Clinical Hypnotherapy
Los Angeles
What is clinical hypnosis, and how can it help you?
If you enjoy getting absorbed — perhaps in a great movie, song, book, hobby, or conversation — you may find clinical hypnosis to be a relaxing and surprisingly pleasant way to enhance your progress in therapy.
Hypnosis is similar to these pleasurable trance-like experiences in that it involves focused, selective attention and reduced peripheral awareness. When delightfully immersed in your favorite sport, TV show, or playlist, for instance, your focus tends to narrow and the busy chatter in your mind and body may quiet down. You may become less aware of your immediate surroundings and may lose track of how much time has passed.
Clinical hypnosis, or hypnotherapy, intentionally utilizes this natural ability to selectively focus attention to move you toward your therapeutic goals. In this calm state of focused awareness, you may readily access powerful internal resources and have increased ease making desired changes, developing new skills, and shifting to more helpful perspectives.
Research has shown hypnosis to be effective for managing chronic and acute pain, processing trauma, and improving symptoms associated with depression, anxiety, habit disorders, stress, and certain health conditions. Clinical hypnotherapy is the use of hypnosis to improve these and other clinical issues, often in conjunction with other modalities, by a licensed healthcare professional.
How do you integrate hypnosis into your therapy practice?
Unlike stage hypnotists or lay hypnotherapists who are not licensed mental health therapists, I am trained through the American Society of Clinical Hypnosis (ASCH), which requires advanced education and licensure in healthcare. ASCH trains healthcare professionals such as medical doctors, nurses, dentists, and mental health therapists in the evidence-based and ethical use of hypnosis for treating clinical diagnoses that are already within their scope of practice.
Depending on your goals, I may offer to integrate hypnosis while we are exploring a particular problem or during a session in which we are also using EMDR, Accelerated Resolution Therapy, IFS, or any other approach. Hypnosis plays great with most modalities and adds a gentle, effective, and pleasurable way to make therapeutic breakthroughs. I may also teach you self-hypnosis or suggest an app for use in between sessions.
Some issues for which I have used clinical hypnosis include procrastination, low motivation, creative blocks, low self-confidence, emotional dysregulation, impulsivity, fear of a medical procedure, indecision, and performance anxiety.
Debunking hypnosis myths
Sometimes it can be helpful to take a moment and address the many misconceptions that have arisen from stage shows and depictions of hypnosis in film and television. It’s important to remember that these forms of media are intended for entertainment.
Due to these portrayals, you may understandably have impressions of hypnosis as a scary method of brainwashing during which a person loses all agency, memory, and self-control. These ideas are false, and sadly, the irony is that hypnosis can be incredibly empowering and liberating.
To clarify, with clinical hypnotherapy:
You are in control of the experience. You cannot be made to do things you do not want to do or to accept suggestions you do not wish to accept. You can come out of it at any time.
You are not asleep or unconscious. In fact, we’ll be chatting intermittently throughout the experience and talking about it afterwards.
The experience is informed by your therapy goals and geared toward optimizing treatment outcomes.
Next steps
How it Works
01
Reach Out
Reach out to schedule a free 20-minute phone consultation. I’ll answer any questions you have and make sure we’re a good fit.
02
first Session
At the intake session, we’ll talk about what brings you to therapy and what changes you’d like to see through our work together.
03
resolve stuckness & thrive
Join me weekly to achieve your goals OR break through blocks in the intensive format.