Does hypnosis actually work? Does it help you quit smoking? Does it help you stop smoking? Does hypnotherapy actually help people quit smoking for life?

These are the question we will answer in this blog post.

Are you thinking, “Does hypnosis actually work? I wonder because I know somebody that did hypnosis and they swear by it, but I know somebody else who tried hypnosis and it didn’t really work for them. What if hypnosis doesn’t actually work?” Today we are going to answer that question.

My name is Ted Bradley, master hypnotist. I’m a specialist at helping people quit smoking, lose weight, and free their lives of anxiety and stress. First, to deconstruct whether or not hypnosis actually works we have to have a workable definition. So let’s look at the definition of hypnosis. Hypnosis. If you look it up online you’re going to find something like this – Hypnosis is a human condition involving focused attention reduced peripheral awareness and an enhanced capacity to respond to suggestion. That’s a terrible definition! I’m a hypnotist and I don’t even understand this definition. Before I give you a better definition let’s answer another common question and just look real quickly at what a “hypnotherapist” is. We don’t need to define what a hypnotherapist is. A hypnotherapist is just somebody that uses hypnosis for therapeutic purposes. That’s it. Nothing more. So let’s deconstruct this and try to get a more workable definition. Hypnosis is a state of hyper focus of the conscious mind so the unconscious mind can be brought forward and changed. You just focus the conscious mind so the unconscious mind can be changed. Now that’s a better definition of what hypnosis is! It’s simply becoming very focused and relaxed so you can align your unconscious mind with your conscious thoughts.

So it looks a little bit like this. You take your conscious mind and you say, “Oh, look over here. Focus over here conscious mind and relax.” Then the unconscious mind can be brought forward and we become more suggestible. So is this real? Well, to find out we have to look at how our brain actually works. Really what we’re doing here is we’re looking at what we call a mind map, the map of how our mind actually works. We know from neuroscience that we can measure conscious thoughts and unconscious thoughts. We know what they do. Our conscious mind it has two main functions. They are the ability to make a decision and to act as an interpreter. So the first thing our conscious mind does is it brings in all the outside information: our hearing, our sight, our sense of smell, our sense of taste, and our touch. It’s an interpreter of the outside world. It’s our thinking thing, the internal dialogue we hear in our head. It has the ability to make decisions. For example: are you going to turn to your left versus turn right? Are we eating Chinese instead of Italian tonight?

It’s a real thing. We know from neuroscience that these decisions happen at the conscious level not at the unconscious level. Now the unconscious mind, what does it do? It’s where our memory is, our imagination is, our fantasies, our emotions, and it’s where habits are. This last one, habit, is the most important one to understand if you want to know whether or not hypnosis works. We’ll come back to habit in a second, but first I’ll let you in on the golden rule. Here it is. The unconscious mind and the conscious mind are separated by something called the critical faculty. I’m not going to go into the critical faculty in this video. Go read my other post How the Mind Works and Smoking (the video form is found on my you tube channel) to get a good definition of that, right now all we need to know is this – what the unconscious mind does the conscious mind cannot do, and what the conscious mind does the unconscious mind cannot do. That is the golden rule of our mind.

We have no memory in our conscious mind. Our thinking thing has no memory. If I ask you to remember your high school principal you have to silent your conscious mind for a brief moment a millisecond so the memory can either come back or not come back. If it takes too long to find it essentially you make a decision, I’m just going to say I don’t remember, because you don’t want to spend the time and energy to wait for your unconscious mind to find the answer. Let’s summarize how our brain actually works. We have a conscious mind and an unconscious mind. They both do separate and different things.

The important thing to remember is habit resides in our unconscious mind and not our conscious mind. Habit is what we do over and over and over again repetitiously, and it tends to be complex like walking, breathing, and running our circulatory system. If our conscious mind had to do these things we’d get overwhelmed, so it’s a function of the unconscious mind. Anything that we do repetitively like that is a habit, like smoking! We developed a strong habit. Think about how you smoke – hand to mouth, hand to mouth, hand to mouth. It’s a habit not an addiction.

Smoking is a habit. So if habit happens in our unconscious mind (it does!), will hypnosis change it? Does hypnosis work? Remember, hypnosis is the act of focusing the conscious mind and calming it so that we can bring this forward our unconscious mind and change it. So hypnosis is really good for changing anything that’s a habit, by definition. Here’s the answer to the question. Hypnosis does work. Absolutely, it works! It absolutely works because all it’s really doing is calming your conscious mind down so your unconscious mind becomes suggestible. How it becomes successful is when you allow your guard to come down by becoming relaxed enough, your unconscious mind can absolutely be changed, even yours.

But what if I can’t be hypnotized? Who all can be hypnotized? You can! Everybody can. It’s natural. We all do it on average seven times a day. For example: You’re driving home. You go home this way every day. Your conscious mind becomes focused on something, a problem at work, your unconscious mind comes forward and does the driving. You get home and you think to yourself, I don’t even remember driving home. That’s a hypnotic trance. That’s all hypnosis is. It is no more complex than that. Okay, it’s natural. Okay, we do it all the time. What does that mean for you?

So here’s the thing, not only does hypnosis work, and not only is it natural and we do it all the time; but, if that’s the case, if hypnosis does work and we’re constantly hypnotizing ourselves, what do you think marketing is? It’s all hypnosis.

That considered, best definition of hypnosis is all hypnosis is self-hypnosis. I cannot hypnotize anybody. I cannot even place anyone who doesn’t want to be hypnotized in a hypnotic trance. It’s not magic. If you go to a hypnotist, and they tell you you’re not hypnotizable all they’re saying is they don’t have the skills to help you to learn self-hypnosis. I’ve never met somebody that I could not hypnotize, because we all do it. It’s natural. The only people that we know for fact that cannot be hypnotized are two types of people – if you have an IQ less than 75 or you’re dead. Other than that you can absolutely be hypnotized.

So, if it’s natural and we do it all the time, why not do it with intention? The best definition of hypnosis is all hypnosis is self-hypnosis. Well then we might as well learn how to hack own brain and get the life we want!

Let’s summarize this.

• Does hypnosis work? Absolutely!
• What is hypnosis? Well, it’s natural. We do it all the time. It’s just relaxing our conscious thoughts so our unconscious mind can come forward and we can change things like habits we don’t want.
• Can I be hypnotized? Yes! Anyone can be hypnotized. All hypnosis is self-hypnosis.

With hypnosis you get to re-write and change your mind so you can get the life you want. All I’m asking is if any of you want any help learning self-hypnosis or learning how to get the life that you want, please consume my content. You can do a lot of the work on your own just by subscribing to my channels and consuming my content or reaching out to me on my Facebook page. You can DM me, you can go to my website, you can send me an email, and you can call me. I’m happy to help anyone that needs help changing their life into the life that they want. Blessings.