WRITING HYPNOTIC SUGGESTIONS

Hypnosis Scripts are collections of suggestions intended to change behaviours. Every hypnotic suggestion needs to be aimed at a specific aspect of the client's inner beliefs about the world or at a specific aspect of unconscious behaviour. Everyone has beliefs about who they are, what they are and the world they live in. Everyone has stored behaviours that they automatically call up to use in specific situations. It is when these inner beliefs and automatic responses no longer fit the client's outer world that problems arise.

 

Effective Suggestions

Suggestions will work when they are
a) targeted precisely at one of those beliefs or behaviours, and
b) use a technique that matches how the mind functions.

Hynotic Suggestions that do not do both these things will be ignored or misunderstood.

Structure of a suggestion

To create an effective suggestion, the therapist needs to decide
a) what behaviour is causing the problem,
b) what belief is linked to the behaviour,
c) what hypnotic technique to use to cause the change, and
d) how to word the suggestion - Direct, Indirect, Metaphor.

 

The table below shows the two main target areas that a hypnotherapy script needs to address, and the two main hypnotic techniques for creating and wording the suggestions in the script. For a detailed explanation of each of these areas click on the links below.

• Direct suggestions
• Indirect suggestions
• Hypnotic Binds
• Beliefs: Core Beliefs Theory
• Behaviour: Cycle of Behaviour Theory
• Cognitive Filters
• Hypnotic Techniques
• Metaphor Techniques

 

Click on the words inside the cells of the table for a detailed explanation and examples of suggestions.

 

TARGETS		TECHNIQUES
Behaviours	Beliefs	Hypnotic Methods	Hypnotic Wording
Situation	Identity	Amnesia	Cause and Effect
Environment	Behaviour	Association	Complex Equivalence
Stimulus	Capability	Dissociation	Conversational Commands
Memory	Rules	Future Pacing	Embedded Commands
Reaction	Others	Post Hypnotic Suggestion	Extended Quotation
Actions	Worldview	Reframing	Lost Performative
Termination		Regression	Mind Reading
Evaluation		Sensory distortion	Modal Operator
Learning		Time distortion	Negative Suggestion
		Visualisation	Nominalizations
		Metaphor	Non Sequitur
		Anchoring	Presupposition
		Cognitive Filtering	Inanimations
		Discrimination	Tag Question
		Deletion	Truism sets
		Distortion	Universal Quantifier
		Generalization	Unspecific Comparison
			Unspecific Object
			Unspecific Verb
			Binds

 

 

Codes indicating the Hypnotic Logic being used.

 

I	Indirect Suggestion
D	Direct Suggestion
K	Kinesthetic reaction	aiming at a muscular memory reaction
A	Auditory reaction	encouraging an auditory recall
M	Metaphor reaction	using a metaphor
V	Visualization reaction	encouraging a visualization
=	Equivalence	Doing one thing is the same as another thing
/	Opposite	The more of one thing the less of the other thing
>	Cause and Effect	Doing one thing causes the other thing