Today we're going to talk about a topic that has puzzled me for years, and frankly, excited me a little. Why on earth does therapy for some people take years? Why do people sit on a couch waffling for hundreds of sessions, when at the bottom line, nothing really changes?
You may be feeling good, looking forward to the day, but you're still missing that one input for that radiant smile. Well, luckily I'm here again to provide that input. Grab a cup of coffee, sit back and relax, because I'm going to tell you exactly why traditional counseling misses the mark and how it can be done.
Watch the video:
The endless sessions of the canalside community
Let's face it: we all know the stories about psychoanalysis. People who spend 150 sessions, or even more, with a psychotherapist. Look at the Amsterdam canals. People walk in the door of the psychiatrist there, the door huh, hopefully not the psychiatrist himself. They lie there for hundreds of hours talking a bit in the hope that it will solve something.
And yes, sure, it clears your head for a while. You're comfortable with yourself, you're getting attention. But does it really change anything at the core? Rarely. It's a kind of emotional massage: it feels nice for a while, but the next day the knot is there again. Unless they accidentally end up with someone like Marcel and there is a sudden "hallelujah moment. But do you know what often happened then? Then they have probably been in hypnosis for a very short time, so the process suddenly did work.
The revolution that had to wait 40 years
In the 1950s, we had Aaron Beck and Albert Ellis. These men were ahead of their time. They found a way to reduce that endless psychoanalysis of 500 sessions to something that was revolutionary at the time: twenty or so sessions. We now call that Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT).
And guess what? They were vilified. Really, completely burned down by the establishment. It took forty years for their method to be declared "evidence-based. Forty years! Why? Because it was faster? Because it was more effective?
Let's look at another "coincidence." In the same 1950s, you had the first DSM, the psychiatric bible. That was 120 pages thick then. Today that thing has grown to 1,200 pages.
See the correlation? While sessions per client declined slightly (thankfully), the number of illnesses exploded. This, of course, is how we can continue to make the same revenue. If instead of 500 times your clients come only 20 times, you do need 20 times as many illnesses to keep the schedule full.
It's all a coincidence, of course, ladies and gentlemen. I'm sure there is no commercial rationale behind it whatsoever.... but I do think it's a very funny coincidence.
The big mistake: Thinking talking helps
Talking generally works darned poorly. If you go into regular mental health care for short-term therapy, you get 10 to 12 sessions. Then, when you're "helped," you're allowed to leave. But often after that, you are immediately moved on to long-term therapy that again can take years.
I have regular discussions about this with psychologists, especially those in the mental health field. They think I am exaggerating. They say hypnotherapy doesn't work very well at all. But then they conveniently forget Kirsch's research from 1995[1]. He found that any therapy works better if you combine it with hypnosis. As much as 25% better!
Imagine if we did cognitive behavioral therapy with hypnosis, the results would be 25% faster. Instead of twelve sessions, you only need nine. Do you normally do ten? Then you'd be done in seven sessions.
But what do you see with the hypnotherapy we teach at Hypnosis Institute Netherlands? Most people are ready in three sessions. Sometimes one, sometimes eight, but I've never had to see anyone more than eight times in the last 20 years. Never.
When a psychologist says that twelve sessions is "short-term," I find that ultra-long. If you need twelve sessions for something that can be done in three sessions, then you're simply doing something that doesn't work as well. And of course they find that annoying to hear from a guest like me. "What do you know about it, Edwin?" Well, I do know something about it.
I'm quite willing to accept the challenge: Give me a client you've already had six sessions with and nothing is happening. Give me two sessions with that person. I would bet money that more will happen with me than in all those sessions with the psychologist.
Protocols are killing results
So why does hypnosis work so much faster? Not because I'm such a genius (although some people say I am, but of course I distance myself from that (just kidding)) but because I don't have to adhere to protocols.
Protocols are safe for the therapist, but often a disaster for the client. When you stick to what you've learned from a booklet, you fill in. You stick a label on the client: "Oh, this is a client with this and that diagnosis, so I have to follow protocol X."
That's where it goes wrong. You have to see the person, not the label. Do you have enough tools in your toolbox to deviate when necessary? Are you allowed to deviate from your practice or yourself at all?
I also used to be very polite. Then I would sit there and hum. "Hm-hm, tell me more..." My sessions sometimes lasted three hours! That doesn't make sense, of course. Until I decided: I'm going to cut straight to the point.
I gave myself license to stop being polite. Because my being polite doesn't help that client. Results help that client. Since I flipped that switch, my sessions take about an hour and there is always a result.
So is the problem solved in one session? Not always. But the client does notice an immediate difference. That's something the average psychologist doesn't do: test in the moment. They give homework: "Go ahead and work on this and we'll see how it went next week." That doesn't work. We all know that almost no one does that homework. You have to get results while the client is in the chair with you.
Feelings vs. Thoughts: The upside-down world
One of the biggest misconceptions in psychology is that thoughts cause emotions[2]. "Change your thinking, then change your feelings." That's only a small part of the truth. Look at young children. They do not yet know language, they do not yet have labels, but they do feel fear, sadness or insecurity. So what was there before? The feeling, of course!
Changing thoughts takes an awful lot of effort. Just go try to "think positive all day" when deep down you are miserable. That's mopping up the mess. But it's pretty easy to change your feelings. And when your feelings change, your thinking automatically changes with them.
Imagine suddenly feeling super happy. Then you immediately think happy thoughts, too. In hypnosis, we go beyond that critical thinking. We work directly on that emotional imprint, the imprint. When that imprint changes, your beliefs, your ideas and even your hierarchy of values change.
The addiction to therapy
Sometimes I think: therapists make people addicted to therapy. They create such a strong dependency that the client panics when the therapist goes on vacation. "Oh no, what am I going to do without my weekly hour?"
If you have ended up there, you are, in my opinion, a bad therapist. You've made someone dependent instead of resilient. You want to make people independent! You want to bring out that inner strength that everyone has within them.
This is also the goal of therapy[3].
Sure, it takes some people a little longer than others. But if you keep pushing someone, at some point they are going to push back. In the beginning, people are often scared or weak: "I don't dare, I find it scary." Fine.
But we keep working until the person thinks, "Wait a minute, I don't need you at all! I can do it myself!" That's the response you want.
The rest is "paid friendship." Keeping people in therapy for years because it makes them feel heard. When really they have just bought a subscription to attention.
That's not my thing, and that's not what we teach hypnotherapists at Hypnosis Institute Netherlands.
Do you also want faster results?
It's time to stop the endless drivel and really start looking at what works. Do you really want change? Then work at the level where the change happens: the feeling.
This is also what we teach you at Hypnosis Institute Netherlands. Want to know how that works? Come to the free master class on hypnosis for an introduction.
Or register directly for one of our events and trainings.
Have a question about the training? Schedule a free 1-on-1 consultation here.
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