Hypnosis is a naturally occurring altered state of consciousness in which the subconscious part of your mind is accessed enabling the hypnotist to affect a particular problem by suggestion. Basically, the individual is put into a trance-like state which allows one's attention to focus on a particular suggestion while being free of distraction.

Many people fear being hypnotized because they falsely believe they will have to give up control of their mind. Not true. Think about when you are so engrossed in a movie and you find yourself in tears. During these movies you are so involved that you actually felt emotion. You were literally in a hypnotic trance. Most importantly, though, you still had the power to emerge from that state if desired. Your mind may be guided by a movie, self-hypnosis tape, or hypnotist, but you still have the power to resist. If you fully believe and acknowledge that you have the power to resist any control of emotions, then hypnosis is nothing to fear.

Your mind is an untapped source of amazing power. If you change your mind, you must change your life. The most effective way to do this is to change your subconscious mind. Hypnosis is widely recognised as the easiest method we can employ to change the subconscious mind.

Hypnosis can be used as a healing tool in a variety of problems including:

Weight loss,

Quit smoking,

Insomnia,

Stress management,

Self esteem,

Motivation,

Memory, and

Gambling.

When used as an accessory to psychotherapy, hypnosis can help clients enter a relaxed, comfortable, trance state for obtaining specific therapeutic outcomes. With clinical hypnosis, the therapist can make suggestions designed to help the client formulate specific internal processes (feelings, memories, images and internal self-talk) that will lead to mutually-agreed-upon outcomes.

Although clinical hypnosis is widely recognised as an effective method of treatment in many conditions, it doesn't always work for everyone. Many people need a combination of various methods of therapy and hypnosis is often used with other forms of treatment. However, the anecdotal evidence of the healing qualities of hypnosis would indicate that it is, indeed, an extremely effective option.

It is not even necessary to be hypnotised by a hypnotherapist as such. There are many self-hypnosis CDs and videos available on the market today. These allow you to affect change in the comfort of your own home.

It's really a misleading notion when people say they were hypnotized. What they really mean is that they allowed their mind to be hypnotized or they allowed a hypnotist to give suggestions that they chose to follow. Just remember that no one controls your mind unless you first grant permission!