Is Hypnosis Safe and Will It Work For Me?

Everyone quite naturally enters a hypnotic trance several times during a day - on waking and falling asleep, if you become engrossed in a book or a TV programme, or if you arrive home and find you cannot remember the drive! Being in a trance is very relaxing, you will be aware of everything around you and will be able to end the session at any time if you choose to.

One of the more frequent questions that is asked is whether the person will get ‘stuck’ in the trance and not be able to be roused. The answer is no. As the hypnotherapy session comes to an end, the hypnotherapist will 'emerge' you from the trance and bring you back to your normal level of consciousness. The worst thing that could happen is that you relax so well that you fall asleep and then wake up quite naturally.

It is important to remember that the hypnotic subject is in charge of their experience at all times. They can come out of the trance and terminate their appointment at any time, and if there was an emergency, such as an alarm going off, they would rapidly emerge from the trance and be able to respond as appropriate.

Another frequent fear that is voiced is that the subject will find themselves ‘clucking and flapping like a hen’ when they are walking down the High Street or find themselves performing some other embarrassing feat in public. This is highly unlikely to happen, as even if the hypnotherapist had given you suggestions to do this, your subconscious would reject anything that it did not mesh with your moral compass and usual behaviour. It is also important to bear in mind that a professional, well qualified hypnotherapist would have no reason or desire to give these kinds of suggestions – it would soon be the end of their practice!

There is also a belief that being in a trance is a bit like being unconscious, and that nothing from a session will be remembered. There may be parts of the session you do not remember, or you may experience some time distortion where either time seems to speed up or slow down, but you will mostly be aware and remember what you experienced during the session.

People are also often sceptical that they can be hypnotised; that they will be unable to go into a trance. In fact, most people can be successfully put into a hypnotic trance and thereby gain the benefits of the positive and beneficial suggestions given by the hypnotherapist, and intelligent, well educated people often find it the easiest as they have the ability to concentrate.