Suggestibility on Prime Time

(This blog was originally posted on March 3, 2014)

                Did you watch the 86thAcademy Awards on television on March 2, 2014? Remember when host Ellen DeGeneres asked viewers to retweet the group “selfie” picture that host Ellen DeGeneres took of herself with a handful of Oscar nominees during the broadcast? Did you do it? If so, you weren’t alone: according to a CNN report, 2.7 million people took on her challenge, and the Twitter platform actually crashed for a few minutes. The event was undoubtedly a major advertising and publicity triumph for the Oscars and the company that manufactured the camera they used to take the shot (Samsung)—not to mention the host. This incident was also a great opportunity for me to illustrate how suggestibility and hypnosis work in real life.

                In my January 16, 2014 blog about hypnotic modalities, I explained how an authority figure could create a hyper-suggestible state in another person and use this state to persuade that individual to behave in a particular way. (If you have ever gone car shopping, you have likely experienced this kind of sensory overload.) She may not have literally sold an item to her audience, but Ms. DeGeneres did a very handy demonstration of group hypnosis with just a few elements naturally occurring elements:

1.       She had authority. As the Oscar host, Ellen DeGeneres had access to all areas of the stage and the audience in the auditorium. A celebrity herself, she also had charisma and charm that helped her to build a rapport with the guests as well as television viewers at home.

2.       She had a message. The role of any host at a party or event is to help the guests feel at ease and have a good time so that, hopefully, they will want to come back again. The Academy Awards may be an American event, but it is known around the world. No doubt the Academy and the television network wanted to receive positive reviews and feedback so they could do this again, next year. What better way to get this message out than to take a photograph of some of your guests having a good time and share that image with everyone you know (or who wishes they knew you)?

3.       There were plenty of environmental stimuli to overload the subconscious mind and create the hyper-suggestible state: the excitement of being nominated for or having won an Academy Award, or the disappointment of not winning that Oscar, after all; the visual overload of being surrounded by beautiful people wearing beautiful clothes; the amount of time the nominees had already spent posing on the red carpet before the awards began; the anxiety/stress that they must have been experiencing while they waited for the award to be bestowed in their category; waiting and wondering who would win an Oscar; the glamorous environment in the Kodak Theater and the stage… You get the picture.

4.       Ms. DeGeneres used the right language to get the group of nominees to do the photo with her. Not only did she have the advantage of being the host for the night, but she knew how and when to cajole one of the A-list actors sitting in the front rows to join the group. Soon, some actors just jumped into the shot without waiting for an invitation.

5.       Watching the scene from home on our televisions or computers, etc., it looked like everyone in the shot was smiling and having fun. Didn’t you wish you could have been in on that picture, too? (Or one just like it, but with your friends and family?) When Bradley Cooper finally snapped the picture, the audience at home and in the theater was ready and waiting to be asked (or told/playfully challenged) to retweet the image so many times that Twitter couldn’t cope with all the traffic.

6.       And hey, presto: 2.7 million people accepted and acted on Ellen DeGeneres’ suggestion. 

Now, that is impressive.

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

© 2015

Hypnotherapy and Public Speaking

(This blog was originally posted on April 22, 2014)

Photo courtesy of Microsoft

 

       This evening I came across the outline for my first-ever presentation about hypnosis. It had been an assignment for the Speech Craft class that my classmates and I took at the Hypnosis Motivation Institute a couple of months before graduation. In it, we learned all of the fine points of crafting and delivering an effective, impactful speech about some element of our new, future vocation as certified hypnotherapists. My speech was very basic: I included some personal information about me and my educational background in the introduction, and then I focused on how and why I decided to become a hypnotherapist. That should be easy, right? Not so fast.

Reading those notes again, 10 years later, I could still remember how nervous I felt while I composed the draft for that speech. As a rule, I did not like to speak in public. I hated to be the center of attention in any circumstance, as I knew I would have to be when I did my presentation. Finally, the instructor and my classmates would be grading my presentation, a prospect that not only exacerbated my anxieties about public speaking but also of taking tests.

Before I drove to class that night, I made sure that I ate a nutritious meal with protein to keep my blood-sugar level (and mood) stable, which I knew would help to lower my anxiety. I wore one of my most professional-looking skirt suits that always helped me feel confident. Once I was in class, I practiced diaphragmatic breathing to calm my nerves while I waited for my turn to speak.

When the instructor finally called me up to the podium to do my presentation, my mind flashed back to the best advice I have ever received about public speaking. The current director of HMI, George Kappas, M.A., C.Ht., once gave the class a pep talk about public speaking and doing presentations on hypnosis and hypnotherapy to the general public. He reassured us that each of us would probably know more about this topic than anyone else in the room. He told us to relax and even suggested that we probably wouldn’t (shouldn’t) even need or want to use notes or note-cards to prompt our speeches because, again, we would already be the experts on this topic. So when I stepped up to the podium that night, I took his words to heart and allowed myself to own the room. Since this presentation was about me and my experience, I could be (and was) completely confident that I was the expert in the room about this topic. That night, I was finally able to overcome a personal challenge. To my surprise, I even created a new “known” in my subconscious mind: public speaking was fun!

Looking back, this class turned out to be one of my favorites on the hypnotherapy-certification program at HMI. First, the assignment made me face and overcome my fear and discomfort about public speaking and taking tests. Second, the experience of having to do a presentation gave me an invaluable opportunity to experience the efficacy of techniques that I now also use and teach to my clients to help them overcome similar fears and anxieties.

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

© 2015

Passive-Aggressive Behavior

(This blog was originally posted on March 31, 2014)

Photo by Sara Fogan

          You must repeatedly remind your teenage son to end a phone conversation with his friend so he can pick up his younger sibling from band practice before he finally snaps the phone shut and stomps out of the room. When you ask your spouse to make a stop on the way home from work to pick up the food you ordered for supper, the response is a loud sigh and a sarcastic comment: “Sure, it’s not as if I don’t have enough to do during the day.” Maybe you consistently forget to return a novel you borrowed from your friend, even though you see each other just about every day at school or work. Sound familiar?

These behaviors are examples of passive aggression, a common form of defensive behavior. It is not exclusive to males or females, and it can be manifested at any age starting from very early childhood until the end of the person’s life. It can start at age 18 months to between two and five years old, when a child starts to differentiate from the parent or caretaker in a subconscious bid to become more independent and autonomous. The more the adult tries to exert authority over the youngster, the more resistant the child becomes: You say yes, the child says no. If the parent does not provide options or alternatives for the desired behavior, but simply demands the child to do what he or she has been told, the youngster doesn’t have a chance to experience the desired autonomy. The child may then exert his or her independence by forgetting to do something or make jokes or sarcastic comments in front of other people as a way to express frustration about the situation. Over time, this tactic becomes a “known” in the subconscious and, eventually, the preferred problem-solving strategy and technique.

With the exception of reactions to fear of falling and fear of loud noises, passive aggression—like all other behaviors—is learned; therefore, it can be unlearned. When I work with a client to overcome this “resistant lifestyle,” I will first explore the different emotional triggers for the client’s behavior, such as tone of voice/words used of the person making a request, the time of day the client is most likely to respond this way, etc. Then, while the person is in hypnosis, I will systematically desensitize him or her to these triggers and teach a relaxation response that can be substituted for the previous “known” behavior (passive aggression).  Finally, I may incorporate some hypnodrama and therapeutic-guided imagery or visualization techniques to give the person a chance to rehearse expressing his or her needs in these specific situations. Over time, by practicing the relaxation response and communicating what he or she needs at that time, the person can establish these behaviors as a new known response in other similar situations.

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

© 2015