When I was 14 years old I was very interested in hypnosis. I imagined that one day I would be a stage hypnotist.

I hypnotized a few friends at school and I remember always being successful. I never once failed.

I had immediate success with my friend Paul when I was able to make him into a human plank suspended between two chairs. And, when I went home for vacation I hypnotized my brothers and sisters.

One of my sisters took the word 'sleep' literally and fell into a sound sleep. When my mother got home she was quite upset with me because it took some time to wake her.

My youngest brother recently reminded me that I had hypnotized him too and this too had upset my mother.

Fifty years later, I am still fascinated with hypnosis and only recently became a certified hypnotist. I learned to handle all of these unusual happenings.

Hypnosis is not sleep. In order to hear what the hypnotist is saying to guide you, you need to be in a focused state of awareness.

We enter into a hypnotic state when we are reading, watching a movie, listening to a good story, when we daydream or when we are falling asleep at night.

So hypnosis is very natural and has been experienced by everyone at one time or another and often every day.

My interest in hypnosis extends to its use on the page. I wonder how others, like yourself, can learn to use it to their benefit?

An Exercise

Do you remember a time in your life when you dreamed of growing up and becoming a fireman or nurse or some other person? Did you ever use dolls or a toy fire truck to pretend?

You pretended to be that person in that role. You didn't stop to say to yourself, "I don't believe that I can do that!" You simply played the role and you acted out what you thought the person did as fireman or nurse.

Go back to that time now and remember how you felt, how you pictured yourself,  the innocence of the moment, when you believed you could do whatever you believed without reservation.

If you remember how you did that as a child, or when you are watching a movie or reading a book, then it becomes easier to do it now.

Perceptual Shift

Once you are aware of an new idea that helps you understand and change your thinking or behavior, you can never go back again, never return to the old way of thinking.

If I told you the world was flat, would you accept that idea? Imagine what people  felt many years ago, when they believed the world was flat,  and they were finally convinced that the earth was in fact round.

What effect did that have on their beliefs? I am sure that the immediate effect was to begin to question all their beliefs. They certainly would try to keep an open mind in relation to how they perceived the world.

Then there is the emotional shock this would create and, combined with this new idea, this would create a lasting change in their thinking and behavior.

Talk about a mind shift, a perceptual shift, a suspension of disbelief. Talk about an immediate and dramatic effect.

Can you imagine that shift in your mind? Could you go back to believing otherwise?

Hypnosis can create exactly these effects in a very short time. At least once in our lifetimes, everyone should experience a guided hypnosis. By experiencing hypnosis, we learn how to use that same tool for our benefit.

Make the Tool Yours - 5 Steps

Daydreaming a role is a very powerful tool.

1) Remember a time when you used a hypnotic state such as daydreaming. 

2) Get rid of your objections to change by suspending your disbelief, by bypassing your critical factor, by silencing your critical mind just as you did when your were a child.

3) Remember your feelings and memories of that time,  and bring those into the present. Add more drama and increase the strength of the feelings for the dream you are creating.

4) Add feelings of joy and happiness and success to the mix. Extend the feelings from the tip of your toes to the top of your head. Just pretend for a change. Be curious about what you can imagine.

Even better, write it down like a story. Include all the details. How you look and feel. How others treat you. And, every day, do a little bit to move toward this new you.

5) Keep on dreaming until you feel that it is effortless, until you feel that doing whatever it takes to get to that goal is not a sacrifice.

If you are determined to change, then change will be effortless. You will not need to be constantly fighting with some part of yourself because it fears and objects to change.

If you are fighting with yourself then the change you dreamed for yourself is probably not for you.

Make this 'in-the-moment' hypnosis your tool for change. Add dramatic feeling to it, while imagining yourself in a new role. Pretend you see yourself doing everything successfully and with confidence.