Bad Hypnotherapists

One of the reason hypnosis gets a bad rap is that there are SO MANY bad hypnotists out there taking people's money. I KNOW, as it took several failed sessions to find a good one, when I was the client. The reason there are so many bad hypnotherapists is that they are CONVINCED when they leave their week long class that they know everything there is to know to start business and be successful. That's what the teacher tells them, anyway. And the teacher has to tell them that to get them into class and get their money. So these confident but ineffective hypnos start business. And the only way to get good is through a lot of experience, which means they have to take a bunch of money from people until they become effective or give it up. (With mind-work, a hypno is more likely to be successful if they charge for their work.) I know a new "graduate" student who THINKS he is a good hypnotherapist. He charges $150/session and quite frequently has ineffective results with clients.

There needs to be a change in the way we are taught hypnosis, so graduates' next step is to embark on a residency where they know they are still learning, have cheaper rates for clients, be acceptable to clients who need/want cheaper rates and aren't afraid of working with someone not yet fully experienced. Sort of like a doctor residency, or the beauticians at school who cut hair for cheap, under the supervision of the instructor, to get experience. Then take a skills test or some how prove that they are doinig good work to become full, qualified hypnotherapist, like after 100 sessions or so. (Thank heavens there is a few reputable hypnosis institutions out there.) I'm not for government regulation, but it doesn't seem fair to anyone (except to line the pockets of the instructor) to convince someone a 7 day class will make a student an expert. Even many healing modalities make you do a sort of residency--certain hours experience--before you are qualified to become a practitioner. They won't send out a certificate until you get x amount of people to write up testimonials on the work you have done with them. Well, some of them USED to do this, I doubt they do anymore, as money rules.

Just my rants for the morning.

Tags: bad, hypnotists, residency, schools, trainings

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Comment by Christopher Bartow on January 30, 2011 at 7:47am: I agree with you for the most part Antonio...but hypnosis is supposed to be "natural" and if we are to believe that we are hypnotized just driving down the road...or watching television...then bad hypnosis is happening around us all the time anyway. And if people are willing to tithe 10% to a church that does nothing more for them than tell them that everything is alright...well...I'll take bad hypnosis over tithing 10% for nothing. The same things may be said about talk therapies or even churches when it comes to made-up abuse....I do not believe they are two different subjects at all...just a matter of degrees.

Comment by Antonio on January 30, 2011 at 1:23am: Christopher those are two entirely different subjects. A church usually is a non profit that survives via donations - if a person is being made to feel like a sinner for not donating then they should find a new Church.

The thing about a bad/inexperienced hypnotist can actually do more damage in the long run. If they don't have good/proper training they might actually end up causing more damage (doing regression work when not properly trained, working without medical referrals and causing more health complications, etc.). Another thing that may happen if the person doesn't get the changes they expected is that they may feel that hypnosis doesn't work. They may end up telling their friends that hypnosis doesn't work, putting other people off from seeking hypnotherapy.

What if a bad/untrained hypnotherapist does some regression work and they lead their clients with improper questions, and the client ends up remembering a false memory of being abused by a family member/relative? The therapist could end up in a ton of trouble - not a good thing for the profession in the long run.

Antonio

Comment by Christopher Bartow on January 29, 2011 at 10:38pm: There are also bad ministers taking people's money, and bad shaman's taking people's money, and bad self-help gurus taking people's money, and all kinds of bad unregulated people taking people's money. Here's the beautiful thing about bad hypnotists taking people's money: (a) they probably didn't take very much; and (b) the client probably still walked away feeling good about the transaction. Unlike a church taking a person's money...a bad hypnotist usually doesn't guilt a person into giving up the funds and then tell the penitent that he/she's a sinner. I mean no offense, but I'll take a bad hypnotist over religion to solve my problems any day of the week.

Comment by Sherell Hebert, LPC, CCH on January 27, 2011 at 8:05pm: Cindy, it is sad to say that there are some hypnotists out there who take the money and run and don't really take the time to really perfect their craft. Whether it is from lack of interest, or lack of skill, or countless other reasons, there are some people who continue to practice with poor results.

I personally think the practice of hypnosis is an ongoing process of study and hopefully evolution. I believe Richard said something to that effect in his training video. (I don't want to misquote you Richard.) I love John's smoking cessation script. I recently purchased it and am very pleased with the quality of the script, the explanation, and most importantly, the results!

Though my practice is primarily counseling/psychotherapy, I do love hypnosis and feel that as a professional, it is my obligation to be the best so that I can do the best job possible for my clients. I'm very appreciative for this forum because I have learned so much and been inspired by so many experienced practitioners here.

That was my rant and rave :-)

Comment by Antonio on January 27, 2011 at 2:14pm: I think it would be wise for the various certifying bodies to work with one another and come up with some basic "guidelines". While these wouldn't have to be legal guidelines, they could be a "best practice" thing. I feel that if the government sees a trend of people doing therapy work and are causing more damage than good, they will try to enforce draconian legislation.

I'm curious if the "new" hypnotists are following the basic rules for their respective Country/State/Providence/Etc. in regards to what issues they can or cannot work on without medical referrals. Humans are not computers and things can go wrong. What happens if something goes wrong and they don't have malpractice inruance or some other form of insurance to save their behinds?

Antonio

Comment by Richard Nongard - NLPBoard.com on January 27, 2011 at 1:32pm: The numbers:

I have a national database, all 50 states, with every licensed mental health professional. It is over 250,000 licensed mental health professionals.

I just bought a national databed of full-time hypnosis practitioners. It is 1900 names and addresses.

Comment by Richard Nongard - NLPBoard.com on January 27, 2011 at 1:30pm: Patrick-

Seonsoned SW/LPC/LMFT are just like everyone else.    Money talks. When you did your 2000-4000 hour supervision for your licence you either did one of two things:   Paid for your weekly supervision, most likely the full hourly rate OR worked at a place or for a seasond therapist for half what you were worth.

Same thing in hypnotherapy. I can gaurantee you can find a seasoned pro to provide supervision for a fee.   And of course, I tend to learn best when I am paying out of my own pocket anyway...

I think the real reason hypnotists do not have this same structre as therapists is simple numbers. There are 6000 licensed mental health professionals in Oklahoma.   About the same, just in the Houston surrounding area, and I bet the same for your state TN....   But in Oklahoma I bet there are 25 practicing full-time hypnosits.   I bet in Houston, full-time hypnosis only is less than 50; and it is the second home of the Erickson Institute....

And so, due primarily to the lack of full-time professionals, DVD edcuation is the next best thing.   It accorred to me when I was putting together our advanced DVD certification course, that while many courses show inductions, or show techniques, no homestudy DVD course showed a complete session from when the client walks through the door to when they leave.    Unedited. Start to finish.   I think a lot of people are actually out there doing hyposis who have NEVER seen a complete session other than thier own.    So I have tried in my courses to include some very practical things like this. James was there for that session with Roy, who remains a non smoker 9 months later...

Now I am not educating the local parrot farmer in hypnosis, almost all my students are licensed mental health professionals, so they already have many tools that would be redundant if I taught them (like what the foundation of a therapeutic relationship is, or clinical assessment.).

I too wish such an opportunity existed for internship, but I think with the umbers we have its just not going to happen....

I

Comment by John Cleesattel on January 27, 2011 at 12:01pm: This is one of the very reasons I made my book and stop smoking intervention available at very inexpensive price, and why I focus on the how and why of hypnosis; to give hypnotists a model that makes some sense and that they can checkout the validity of for themselves, so they can be more successful at what they do. We all benefit when that happens.

John

Comment by James Hazlerig - HypnosisAustin on January 27, 2011 at 9:19am: Hey, CindyLou,

I love your vision of what hypnosis training should be. In my case, I took a 250-hour course that had a very small student-teacher ratio (1:1 for a lot of it). My teacher was part of a wellness center with a sizable client list, so she put out the word to all those who had come there (for hypnosis, acupuncture, massage, herbs, colon cleansing, reiki and so on) that she had a student who needed volunteers to practice on. I was also expected to rack up a sizable list of practice sessions outside of class. My teacher told me that I could charge these people or ask for donations as I saw fit, though I generally did not.

Now, I am a bit of a cheapskate when it comes to training. If I can buy a thirty-dollar book to teach myself, I'll skip the two-thousand dollar seminar. That said, I don't regret a dime I spent on that training program. The experience was worth it.

Of course, we can have this vision, but implementing it presents some dilemmas.

On one hand, we'd love to see hypnosis training work this way, but on the other hand, we agree that we don't want government regulation to enforce it. It would be great if every instructor and school would agree to these minimum requirements, but it's never going to happen. (And in all fairness, there are some great one-weekend trainings for special purposes; Richard Nongard does an excellent job of teaching counselors the basics of what they need to know in just one weekend.)

Likewise, a new hypnotist wants to stack the deck in his favor, and charging people is one of many ways to do that. Many new hypnos are reluctant to charge what they're worth because they lack confidence. The flipside of that is an honest person's confidence will be shaken if he feels he's doing something dishonest--such as charging people for something he's not sure will work. My solution, when I want to try out a new technique, is to offer a limited number of free sessions to members of my mailing list; I explain upfront that the techniques I need to practice have been used successfully thousands of times by other hypnotists, but that I want a chance to develop proficiency before I charge clients for them. That way, the client's confidence is preserved, along with my perceived integrity.

Another dilemma is of course that a hypnotist needs confidence, or at the very least, confidence is something that really stacks the deck in the hypnotist's favor. So part of being a good teacher is instilling confidence--but when does that cross the line to becoming false confidence?

As you can tell, your rant stirred up a lot of thoughts for me. :-)

Comment by Patrick Hopper on January 27, 2011 at 8:38am: I would LOVE to have the benefit of such a residency. I am a licensed counselor, and I am gradually weaving in hypnotic elements as I continue to do REBT and Solution-Focused work, so I do have the luxury of slowly adapting my approach. I would like to be making the transition faster and more efficiently. I believe this would happen if I had daily feedback from a seasoned hypnotherapist. I have approached some local practitioners, but have gotten no takers.