I don’t think it matters very much to anyone, other
than the practitioner her/himself, what we use as a job title.
We are all hypnotists in the same way that all doctors are
doctors. It might be argued that some hypnotists may not do very much
hypnotizing but, then, some doctors do not doct very much either. Still, they
are all doctors and we are all hypnotists. There are, however, different
kinds of doctor, and different kinds of hypnotist.
Stage hypnotists entertain. That’s easy enough (although,
these days very few every get onto a proper stage, and 'Pub Hypnotist' might be
a more accurate title).
Almost everyone else is a hypnotherapist, which title is in
common currency and has almost universal acceptance. Hypnotherapists do what
they were trained to do, and whether that’s direct suggestion for smoking
cessation, or progressive relaxation and ego-strengthening, and whether that was
learned in school or by mail, they are hypnotherapists.
My LCCH Practitioner Diploma confers on me the title of
Registered Hypnotherapist. I choose not to use that title because I don’t
think I’m entitled to it, whatever the LCCH says. I don’t think I’m
entitled to it because LCCH teach people to do psychotherapy in hypnosis. Thus
the ‘therapist’ element suggests ‘psychotherapist’ to me (whether it
should or not), and I know I do not have any qualifications or pretensions as a
psychotherapist.
I do know some psychotherapists. Some are eclectic, some
integrative and some specifically dedicated to one particular school of
psychology. When they work they are very conscious of observing the disciplines
of whichever model they have chosen to utilize at that moment. If, therefore,
they are embarked on some Freudian psychoanalysis, they know that is what they
are doing and are unlikely to slip in a bit of cognitive-behavioural for good
measure. And if they (perish the thought) ever did elect to go from one such
extreme to the other, they would know absolutely what they were doing and why
they were doing it. If they do that having hypnotised the patient first then
they, in my (and, probably, only my) book, merit the appellation
‘hypnotherapist’.
I can’t do that. I’m not clever enough, haven’t
studied enough and am not disciplined enough. I am a very good hypnotist, but I
am not a psychotherapist. That does not mean, however, that I hypnotise someone
and then stop. It does not even mean that I hypnotise someone and then just do
direct suggestion, as readers of, say, Hand-Made
Harry would probably agree.
Once I’ve hypnotized a patient I simply use my
compassion, intelligence and common sense. I never think of Rogers or Ellis or
Yalom. I don’t try to apply any models or observe any disciplines, other than
my own sense of ethics and morality, and the BACP
codes of conduct.
As I hypnotize, and then utilize my Compassion,
Intelligence and Common Sense I suppose I could brand it as Hypnocics, and start
a school; and if I ever codified it and got it accepted as a valid
psychotherapeutic discipline then I might think I deserved to be a
psychotherapist, and a hypnotherapist too. But that’s never going to happen
because a) no one needs another brand and, b) even I can’t decide how to
pronounce hypnocics! (My preference is for soft ‘c’s but they would
inevitably end up hard and that would be totally inappropriate.)
So I call me a clinical hypnotist. ‘Clinical’ to
distinguish from ‘stage,’ and ‘hypnotist’ because that, I am. Beyond
that I’m simply using my personality.
But mostly, I'm just barry.
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