Mariana Howe's Page

Not seen you here for some time.
I hope all is well with you.

Love and hugs,

Fable

Lawrie Shaw the Sunderland Hypnotherapist

Mariana,
Sorry for the delay, the holidays you know ;-) The therapist used a method simular to what I use. I do think, however, a nice induction while on the table could be very effective and less time consuming. Any luck with your search?Hope you're fairing well with all this chilly weather.
D

Mariana:
Thanks for the kind comment and compliments! I also have it here with the the PDF CD if you need it. I wish you my sincerest very best!
Your Friend,
John
Trance-Master.com

Mariana
I think rolling with the punches demonstrates the competence of the therapist! If we freaked every time a client didn’t respond the way we expected; we’d be stuck at “take a deep breath” and never get any work done! I’ve had one treatment here in Portland which prompted me to integrate the two modalities in my practice. I hope you have success your search.
Be well!
D

Mariana,
I kind cheat ;-) The first session is a full blown hypno wherein I lay down some PHS to re enter trance easily. So, when I do the massage I have the client breath deep and do a bit of progressive then trigger the post. I usually work in that as I touch this part they'll relax even more.. I test for depth,then go to work. I've done regression work this way as well as eating disorder and drepression. Like I mentioned; the response is always favorable.
How about you, what's you style?
Doug

Mariana,
I, too, am a Massage therapist. Just recently have been incorporating hypnosis in my sessions. The feedback is very positive. How long are your sessions? I find 90 min. works best and the client benefits the most in this time frame.
D

Yes, massage work, especially deep tissue and crano-sacral tends to surface your emotions. He talked through the entire massage. In the beginning of the massage he would lead me through a long, slow induction as he was getting my body balanced and positioned. When my muscles relaxed and he felt I was in trance he would switch to metaphorical suggestions. Fortunately, he never used direct suggestions as people tense (to some degree) because they think they need to pay attention. Of course, that defeats the purpose so learn to use metaphors. After the first few massages i would tend to go very deep into trance and he would tell me to come up to a lighter level to be able to answer his questions and then i could go right back as deeply relaxed as the work to be done would allow. He would ask me questions about the emotions the deep tissue work was surfacing. Sometimes I would feel sad, sometimes I would giggle. Sometimes he would actually finish the massage before he re-alerted me. That's pretty good because his massages were always 2 hour sessions. It was always deep tissue work.

I had a wonderful massage therapist for 2-3 years who was also a hypnotherapist. He combined the 2 in each session. As he was starting the massage he was also using an induction and the more I relaxed the more he was able to key in on what was coming up in the course of the massage. When we first began those sessions I did not go as deeply in trance as I did later. He would keep me at a light to medium level of trance so that it didn't take too much effort for me to answer his questions about what emotions the massage was bringing up. When he would work those areas of my body and release the knots in my muscles he was also giving suggestions to release the issues causing the knots. By the time we got 3/4 way through the massage I was in a deep trance and by the time we got to the end he had realerted me. My body and my mind healed at the same time. I was able to let go of some pretty heavy duty trauma--physically and emotionally that would have taken a lifetime if I had tried to do them separately.

A few years ago I trained a group of nuns who were massage therapists to do the same thing for their clients. it just takes practice, practice, practice. So what if your massage surfaces an emotion you are not prepared to deal with? Chances are they have had those emotions surface before. You won't be the first. Switch the body part you are working on to let those emotions subside and figure out how to help them release them the next time they are in. Then, next time work those body parts while helping them to release those emotions. You don't have to do it perfectly every time. Hope it helps.

Mariana,
I noticed your reply to Adam Eason's blog post about being a unique hypnotist. You stated that you worried about saying the wrong thing and messing someone up. Please understand that that is not something you can do with hypnosis. Oh, an unscrupulous person could purposely implant a phobia or something like that, but not without specific intent to do so.

Hypnotherapy classes stress caution for abreactions. People have abreactions because of stress issues in their personal life that they will not let their conscious mind deal with. They bury them so they don't have to deal with them. During trance, the conscious mind gets focused elsewhere and nothing is holding down the reaction to the stress anymore so it surfaces. Abreactions are not harmful, they are just unpleasant. It used to be thought that they were necessary as a part of emotional healing, so do not be afraid of them. You were also taught what to do if one occurs, its not that big of a deal.

As far as a technique for using hypnosis in your massage therapy, I have a suggestion for you. I developed a technique that takes less than 30 seconds, is totally interactive with the subject, they approve everything "as" you do it, and is very gentle. Does not require touch, surprise, confusion, or yelling. Some refer to it as waking hypnosis since you don't have to use the sleep command.

While I have videos of it on here and on my website. A friend of mine made much better quality videos that he put on youtube. Here is the link to them.

I think you may find it interesting, and perhaps the solution to how to incorporate hypnosis into your massage therapy sessions.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PI5fUNdZhas&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZH4xC62oaU

Best wishes
John