Field Report: No Pain, No Gain?

Summary: I help a co-worker get temporarily relief from back pain.


This event took place around the second week of January 2005.

It had been raining for the last few days and this day in particular was no different. I was returning from one of the labs at work with a co-worker. As we walked, we were shooting the shit and during the conversation he mentioned that his back was killing him. When I heard that and it was like a light bulb had appeared above my head, lit up, and went "Ding!"

The previous saturday I had gone to a Hypnosis event in Long Beach called Wake-Up America. During a presentation on hypnosis and its use in pain control, the presenter demonstrated one of the techniques with a woman who had rheumatoid arthritis that was acting up that day. Before they began, she rated her discomfort at around an 8 (on a scale from 1 to 10.) It was pretty bad. By the time they were done (about 5 minutes later), her discomfort was down to a 1... and that lasted the rest of the day. (The presentation was given just before lunch. I stayed at the event all day and talked to her just before it ended at around 5pm.)

So when I heard my co-worker was in pain, I immediately wanted to try out the technique I saw that Saturday. I wasn't sure if it would be appropriate to ask him to participate in my little experiment, though. We were at work and some people don't take the idea of hypnosis very lightly (even though everyone experiences some form of hypnosis everyday - some just aren't aware of it.)


*Disclaimer: Using hypnosis/NLP to alleviate medical conditions, such as pain, is no joke. In nearly all cases, a medical professional should be consulted first and/or worked with in conjunction with any hypnosis/NLP type treatment. Pain is information for the brain. Sometimes, it is a symptom of something more serious. Pain lets you know that your body is hurting and that you should take care of it. Pain is a good thing. (... to a certain extent.)

In this case, my co-worker was just going to take some aspirin or ibuprofen anyways, so I decided it would be okay to help without consulting a medical professional.

Here's how it went down:

(I don't remember what happened word for word, but this is the gist of it.)


---------------------------

(My Co-Worker has been talking about how his back is "killing him." I offer to help.)

Me: You know...I don't know if you're interested, but I just learned a technique to relieve pain and I can probably help you out if you want to give it a go.

Co-Worker: What do you mean?

Me: It's just a simple exercise I can run through with you in a few minutes. You'll feel better by the time we're done.

Co-Worker: Really? Shit. I'll give it a go.

Me: On a scale from 1 to 10, 1 being the lowest, 10 highest, where would you rate your current discomfort?

(Moves around, seems to be analyzing his situation)

Co-Worker: It's about a 5.

Me: OK. Now, the pain you feel is an indication that something is not right with your body and you should pay attention to the information that it provides you. So, this is only going to provide you with temporary relief. It could last anywhere from an hour to 24 hours, maybe more, maybe less. Is that cool? Are you ready to do this?

Co-Worker: Yeah.

Me: OK. Have a seat.

(He sits down, I stand to his left.)

Me: The first thing we need to do is find out something that you consider more important than your current discomfort.

(I take a couple minutes to describe to him what I mean...)

Me: So, can you think of something, an experience, a feeling, anything, that's more important to you than your current discomfort?

(He looks up while he searches for that something.)

Co-Worker: Yeah.

Me: You got it? (He nods.) OK, whatever you've thought of, I'd like you to think of an experience or situation where you have that. I want you to re-live that experience for a moment. Be there. See what's around you from your own eyes, hear with your ears, and really feel whatever it is you feel in that situation.

(He closes his eyes for a couple seconds. I touch his left arm and hold it for a little bit.)

Me: OK. Great.

(His eyes are now open.)

Me: By the way, what is that?

(I point to an object on the table in front of us.)

Co-Worker: Hmm... I think it's a wallet.

Me; Oh, OK... OK. Now, I want you to focus on the area of your body where you feel that discomfort. Really get a feel for it.

(He tenses up, breathing changes. I touch his left arm below where I touched it before and hold it for a while.)

Me: OK, you got it?

Co-Worker: Yeah.

Me: Hmm... I wonder whose wallet that is, do you know?

Co-Worker: No.

Me: Oh, OK, whatever. Now, I'd like you to count out loud from 1 to 5.

(I touch both spots on his left arm that I touched before and hold both while he counts)

Co-Worker: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Me: Shit. I wonder whose wallet that is. Who'd leave their wallet out there like that?

Co-Worker: Huh? Yeah, I don't know.

Me: Anyways. OK. Now, this may sound silly, but it works. Do you know the song "Row, row, row your boat?"

Co-Worker: Yeah

Me: OK. Sing that song for a couple verses. I'll let you know when to stop.

(His eyebrows contract, as if he was confused, then relaxes and he begins to sing)

Co-Worker: "Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream..."

(As he sings I touch his left arm again where I touched it the first time and brush my hand down his arm a few times, as if brushing off some lint)

Me: OK. Now, how do you feel? You can get up and really test it out.

(He gets up, walks around, stretches to touch his toes, twists at his waist a few times.)

Co-Worker: Yeaaaah. Wow. It still hurts, I can feel it, but it's better. Before I couldn't even walk normal. Yeah, it's better. Man. What is that Voodoo shit?

Me: Haha. So what would you rate it now?

Co-Worker: About a 2.

Me: Are you good? Do you want to bring that down some more?

Co-Worker: Hmm... I'm good. It still hurts, but it's a lot better. I can live with this. But, hey, if you can get rid of it. Let's do it.

Me: I'm not going to get rid of it completely, because I don't want you to forget about it and possibly do more damage because of that, but I can bring it down some more.

Co-Worker: Let's do it.

---------------------------


We do the same process again. When we're done, he rates his discomfort between 1 and 2, and we stop there. He's happy with that and thanks me about 5 more times throughout the rest of the day. Nice.

Field Report: Antsy Shmantsy

Summary: I help a friend get some relief from her feelings of restlessness.


One night I was hanging out with one of my friends when she got antsy and it was clear to me that she was uncomfortable with that. As soon as I noticed it, I dug into my bag of tricks to see if there was something I could do.

I had just read about some technique called 3DMind (www.essential-skills.com) and even though I had only read a very cursory overview, I had enough of an idea of it to play with, so I did. Within about a minute, literally, she had calmed down and totally relaxed. There was no more antsy in her. Nice.

We're not offering you something that's true

"We call ourselves modelers. What we essentially do is to pay very little attention to what people say they do and a great deal of attention to what they do. And then we build ourselves a model of what they do. We are not psychologists, and we're also not theologians or theoreticians. We have no idea about the "real" nature of things, and we're not particularly interested in what's "true." The function of modeling is to arrive at descriptions which are useful. So, if we happen to mention something that you know from a scientific study, or from statistics, is inaccurate, realize that a different level of experience is being offered you here. We're not offering you something that's true, just things that are useful." (Frogs Into Princes, p. 7)


A few useful tidbits for the nlp practitioner:

1) "How do you know ..."
As in, "How do you know when you are afraid of snakes?" or "How do you know when you want to smoke?"

2) You will always get answers to your questions insofar as you have the sensory apparatus to notice the reponses.

3) Let's say I had to fill in for you for a day... What do I do?

At any moment...

"At any moment that you find yourself hesitating, or if at any moment you find yourself putting off until tomorrow trying some new piece of behavior that you could do today, or doing something you've done before, then all you need to do is glance over your left shoulder and there will be a fleeting shadow. That shadow represents your death, and at any moment it might step forward, place its hand on your shoulder and take you. So that the act that you are presently engaged in might be your very last act and therefore fully representative of you as your last act on this planet."

- Don Juan

Penn & Teller: Bullshit! - The Hypnosis Episode

I watched "Penn & Teller: Bullshit!" last night, the one about Hypnosis. They really made one of the hypnotists seem pretty ridiculous, just as they did with the whole idea of hypnosis. If you get a chance, it's an interesting episode, you may enjoy watching it.

After watching the episode, I did a quick web search to see if I could find out how other people felt about it. It didn't take me long to get sidetracked and I found my way to some site that mentioned Derren Brown. Apparently, he's a pretty popular entertainer in the UK. From what I read about his show and performances, it seems really interesting. If any of you have any of his shows on video and are willing to share or know how I can get a hold of some, let me know.

Field Report: Merry X-Mas! You're a non-smoker now

Summary: I help my sister and a friend quit smoking.


This took place on the eve of Christmas eve.

It was around 11:30pm. I had just arrived at my sister's place after a long 5 hour drive from LA. My sister, a friend, and I were playing Yahtzee and I remembered how my sister had wanted me to help her quit smoking. Both she and our friend (let's just call him R) had been smoking for decades.

As we played Yahtzee, I brought up how, previously, they told me that they wanted to stop smoking. Just as I brought it up, R started telling me that he only had one cigarette left to last him until tomorrow.

It was around 11:30pm and he was worried about only having 1 cigarette to last him until tomorrow. Wow.

Anyways, I asked them if they still wanted me to help them quit smoking. They both said yes.

I've wanted my sister to quit smoking for sooo long. And now I had a chance to help both my sister and R, two people very important to me, become non-smokers. I was so excited to hear that, that I just couldn't wait, so I asked them if they wanted to do it right then. They were each a little hesitant. I think it was because they thought I was going to hypnotize them and that it would take a while and we'd have to stop playing Yahtzee and all that.

So here was the situation: I was going to help two people become non-smokers. Both were hesitant and one had an urge to smoke right then and was afraid he didn't have enough cigarettes. Oh yeah, and this would happen while we played Yahtzee.

So what happened?


Short version:

I simply told them it would be easy and we could do it while we continued to play. They both were cool with that and ten or fifteen minutes later, after some NLP magic, they were non-smokers.


Long version:

Here was my game plan: I figured I'd do some NLP stuff and see what happened. I didn't even know myself whether or not it would work, but it was definitely worth a try. If the NLP stuff didn't work, I would hypnotize each of them and use a stop smoking script that I memorized before arriving there that night.

The first thing I did with both of them was ask about their goal (to quit smoking). I helped them, as best I could, to adjust their goal until it was well-formed.

I asked a lot of questions: What stops them from reaching their goal now? What did they get out of it currently? What will they get when they've reached their goal? What won't they get? How will they know when they've reached their goal? etc. This helped all of us get a better understanding of the task at hand.

After that, I helped construct a swish pattern for both of them, had them carry out the exercise, did some future pacing, and told them we were done. Oh yea, and as we continued to play Yahtzee, I gave them some semi-covert suggestions for their ongoing success.

When I told them we were done, they were both surprised how short it took. At the time, I wasn't really sure if it worked and neither were they. One thing I did know was that R no longer had an urge to smoke.

After that night, and for the next couple weeks during the holiday season, I got to see firsthand how they were doing as non-smokers. The entire time, neither of them smoked. Their habit of going outside at different times of the day to have some "free time" (where they smoked together) stopped altogether. At times, I thought it was kind of funny and a little sad because when our cousin (who is a smoker) spent time with us during the holidays, she would still go outside for "free time" - alone. After a couple days, my sister was grumpy and I remember her saying that it was because she hadn't smoked a cigarette for a couple days, but she seemed to get through that fine. R didn't show any signs of withdrawal or compulsion to smoke - in fact, he gave that last cigarette that he had to my cousin. haha.

This event took place Dec. 23, 2004. Today is Jan. 18, 2005. I just talked to each of them and heard stories about how their friends are really surprised at how they're not smoking anymore.
My sister mentioned that her boss would pay me to help him quit smoking if it worked for him (I guess he needs some time to see for himself how long my sister will keep the change). She also said that she feels healthier now and can tell the difference. Unfortunately, they both seem to want to believe that they've simply replaced addictions - my sister says she's addicted to buying purses now and R says he's eating more. I'm not sure if those things are related to the fact that they quit smoking or if they're just using it as an excuse, but I'll deal with those the next time I'm home. For now, I shall relish in the pride and fulfillment of knowing that they've been non-smokers for nearly a month now and it seems to me that they will continue to be non-smokers for a long time to come.

Field Report: "Working" Induction

Summary: I hypnotize a co-worker.


Here is the first of many "Field Reports" that I will be posting to the blog. Each Field Report will contain a report of things that I've actually experienced, in the field, so to speak.

It was a few days before Christmas and my training was over. Some of my friends and co-workers already knew that I had been spending the last few weekends going to my NLP practitioner training and most of them referred to it as hypnosis school. Since it was just before the holidays and the week of Christmas, things around the office were pretty slow. So one day I asked a co-worker if he'd like to be hypnotized.

When asked, I told him that I had already hypnotized many people (which was true, since nearly everyone has, at one point or another, whether they were aware of it or not), but it was actually the first formal induction that I had attempted outside of my training. Before going into the formal induction, I did a short pre-talk. This served the purpose of finding out what he thought of hypnosis and giving me a chance to answer any questions and tell him a little bit more about it, which served to help put him at ease, remove any fear and clear up any preconceived notions that he had about hypnosis.

Then, I hypnotized him using the Elman induction. At first, he was all smiles, giggling now and then. I think part of it was that he didn't believe it would work and another part was that he was probably thinking to himself, "Wow, I'm actually going through with something like this. This is not my kind of thing. Hah."

Seeing that made me even more nervous than I already was. But I was determined to give it an honest effort. I didn't want to sabotage myself with a half ass attempt. And as I continued, he began to relax more and more. By the time I tested for eye catalepsy, he was really relaxed and when I asked him to open and close his eyes for the first time, he took a pretty long time to simply open his eyes. When I noticed that, I knew something was working.

So I went on for few more minutes deepening his relaxation, having him open and close his eyes, doing some arm drops, etc. Then I heard some co-workers walking by and that made me nervous again. I then had the bright idea to bring him back to full consciousness at the count of 3, which I proceeded to count to very quickly, without suggesting that he would be fully alert or refreshed or anything like that.

1, 2, 3 - Snap! Open your eyes. And he did.

I asked him how he felt and he told me he felt really relaxed... too relaxed - groggy, even. And then he indicated to me that he felt like going to sleep and didn't feel like doing anything, which to him, was not a good thing at that particular time and in that particular context. He had a hypnotic hangover.

It was at that point that I realized that I had forgotten to give him adequate time to return to full consciousness and didn't give him any suggestions to be fully alert or feeling wonderful or anything like that. Whoops.

Upon realizing what was happening, I asked him to close his eyes again. He was a little hesitant at first (probably because he was now all groggy and he didn't really want to be.) But eventually, he closed his eyes again and I went back to work. I had him begin to imagine that he was doing a physical activity that required him to be very aware of what was going on, and as he did so, that all of his senses were beginning to heighten. I proceeded in this fashion for a minute or two and then brought him back . (and this time, I remembered to suggest that he felt fully alert and better than he had felt all day.)

When he opened his eyes that time, his head jerked back quickly, he looked around the room, stretched and seem to be back to "normal." I asked him how he felt and he said he felt good. I also asked him what he thought about hypnosis and his experience. I remember him saying "I can see how that can fuck with people's head," but he didn't really say much more than that. I was hoping to get more feedback from him, but by that time, his office-mates were just walking back into the office, and so we all just started chatting it up, talking about sports and news and the like.

A couple weeks after that took place, I spoke briefly with him about that time and he said that when he opened his eyes at the end (after I asked him to imagine he was doing a physical activity), his white shoes seemed really bright (which explained the sudden head jerk after opening his eyes.)

In the beginning...

As mentioned in an earlier post, my journey began when I came across the term NLP somewhere on the web. After a short web search, I came to find out that NLP was related to hypnosis and often I'd come across testimonials of amazing and incredulous stories. This peaked my interest and provoked my skepticism, so I began to read articles and surf sites related to NLP.

After a couple days of web searches, I began to get an idea of what NLP and hypnosis were and still interested, I began reading books on the subject. The first book I read was "Using Your Brain For A Change." I think I finished that book the same day I checked it out of the library. I was so interested in the topic that I kept on reading book after book. I read most of the books like a novel, but whenever I came across an exercise, I tried it out. I didn't know anyone else that was interested in this stuff and I also didn't think any of my friends would be interested, so I kept it to myself and did the exercises alone. Even after reading a lot of books and doing the exercises, I didn't notice any type of change personally, so I wasn't convinced that this stuff worked. Still, there was something about it that kept me interested and I decided to pursue live training.

I went to an 8 day accelerated NLP Practitioner training and trained with Curtis Cherrington of Align 2 Success. I researched a lot of different trainers and organizations and decided to go to that one because it was the most convenient (near where I lived and took place on the weekends) and was backed by the Society of NLP, which was created by Richard Bandler (co-founder of NLP). It was pretty pricey - on the scale of a couple thousand bucks. Man. That's a lot. But still, something compelled me to do it.

I began thinking about learning how to do hypnosis a long time ago and I really wanted to satisfy my curiosity. The main question I asked myself was: Is it worth the money to find out? I think I finally convinced myself by thinking if I do it and it doesn't do anything for me, I'll have wasted a lot of money, sure. But what if it does work? What if there is some truth to the stories that I read? What if...? Granted, there are ways to learn this stuff without making a large monetary investment. But for me, I decided it would be more convenient, faster and beneficial to do the live training.

The training itself was pretty good, and that's coming from an analytic skeptic like me.

I got along really well with Curtis (the trainer). We seemed to have a good amount in common and shared similar views concerning NLP and hypnosis. He seems to really care about whether his students understand the material or not. And I think that's genuine, even though the skeptic in me keeps thinking "He gets paid to get in rapport with you. Of course he shares your views. Of course you have things in common." etc, etc... Either way, he's a nice guy. I like him. And that's what matters... That, and the fact that I think he's good at what he does and if he was simply manipulating me - oh well, more proof that he's good at what he does and that's fine with me, too. Also, he didn't act like a salesman at all. Everything I can remember him offering was in the best interest of the participants and that was usually in response to a request. He didn't try to sell us on his next training seminar or anything like that. In fact, he even offered us another great opportunity at the end of the training, no money involved.

As for the training itself - the concepts were presented clearly, we had a good group, and we got lots of chances to practice and experience NLP and hypnosis in action. We went through different exercises with each other and at the end of most days, Curtis did a group induction, putting us in a nice trance and giving suggestions to our unconscious to find new ways to integrate and review what we learned over the next few days and nights, in our dreams and what not.

During the training, I was formally "hypnotized" for the first time. That was interesting. One thing I can say is that it wasn't what I expected. At the time, I was aware of everything, so I still had doubts about whether I went "under." But I was sure about one thing - I did feel pretty damned relaxed, despite having to sit in some cheap, uncomfortable hotel chairs.

Overall, in the 8 days we spent together, things went pretty smoothly and fairly well. Since I had done a fair amount of reading on the subject prior to attending the training, I was fairly familiar with the concepts and I didn't get very many new insights during the lectures. The best parts or the training for me were the exercises, the practice, and the people I met there.

After finishing the training, I didn't feel very different, though. I didn't feel very competent with the material and I wasn't about to give one of those crazy, incredulous testimonials describing how much my life had been changed by NLP and the training. Shit, in fact, I wasn't very impressed with any changes or my level of proficiency at all. Did I just waste my money on all of it? Was it all just a scam?

Those thoughts ran through my mind. But I also thought that I had to at least give an honest effort to really learn this stuff and become competent with it, since I had already made such a large investment. By that time, I had a good conceptual understanding of NLP and would have done well on a written test of the models, techniques, and other such material. But, had I been asked to demonstrate my competency, I didn't feel very confident that I would have done well at all (but I could definitely fumble my way through it.)

And anyways, what can you really expect from only about a week of training? A lot of material was covered and it takes practice and experience to really "get it" and become competent as a practitioner. I truly believe that, regardless of what all of the advertisements imply and some even claim (which reminds me of how much I hate certain marketing tactics and advertisement claims, but that's a rant for another day.)

As for my development in NLP, after the training and the books I've read, I definitely have a good foundation upon which to further develop my skills. (Although, it would've been nice to feel more proficient at the end of the training than I did at the time.) More practice and demonstrations would've helped, but that can only teach you so much. I think you have to go out and do it in the real world, with non-seminar participants like friends, family, strangers and the like. That's where the real learning begins. So looking back, I think I got most of what I could have gotten out of the training (well, maybe I could've been taken deeper into trance so that I was absolutely convinced that I was under.)

Surprisingly, a little while after the training, I started to notice some pretty odd things. The things I noticed had actually started occurring before the training ended, I just didn't realize it. Now whether these things I noticed were related to the training, or just a coincidence, I don't know. Regardless, it was pretty cool.

Something to keep in mind before I list what I noticed is that during the training we did a lot of exercises. Most of the exercises had to do with making some type of behavioral change. For example, we did some exercises that were designed to help us remove limiting beliefs, change certain behaviors, etc. Some of the things I had wanted to change had to do with my desire and habit of drinking a lot of soda, eating fast food often, working out (I wanted to work out more), and waking up earlier in the morning without hitting the snooze button so many times. Anyways, here's what I noticed:

1) I noticed that soda didn't taste quite as good. At first I thought it was the soda machine and that I had just gotten a bad mix. But after a couple weeks of drinking fountain, bottled, and canned soda I started to think it was just me. My friends helped confirm things. The soda tasted normal to them. It only tasted bad to me. That was pretty shocking. As a result, I don't get as much pleasure from drinking soda and now drink primarily water. yay.

2) I noticed I wasn't as satisfied with fast food. I used to really enjoy eating fast food - it actually tasted really good to me. Nowadays, it doesn't really satisfy me in the same way. I still eat fast food. But now it's primarily because of the convenience, not because I desire it and want it. It's more of a last resort for me now (just before resorting to cooking up my own food, that is.)

3) I began to work out more often and more intensely. Before the training I was working out 2-3 days per week. My max continuous jogging time was about 22 minutes and it had been that way for the past year or so, with the exception of one or two runs. Some time during the training, I started working out about 3-5 times per week, running up to 40 minutes, and now I actually enjoy doing it a lot more and even look forward to it. It wasn't like that before.

There may have been more changes, but those were the most noticeable for me. Unfortunately, I still wake up and hit the snooze button pretty often. Now whether those are actual results from the NLP training, or they're just coincidences and I just associate those changes with the NLP training, it's still a positive improvement in my life. Also, I did satisfy my curiosity and take some of the mystery out of NLP and hypnosis.

My training ended just before the holiday season of 2004 and I made it a point to try and practice as much as I could and even try to get my friends involved to help me out. The experiences I've had when playing with what I learned have slowly begun to convince me that my investment of time, money, and effort was worth it.

I'll blog up my experiences thus far at a later time. Some of them were pretty damn shocking and almost unbelievable. If I hadn't been there and actually, physically been involved, I sure wouldn't have believed it. But then again, they could all be coincidences. Or lies.

NLP? Hypnosis? You believe in that stuff?!

I think I read somewhere that NLP was a way to do covert hypnosis. Covert hypnosis? You mean it's possible to get people to cluck like a chicken, make fools of themselves, and generally just get people to do as you command - covertly? If that's possible, once I master it, I can proceed with my plans to take over the world... muuuhaahaahaaa.

Unfortunately (for my plans of world domination, that is), like many things, there are a lot of misconceptions and rumors surrounding NLP and hypnosis. I've been studying the two topics to try to unravel the mystery and get down to the nitty gritty. Is it real? If so, what exactly is it?

Let me first state that I am a skeptic. I think a healthy skepticism is a good thing. In addition, I am an engineer, so I have been trained to be very analytical and scientific about things. Whether or not this is a good thing when learning NLP and hypnosis, I don't really know, but that's where I'm coming from as I approach and learn about them.

Anyways, back to the topic at hand - NLP, hypnosis. What are they? Do they exist?

NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming), some say, is a pragmatic school of thought - an epistemology - that involves many aspects of being human. According to the NLP FAQ (http://www.rain.org/~da5e/nlpfaq.html) NLP is "a constantly evolving set of models, presuppositions, patterns, techniques, and observation-based theories resulting from the study of the structure of subjective experience, behavior and communication. Beyond understanding, NLP seeks to enable remedial and generative change quickly and ecologically."

Although I've been studying NLP for a little while now and have a document which certifies that I am a Licensed NLP Practitioner, it's difficult for me to give a concise description of it. Richard Bandler (co-founder of NLP and founder of the Society of NLP), says it is also "an attitude and a methodology that leaves behind a trail of techniques." There are a lot of books and web sites out there that may help you get a better idea. You might start with Google. That's all I'll say about that.

Now... hypnosis.

It has been given many definitions and some even say that it does not exist. The United States government defines hypnosis as "the by-pass of the critical factor of the conscious mind followed by the establishment of acceptable selective thinking," i.e., the by-pass of a person's analytical and judgmental ability combined with a concentrated focus of awareness.

It may help to add Steven Heller's view that "[included in the] definition of hypnosis is any form of communication in which a person or persons, whether a hypnotist, wife, husband, teacher, or [whatever]? uses words, tonality, expressions or movement that elicit and/or evoke within another person an internal experience, and that experience becomes a reality of its own. (For more information on-line, you can refer to the Hypnosis FAQ at http://www.royhunter.com/hypnofaq.htm)

Like many others, including Dave Elman and Steve Heller, I believe that we've all been hypnotized hundreds, even thousands of times throughout our lives.

If you've ever watched a movie or TV and were so entranced by what you were watching that you began to realize certain feelings (happiness, sadness, suspense), and you might even realize certain physiological responses (change in pulse rate and/or breathing, tearing, smiling, tingling, etc) - that's hypnosis.

If you've ever driven your car and realized that you can't quite seem to remember all the details of how you got where you were - that's hypnosis.

If you're superstitious and believe in the stories of Friday the 13th, to the point where you may allow your belief regarding that day to alter your plans or "reality", even though logically, it's just another day like any other - that's hypnosis.

Natural occurrences of hypnosis can be found everywhere in everyday life. It's a naturalistic state of mind. In fact, the term hypnosis is actually a misnomer and like many other things, many people have misconceptions and previous notions of hypnosis that are misunderstood or simply inaccurate. Many prominent hypnotists can't even agree on a definition of hypnosis. And to some, there's no such thing as hypnosis. (Or perhaps, it's all hypnosis.)

On a more personal note, most people I know harbor some type of fear regarding hypnosis (and NLP for that matter) even though a lot of them think it's bullshit. As for me, I started out like many of my friends. I wasn't really sure if it worked, but I leaned more towards the idea that it was bullshit. I didn't really know many people that were personally involved or knew much about either topic. The one thing that kept hope alive for me, though, was that when I was in high school, some friends of mine were volunteers at a stage hypnotist show at the county fair. I was amazed. And when I asked them about their experience, I trusted that they weren't bullshitting me.

In order to satisfy my skepticism of hypnosis and NLP, I decided to find out what they were for myself and then decide if it's bullshit or not. I've surfed the net, read books, attended live training, joined practice groups, and played with each for the past few months.

With that said, the question remains: do I believe in this stuff? I believe in a lot of it, but I'm still skeptical.

The Adventures of Somebody

What I am about to tell you is a lie and does not exist.

This blog is an online record of my trials and tribulations while learning and practicing NLP and Hypnosis - both of which, are lies and do not exist.

It all started one day as I partook in my procrastination activity of choice, web surfing. Somehow I came across a page which mentioned NLP. Since I had no idea what it was, I took my web surfing in a new direction and began to research and find out just what was behind this three letter acronym.

That's what I do. I surf, I find an unknown, I go to google, I am enlightened. Often, it ends at www.dictionary.com in a matter of minutes. Sometimes the search may last an hour or two, couple days tops. I think this search is going on 4 months now.

This blog shall serve as an outlet, log, and hopefully maybe as a resource for some of you that may find yourself in a similar position as myself - wondering about what this stuff is all about.

Thus begins the adventures of this particular somebody. Let the lies begin.