Graduation and Presenting at BR

I don’t usually post much in the way of personal promotion here, but I wanted to take the time to post two brief notes, as I’ve had a few small personal milestones.
I’m now a Clinical Hypnotherapist. I recently completed a DETC Accredited degree in Hypnotherapy. While this is not exactly an MBA or PhD, it was a non-trivial amount of work. Much to my chagrin it was also a non-trivial amount of money… I’ll be paying for it well into the next two years. But you get what you pay for. There are a lot of places where you can learn something about hypnosis, but programs that are accredited by the Department of Education through a legitimate accrediting body are…not quite as easy as some other routes. I’m reasonably proud of having followed through on it.
I need to complete 300 clinical hours for Certification, so that’s a ways off, but…it is the first step. Maryland, DC, and Virginia don’t have any restrictions on the advertisement or practice of hypnotherapy, but in almost all states that do, I’d be eligible to practice and…I wouldn’t have wanted to without meaningful training. It also clears my time to begin the groundwork for a Masters in Psychology which I’ve been thinking about more and more seriously.
I don’t really know about practicing, though I’m considering hanging a shingle out on the Kink Aware Professionals site, just because there are so few KAP’s listed in the DC Metro Area. I’d have to have some semblance of an office to do that, at least space I could use to see patients.
I do want to be clear that I draw a strong line between the practice of Clinical Hynotherapy and the use of Hypnosis as an Erotic entertainment. I do think there is crossover in the area of “sexual self improvement” but the two shouldn’t be mixed up.
It’s unusual to find Psychologists who have acted as both entertainers and therapists, but in the field of hypnosis it is not unusual to find practitioners who have also done entertainment work. Hypnotists are workmen and engineers. True, I think they might make some contribution to the science, just as I think a lot of bright Engineers contribute to the Sciences by making direct observations. But that’s not the focus.
Different fields different standards.
From my point of view Hypnosis is to Psychology what Engineering is to Science. Scientists want to know why gravity works. Engineers need to understand it precisely enough to build a bridge that doesn’t fall down. A good, high level, engineer needs to understand a lot of science. But their work is mechnanical…building things or changing things. Psychologists study the mind. Hypnotists reach into the mind and actually change it, using the information and models we get from Psychologists. I guess in the long run I’ve always been a hands-on sort of guy.
I do not have credentials in Psychology though once upon a time I wrote a substantial portion of a Master’s thesis in it. Only problem is it wasn’t my thesis, but I got a pretty good grade. It’s a long story and I was younger and more reckless then and it helped someone who needed it. In a lot of ways I was disappointed by Psychology and Psychiatry. Despite loving some individual Psychiatrists profoundly, the actual practice of Psychiatry seems bizzarely remote from human concerns, and Psychology often seems to take a hands-off approach to personal change that resembles those movies where an unskilled passenger finds themselves unexpectedly at the controls of a jet and must be talked down by the tower.
I’m all about personal accomplishment. But how would you feel if you had a tumor and the Doctor started by saying “well, first, you’re going to need to get some scalpels and anethsize yourself…make sure to wash your hands.” And I think that people have been so heavily trained to the idea that accepting any intervention in their own mind as “wrong” that they often fight help tooth and nail.
Most of us aren’t responsible for the things that are in our subconscious mind. It was put there by someone else. By what logic should we not have the option of allowing the mental equivalent of a surgeon to take it out or rewire it? Hypnosis is not some strange side-branch of mental understanding. Properly practiced it is understanding how our minds came to be the way they are, and reaching into them to change the things that we are normally stuck with because we cannot consciously access them.
In any case and on a lighter note, I’ve been asked to present on Erotic Hypnosis at BR on Tuesday March 22, at 8pm. Obviously I’d love to have friends come out and watch. Here’s the information.
And thanks to everyone who gave support and encouragement along the way…
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