What is hypnosis
Hypnosis is an altered state of consciousness, its a narrow focus of attention. Its a natural state that we can go into many times per day. For instance when you are daydreaming, reading a book, watching a movie or when you are driving a familiar route in your car, you are in a state of hypnosis. It’s also an optimum state for making positive changes in your life.
What is hypnotherapy
It’s simply using a therapeutic technique to assist a client with their goals, when they are in a trance state. For instance, I’ve never seen a client who ever enjoyed smoking the very first time. If you think about it, it’s something that makes you smell and has a good chance of killing you longer term. So why do people do it, well most people first start in their teens because they want to be cool or sexy. Then over time your unconscious mind accepts the fact that you are a smoker. Then about 30 years later, people start to get some kind of health related issue, and try to stop, but find it difficult to stop. This is because the unconscious mind still links up the original said benefits to smoking. So when I get the call, I can put a client in a trance state I will bypass the critical factor (which is like a guardian at the gate of your conscious mind allowing me access to your unconscious mind). And as long as what I say does not go against your will, morels, values or beliefs and is a benefit to you, you will accept and take these onboard, I will also use a variety of other techniques to get leverage so you will see yourself as non smoker. That is why it’s only a single session.
How Long have you been in practice
I formally joined the National Council of Hypnotherapy in 2006, then qualified in 2007 with diplomas in hypnotherapy and NLP and stated to see/charge clients then. Upon qualifying I was also selected by my training school to setup and run a practice in Leeds, which I did for a number of years. I then went onto doing a variety of specialist training in hypnotherapy, following that I was eligible to do a fast track course in hypno-psychotherapy at The National College of Hypnosis and Psychotherapy. Before I trained in 2006, I also did a variety of distance learning hypnotherapy courses to develop my skills and had a few mentors I trained with in the field of personal development such as Tony Robbins, who stared in the documentary “I’m not your guru”.
Are you a member of any accredited hypnotherapy organisations
I’ve been a member of the National Council of Hypnotherapy since 2006, I’ve also been a member of the National Guild of Hypnotist (USA) and a member of The National College of Hypnosis and Psychotherapy.
How much do you charge
My fees are stated on my prices page, but I never got into hypnotherapy for the money. I even left a job in finance (which paid a lot more money), to do this m, as it’s something I am passionate about. I have just increased my fees (the first time in 10 years), and mainly because it’s more inline with what other experienced hypnotherapists. In my early days, I wanted to help everyone I could and I would not charge them. What I found though, was that people think it’s not worth anything so must not be any good. Using money helps get leverage on a client in order for them to make the required changes. Even now, if a person wants help and is genuinely struggling to pay I can offer a discount. What I want from clients is for them to get more from the session than they ever expected.
Where is your practice located
I’ve built a new practice in Holmfirth, which is in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire. I wanted a location within easy reach (less than a hours drive) from 3 major cities, being Manchester, Leeds and Sheffield. If you look on a map, Holmfirth is in the middle of these 3 cities. The practice took 3 years to build (literally as the site needed to be cleared/demolish another building first). It has a consultation room, a Hypnotherapy room (as seen in some of the pictures) it even has a fully equipped commercial gym. The layout and position of the Hypnotherapy room was all designed years before it was build, it looks into its own 1 acre wood, which came with the site.
I’ve seen a stage hypnotist, I don’t want to do anything silly
Stage hypnosis works, but again you can’t make the person do anything that they would not want to do anyway. Stage hypnosis is for the benefit of the audience, Hypnotherapy is for the benefit of the client.
What is NLP
Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) is a model of communication that focuses on identifying and using patterns of thought that influence a person’s behaviour as a means of improving the quality and effectiveness of their lives. It offers a paradigm of how the brain works (neuro), about how language interacts with the brain (linguistic), and how we use this interaction to get the results we want for ourselves and others (programming). It is an effective, proven vehicle for accelerated human change, radically altering the “old way” of lengthy psychotherapy.
NLP was initially created by linguist Dr. John Grinder and computer scientist Dr. Richard Bandler. Together they produced a linguistic model that identified the language patterns of a few gifted individuals such as hypnotherapist Milton Erickson, MD., Fritz Perls of Gestalt therapy, anthropologist Gregory Bateson and Virginia Satir of family systems therapy. The synthesis of their findings, a blend of cognitive and behavioural science, resulted in the technology known as Neuro Linguistic Programming. Since it was first developed, NLP has grown, changed and expanded, and it continues to do so today.
You will be pleased to know that Andy is also a certified and registered NLP practitioner.