voice, lower your volume, lower your pitch and deepen your tonality.

These changes should occur gradually as the induction progresses. The therapist starts the induction at normal volume and tempo etc. At the deepest part of the trance the therapist should have the maximum alteration to his voice. By changing his voice in this way the therapist is matching the Patient’s experience of going deeper into trance. This also helps the Patient anchor the trance experience to the therapist’s voice. In future sessions the therapist need only talk in this special way and the Patient will start to go back into trance again.

You should appear confident and take your time.

As you are pacing your suggestions and counting with the Patient’s breathing it will be difficult for you to rush. It’s very important that you give the Patient as much time as is necessary to experience the trance state. When you talk to the Patient you should appear confident and knowledgeable. If you communicate doubt through hesitation or lack of confidence then the Patient will pick this communication up. This will cause a loss of rapport and a lack of trust. So always appear confident and take your time.

You should bring the person out of hypnosis by reversing the induction procedure.

This principle doesn’t apply in every case. But in the case of the staircase induction it is very important. It is also a way of learning all of the steps of the staircase induction. When the therapist decides to bring the Patient out, usually after about five minutes, the therapist will ask the Patient to watch the picture on the screen and then to experience standing up from the imaginary chair the Patient is seeing in the trance state and to walk out of the room, out of the door and slowly come up the stairs. As the Patient comes up the stairs the therapist can count backwards from twenty to one. Remember that when there are twenty stairs the therapist counts from one to twenty to go down into trance and from twenty to one to come out of trance. When the therapist counts from twenty to one to bring the Patient out of trance he should time the numbers with the Patient’s inhalations this time. Likewise the therapist’s tonality, pitch, volume etc. should change in accordance with the depth of trance as the Patient comes out. The therapist’s voice should get louder, the tonality should harden, the pitch should rise until the voice sounds perfectly normal as in everyday conversation. When the trance has been terminated thank your Patient and ask for their experiences. How about something very simple – if the client has been hypnotised before:

Hypnotic Induction Based on Recalling a Previous Experience of Hypnosis

Trance can be induced by recalling appropriate trance contexts and associations.

By talking about previous times when the Patient actually was hypnotised the therapist can help the Patient re-access the appropriate psychological and physiological state associated with the earlier trance experience. The therapist requests that the Patient remember what happened in the hypnotic context thereby bringing back memories associated to feelings, the feelings are directly the result of the change in psychological and physiological state induced by the recall of memories of the trance. This is possibly the quickest form of hypnotic induction available. Simply by requesting that the Patient recall a previous trance the trance is re-induced.

Always use a positive and successful example of a previous trance.

When you first meet your Patient, ask them if they have been hypnotised successfully before. Ask them what it was like and whether it was beneficial. If the previous experience was positive then you can use that induction as a re-induction procedure. All you need to do is ask the Patient to recall the trance induction as you slowly feed back their words, re-capping the stages of the trance induction and compounding their experience by emphasising their minimal cues.

Rapid Inductions

What is all this talk about rapid inductions? It seems that everywhere you look on the Internet you see people offering to teach “rapid inductions”. What does a rapid induction demonstrate other than the hypnotist’s need to prove that he has the power to put someone into hypnosis quickly? It’s about the hypnotist’s ego, it’s not about helping the client. I see very little therapeutic benefit in putting someone into hypnosis in such a controlling way.

Our approach taught at British Hypnosis Research is based on respectfully helping clients resolve their problems for themselves at an unconscious level, and with the hypnotherapist’s role perceived as an observer of the therapeutic process. We want our clients to leave the therapy session believing that they were responsible for their changes themselves and that they don’t have to submit to someone zapping them into an altered state, taking over their mind and reprogramming them to be someone else. We want to empower clients, not dis-empower them.

Rapid inductions, direct and authoritarian hypnosis techniques and stage hypnosis is for entertainment only and has no place in a responsible hypnotherapy practice. If you want an effective yet indirect and respectful hypnotic induction technique, learn how to put clients into trance with the above techniques.

Trainee hypnotherapists need to know when someone is going into trance or is already experiencing hypnotic trance, because when people go into hypnosis many changes occur, and the hypnotherapist needs to utilise these changes. These changes should always be noticed instantly by the observant therapist. These changes are called Minimal Cues. These are the identifiers of hypnotic trance. The changes below do not always happen in every hypnotic subject but most will be seen at some time during the trance experience.

Eyefixation.

One of the main principles of hypnosis is to capture attention. If you are telling a compelling story or are using direct eye contact the subject will often de-focus their gaze and have their eyes fixed on either a random place in the room (maybe visualising the story you are telling) or on your eye contact. In these cases you will often see a lack of blink reflex and open eye catalepsy (inability to blink or close the eyes).

Pupil dilation.

When the subject’s eyes defocus you will see a relaxing of the muscles around the eyes and, depending on the amount of illumination in the room, pupil dilation.

Change in blink reflex.

Often the subject’s blink reflex will start to slow down. This is a sign that the subject is going into trance. You can utilise this slowing down in two ways:

1. You can match the movement of your own eye blinks to that of the subject and then gradually slow down your blink reflex to non-verbally suggest to the subject that their eye lids will shut.
2. You can associate a hypnotic command such as “deeper”, “heavier” or “comfort” to their eye blinks. By repeating the command each time they blink, even if it occurs in mid-sentence as you speak, you will be associating, unconsciously, the feelings related to the commands, to the eye blink. This will induce further blinking and then eye closure.

Rapid Eye Movement

When people dream their eyes move rapidly back and forth from left to right. They are visualising images associated with their dream. The same phenomena happens in trance. Often you will see REM (Rapid Eye Movement) when you ask the subject to visualise something.

Eyelid Flutter

Some subjects develop an eyelid flutter. This is an automatic response in some people and does not indicate nervousness of any kind. If the subject is concerned about it you can utilise the flutter as a ratification of the trance by commenting on how this particular phenomena is characteristic of a good hypnotic subject.

Smoothing of facial muscles.

The muscles in the face will usually smooth out and the patient will appear more attractive. They will lose signs of tension in their face and their jaw or shoulders may drop a little. Sometimes subjects hold on to the tension in their jaw or shoulders and you may need to encourage them to relax these muscles with some gentle indirect suggestions.

Slowing of respiration.

The subject’s breathing will usually slow down and may get deeper. If the breathing becomes too laboured they may have fallen asleep, in which case you should gently wake them and start the induction again. Usually they develop a nice slow comfortable breathing rate and you can associate words like comfort and deeper to this rhythm to encourage these feelings. It is better to associate these words with the subject’s exhalations as the body is naturally relaxing more on the out-breath.

Reduction of the swallow reflex.

People normally swallow about once or twice every minute. In hypnosis this swallowing can stop altogether. It is not unusual to find a subject not swallowing for half an hour. If the swallow reflex does not stop altogether there is usually at least a slowing down of the reflex. If you see an increase in swallowing it is a sign that the subject is a little nervous.The increase in swallowing is not caused by an excess of saliva but by a dryness in the mouth. This dryness is caused by apprehension or fear and the swallowing is generally a conscious response made by the subject to prove to themselves that they can still swallow comfortably. Sometimes very nervous subjects get quite concerned with this difficulty in swallowing. If this is perceived then you should re-assure the subject without placing too much emphasis on the difficulty they are having.

Body Immobility.

The subject will also develop a comfortable immobility in the body and limbs. They may adjust their position once or twice to get comfortable but after that they usually relax into a comfortable position. If the subject continues to fidget they may be nervous or the chair may be uncomfortable. If they are nervous you can give suggestions that they need not go any deeper into a trance than is right for them at that moment.

Inner absorption.

When people daydream they appear very absorbed in their inner thoughts. They will often demonstrate all of the above Minimal Cues. So inner absorption is a term used to describe the collective cues of trance.

Response Attentiveness

You can usually tell good hypnotic subjects by watching for their minimal cues. Pupil dilation is a good indicator of trance responsiveness. The term “Response Attentiveness” describes the collective minimal cues of trance. In the context of a therapy session you will see the Patient “drift off” from time to time during the conversation. This is usually accompanied by a shift in the facial expression, a softening of the facial muscles, sometimes looking away, de-focusing and a slowing of the respiration. When you see this special combination of cues you can encourage trance to develop further by going in to your “trance style” of communication. The Patient will associate your shift in communication style with their shift into an altered state and its associated minimal cues.
You should look for head nods and signs of agreement. Within the context of a group conversation you can usually identify the most responsive hypnotic subjects by watching for a combination of pupil dilation and head nodding. Assuming that their pupil size is not due to a medical condition or medication, the person with the largest pupils who is also appearing to listen intently by nodding their head is the most likely hypnotic subject.

Communicating with the Unconscious

In hypnotherapy there is pre-supposition that the Patient has a conscious and an unconscious mind.

Of course this is only a model. This model has evolved from the early Freudian concept of the unconscious being a seething pit of repressed memories and experiences revolving around sex to the more humanistic perception of theunconscious mind being a reservoir of resources and skills to be nurtured and treasured. In hypnotherapy we include a bit of both of these poles.

We see one of the functions of the unconscious as being the security guard of traumatic feelings and emotions. In this mode the unconscious holds back some experiences and memories to protect the Patient from pain. Whilst these experiences and memories may be negative they are not necessarily caused by early sexual experience.

One of the unconscious mind’s other functions is to store and sort positive experiences and memories. It is from this “store” that the therapist takes his ideas for therapeutic interventions. The third function is to oversee the bodies autonomous processes and healing mechanism.

Therapists prefer talking to the unconscious rather than the conscious mind.

The conscious mind contains the Patient’s learned limitations. These limitations often get in the way of successful therapy. After all, if the Patient knew consciously how to get better, why would they come to a therapist. Despite this obvious revelation many Patients like to participate consciously in their own healing or treatment. It is only natural that Patients should try and help themselves through conscious effort. So the therapist also has to educate the Patient about the functions of the conscious and unconscious mind and play down the former whilst praising the latter. Analogies About the Patient “taken for granted” abilities such being able to write their name without effort or tie a shoelace without thinking serve to highlight the enormous competency and dexterity of the unconscious mind.

Some Patients have difficulty with the concept of mind.

As the mind is physically elusive it is often had for analytical type Patients to accept it as a reality. Of course they are quite justified in doing so as it is only a model after all

– designed so that we can write books about it. With these kinds of Patients is useful to talk about the mind in terms of brain. The brain has two hemispheres. This is fact. It is also fact that the two sides of the brain have different functions. Each controlling different cognitive processes, behaviours and emotions. The right brain is seen as the creative, dreaming and imaginative brain whilst the left brain is seen as the analytical, logical and reasoning brain. In terms of conscious I unconscious processes we can suggest that the right brain is more likely to be the centre of unconscious process and the left brain to be more responsible for conscious thought.

Because the body is wired to the two hemispheres cross laterally we can also surmise that one side of the body, the left side, is more closely linked via the right brain to unconscious processes. The reverse being true for conscious processes.

Most of the language skills we use in indirect hypnotherapy are designed to appeal to the unconscious mind.

Whilst we will often tell the conscious mind to “go and do something else” whilst we work intimately with the Patients unconscious. By working more closely with the unconscious (right brain) of the Patient we hope to bypass the conscious resistance or sabotage sometimes introduced by the Patient’s conscious doubts about the method of treatment. Patients are most persistent in wanting to help themselves, and the therapist, resolve the issues they bring into therapy. Only by developing an honest relationship with the Patient’s unconscious cognitive processes can we truly hope to work therapeutically without interference from the part of the Patient that has perhaps created their problem in the first place and certainly is an ongoing participant in its maintenance.

One of the most classic hypnosis inductions is the Arm Levitation Induction. This class of induction has been used by most hypnotherapists over time and the idea is that as the client’s arm raises into the air (seemingly by itself) the client goes deeper into hypnosis. American psychiatrist Milton Erickson refined the technique by applying his “indirect” hypnotic skills and developed it into a utilisation approach, and it is Erickson’s approach that I have been teaching for the past 25 years.

Previously, the therapist would suggest levitation in a direct and authoritarian manner. Unfortunately this gave the impression that the arm levitation was caused by the “power” of the hypnotist. Erickson’s approach allowed the client to experience the arm levitation happening from inside him/her self as if the response were the result of unconscious processes causes by the association of ideas.
Erickson would often “seed” ideas and suggestions for hypnotic phenomena long before he asked for it to happen formally. By offering casual anecdotes, analogies and metaphors about lifting, lightness and levitation he would seed the idea of arm levitation so that the client’s unconscious mind picked up on the indirect suggestion for arm levitation to occur.

Anticipation and Expectancy compound the success of arm levitation. You should expect the arm to lift whilst leaving a little room for escape in case it doesn’t because the client will usually pick up on apprehension and doubt communicated by a therapist who lacks confidence. When you attempt an arm levitation you should pace yourself so as to be one step ahead of the client. You can do this by paying attention to the experience and physiology of the client. If an arm is going to lift the client will tell you in their own way either verbally or non-verbally.

So, now to the actual arm levitation itself – first you should draw the client’s attention to any differences between their right arm and left arm. You should do this in an enquiring way and with an anticipation that there will be a difference. Your anticipation of a difference will be picked up by the client at an unconscious level and this will create expectation on behalf of the client, and this is where your indirect language skills will prove useful.

Further requests to pay attention to the difference will compound the sensations in either arm. You can uses almost any difference in sensation as a starting point – warmth, cold, lightness, heaviness, numbness, pins and needles etc. As soon as the client recognises one sensation in one arm you can imply that they will experience the opposite sensation in the other arm, you can do this with enquiring questions such as “and how does that compare to the feelings in your other arm?”. You can further suggest that the more one arm feels one sensation the more the other arm will feel the opposite sensation. So you work one sensation against the other. Warmth and coolness, heaviness and lightness, sensitivity and numbness etc. This is called the law of reversed effect. Obviously if one hand feels heavier than the other, then the other will feel lighter. You are only capitalising on naturally occurring phenomena.

The next step is to lead the client into expecting the arm to lift. You can do this by overlapping your suggestions of sensations to suggestions of lifting in one arm more the other, you might even suggest that one arm can get lighter and the other gets heavier. Visualisation often compounds the success of arm levitation so sometimes you might want to ask the client to imagine their arm lifting while their eyes are closed. This is a kind of rehearsal technique. However, while this often works very well, sometimes the client believes that the imagined arm levitation is real and does not actually lift the arm as part of the hypnotic phenomena. As long as the client “believes” that the arm has levitated it does not matter.

The hypnotic trance can be deepened with a real or imaginary arm levitation, in the same way that if you think of a juicy lemon being sliced, you may start to salivate. The arm levitation is a hypnotic induction, a trance deepener, and a trance ratifier combined. It can also be used as a physical metaphor for muscle control for therapy. Further deepening of the hypnotic trance can be achieved by slowing lowering the client’s arm back to their lap.

As you can see the details or each step are quite complex, especially as they overlap each other. So the technique needs to be learned directly from observing a demonstration and being guided in practice by a good teacher.

Stephen Brooks