I would recommend that you always do the pre-talk and then the suggestibility test when you are beginning with a new client. Although once you have a client in once, you probably won’t do the suggestibility test again; this is just for new clients. I am going to recommend that you do both of those when you get new clients in but then you go directly to this step, which is the Ericksonian Patterns.

Let’s talk a little bit about them before we actually do our trance induction. Erickson’s major approach is described as indirect permissive hypnosis. That is as opposed to direct authoritarian. In the direct authoritarian approach, what we say is uncross your arms and legs. Put your feet on the floor and take a deep breath and go into a trance. What we say in Ericksonian hypnosis is we would be a little more indirect about it, a little more permissive. I wonder as you sit there listening to the sound of my voice can you experience being more relaxed. As you notice you are more relaxed is it easier for you to go into trance.

So Erickson was very, very permissive about it. There are some people who I will need the direct authoritarian approach and there are some folks who will need the absolutely indirect permissive approach. You’re going to have to notice which kinds of people or which kind of person you are dealing with.

Typically however, people who have spent most of their life following orders, such as someone in the military, will respond best to a direct authoritarian approach. But some people especially in our day and age are put off by a direct authoritarian approach. They would not feel comfortable about being told what to do in which case then you will have to use a more permissive approach.

Let’s explore the Ericksonian approach it is a bit of a different philosophical concept about hypnosis than what people generally think about hypnosis. So remember, Erickson said that patients are patients because they are out of rapport with there own unconscious. Patients are people who have had too much programming. So much outside programming that they have lost touch with their inner selves.

He said that his learning over the years was he tried to direct the patient too much. So I would say that Erickson did indirect authoritarian hypnosis for at least from 1920 until 1940 maybe even 1950. So as time went on he began to switch over and became far more indirect. So that by the time of his death in 1980 he was really doing mostly all indirect hypnosis. He might not even mention the word hypnosis. He might just sit down and tell the patient some stories. All of a sudden they would find that they had changed or got better.

Erickson’s approach, according to Ernest Rossi at this particular segment is based on the work of Ernest Rossi. Erickson’s approach was labelled by Rossi as the utilisation approach, and utilisation means that we utilise whatever it is that happens during trance .