Recipe for Success, Part 1

I am continuing to suspend in-person hypnotherapy sessions with me in my office. However, phone, and Zoom consultations ARE and WILL REMAIN AVAILABLE! 

 

(This blog was originally posted on January 18, 2017)

Photo by Rick Hustead

 

 

People often come in for hypnotherapy to change or adopt a behavior that will help them achieve a specific goal or succeed at a particular endeavor. Contrary to popular belief (and the stories we tell ourselves), Hypnosis Motivation Institute founder John Kappas, Ph.D. asserted that such success had nothing to do with intelligence, working hard, being nice or deserving, etc. Rather, success (or lack thereof) boiled down to the mental “programming” a person received and how that program was reinforced in daily life (behaviors).

Dr. Kappas attributed the difficulty to change or re-program these behaviors to homeostasis, whereby a person tends to only go so high before hitting a metaphoric “ceiling” to this success. Silently, suddenly self-sabotaging behaviors start to happen to keep the individual stuck in the same (comfortable and familiar) life patterns he or she is trying to change or improve. It is easier and oftentimes more socially rewarding) to stay the same or resist change (see Systems Approach in Hypnotherapy). Fortunately, there is also a metaphoric “floor” to this resistance, at which time the person goes so low that he or she is motivated to make a positive change and break out of this negative or limited cycle.

In Part 2 of this blog, I will describe the Recipe for Success to help you stop the self-limiting script and help you achieve your self-improvement goals.

 

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Hypnotherapy to Release Weight

Hypnosis for weight loss series: $1,250 for 10-week series. (This is a $250 savings!) The $200 fee for the first session will be included in this rate only when the package is purchased up front. Book this package before June 30, 2023, to lock in this price as my rates will be going up on July 1, 2023.

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Sara R. Fogan, C.Ht. is a certified hypnotherapist based in Southern California. She graduated with honors from the Hypnosis Motivation Institute in 2005. Sara has been voted the Best Hypnotherapist in Santa Clarita, California, four years in a row (2019-2022). For more information about Calminsense Hypnotherapy® and to set up an appointment, please visit http://www.calminsensehypnotherapy.com/

© 2023

The Role of the Audio Track to Reinforce Hypnotic Suggestions

I am continuing to suspend in-person hypnotherapy sessions with me in my office. However, phone, and Zoom consultations ARE and WILL REMAIN AVAILABLE! 

 

(This blog was originally posted on March 23, 2016)

Photo by Rick Hustead

 

Audio tracks can be used to consistently reinforce a suggestion for changed behavior that is made to a client during the hypnotherapy session. Hypnosis Motivation Institute founder John Kappas, Ph.D.  liked to record of the hypnotic suggestions and affirmations that he gave clients during hypnosis. He then gave the recording to the individual to listen to independently at home and reinforce the suggestions for behavioral change between sessions. He found that these recordings were particularly useful to achieve self-improvement goals such as increase self-confidence, correct or curb impulsive behaviors and behaviors, facilitate weight loss/weight control, and modify fear reactions.

Like the Hypnosis Motivation Institute founder, I also like to offer and typically make an audio track of the hypnosis portion of the session for each of my clients to play at home and fortify the hypnotic message I provided in the office. Sometimes I put it on a CD but, more often lately, I simply e-mail a digital copy of the track to the client to listen to on a mobile device. Since it is designed to relax the listener, I always attach a written warning in the e-mail or on the hard copy that the person must not play the track while driving or at any other time when alert attention is needed.

Unlike the generic, topic-specific hypnosis tracks that you can purchase at book stores or on-line, the recordings I provide for each client are individualized to address each client’s specific therapeutic goals and needs. In almost every case, the suggestions, affirmations and motivational words that I provide in the hypnotic script are created on the spot, based on information that the client provided just moments before being counted into the hypnotic trance. Even scripts that have been previously created to facilitate weight loss, quitting smoking, overcome a fear/phobia, etc. must still be customized this way so the client’s subconscious mind will accept the new message I am providing. Each of these recordings is free, a “take-away gift” I give to the client at the end of each session.

Dr. Kappas advised that hypnotherapists should use discretion when providing the recording for a client. For example, hypnotherapists should only record the session for someone whom he or she feels confident will stop using the track once the problem is resolved or his or her situation has changed, he said. As I mentioned previously, I typically offer to record the hypnosis for each of my clients; this is true regardless of the person’s presenting issue according to the therapeutic guidelines and state regulations of the Business and Professions Code 2908. In addition, each hypnotic script includes suggestions that reflect where the person is on his or her therapeutic journey to address and help the client focus on that stage of the therapeutic journey.

 

 

 

Sara R. Fogan, C.Ht. is a certified hypnotherapist based in Southern California. She graduated with honors from the Hypnosis Motivation Institute in 2005. Sara has been voted the Best Hypnotherapist in Santa Clarita, California, four years in a row (2019-2022). For more information about Calminsense Hypnotherapy® and to set up an appointment, please visit my website. 

© 2022

 

Going for a Cause

To minimize risk of exposure to and spread of the COVID-19 virus and COVID-19 variants, I am continuing to suspend in-person hypnotherapy sessions with me in my office. Meanwhile, phone, and Zoom consultations ARE and WILL REMAIN AVAILABLE! 

 

(This blog was originally posted on May 4, 2014)

Photo by Rick Hustead

 

At some time in our lives, just about everyone uses a defense mechanism to cope with a stressful or disappointing experience. These strategies can include denial or displacement of the unpleasant emotion, repression of a memory, substance abuse, regressing to an earlier stage of development or even substance dependency. However these behaviors provide only a temporary perception of control over the environment; eventually, we have to deal with and resolve the primary issue that has triggered the defense mechanism in order to achieve personal growth. To be an effective hypnotherapist, I must recognize which one(s) a client may be using, how and why the device is working in this situation, and when it is preventing desired change and personal growth to occur.

According to John Kappas, Ph.D., resistance to changing a behavior is the first stage of effecting this change. “We do things systematically to avoid change,” said the founder of the Hypnosis Motivation Institute. “Change is a threat to the unconscious mind.” To facilitate change in a client’s behavior—such as helping someone to quit smoking or to lose weight—the hypnotherapist must “buy” the person’s symptoms of defensive behavior and provide some symptomatic relief. But for the problem or unwanted behavior to be truly resolved it is often necessary to go for the cause of the conflict or symptom. “The client may be subconsciously protecting [the cause] by employing defense-mechanism devices,” Dr. Kappas explained.

Usually, many factors combine to create the primary issue or problem, and the client is suggestible to those precipitating factors, the hypnotherapist explained. Consequently, the first hypnotherapy session with a client is the most important component of the therapeutic process, because this is the first opportunity to start working with the client’s suggestibility and “suggest” certain changes in behavior. For example, I might work with a client to desensitize the person to the association of smoking a cigarette while drinking an alcoholic beverage before supper. Or, I would create a new association in which a client would “choose” to write about his or her negative emotions in a journal rather than eat a bowl of ice cream when the person felt angry or sad. But these changes in behavior—social drinking and displacing negative emotions through eating—can and will only occur when the client is ready to recognize the relationship between the emotion and behavior.

“You cannot cure a person by telling him what the problem is,” Dr. Kappas said. “Whenever you hit the cause of the problem, symptoms start to disappear. Once you identify and remove the primary cause of the problem, you must alleviate secondary issues.”

         

 

Sara R. Fogan, C.Ht. is a certified hypnotherapist based in Southern California. She graduated with honors from the Hypnosis Motivation Institute in 2005. Sara has been voted the Best Hypnotherapist in Santa Clarita, California, three years in a row (July 2019, September 2020, July 2021). For more information about Calminsense Hypnotherapy® and to set up an appointment, please visit http://www.calminsensehypnotherapy.com/.

© 2021

 

Going for a Cause

 To minimize risk of exposure to and spread of the COVID-19 virus, I am temporarily suspending in-person hypnotherapy sessions with me in my office. However, phone, Skype and Zoom consultations ARE and WILL REMAIN AVAILABLE! 

 

 

(This blog was originally posted on May 4, 2014)

 

 Photo by Rick Hustead

 

At some time in our lives, just about everyone uses a defense mechanism to cope with a stressful or disappointing experience. These strategies can include denial or displacement of the unpleasant emotion, repression of a memory, substance abuse, regressing to an earlier stage of development or even substance dependency. However these behaviors provide only a temporary perception of control over the environment; eventually, we have to deal with and resolve the primary issue that has triggered the defense mechanism in order to achieve personal growth. To be an effective hypnotherapist, I must recognize which one(s) a client may be using, how and why the device is working in this situation, and when it is preventing desired change and personal growth to occur.

According to John Kappas, Ph.D., resistance to changing a behavior is the first stage of effecting this change. “We do things systematically to avoid change,” said the founder of the Hypnosis Motivation Institute. “Change is a threat to the unconscious mind.” To facilitate change in a client’s behavior—such as helping someone to quit smoking or to lose weight—the hypnotherapist must “buy” the person’s symptoms of defensive behavior and provide some symptomatic relief. But for the problem or unwanted behavior to be truly resolved it is often necessary to go for the cause of the conflict or symptom. “The client may be subconsciously protecting [the cause] by employing defense-mechanism devices,” Dr. Kappas explained.

Usually, many factors combine to create the primary issue or problem, and the client is suggestible to those precipitating factors, the hypnotherapist explained. Consequently, the first hypnotherapy session with a client is the most important component of the therapeutic process, because this is the first opportunity to start working with the client’s suggestibility and “suggest” certain changes in behavior. For example, I might work with a client to desensitize the person to the association of smoking a cigarette while drinking an alcoholic beverage before supper. Or, I would create a new association in which a client would “choose” to write about his or her negative emotions in a journal rather than eat a bowl of ice cream when the person felt angry or sad. But these changes in behavior—social drinking and displacing negative emotions through eating—can and will only occur when the client is ready to recognize the relationship between the emotion and behavior.

“You cannot cure a person by telling him what the problem is,” Dr. Kappas said. “Whenever you hit the cause of the problem, symptoms start to disappear. Once you identify and remove the primary cause of the problem, you must alleviate secondary issues.”

       

 

 

Sara R. Fogan, C.Ht. is a certified hypnotherapist based in Southern California. She graduated with honors from the Hypnosis Motivation Institute in 2005. In July 2019 and in September 2020 she was voted the Best Hypnotherapist in Santa Clarita, California. For more information about Calminsense Hypnotherapy® and to set up an appointment, please visit http://www.calminsensehypnotherapy.com/.

© 2020

 

The Pattern Interrupt

(This blog was previously posted on March 13, 2014)

Image courtesy of Microsoft

The subconscious mind controls almost all of our beliefs and behavior. Therefore, the mental script for an entrenched habit will overpower the conscious mind’s logic, will-power, decision-making and reasoning faculties that want to change this habit every time. When I help a client to change a behavior in hypnotherapy, I utilize a technique called “pattern interrupt.” The purpose of the pattern interrupt is to give the SCM a time out while the individual engages in something completely different for a little while. Through this exercise, the client experiences how it feels to have the power and control to choose whether to engage in an activity that has been controlling his or her life. 

When I work with someone to change a behavior, such as to quit smoking or lose weight, I first ask what specifically triggers the undesired behavior, and how he or she handles this kind of temptation. Next, we discuss options for dealing with the trigger without engaging in the unwanted behavior. It is important that the person comes up with these alternative behaviors in order for the client to remain motivated and enthusiastic about working to achieve his or her goal. The pattern interrupt should be simple and easy to do, whether it is taking ten slow, deep breaths instead of lighting a cigarette; drinking a glass of water instead of a can of soda; take the dog for a walk instead of playing a computer game. I will also reinforce these options as hypnotic suggestions so the subconscious mind will also start to recognize these new activities as “known” behaviors.

Every time you choose to do the replacement activity, even for just a couple of seconds, you are reinforcing a new behavior and creating a new known in the SCM. The great thing about the pattern interrupt is that anyone can do this. You don’t need to be in hypnosis or to have received a post-hypnotic suggestion to substitute an unwanted behavior. When temptation strikes, you just need to do something else for a little while… just long enough for the craving to subside and your subconscious mind to forget, for a little while, that this behavior ever existed, at all.

Special offer for Active/Retired First Responders and Military Personnel

 Special Offer: 25 percent discount off the first hypnotherapy session for all active/retired military personnel and first responders (police, fire-fighters, EMT/paramedics, ambulance personnel, emergency dispatchers, E.R. physicians/nurses).

Sara R. Fogan, C.Ht. is a certified hypnotherapist based in Southern California. She graduated with honors from the Hypnosis Motivation Institute in 2005. In July 2019 she was voted the Best Hypnotherapist in Santa Clarita, California. For more information about Calminsense Hypnotherapy® and to set up an appointment, please visit http://www.calminsensehypnotherapy.com/.

© 2019