A person’s susceptibility to hypnosis is dependent on several factors. Whether these factors work together or oppose each other is entirely in the hands of the individual.
There are factors that are outside of anyone’s control. They come down to the individual makeup of each person. For instance, if someone is naturally susceptible to suggestion in their everyday life, they likely will carry along that susceptibility in the hypnosis process as well. Everyone is susceptible to some degree, but this is one of the variable that will contribute to a person’s likelihood of achieving hypnosis easily.
But there are varying degrees of depth of hypnosis, and hypnotherapy doesn’t require a deep state of hypnosis. It can be beneficial at varying levels of depth. The self hypnosis CDs and downloads that I have produced are designed to take someone from a completely awake state into some degree of hypnosis.
Susceptibility to suggestion is also impacted by repetition. The more you hear a message, the more likely you will be to able accept is as fact, to buy into it, whether consciously or not. This is also true in everyday life.
Some people take to hypnosis quite effortlessly, while others need a bit more practice. Their degree of susceptibility might be influenced by other conditions around them, and they may find they need just exactly the right circumstances to achieve hypnosis.
But the most important contributor to someone’s susceptibility to hypnosis is really their attitude. If someone tries it and has immediate success, that’s terrific. But if the first time you listen to a hypnosis CD and you do not achieve hypnosis, some people will stop at that and conclude that it doesn’t work. That’s unfortunate, because if people are willing to commit to listening to the recordings regularly, and to finding the ideal conditions for themselves, they will achieve some degree of hypnosis, which will benefit them.
Hypnosis is about suggestion, and there is a degree of suggestion to all forms of therapy. If there are any prerequisites to qualify someone as a candidate for hypnosis, it’s attitude first and foremost. Sure other intellectual variances may factor in, like concentration and imagination, but they would likely affect the level of hypnosis, rather than the ability to achieve it in the first place.
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