INTERACTIVE HYPNOTHERAPY: PARTS I TO IV

Eye of the house

Masterclasses in interactive hypnotherapy

Deborah Marshall-Warren will soon be commencing masterclasses in interactive hypnotherapy. These courses are for people who have attended the Introduction to Hypnotherapy course, or who are already practising hypnotherapists, and who wish to push their repertoire of skills to new horizons. Interactive hypnotherapy involves a structured and creative dialogue with the subconscious mind, and has a speed and power substantially beyond the techniques of simple approaches based on 'direct suggestion' and visualisation. This is an intensive series of short courses, that equip you with the basic skills and procedures to start using interactive hypnotherapy in your own practice.

The courses will be held in London, England, and in Zabbar, Malta. The venue in London will be a spacious Victorian town house in West Hampstead. In Malta, the venue will be an old limestone house in the unspoilt town of Zabbar -- twenty minutes' bus ride from the capital city of Valetta. Both venues offer space for teaching, and practice areas with therapeutic couches for work in pairs and small groups.

For bookings or enquires, please contact Deborah Marshall-Warren on: London (020) 7432-0307, or email appointments@marshall-warren.com. Or, go straight to the online enrolment page or the offline enrolment page.

THE COURSES

This is a full-time, intensive course (over a long weekend of an evening and two days in London, or three linked days in Malta). The courses are fully structured to make maximum use of the time. They are backed up with comprehensive written training materials. They will comprise: one-to-many lecturing; demonstrations by Deborah; one-to-one practice between course participants. The courses are focused on effective practice, as well as basic theory.

The basics of hypnotic induction will be revisited in the first session. A pre-requisite will be to memorise e.g. the Elman Induction Script before joining the course. The script will be issued on emrolment. (The text is also available in Deborah's book, "I'm Afraid of Hypnosis but I don't Know Why")

This course is primarily for people who have completed the Introduction to Hypnotherapy course, and for practitioners who are currently using the techniques of visualisation and direct suggestion. You may wish to acquire further techniques, in order to enhance the effectiveness and flexibility of your hypnotherapeutic process. It will also be useful for practitioners who are using some other interactive techniques of hypnotherapy, or hypnoanalysis, and who wish to explore different working methods.

Hypnotherapists who work only with direct suggestion and guided visualisation often complain about the inherent limitations of the method. By using more refined scripts, they believe they can tackle more recalcitrant problems and produce more lasting changes in the client's mind. In fact, the fundamental obstacle to greater success is not the script per se, but the decision to use solely direct suggestion. Presenting problems often have roots that go beneath the surface. The root may not be known to the client. Or, more often, the client knows about the originating incident, but simply does not have insight into the connection between the early incident and the present problem. When the root is unknown to both client and therapist, there is little likelihood that direct suggestion or guided visualisation will be able to address the issue.

How does interactive hypnotherapy differ, in its effect, from the more common technique of direct suggestion? Well, for example, a perceived lack of confidence generally has a root. Direct suggestion hypnosis is rather like stepping into your garden and removing the tops off the dandelions. To all intents and purposes the dandelions are gone. However, you have not accessed the emotional root. Interactive hypnotherapy enables the client to discover what is essentially fuelling 'the root' of low self esteem, and to discover its source. In hypnosis the client can then be guided to remove 'the root' cause - that from which it 'stems'.

Reciting suggestion scripts to clients tends not to be very fulfilling either for clients or for therapists. It has been suggested that this is one reason for therapists to abandon the profession in frustration.

Unfortunately, hypnotherapy training courses often omit the more exciting and effective methods that exist. The most potent of these is the active dialogue with 'inner team members'. These are essentially 'sub-personalities' that are invoked in order to create a manageable interface with the subconscious mind. The key elements of this masterclass are the tactics and strategies for negotiating with the 'inner team members'.

In more detail, the two weekend trainings will teach you the following aspects of fast-track hypnotherapy:

Part I

Skill development for practising hypnotherapists, especially those who currently work only with direct suggestion and guided visualisation.
A process that enables a hypnotherapist to work together with a client in a participative way, which helps the client gain access to a deeper wisdom and self-knowledge.
The beginnings of a basic repertoire of steps in interactive hypnotherapy.
How to build and coach an inner team in the client's subconscious.
How to unblock stalling in the client's process, to get the client moving in the dance again when the steps appear to falter or stop.

Part II

How much can often be accomplished in a single session with a client. The surprise often leads clients to make such unsolicited comments as, "It’s amazing. I feel like I have done three months psychotherapy!" It will a intrigue you to consider what you will be able to achieve with your own clients.

Part III

Expanding and reinforcing the repertoire of steps in interactive hypnotherapy.
Internalising the steps of the hypnotherapeutic process, and then practise alongside supportive notes after the training, to create and develop your own style of interactive hypnotherapy.
How to manage and build client expectations.

Part IV

Revision, written paper, and practicals.

You will learn through:

Lectures and discussions, with question-and-answer opportunities at key points.
Watching Deborah work with course delegates with real presenting problems. Each demonstration will be followed by a full discussion and analysis after each session.
The opportunity to work one-to-one with course delegates.
Feedback discussions on the one-to-one work.
Sharing of group members' experience through discussion of chosen themes.

The first course will run in November 2003, in London.

Pre-course introductory session

Students who wish to participate in the course will be offered the opportunity of a one-to-one demonstration of the interactive style of hypnotherapy at the discounted 'student rate', on confirmation of booking and receipt of the deposit.

What you can gain

Deborah is hugely encouraged that more and more people are coming to understand hypnotherapy and what it can do for them. Hypnotherapy is moving toward mainstream acceptability. At present, however, I would caution those training in hypnotherapy that it may be risky to abandon your current job or profession prematurely. A career in hypnotherapy is immensely enriching in human terms, but may take some time for a stream of clients to build to a level of self-sufficiency.

Those currently practising hypnosis, and using only the techniques of direct suggestion and guided visualisation, will derive several benefits from this course. They will gain in confidence, and in their professional competence; they will expand their repertoire and range of tools; they will obtain more satisfaction from their work; they will be braver in the cases they tackle and will most definitely be able to expand their practice as a result of participating in the course and then practising what they have learned; their clients will benefit considerably, and the standing of the profession of hypnotherapy in general will be improved.

For extended excerpts of actual case studies using interactive hypnotherapy, you are recommended to read Deborah's book, "I'm Afraid of Hypnosis but I Don't Know Why".

ABOUT INTERACTIVE HYPNOTHERAPY

Think of the subconscious mind as a team of players. I often say to my clients that, as a therapist, I am ... a facilitator, a cheerleader, a partner in their dance, a player on their team. The therapist senses the cues to give them, to help them along the journey, and co-creates the choreography as the session progresses. It is the clients who create the music and the song. It is their wisdom that provides the content. It is their words that heal. It is their wisdom that affords them the clarity and the understanding. Remember always that the client is the composer and the arranger of his or her life’s song and dance. Interactive hypnotherapy puts your clients into a state of relaxation, where they can take hold of their creative reins and steer a fresh course.

The voice of the therapist is a chorus line to the client’s song, as she repeats, and repeats again, the best and the brightest of the client’s lyrics. The more often you are exposed to an idea, the more it influences you. By repeating precisely and verbatim the client’s words, and by championing with vigour, the positive and affirming declarations the client chooses for themselves, you effectively help to turn up the volume on their channel for change.

Whole-Being Hypnotherapy

Deborah's practice, Whole-Being Hypnotherapy, is based in North-West London.

Whole-Being interactive hypnotherapy has evolved over nine years of professional practice.
Whole-Being hypnotherapy respects and embraces the wisdom within, and our individual ability to come forward with our own suggestions for change -- suggestions that can enable and ennoble our lives.
The creation of an ‘inner team’, and the notion of ‘building an inner team’ -- to facilitate continuing inner ‘life coaching’ outside the session -- have themselves evolved, and grown from firm foundations.

The Inner Team

The 'inner team’ metaphor has its foundations in the forward thinking of present and past hypnotherapists. In recent years, Valerie Austin recognised the potency of a selection of techniques, themselves devised by past masters of hypnosis and therapy. These elements formed a repertoire that she worked with, and developed, for a number of years. The sequence of steps was found to work elegantly to elicit clean, fast, and effective change in clients.

Whole-Being Hypnotherapy expands the repertoire and the resonance of these elements of technique.

I have found that with the majority of clients interactive hypnotherapy effects change successfully and permanently, within just three to five sessions, the average treatment taking three sessions. Sometimes, even a single session may succeed in achieving the client's aims.

Some sessions do require more negotiation, more persuasion, and more choreography than others. Fresh steps do evolve with practice. By learning to listen to, and by trusting, your intuition, you may introduce other steps and so choreograph the therapeutic dance in a slightly different way. The interactive, and therapeutic, dance between yourself and your client is always in motion.

PRACTICAL DETAILS : MALTA

Full-time training by Deborah Marshall-Warren.
In Malta, training will take place in a beautiful and comfortable stone house in the quiet town of Zabbar. In England, the venue is a light and spacious house in West Hampstead, London.
A comprehensive training manual to support you every step of the way.
Supplementary reading material including a relaxation tape.
Vegetarian lunches freshly prepared by our caterers each day, to be enjoyed in the secluded courtyard of the house or on the house's roof terrace.
Refreshments throughout the day.
For the Malta venu: transport from the Corinthia Jerma Palace Hotel (which is recommended for accommodation) to the training venue each day at 9:30 a.m. for a 10 a.m. start, and return transport to the hotel in the evening at around 6 p.m.

The course fee does not include accommodation, evening meals, or transportation from the airport to the hotel.

The modules may be joined at any stage of the programme. A pre-requisite will be to have completed the stage prior to the one you wish to join.

A non-refundable deposit of £195 secures a place on the training best suited to your schedule. Though non-refundable, the deposit may be transferred to another set of course dates.

For information on travel to and within Malta, and accommodation in Malta, please see the Malta page.

PRACTICAL DETAILS : LONDON

London, England

Interactive Hypnotherapy Part I
£295 including all course materials, lunch, and refreshments. Deposit £95. Friday, date TBA 2004 7 pm to 9 pm

Saturday 21st & Sunday 22nd February 2004 9:30 to 18:00

Interactive Hypnotherapy Part II
£315 including all course materials, lunch, and refreshments. Deposit £95. Friday, date TBA 2004 7 pm to 9 pm

Saturday & Sunday date TBA 2004 9:30 to 18:00

Interactive Hypnotherapy Part III
£395 including all course materials, lunch, and refreshments. Deposit £95. Friday, date TBA 2004 7 pm to 9 pm

Saturday & Sunday date TBA 2004 9:30 to 18:00

Interactive Hypnotherapy Part IV
£395 including all course materials, lunch, and refreshments. Deposit £95. Friday, date TBA 2004 7 pm to 9 pm

Saturday & Sunday date TBA 2004 9:30 to 18:00